and supernaturall there 's a great pronenesse in creatures to Revolt from it like a Rolling stone on the steep of a hill The Remains of old nature would torrent-like bear down all if Sovereign Power did not barr up the One and sustain the Other For a spark of Divine nature to live in the brest of a lapsed Creature is as great a miracle and as high an effect of Sovereign Power as all the Instances before enumerated and More Lastly The Sovereignty of God is most glorious and adorable in Ordaining His own son who was holy harmless undefiled and seperate from sinners and was also United to the Second Person to be the Mediator and to make His soul an offering for sin And then in His Eternal disposing of Mens everlasting condition To shew or not to shew Mercy unto Men equally dignified or rather Indignified in themselves To make of the same lump one Vessel to honour and another to dishonour is the highest act and demonstration of Sovereign power concerning Men Which thing when ever we hear of or think upon we should put our mouths in the dust Before I come to the Inferences I would add a Caution or two to prevent those sinister deductious which our deceitfull hearts may be apt to draw from this Sovereign Truth First Caution 1. See that you make not God the Author of sin by charging His sacred Decrees with Men's Miscarriages as if they were the Cause or Occasion of them which we are sure they are not nor can be any more than the Sun is the cause of darkness Be it alwaies remembred That the Lord's Rejecting of Men puts nothing of evil into them Nor necessitates the will It only leaves them to their own wayes which they freely choose yet Banking them in and stopping them up as He did the Fountains of the Great Deep lest they Deluge the World with sin Secondly Go not about to palliate Nor think to extenuate your sin by Arguments fetcht from those Decrees That sin of the Iews in Crucifying Christ was in no wise lessened because the Councel of God had determin'd the thing to be done For they perpetrated it with wicked hands Nor is any Man's Unbelief e'r the less culpable from God's Eternal disposement of Mens conditions For it is not upon that consideration that they stumble at the Word or turn the deaf ear to it or resist it but from their own natural blindness and enmity against it And so I come to the Inferences And First Infer 1. From the Scriptures so copiously holding it forth I infer That the Doctrine of God's Sovereignty is a very teaching Doctrine and full of instruction and consequently that it is both a Duty and much for our Profit to be well acquainted with it And great confidence I have That the farther ye go in an humble fiducial disquisition and contemplation of it the clearer will be the Reason thereof and the more usefulness will still appear to be in it Let Reason but keep its own place that is let it work by the Rules of Right Reason and nothing will be more consonant thereto than that the Most High should bear rule over all and Do according to his Will and that Men who are Atoms of Clay animated by his breath should own Him for their Sovereign Lord and accordingly submit to Him yea though so it were that our own personal welfare were not concerned in it It will be of singular Use and Moment to us in the whole of our lives Nothing like this will allay those carnal Reasonings which are so unreasonably prone to put in their Verdict of spiritual things which yet Carnal Reason hath no cognisance of and will indeed be silenced by nothing else The Apostle therefore in Rom. 9. ver 19 20 21. thinks them not worthy a further Reply whose captious Enquiries the Sovereignty of God will not satisfy A second Inscrence Infer 2. which naturally flowes from this Doctrine is that of the Psalmist Oh come let us Worship and bow down Ps 95. 6. and kneel before the Lord our Maker Let us give Him the glory of this great Attribute by a Real and Practical Owning that indispensible bond of obedience which it layes upon every Creature We are highly obliged by it both in point of subjection and in point of faith 1. In point of subjection to His Laws Ordinances Providences First For the Lawes of God and His Appointments These we are to attend Job 22. 3. 35. 7. observe obey I cannot say For the Lord hath need of them For neither can our Righteousness profit Him nor our wickedness impair Him He that is Wise is wise for himself but do it because the Lord hath commanded Ps 9. 1â— He is the Lord thy God and worship thou Him Pro. 45 11. This is that strong Reason by which He hath backed both Commands and Prohibitions Exod. 20. 2. I am the Lord thy God Thou shalt doe thus And thus thou shalt not doe I am the Lord This he sets in the front of All and with this He closeth the Râ—re and Guards them on every side Moses brings it in as a convincing Reason why we should love God with our whole heart and keep his Commandments namely because he is the Lord and He onely Deut. 6. 4. No One therefore may pretend to a right of giving Laws to Men or to an interest in their love and obedience save with respect to God and the authority they have from Him And though He is sometimes pleased and it is a great condescention in the great God by arguments taken from our own Good to draw us to obedience Do it for it is your life Deut. 32. 47. yet in our spirits That of His Sovereignty and Glory ought to have the preference To cast out Ishmael was a thing grievous to Abraham but being Commanded of God he debates it Not Nor delayes to do it Therefore hold on your way though never so great Obscurity be upon it at present Minde your duty in the midst of discouragements Do as Peter who though he had labour'd all night and caught Nothing yet Master At thy command I will let down the Net again 2 Be subject to His Ordinances If He please to Command the using such Meanes Lâ—ke 5. 5. as have no Natural virtue towards such an effect as in Moses stretching his hand over the Sea and smiteing the Rock with his Rod so Water in baptism Bread and Wine in the Lord's Supper Presume not to say What is there in these Godliness is a Mystery which onely faith can understand There is no Divine Institution but hath Meat in it that you know not of which if rightly used will speak for it self If He please to make Clay of Dust and spittle Contemn it not but submit to His Will and way and be thankfull for thy Cure Iudges 12 â— with Ch. 16. 1â— Sampsons hair was an Ordinance to him
which when he slighted the spirit of God left him and he became as other Men and recovered not his strength until it was grown again 3. As touching the Providences of God Observe them and Submit to them look not upon them as Empty things The least may yield you Instruction as also the Most unlikely Out of the Eater comes forth Meat and out of the strong sweetness Though the thing be a â—iddle to an heart uncircumcised Plough with His Heifer and ye shâ—ll find it Neither look on them as Things Impertinent But say rather Is there not a Cause though I see it not The Lord does nothing in vain Neither yet look on them as Things Contingent Math. 10 29 30 A sparrow falls not without His will and the hairs of your head are all Numbred Ps 39 9. David was Dumb and opened not his Mouth why Because Thou Lord didst it And Shimei's Cursing he beares patiently 2 Sam. 16. 10. on the same account It may be the Lord hath bidden him There may be Such a Mixture and Confusion of things and your expectation so delayed and frustrated That your froward untamed heart may be ready to Wrangle it out Eccles. 8. 14. Why falls it alike to All Why to the Just according to the Work of the wicked and to the wicked according to the work of the Righteous Or why One event to them All This is not to Enquire wisely you should rather conclude and say as the Disciples in another Case The Lord hath need of them That is He hath occasion to use such a Providence to fullfil a Word If ye would Cast so as to lye by your Mark this Attribute of Sovereignty gives you the best Ground Search and Observe as much as ye will so you take Faith along with you Without which ye can do Nothing Warrantably Faith is a Sworn Officer to the Great king and has a key for every lock that is fit to be opened It forces Nothing but where it cannot Enter it stands without and Waits a fitter season Let Faith also be Chief Speaker in all your Debates And then the Result will be That Carnal Reason and Present Sense though very Tenacious and Stubborn shall yield the Cause and let you goe The Summ of all is this That though ye be not Conscious to your self of any particular Cause or Miscarriage besides what is Common to Men which was the Case with Job Lay your hand upon your Mouth as Job did The Most High doth according to His Will Dan. 4. 34 35. This even the proudest of Kings acknowledged when his understanding returned to him and so do you And know That if your spirit be out of frame in your present Condition it would not be better in any other Secondly Our Faith also is highly concerned in the Sovereignty of God For It both obligeth to Believe in Him and also affords Matter for Faith to work upon To these Ends the Lord holds it forth to Abraham Once and Again Gen. 17 1. I am God Almighty c. This was it enabled him to believe he should have a Son even whiles the Deadness of his own Body Rom. 4. 19. and of Sarah's Womb wrought strongly against it This also was that made him so readily assent to the offering up of this Son when he had him He had as much to say against it as could well be supposed For the Promise was That in Isaac all families of the Earth should be blessed which Promise and this Command Abraham's Reason could not Reconcile The Contradiction would surely have Run him down had not his faith in this Great Attribute held fast and guided the Reignes Suggesting to him That He who gave Isaac a being from a Withered Stock was able also to raise him from the dead Heb. 11. 19. Abraham there fore disputes it Not Stands not so much as to consider upon 't but up he gets him Early to do it And hence he obtained that honourable title James 2. 23. to be called The friend of God Ye have seen Now what Abraham did Go ye and do likewise Take hold of Gods Sovereignty as your own and to be improved for your good Faith gives a Propriety in any Attribute it looks upon and drawes out the virtues and Influence thereof for it self And therefore What ever difficulties are in your way be not disheartened by them but call in this Sovereignty of God by faith to your help Remember the ready subjection which all Creatures do pay to his Word By which alone without Creatures service He can level the Mountains and make Crooked things streight Restraâ—â— Alter Invert and Turn upside down the very Course of Nature so that That which is death in it self shall be life to you New Cords and Wyths when touch'd by his word are as flax and tow when touch'd by the fire Iron shall be as straw and brass as rotten wood Therefore lengthen the Cords and strengthen the stakes of your faith you cannot beleive for greater things or better than God can do for you Even sin it self which is the Great and in truth the onely evil It is His enemy as much as yours And you may be sure He would not have suffered its being in the World if He had not a Power to Correct and Curb it yea and to destroy it too at His pleasure Take hold of His sovereign strength and your work is done But here also a Caution or two may be seasonably added 1. That if death in the pot have once been healed and your borrowed Ax-head sunk once past hope of Recovery have been brought again to your hand look that Remissnes grow not upon it Beware ye gather not Wilde Gourds a second time Nor persume to throw the helve after the Head The Divine Power is too great a thing to be trifled with or Made to serve with the â—ollies of Men. 2. That you never look on this Great Attribute of Sovereignty without your Mediator As without whom it would be matter of Terror and Amazemeut to sinners It is He onely can render It Propitious to you As Nothing is pleasing to God but in and through Christ So Nothing in God is Comfortable to Men or for their Eternal Good but as it comes to them through Him As Waters out of the Sea immediately are not potable unless they be first exhaled by the Sun or pass through some vein of Earth which makes them Congruous to our Nature I shall mention two particulars of Nearest Coâ—cerment to us wherein we are in a special manner to have respect unto the Sovereignty of God 1. As touching your own Condition your everlasting Condition Submit to Mercy to Sovereign Mercy that is yeild your self to God without Capitulaâ—ing or Makâ—ing terms with him Those Syrians well under stood the Meaning of this They put Ropes on their heads and themselves in the Conquerors hands 1 K. 20. 31. upon an uncertain Conjecture
Chief and Eminent Elect One The First-born and Prince of the Family and all the Elect besides were given to Him as younger Brethren to be maintain'd upon His Inheritance It is plain to him that reads That the whole of Salvation was laid upon Christ That He bears up the Pillars of it and that all shoulders else had been too weak He is both the means and Center by whom and in whom God will have all things gathered together in One He was made God with us That we might be made One in God as appears by the scope of His Prayer in the 17th of John In Him the Father is well pleased and out of Him there is nothing pleasing to God or good for Men We are therefore said to be Chosen in Him a Eph 1 4. To be Called in Him b Phil. 3 14. To be Created in Him c Eph. 2. 10. To be Preserved in Him d â—ude vâ—r 2. and in Him to be blessed with all spiritual Blessings Blessings in themselves d e. Eph. I. 4. would not be so to us if not in Christ And being in Him all things are turned into blessings to us For now Nothing can come at us but as coming through Him and what ever so comes is Tiâ—ctured by His Divine Excellency and made Propitious to us And hereby it is That the Thing we were Chosen unto is effectually and unfailably Provided for There may divers good Reasons and Ends be assign â—â—d for God's Choosing the Elect in Christ As I. That by bringing in Man's Restauration this way Arg. 1. He might as it were Baffle His great Adversary and Out-shoot him in his own Bow And it well became the Wisdom and Grace of God Thus to do The devil thought by Poisoning the Root to Vitiate and Ruin the whole Stock and Progeny and he fail'd not of His Design The Lord would therefore by putting His Elect into a Head uncapable of Degeneracy Retrieve that Ruin and not only recover them but bring them into a Better Estate than that they had lost He would set up a Man that should be too hard for the Devil and be able both to Destroy Him and Dissolve his Works And He hath accordingly done it In which Method of Man's Recovery is a great Answerableness to the Method of his Ruin And it is a Thing the Lord would have us to mind Rom. 3. 12 21. as appears by the Parallel beforementioned II. That by shewing us His Righteousness in the way and manner of our Recovery Arg. 2. we might the more readily subscribe to His Righteousness in the imputation of Adam's sin For without the sight and knowledge of One we cannot with any heartiness submit to the other Hence Some in their too-bold Arguings against Election have alledged That What Adam did was without their Consent III. If the Elect had not been in Christ Arg. 3. the satisfaction He undertook for Sinners could not have availed them As Adam's sin could not have been ours if not in him So neither the Righteousness of Christ if not in Him Our sins could not have met upon Him nor we have been Iustified and Reconciled by the blood of His Cross If He had not sustain'd our persons and stood in our stead Another's Act cannot be mine either as to Profit or loss if there be not some kind of Oneness between us IV. If not in Christ Arg. 4. we could not have been Sanctified The Lump was sanctified the first fruits Rom. 11. 16. The Wilde-Olive-Nature could not be supprest and changed but by grafting into the True As a Man cannot be Naturally born Without relation to Adam as his Natural head so 't is impossible to be born again or Regenerated without the like relation of Union to Christ as his Spiritual Head There is no being a New Creature without being in Christ 2 Cor. 5. 17. They that are joyned unto the Lord and they only are one Spirit with Him The branch must be in the Vine before its sap can be derived into it He that sanctifieth and they that are sanctified must be One There must be a Contact a touching of Him before this virtue can come from Him V. They were Chosen into Christ Arg. 5. That the Salvation they were Chosen unto might be invincibly secured of which this putting them into Christ is a pledge irrevocable Their Vnion with Him is their stability It is That makes them hold out as He Himself did till all is finished Isa 42. 4. He did not fail nor was discouraged so neither shall they and this because he is their Head This makes them victorious over all the power of the enemy Election indeed makes their Salvation sure but it is by this way of Putting them into Christ In whom the heirs of the World to come are preserv'd whiles the World of ungodly are deluged in Perdition Gen. 6. 18. Adam therefore whiles a Common Person and as such could not be said to be in Christ If he had he could not have fallen For Joh. 5. 26. the Father hath given the Son to have life in Himself i. e. to have it as a Root That all in Him might still be supplied from an increated Grace and Power which holds them fast to Himself and so from Withering and falling off It is not Grace received by us that keeps us But that Grace which received us to the Glory of God the Father Rom. 15. 7. which still Communicates a fresh supply Through Jesus Christ Having gone these few steps towards the Compass and extent of Election It concerns us also to know where this broad River hath its Head What Rock it is That this Immense Fabrick is built upon That we may not give the honour of it to another nor indanger our selves by settling on a wrong foundation To shew which is the Scope and Subject of the Sixth particular under this General Head viz. VI. That Election is founded upon Grace Or The good pleasure of God's will is the only Original Cause and Motive of Election As in Men's Genealogies there is no stop until you come up to God the Father of all Luke 3. 23. 38. So is it in the order of Causes relating to Men's Salvation The efficiency of all things that are mediate and subordinate depending on God as First and Sovereign His Willing the futurition of them is the cause of their being and We shall never judge Rightly unless we come up to the Will and Good Pleasure of God as the Sovereign Rule and Law of His Works And this I term The onely Original Cause of Election to shut out Faith foreseen with all the works and worthyness of Men from being any way Causal Influential or Motive thereto and so from sharing in the Glory of God's Grace which He is very jealous of and will not impart to any The Ground or Moving Cause of God's Election is quite different from the manner
does He does it Freely without respect to Mens desert Nay their Vndesert rather is an expedient Consideration in this Act of Grace By Works I understand All that Self-Righteousness Goodness Conformity to the Law Or what ever else is performable by Men. These viz Grace and Works he proves as inconsistent as Contraries can be and that the least Mixture would vary the kind If but a sâ—ruple of Works be taken in Grace is no more Grace For to him that worketh is the Reward not reckoned of Grace but of Debt Rom. 4. 4. Grace and Faith are well agreed These both have the same scope and end But Rom. 4. 4. Grace and Works have always Clash'd The setting up of the One is the deposing of the other Either the Ark must Out or Dagon down One Temple cannot hold them both Rom. 3. 28. To the same effect is the drift of that discourse in Gal. 5. It appears from Acts 15. 1. That some there were who taught a Necessity of Circumcision as without which they could not be saved Pretty willing they were to admit of Christ so they might joyn Circumcision with Him and keeping the Law of Moses But this dangerous daubing with things unmixable our holy Apostle could not brook both as reflecting on the honour of his Master and undermining their onely Foundation And therefore to keep them from or bring them off that perillous Quick-sand he tells them expresly These two cannot stand together in that matter For if they be Circumcised they are Debtors to the whole Law and Christ is become of none effect to them because they are fallen from Grace It is as if he had said If you take in any part though never so little of Legal Observances as Necessary to your being Justified ye forfeit the whole benefit of Gospel-Grace The Grace of Christ is sufficient for you He is a Saviour Compleat in Himself and if you look though but a squint at any thing else it is a Renouncing of Him He will be Saviour altogether or not at all And therefore he tells them again and that with a kind of vehemency Gall. 5. 2. That if they be Circumcised Christ shall profit them Nothing And as a Man may not put in his Claim for Justification on accompt of his Works so neither of his Faith as if That were Mâ—terially or Influentially Causal of Justification For Faith it self as it is the Believers Act comes under the Notion of a Work Let us therefore Consider What part it is that Faith holds in this Matter least whiles we cast out Works as not standing with Grace we make a Work of Faith It is Faith's Office to make the Soul live wholly on Another and to Renounce Self ability as much as Self desert To apprehend that Righteousness by which Grace Justifies Not onely to be Justified thereby upon your Believing but to work in you even that Faith by which you apprehend it Isa 45. 24. answerable to that of the Prophet In the Lord have I Righteousness and Strength He that will be Saved must come as an ungodly Person to be justified freely by the Grace of God He must reckon himself an Vngodly Man to the very instant of his Justification True it is The Just shall live by Faith but 't is also true That it is not their own Faith or act of believing that they live by though not without it Which also seems the Apostle's meaning where he sayes The life which I now live I live by the Faith of the Son of God Where note That as Faith is the life of a Believer so Christ is the life of his Faith I live saith he yet not I but Christ liveth in Me Christ was his life and he lived on Christ by virtue of Christ's living in him Notwithstanding all which it is evidently true and must constantly be affirm'd That Grace and Works will still be together in the way of Salvation the one doth not extinguish or exclude the other Only not as Collegues or Joint-Causers thereof But rather as a Workman and his Tooles which himself first makes and then workes with them By Grace ye are saved through Faith Eph. 2. 8. and that not of your selves it is the Gift of God Even this believing or Acting faculty is a Creature of Grace's raising up and therefore in the Throne 't is meet that Grace should be above it Works therefore how good soever are not the Cause of Salvation and if so then not the cause of Election for This indeed is the Cause of them both And Works if right and truly Good will alwayes be ready to own their Original and to keep in their own place Where also they will be most considerable and do the best service III. Arg. 3. That the good pleasure of God's Will gives Rise and Foundation to Election is further argued from Men's Incapacity to afford any ground or Motive to God for such a Gift Adam stood not so long as to beget a Son in his first Image It is sâ—en by his first-born Cain what all his natural Sâ—ed would naturally be And though there be some that do Magnifie Man and presume to speak of him at another rate yet evident it is by Scripture-light and experience of those Renewed That Man fallen is poâ—r blind Naked and at enmity with all that is truly good and that he is never more Remote and farr off from God than whiles in high thoughts of himselfe Glorying in his own Understanding Strength Worthyness Freedom of Will Improvement of Common Grace and the like For These make him proud and presumptuous and to have slight thoughts of that special and peculiar Grace by which he must if ever be Renewed and Saved But the Lord Himself who best knows him reports the matter quite otherwise and we know that His witness is true viz. That all the imaginations of their heart are onely evil continually Gen. 6 5. That their inward part is very wickedness Ps 53. 1. That every Man is brutish in his knowledge Jer 10 14 ver 8 21. Altogether brutish and foolish yea even their Pastours that is the very best and most intelligent amongst them Ch 4. 22. Eccles. 91 3. They are wise to do evil but to do good have no understanding And their hearts are full of madness And it was not thus only with the Gentile Nations who were left to walk in their own way but even with the Jews Isa 5. 4. who had all the means of becoming better that could be devised Excepting that of special Electing Grace which took-in but a Remnant They were called Jews Rested in the Law Made their boast of God Knew His Will Approved the things that were excellent Were confident that they were a Guide of the blind and a light to them that were in darkness Instructors of the foolish Teachers of Babes And yet all this while and in the midst of all these high attainments did not
being thus quickened by the Spirit of liâ—e from God and set upon their feet they are capacitated for action viz. in Things to be done by them And now say they as Daniel Dan. 10. 9. 19. Now let my Lord speak for Thou hast strengthened me And thence-forth their work and business is to Glorifie that Grace that hath saved them To walk before God in the daily exercise of those Graces He hath given them To press after Perfection that is a Meetness for that State of Glory which these things are preparatory to which the Scripture calls A walking worthy of the Lord To shew forth his praises the virtues of Him that hath called them Making His Law their Rule and His Glory their End above all And all in way of dutiful Gratitude For though you may and ought to have respect to your own Salvation peace and comfort yet so as to substitute all to the Glory of God's Grace And take this by the way to encourage you in your duty That the Glory of God and His people's blessedness are so intertwisted as never to be divided Whiles you keep That most directly in your eye and scope your own Concerns are most currently going-on They fall-in together and keep in the same Channel II. Whence these Requisites to Salvation come That Jesus Christ that Great Fundamental Requisite or One thing necessary is the Gift of God sent into the World by Him and set forth a Propitiation through faith in His blood is above all need of proof But the present enquiry is touching the Author of Faith and holiness The Efficient Cause of Regeneration What Power it is by which the New Creature is formed and brought forth Our Assertion is That the New Creature is God's workmanship entirely and alone This the Scripture seems evident for But being a Truth unacceptable to Nature And there being some who Owning the Name deny the Thing we must the more intently look to the proof of it and our Argument for it is this That the Mew Creature must be wrought either by a Divine Power Or by a Natural power Or by the concurrence of both together But I It cannot be wrougbt by a Natural power and that for these Reasons among others 1. Because it is a Creature I. and of all Creatures the Noblest and most excellent All the Virtuoâ—i in the World are not able to make an Atom They may refine and sublimate things that are but cannot give the least being to that which is Not. How then should the Natural Man give Being to the New Creation To suppose such a thing would be a degrading to the Divine Nature A setting the Image of the Heavenly below that of the Earthly For He that builds is worthy of more honor Heb. 3 3. than the thing that is built by him 2. Nothing can afford That it hath not in it self II. Now Every Soul in nature is Darkness and possest with an habitual aversion from God And light is not brought out of darkness nor a clean thing out of an Unclean No man will expect Grapes from thorns the product will be according to That of which it is produced Every Seed will have its own body Matth. 7. 18. Joh. 3. 6. An evil Tree cannot bring forth good fruit That which is born of the Flesh is flesh and will never be better Therefore the New Creature being a Divine Thing cannot be Educed of Natural Principles 3. The Natural Man is not only void of all virtue and property that tends to Regeneration III. but is Opposite thereto To be grafted into the true Olive-tree Rom. 11. 24. is contrary to Nature He is Enmity against God and Enmity being a Principle uncapable of Reconcilement it cannot be supposed it will help to destroy it self They will not so much as seek after God Psal 10. 4. John 8. 44. nor take Him into their thoughts Satan they follow with natural Motion but as for the word of the Lord Jer 44. 16 ch 2. 25. ch 17. 9. they profess stoutly They will not hearken unto it They have loved Strangers and after them they will go So desperately wicked are the hearts of Men They are even made up of fleshly lusts which war against the Soul And whatsoever hath respect to its happy Restorement And this Enmity is maintained and animated 1 By the Darkness that is in them which all men in Nature are filled with or with false lights which are equally Pâ—rnicious and obstructive to this Work By reason hereof the most glorious objects though just afore them are hid from their eyes 1 Cor. 2. 14. They do not nor they cannot discern the Things which are of God They have false Conceptions of every thing Call Good evil and evil Good put light for darkness and darkness for light and the most excellent things are commonly furthest off from their approbation It 's a known Experiment That the more Spiritual any Truth is the more will carnal Reason object against it John 3. 9. ch 6. 52. How can these things be and How can this Man give us of His flesh to eat By all the understanding that Men have afore Conversion they are but more strongly prejudiced against the Truth Acts 17. 18. 1 Cor. 1. 19-23 2 This Enmity is further Confirm'd and Fix'd by the Naturality of it If it were an Adventitious quality it might possibly be separated But Now it cannot by any humane power And that it is Natural appears in that theVniversality of Mankind is infected with it It is not Here and There One Rom. 3 9 18. But All and Every one Jews and Gentiles are all under sin None that understandeth None that seeketh after God Gen. 6. 13. None that doth good no not One Every imagination of their heart is onely Evil and that continually Every Man is brutish Jer. 10. 14. Psal 51. 3. 58. 5. and altogether filthy and this in their Root Conceiv'd in sin Go astray from the womb c. It also grows up with them and the longer it lives the worse it is and the more Impregnable Rom. 8. 7. It is not subject to the Law of God neither indeed can be And though at times they look another way like Bullets of Stone or Lead which acted by a foreign power are mounted into the Air their upward Motion quickly ceaseth because it was not Natural They come again to their Center of their own accord and there they will live and die As was verified in Saul Ahab Agrippa and others 4. The New Creature cannot be the Product of Natural Power IV. because every thing is Receiv'd and Improv'd according to the Nature of that which receives it Plants and other Creatures turn all their Nourishment into their own Species and Property A Vine and a Thistle both planted in one Soil have the same Sun Dew Air and other Influences common to both yet each one Converts the whole of
it And hence it is that we find those Imperial terms I will and Ye shall so much in use about this Matter Thus the Lord began with the Serpent which was a leading Case to all that follows It shall bruise thine head In which compendious word the destruction of Satan and Sin is effectually provided for And elswhere He speaks as much for quick'ning the Soul I will put my Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My Statutes Ezek. 36. 27 28. Ye shall be my People and I Will be your God They shall Return unto me with their whole heart with many Others The Lord still utters Himself in tearms of Omnipotency as putting-forth an Almightiness of Power which as it needs not so it will not yea it cannnot with a Salvo to his honour admit the least Dependence upon Created power to make it successfull Isa 55. 11. His word shall not Return unto him void It shal accomplish that which He pleaseth and prosper in the thing whereto He sends it John 11. 44. He that was dead comes forth at his word though bound hand and foot II. Conversion is a Creation-work II. which though done by degrees must be gon-thorow with and that by Him who layd the foundation Or all the foregoing parts for want of a Cap-stone will moulder and come to nothing As when Adam was to be made The Lord first prepares the Earth then moulds it in such a form and then breathes into him the breath of life Els that lump had never been a living Soul So in the New Creation The Lord works and goes-on to work and leaves it not until He hath set it going He doth not onely cause the light to shine into darkness but gives withall a suitable understanding 1 Joh. 5. 20. Joh. 1. 5. a faculty connatural with the object as without which the darkness would never comprehend it Ezekiel might have prophecied till Doom's day ere those dry bones would have liv'd if the Lord Himself had not caused breath to enter into them Jam. 1. 17. 2 Cor. 4. 6. And probably He is called The Father of lights plurally to denote that as well the light comprehending or capacitating our comprehension is from God as That to be comprehended Psal 36. 9. In His light we see light III. God's Effectual Working in this Matter III. and the Necessity of His so working may also be Argued from the common sense of those already wrought upon and brought-in by whose Prayers and Confessions it is evident That they still needed a powerfull and effectual influence to Carry-on the Work already begun Turn Thou Me and I shall be Turned Quicken us and we will call upon Thee Draw me and We will Run after thee Not that we are sufficient of our selves to think any thing but our sufficiency is of God I live Gall. 2. 20. yet not I but Christ liveth in me c. Hence it readily follows That if those already Turned and made partakers of the Divine nature whose hearts are in the good wayes of God and who desire Nothing more than to Walk in them cannot yet keep themselves Going without a Continued Efficacious Influx and Spring from Above Much-less can the Natural Man without the like Supernatural and Divine Efficacy effectually bend himself to a Compliance with them Prov. 13. 19. It is It is an abomination to fools to depart from evil IV. IV. If the Lord did not Work Effectually He should loose the honour of His work If the Efficacy of Grace should depend on the humane Will i. e. If Grace be rendred Effectual by some Motion or Act of the Will which Grace is not the Author of Then will Nature assume the Priority Works will glory over Grace and Free-will will be said to be better then Free Grace For that the less is blessed of the Better Heb. 7. 7. is without contradiction And that that which sanctifies is Greater than that which is Sanctified by it is so obvious That Christ appeals it to the Reason of Fools and Blinde Math. 23. 19. If therefore you will grant That Grace is Better than Nature Follow it must That the Will is Blessed and Sanctified by Grace viz. by its powerful and effectual operation upon it And here indeed lyes the honour and efficacy of Grace Not in a Vincible Moving Exciting Perswading or Threatening the Will to a complyance but in making the Will actually and willingly complyant with It self And thus the Lord Doth and thus He will Do where ever He will be Gracious tho never so muchagainst the present minde and natural propension of the subject And yet there no such thing as Forceing the Will As you may see afterwards V. V. The Doctrine of Effectual Calling is further confirm'd from the office of Christ as a Redeemer which was not only to purchase Eph. 1. 7. Eph. 2. 13 16. Heb. 2. 17. Rom. 5 9 10. Coll. 1. 20. 21 22. Dan. 9 24. but to put us in actual possession of the good things He purchased for us Redemption and Reconciliation are Relates Comensurate and Inseparable It is not onely a Reconcilable state that Redemption puts us into but a state of actual Reconcilement It slayes the enmity makes an end of Sin and brings-in everlasting Righteousness On this accompt our Saviour bears that glorious title Thou shalt call His name Iesus Math. 1. 31. for he shall save His people from their sins and For this Cause was the Son of God manifested that He might destroy the works of the Devil Now 1 Joh. 3 8. of these works Blindness of mind is the first-born and foster-mother to all the Rest 2 Cor. 4 4. 't is this keeps the soul in unbelief as under locks and bars and therefore must of necessity be dispell'd which can onely be done by causing the true light to shine Effectually as He did the light of this world in the first Creation which the Apostle in 2 Cor. 4. 6 Resembles it to Isa 42. 7. Luke 1. 79. Isa 49. 9. Hence those frequent mentions of His being sent To open the blind eyes To give light to them that sit in darkness And to bring forth the Prisoners from the Prison-house which may not be valued as things in design yet lyable to obstruction but to be as certainly perform'd as that Christ should dye In the 107 Psal it is spoken of as done already He brought them out of darkness and the shadow of death Ps 107. 14. and brake their bands in sunder And that he speaks it of Redeemed-Ones appears by v. 2. First take them as in Darkness and he is so to give them light as to guide their feet into the way of peace Mark 8. 13-25 That story of the blind Man in the 8 Mark is a pertinent shadow of it Christ spits on his eyes and puts His hands upon him as yet he saw but darkly Men as Trees