Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	believe_v	election_n	faith_n	1,811	5	6.4367	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A60360	The predestinated thief A dialogue betwixt a rigid Calvinian preacher and a condemned malefactor. In which is not onely represented how the Calvinistical opinion occasions the perpetration of wickedness and impieties; but moreover how it doth impede and hinder, nay almost impossibilitate the reducing of a sinner to emendation and repentance.	Slatius, Henry, 1585-1623.	1658 (1658)	Wing S3982A; ESTC R220063	24,121	82

power of obeying in this faln corrupted condition God requires faith of all to whom the Word is preached but will not give faith to all to whom it is revealed Pr. You seem to me to have been alwayes of this opinion Th. I was not so wedded to this opinion till such thoughts as these ran alwayes in my minde that I was really of the number of the Elect. Pr. Do not presume rashly you too confidently pronounce your self Elect when from your Childhood you have been such a rakehell and have not to this day mended your course these are but small fruits or signs of your Election Th. O good Sir you must know that all z Calv. in Instit lib. 3. c. 24. dist 10. the Elect are not called so soon as born nor all at one and the same time nay before they are congregated to the Supreme Pastor they wander in the common desert of this world in sin and are neither known to others or themselves to be elected to life till the peculiar mercy of God keep and guide them a Musc loc com de Fide c. 7. Neither is God bound to any time when or persons which to call so that 't is for no one to doubt when he shall be call'd for no sin is so great as to ●inder when heaven calls Whence it appears clear as Noon-day I am not presently to despair if I have not lived so unblameably as you would have me Pr. Yet it was your duty as the Apostle sayes by good works to make your salvation sure Th. How came you to speak so unadvisedly Sir does our Election depend on good works I 'll prove it does not and further I am perswaded that the Elect may fall b Zanch. in M●scel p. 329. into great and hainous sins as Adultery Murther nay sometimes into such errours by which sometimes partly sometimes wholly the very foundation of Salvation is turned topfie-turvy or otherwise against their Conscience to sin foully and grievously c Ruard Acron Explic. Catech. qu. 53. fol. 137. against any of the Commandments of God but all these things hinder little or nothing For d Wilhel Teeling in dial de statu hom Christi pag. 44. God will not damn any of the elect though they sin because the foundation of their safety lies in his eternal act of their election neither can a thousand nay the sins of the whole world nor all the Devils in Hell destroy one of the Elect Our sins may harden our hearts weaken our faith but cannot quite destroy it nor extinguish the Spirit of God utterly So that God damns none for their sins whom he has adopted in Christ Pr. What then you did not fear to be damned Th. No not I a jot for who are e Toss de Praedest cap. 3. Zanch. de nat Dei l. 7. q. 1. predestinated cannot be cast off for ever because once elected by the immutable Decree of God and again because whom Christ loves he loves unto the end Pr. But you ought to have turn'd and conform'd your self according to the will of God that you might have obtained the remission of your sins Th. For any thing I understand you have even the same conception of f Smout in Script consent fol. 12. the New Covenant as of the Old which was placed in the condition of Works as if we would constantly believe and do this and thus God would again do for us so and so c. which rule is diametrically opposite to the New Covenant conditions g Id. fol. 31. God makes a New Covenant with us and promises us not onely when we are without any but have strayed a long way from the condition whilst we wallow in the midst of sin h Id. fol. 46. Behold God forgiveth sin before he renews the heart and does both these before we have done any good nay whilst we are in our sins and do profane his Name Hence 't is abundantly evident i Gesel probat fol. 33. that God does prosecute all his Elect with a singular eternal gracious and saving love before they believe or repent For truly as the Synod of Dort k Acta Synodi cap. 1. Art 9. sayes Election is made not from any foreseen faith obedience fanctity or any other good quality or disposition as a pre-requisite cause or condition in us that we should be thus elected but are chosen to faith and obedience so that Election is the cause from whence all good works flow and from hence faith holiness all spiritual gifts flow and at last life it self as the fruit and effect meerly of it Pr. Whither do you intend to protract this Dispute hold your tongue and leave this disputing think with your self how far the night is spent and how nigh your life is to its period and be more sollicitous how you may be saved when you shall depart this life Consider those words of St. Paul 1 Cor. 6.10 Nor thieves nor drunkards shall inherit the Kingdom of God yet you must possess it if you be saved Th. Do you think you can shew your self a Physician to my sinful sick Soul Pr. Believe in Jesus Christ mourn for your sins beg a blessed change from God an happy hour wherein he may give you the remission of your sins and life everlasting Th. What must I believe that I may believe in Christ aright Pr. You must believe that Jesus Christ by his Death and Passion merited the remission of sins and life eternal and that for you particularly This is commanded you in the Gospel Th. Whatsoever the Gospel says is it true or false Pr. 'T is truth it self Th. Has Christ by his Death and Passion purchased these things for all Pr. l Pisc con Schafm disp de Praedest pag. 12. Although humane Reason and in good men has thence taken scandal and some of the Evangelical Doctors much rage rail when they hear any teach that God would not have all men to be saved but onely such and such and Christ is not dead for all but we firmly believe on either side and that from Scripture it self so that I may assert in plain words m Perk. de Spir. desert p. 3. God has constituted no Mediator for the reprobated for Christ is the Redeemer of the Elect onely and not of others Th. Is not Christ then dead and made n Polan Explic. quar in Relig. diff p. 154. q. 4. an offering for Reprobates Pr. I pray Sir if you be one of Christs elect Sheep why do you thus patronize the Reprobate and Damned Reade the judgement of the Synod of o Synod of Dort c. 2. art 8. Dort that will teach you that this was the free counsel gracious intention of God the Father of the precious death of his onely Son to effect grace and Salvation in all the Elect giving them alone justifying faith and by it infallibly bringing them to heaven that is God

punishment more to be feared to your Soul Therefore tell me now you are a going out of this world whether do you think you shall go Th. To heaven as well as you who art not much better than I. Pr. Do you think then you are as good and as honest as I am Th. Yes that I do and that I will prove out of your own proper Confession a Calv. Com. on Isa ch 64. v. 7. of his Institut l. 3. c. 12. dist 9 13 14. Ibid. c. 14. dist 9. one for all Your best works in themselves are filthy deformed detestable nay meer abominations and sins and like an unclean woman alwayes infected with filth and spots so that you are not accepted or esteemed of God for any of your works because that they b Belg. Confes art 24. deserve nothing but eternal punishment and that c Catech. Heidel quest 60. you altogether grievously sinn'd against all the Commandments of God neither have observed any one of them nay that you are altogether prone to all manner of malice and hatred both against God and your Neighbour In those printed Prayers at the end of your Psalter you confess worthy Sir your worchiness not onely to be blinde in your understanding but unapt to all good that it strayes from God follows its own vain imaginations that it daily sins and that most hainously and that it is by our Original Sin sometimes so corrupted and instigated that by reason of it there rise many and sinful thoughts which fight against God and your Neighbour so that many times you transgress the commands of God without intermission In brief you are a miserable sinner conceived and born in all sin and corruption prone to all evil unapt and averse to all good so that you have uncessantly by your sins throughout your whole life excited the anger of the Lord against you and according to his righteous judgement has deserved on thy self his eternal the more the pity Condemnation Your Conscience accuses you of this d Confes Belg. Art 7. nay your very sins witnesse against you so that being convinced you often groan under the sense of your corruption and desire to be freed from the body I will speak in short Since your being of little or no profit for e Teelings Dial. of Christian mans state p. 8 9. from your nativity you have been a childe of wrath and heir of Divine vengeance hadst communion with damned Devils when thou wast in thy Mothers womb full of all natural poison whence all evil actions proceed that you can do nothing more than sin yea when thou wast an Infant hadst thou but been tempted by the least occasion for you are naturally as propense to sin as the Serpent is to bite or sting and as is the Serpent odious to men not for the mischief it has done but the poison it carries about with it so even you are counted odious by God by reason of that poison of Original Sin in which you were born and conceived All this and much more of the same kind you say of your selves and have subscribed it with your own hand Nay you brand all those which deny to affirm these things with you by the name of Hereticks as Arminians Pelagians and such like Names and how would you take it if some one Shimei like should make it his business to reproach and assault you with dishonesty and maledictions and vomit out if there be any things worse than these upon you Pr. For the honour of God and the exalting of the superabundant riches of his grace I willingly confess my self guilty of all this nay God will that his chosen and faithful should be such sinners that they should not boast of themselves but f Calv. Instit l. 3. c. 14. dist 9. be humble which humility confists in this that we empty our selves of all goodnesse whatsoever Th. And of late I have believed this to be true too Sir and I did further judge if I may speak my minde in this case that I was forthwith to do no good my self for the further I was off from doing any good the truer I could confess my self to be void of all righteousness and goodness Pr. I would not have you so understand me as if God would have us to be sinners and not endevour to do good works but that 't is onely by his grace lest we should seek to be justified by our works Th. I believe the same yet and because I well know how deadly a sin it is to lean to good works for justification and see with what subtilties the devil does hunt men how with heresies he entraps men I have even lain aside doing good if I could onely leaning to the free grace of God Pr. Must you have your will and your judgement afore all others and interpret our doctrine no otherwise then if it were the cause of your perverse life Fy Fy. God intends this that men should not seek to be justified by works but faith Th. By faith what faith Pr. As our Catechism has it in the 60 question I believe onely in Jesus Christ through whom by faith I shall be justified before God My conscience accuses me of all these things that I have sinned most hainously against all the commandments of God that I have observed none of them and am now liable to all evil yet the good God without any merit of mine out of his own meer grace both gives and imputes to me the perfect satisfaction justice and sanctification of Christ as fully as if I had committed no sin yea as if I had performed all that righteousnesse and obedience which Christ either did or suffered in my own person as I apply this by belief to my heart Th. You say well Sir this pure and sound faith has been alwayes my faith and so that I am more perswaded I have alwayes stuck close to that Doctrine of the reformed Churches so that I have almost wearied God if it were possible with my prayers in which faith without any good works I persist Furthermore this was alwayes in my mind often in my mouth g Luthers preface to Galat. That it was the chiefest art of a Christian to know no law no good works no not a tittle as to justification h Luth. lib. of Christian liberty for a Christian neither wants works or the law after by faith he is freed from all laws i Luth. on 2. chap. to Gal. Id. de lib. Christian Faith is onely necessary to salvation other things we are freed from whether commanded or forbid Goodworks make not men good nor bad ones bad and as to unbelievers no good work profiteth to their salvation so on the contrary no bad action makes a man bad or condemns him but onely unbelief For where faith is no sin can hurt Pr. What then have you such an esteem of good works indeed we teach indeed that faith in Christ does alone