err on that hand I had rather err in giving too much then too little to Christ. Do you think that a true Believer who doth not look upon the act of Faith or works of Holiness to be any part of his justifying righteousness but casts himself upon Christ do you think I say that God will reprove such a person at the last day for ascribing too much to Christ and not pleading his own righteousness Certainly a Believer cannot plead the righteousness of Christ without Faith his way of arguing from Christ will sufficiently evince the truth and reality of his Faith there needs no other proof and demonstration of it I should have made some Application I will tell you what I intended First To those who ground their Justification upon the sandy Foundation of their inherent Righteousness I would exhort them to pull down the house presently before it fall upon their heads and lay a better Foundation if ever they think to stand before the Son of Man in his Day Then I should exhort them and press them to study other Arguments as there are very many to promote Good Works and practical Holiness among men and not justle out Christ to make room for self Righteousness in the matter of Justification What must we work for Life still To work for Justification is to work for Life and why should we thus turn the Gospel into the Law I should speak also to those who are built upon the right Foundation and have cast themselves upon Christs Righteousness for Justification unto Life Let such be careful to maintain good Works let them be Examplary in the practise of them and bring forth fruit meet for the Kingdom of God. For as the Foundation may be too weak for the Superstructure so the Superstructure may be too mean for the Foundation And therefore down with all this Hay Wood and Stubble and labour to walk more sutable to that Holy Faith under the Profession of which you live Brethren The unsutable and uncircumspect lives of Professors have been the greatest scandal to the Doctrine of Justification by Faith it hath opened the Mouths of men against it Therefore labour to live men into a Conviction of this Truth Disputes and Words will not do it till you make it appear that the Grace of God that hath brought Life and Immortality to light through the Gospel hath taught you to deny all Ungodliness and Worldly Lusts. This is the way to promote the Doctrine of Justification by Faith alone You that are built upon the right Foundation had need be careful and circumspect The House is not yet finished we do all of us lie open more or less to Storms and Tempests here below though they cannot throw down the house yet they may shake the house the rain may beat into the house may soak through every room of the house may foul the house may greatly incommode us and distress us Therefore keep your Souls in good repair keep them as tite as you can against Wind and Weather And for your Comfort I would have told you that Heaven will mend all the Errors in the Superstructure if the Foundation be right God will then take away and separate all those weaknesses and sinful mixtures that now run along with all our Graces all Cracks and Flawes the sinkings and failings the bendings and leanings this way and that way in any part of the building Heaven will mend all will set all right and straight when we are Sanctified throughout and the Top-stone is laid FINIS A DISCOURSE OF REPENTANCE SHEWING The Difference between Legal and Evangelical Repentance AND The Necessary Connection between Evangelical Repentance and Saving Faith. By Thomas Cole Minister of the Gospel LONDON Printed for Thomas Cockerill at the Three Legs over against the Stocks-Market 1689. A DISCOURSE OF Repentance MARK 1. 15. Repent ye and believe the Gospel THE summe of the Gospel lies in Faith and Repentance which alwayes go together and cannot be separated though they may and ought to be distinguished one from the other I have chosen this Text to show the necessary connection that is between Faith and Repentance that I may be the better understood I shall observe this method 1. Distinguish between Legal and Evangelical Repentance 2. Shew the nature of Evangelical Repentance what it is and wherein it does consist how it rises out of faith what its use and end is 3. Shew the necessary connection that is between Evangelical Repentance and saving Faith. 4. The real difference that is between them notwithstanding this necessary connection 5. Inquire into the true cause and reason why the Professors of this Age who are so much for Faith do mind Repentance so little 6. Apply all First Distinguish between Legal and Evangelical Repentance You see the Repentance and Faith spoken of in the Text have both of them a reference to the Gospel Repent and believe the Gospel We shall better understand the nature of Evangelical Repentance by comparing it with Legal Repentance observing as we go how they differ from each 1. Legal Repentance is the work of the Law i. e. The work of the Spirit by the Law for the Law works but faintly under the influence of meer Natural Light unless the Spirit awaken the Conscience and set home the Law little will be done such a work of the Law you have Rom. 2. 15. letting in a Spirit of Bondage upon the Conscience accusing us for what we have done against the Law and leaving us so convicted without any plea for our selves Evangelical Repentance is the work of the Gospel sweetly melting the Heart by Arguments drawn from the Love of God and his free Grace in Christ towards Sinners it encourages a trembling Soul to plead with God for Mercy as the Publican Lord be Merciful to me a Sinner 2. Legal Repentance is all terrour and no hope it rises from the revelation of Gods Wrath against Sinners 't is a despairing Repentance without any hope of pardon the Curse of the Law lies hard upon a Man he knows not how to get from under it but lives in a fearful expectation of fiery indignation to devour him he is a terrour to himself But Evangelical Repentance leaves not an affrighted sinner altogether without hope as I shall shew under the next head 3. Legal Repentance is from worldly sorrow not so much for the sin as the penalty incurred thereby the apprehension of which is very dreadful to a convinced sinner he is more affected with the evil of punishment then with the evil of sin in it self 't is not for Gods sake but his own that he repents of sin he could love it well enough if it did not damn him Though I do not deny but a Repentance purely legal may have some sense of the evil of sin as sin not only as malum prohibitum but as malum in se as evil in its own nature where common notions of good and evil are not
utterly extinguished it must needs be so especially under a higher conviction from the Spirit of God that gives us a farther discerning of the evil of sin then the meer light of nature under its greatest elevation can possibly do It was so in Iudas Matt. 27. 34. he was convinced not only that he had broken the Law of God but that he had sinned in so doing I have sinned in that I have betrayed the innocent blood He knew he had a hand in murdering a Man a good Man a great Man who was more then Man no doubt all this came up into his mind concerning Christ yet the knowledge of Christ that Iudas had did not reach so far as to beget the least hope of Mercy from him and here lay the legality of his Repentance it was a despairing Repentance he conversed only with the Law and so sunk under the wrath of God and the curse of the Law he had none to accuse him but his own Conscience the Rulers and chief Priests were for him had set him a work and rewarded him but seeing him under such horror of Conscience he had done their business what care they see thou to that unconvinced sinners do slight the convictions of others they may go hang themselves for all them they have no pity for them I speak this to shew that legal Repentance may take in something of the evil of sin in it self as well as the destructive nature of it to us though these legal convictions of the evil of sin in it self are far short of those more through convictions that accompany true Evangelical Repentance Though the sorrow that is in legal Repentance be but worldly yet 't is very pungent it pierces us thorow and pretends to some Devotion too as if it were for Gods sake when self is only at the bottom Pharaoh confessed his sins and desired the Prayers of Gods People Exod. 9. 27 28. Saul wept for his sins 1 Sam. 24. 16. The effects of Gods wrath are very dreadful upon convinced sinners may draw Tears from their Eyes when they see what mischief they have brought upon themselves they repent but how Not of the sin but of the punishment Alas What does that signifie how ineffectual is it What have we to do to repent of the punishment We can't reverse it 't is Gods part to repent of the punishment to turn from his wrath to cease from his anger which he will do when we repent of the sin that occasioned it To repent of the punishment is in effect to be sorry that God is so just that he so severely animadverts upon sinners we wish he would let them go unpunished that we might more securely go on in our sins the only way to escape vengeance is to acknowledge the sinfulness of sin and to repent of our great folly in committing it such a frame of Spirit bears some proportion to the Holiness of God argues true Godly sorrow which worketh Evangelical Repentance unto Salvation 2 Cor. 7. 10. 4. Legal Repentance is before Faith without Faith may never issue in saving Faith as in Cain Saul Iudas but Evangelical Repentance does alwayes accompany saving Faith and of this I am now to speak under the second head shewing you Secondly The nature of Evangelical Repentance what it is in its first rise and original upon what 't is founded It came in with the Gospel the Law never intended any such thing the sinner was to be cut off by Law to die without Mercy in the day thou eatest thou shalt die says the Law unless ye repent says the Gospel here is an exception put in in case of repentance against the peremptory Sentence of the Law. I say repentance comes in with the Gospel I will put enmity c. Gen. 3. 15. Repentance rises out of this Enmity This seems to point particularly at the Conversion of Eve who by Faith in the promised Messiah should turn against the Serpent I will put enmity between thee and the woman this woman whom thou hast deceived shall become thy Enemy and bring forth a seed that shall break thy head thou shalt bruise his heel but his Death shall be thy overthrow Repentance is a Gospel Priviledge purchased by Christ 't is an act of Grace in God to injoyn us Repentance as his leaving men in an impenitent hardened frame is an act of his Justice and Wrath. The Law in its Original Constitution does not intend the amendment of the sinner but his utter Destruction the Law can kill the sinner but cannot mortifie the sin Damnation makes no man better but concludes him Eternally under sin and wrath the Justice of God is not obliged to turn a sinner from his sins but to turn him into Hell for his sins That which makes it a just and righteous thing with God to forgive the sins of Believer is Christs Merits and his own Promise 't is Justice in God to make good his own Promises Rom. 3. 25 26. 2 Thes. 1. 6 7. he is a debtor to his own promise he cannot deny himself 2 Tim. 2. 13. he owes the performance of his Promise to his Faithfulness and Truth 't is an act of Justice to himself to keep his Promise God offers Mercy to sinners not because they do repent but that they may repent Repentance is not the Cause but the Effect of Pardon God always intends Pardon to those whom he effectually calls to repentance he gave no such call to the Angels that fell there was no Gospel preached to them No fallen Angel was saved because no Elect Angel fell but there are many of Gods Elect among the fallen Sons of Adam to whom promises of Salvation were made upon their believing in Christ this being published to all in the Gospel all who hear the Gospel do put in for their share in this Salvation and that they may render the attainment more easie and feazable to them they deny absolute Election bring in Universal Redemption assert the liberty of Mans Will to believe if he please and supposing it to be in their own power to believe they conclude they may be saved as well as others and this is the ground of all that security that is among common Professors Having spoken thus much of Evangelical Repentance as it implies a real hatred of sin as sin and a real turning to God as the chiefest good from an inward change of nature renewed after the Image of God I shall now shew you 1. That such a Repentance can never be wrought in any by the Law alone the Gospel has a principal hand in this Why not by the Law. Because in the Law there are not sufficient motives and inducements to Repentance nothing that encourages to it that renders it available to mans Salvation the law cannot give life to a sinner upon his repentance the Gospel can but the Law cannot could a man under the Law Repent suppose that What would he get by it he must to Hell
after all the Law as a Covenant of Works does not seek to bring a sinner to Repentance but to Punishment the Law cannot give Repentance unto Life because it cannot give Life upon our Repentance You 'l say then is the Law against Repentance I don't say so neither for take Repentance as 't is a just equitable thing as a holy disposition of mind so the Law is not against it where ever it may be found as it is not against any other act of Moral Righteousness as such that a man may do and yet for all this 't will condemn a man for his sin and all his righteousness shall not be remembred though the Law be not against Repentance yet it will not accept of repentance as a satisfaction for past sins but the Gospel provides full satisfaction for the Law and promises sufficient and effectual Grace to the sinner to bring him to repentance having rescued him from the Curse of the Law enables him to walk worthy of the blessing of the Gospel if those who are justified were not sanctified they would live to the scandal of the Gospel The Law cannot contradict it self having already pronounced a peremptory sentence of death upon the sinner 't is impossible the Law should ever give repentance unto Life the Law insists upon the Execution of its own Judgment and will not be satisfied till that be done in this the Gospel yields to the Law to have execution done upon man for sin and provides a man on purpose the man Christ Iesus who bore our sins in his own body upon the cross 3. This Evangelical Repentance implies real Sanctification but the Law sanctifies no man because it can't convey its own Holiness to another can't alter the Nature of a Man but only shew him what mischief his sin has done him shews him his sin in this or that instance to his great terror but if he happen to out-live those terrors and not die in the fit as Iudas his evil heart will encline him as strongly to sin as ever it did before his former Convictions they made him give a present start backwards but he will quickly recover himself and return to his wretched course he cannot cease from sin though he know it displeases God yet he likes it never the worse for that might he but escape the punishment 't is not the wrath of God in it self that he fears but only as it goes forth in the penal effects of it against himself else he could suffer God to be angry and not be troubled at it whereas this goes most to the heart of a Child of God that he has incurr'd his displeasure There is no soundness in my flesh because of thine anger Psal. 38. 3. The Law alone never works any real Sanctification in a sinner 't is indeed the rule of Judgement it judges us according to what we are but cannot make us better 4. Repentance is a turning unto God but the Law gives no encouragement to a sinner to turn to God it holds forth the Wrath of God against him that makes him run from the presence of an angry God and hide himself as Adam did how can dry stubble stand before a consuming Fire but God out of Christ is a consuming Fire to a sinner he dares not come near him 5. The law by it self can't work a saving Conviction 't is very Instrumental in conjunction with the Gospel to do this but of it self it cannot Saving Conviction is of the essence of Evangelical Repentance Saving Conviction hath these four properties 1. It apprehends upon Scripture grounds a possibility of a sinners Salvation and not only so but a fair probability of it upon the due use of those means appointed by God in order thereunto and leads out the sinner to seek relief in Christ under some hope of obtaining it 2. It works a hatred of sin as sin strongly inclines and disposes the heart of a sinner to break off from his sins and to betake himself to a strict course of Holiness God offers Grace to sinners because he intends to give Faith and Repentance to as many as are ordained unto Life Faith inclines us to beg Repentance disposes us to it laies open the foulness of sin so plainly so convincingly that we cannot but repent of it under such a saving Conviction as Faith works in us I call it a saving Conviction because it puts us upon the diligent use of all means tending to Salvation a man is so convinced that he cannot rest till he has found out an effectual remedy to cure so deadly a disease nothing will satisfie him but Christ we see not all that is in sin till we see an absolute necessity of Christ to save us from it Here is a deep discovery of sin indeed when we know nothing but the Blood of Christ can take it away Behold the Lamb of God c. a Sacrifice of Gods providing all the Bulls Goats Sheep and Lambs of Mans procuring will never expiate sin nothing that is among men can do it but God has a Lamb cherished in his own bosom from Eternity this Lamb must be slain to take away the sins of the World 't is very astonishing to think what God parted with from himself to satisfie his own Justice his Attributes conspire together to heighten and advance each other infinite Grace lays out it self to satisfie infinite Justice and satisfied Justice gives way to infinite Grace to glorifie it self in mans free Redemption 3. It convinces us not only of particular sins but of the general Corruption of our Nature 't is by a Divine supernatural Light that we discern this we have a feeling of it in our selves from an inward Principle of a higher Life raised up in us by the power of God in our Regeneration which will not suffer us to walk any more after the flesh we cry and complain of that proneness that is in us to evil O wretched man that I am c. Rom. 7. No unconverted man is brought in complaining of the Corruption of his Nature only David and Paul and such like but none else When we look upon the old man with the eyes of the new we see that deformity that never appeared to us before 4. It Convinces us not only of the severity of the Law in punishing but also of the Holiness of the Law in all its just and reasonable Commands Rom. 7. 12. This is a main difference between Legal and Evangelical Repentance that Conviction and Sense that is in a Legal Repentance of the Holiness of the Law is very small next to none at all and that which is proceeds chiefly from the remainders of light in all natural Men left on purpose in the Conscience that all reverence of God and his Law might not be quite cast off and something of this may now and then appear under strong legal Convictions of sin as in Iudas but all this never begets any true love to Holiness for still
they go on in their sins and have pleasure in them that do so Rom. 1. 32. which is a great demonstration of the absolute Dominion sin has over fallen man in carrying him on not only against the known Law of God written in the Word but against all the natural Notions of the Law written in his own heart nothing can hold him in he despises God and man and his own Conscience he will not be a Law to himself Legal Convictions come short in all these properties of saving Conviction Legal Convictions are either such as are antecedent to the Commission of Sin or such as follow upon it which are properly called Convictions Convictions antecedent to sin are all one with the knowledge of the Law by which we understand what is morally good or evil in it self what is sin and what is not Adam and Eve in innocency were under this Conviction they knew what God had forbidden viz. to eat of the Tree of Knowledge of good and evil and that to eat of it in opposition to Gods express command to the contrary was a high act of Disobedience to be punished with Death but by the subtilty of the Devil they yielded to the Temptation and did eat if their perfect knowledge of the Law could not keep them in Innocency from falling how can we expect that our imperfect knowledge of the Law from any Convictions of that kind which we may be under should keep us And for those legal Convictions subsequent to the commission of sin by which we see the obliquity of our own actions and know our selves to be Transgressors of a holy righteous Law they fall short in all the forementioned properties of saving Conviction they leave us without hope of Mercy work no renovation of nature in us they may disturb us in the present act of sin and terrifie us much about that laying some present restraint upon us but they work no real Reformation in us Iudas was in great horror of Conscience for betraying his Master was much troubled that he should have a hand in shedding innocent blood and yet under the light and power of this Conviction how evil it was to Murder another he hangs himself which was as contrary to Law as killing another I speak this to shew how legal convictions may hurry a man from one sin to another but they never lead him into a constant setled way of true Holiness whence I infer that Convictions purely legal will never work Repentance unto Life How Repentance unto Life is wrought by the Gospel Because God hath appointed the Gospel to be the means of Repentance Luk. 24. 47. Rom. 16. 25 26. to the Glory of his Free Grace as Justice is glorified in the Damnation of an impenitent sinner so Grace is glorified in his Conversion Evangelical Repentance is from a Discovery of Gods Love and Free Grace His goodness leads us to Repentance Rom. 2. 4. 2 Pet. 3. 9. Psal. 130. 4. A true Penitent fears least he should miss of Mercy and come short of it he rejoyces at the good News of the Gospel begins to lift up his head in some expectation of a blessed Redemption he serves God chearfully being perswaded that his Duties and Services will be pleasing to him and accepted by him for Christs sake Psal. 130. 4. Hos. 6. 1 2. a sence of love and mercy quicken up a drooping trembling sinner to return unto God the Prodigal remembred what a kind Father he had Luk. 15. 18. 't was Pauls Argument Rom. 12. 1. 2 Cor. 7. 1. 'T is a sad thing that the Grace of the Gospel which is intended to keep men from Despair should by some be made an encouragement to presumption God forbid we should continue in Sin because Grace abounds 2. The Grace of the Gospel is not only an appointed Means but is in its own nature a fit means to work repentance suited and adapted to that end the goodness of God leads us to repentance the Schoolmen tell us that amor est congregativus and they give this reason for it because it does congregate and gather in our roving scattered thoughts from those various lesser Objects after which they go fixing our Minds upon God the only soul-satisfying Object Love is conciliative when God doth through Faith let in any sense of his intended grace towards sinners the heart melts under it a sinner does not repent that he may believe but because he does believe something of the Love of God to sinners in Christ Jesus some inkling of this is come to his ear hath touched his very heart before ever he sets upon repentance and now he can hold no longer the love of Christ constrains him great is the power of Love when it commends it self to us in some signal expressions of kindness to our visible advantage and benefit 3. Because Christ gives repentance Act. 5. 31. he purchased this and all other graces for us by dying for us he not only obtained pardon of Sin in our Justification but all inherent Graces in the Saints come from Christ he procured them for us he works them in us his sufferings being not only satisfactory for sin but meritorious of grace to be bestowed upon us though the Law can't sanctify a sinner yet Christ can and 't is an act of special grace towards us when he doth but he will first satisfie the Law and Justice of God that being brought under grace by our free Justification we may answer to the Law of grace in our sanctification denying all Ungodliness and Worldly Lusts living soberly and righteously here below as the redeemed of the Lord ought to do the Law commands perfect Obedience but in case of Failure the Gospel Promises Faith and Repentance Zach. 12. 10. Acts 11. 18. 4. Because God hath annexed a quickning Spirit to the Gospel to make way for his Grace and to give it a prevailing efficacy in the Hearts of men they are drawn by the loving kindness of God and cannot resist it the Spirit opens the Mystery of the Love of God in Christ and so charms the Soul with it that it is impossible to withstand the allurements of it 5. Because the ways and means of bringing a sinner to life are all supernatural the Law speaks nothing of this the Law never puts us upon any thing that is supernatural I mean that originally was so to man in his perfect state for then it had been quite above the reach and capacity of Mans Understanding but God suited his Law to those inbred Notions and Principles of Truth that were concreated in us the way of salvation through Faith and Repentance being supernatural we must apply our selves to the Gospel to know this 3. The necessary Connection that is between Evangelical Repentance and saving Faith. I prove it thus 'T is so in the first production of Repentance and in all the subsequent acts of Repentance therefore 't is alwayes so In the first production of Repentance if you