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A41483 The banner of justification displayed: or; a discourse, concerning the deep, and important mystery of the justification of a sinner wherein the severall causes thereof, being both numerous and various, are from the first to the last diligently enquired after, and their severall contributions towards so great and happy a work, clearly distinguished, and assigned to their proper causes (respectively.) and more particularly is shewed, how God, how the grace of God, how the decree of God, how the soveraign authority of God; how Christ, how the active obedience [of] Christ, how the passive obedience of Christ, how the resurrection of Christ, how the knowledge of Christ; how the spirit of God, how faith, how repentance, how works, how remission of s[in,] how the word, how the minister of the word, how the P[ope?] himself which is justified, may all truly, though upon severall accounts, and after different manners, be sayed to justifie. Goodwin, John, 1594?-1665. 1659 (1659) Wing G1150A; ESTC R221574 62,441 91

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God in that behalf although it be a means or condition of the best and most proper complexion or consideration for God to entertain or pitch upon in a Decree for justification yet would it not be a proper or sufficient means to justifie any man because in such a consideration I mean as separated or divided from the justifying Decree of God as it hath neither any naturall nor morall dignity or worth commensurable to so high and sacred an effect as Justification so neither would or could it have any Instituted or Superadded authority from any other hand whatsoever wherby to carry or atchieve it whereas if it be meet to suppose that the justifying Decree of God could or would have joyned it self or taken into communion with it self any other thing habit or act as suppose love humility patience or what ever besides Faith in Christ for the work of Justification this by vertue of the soveraign Authority or force of the divine Institution or decree in conjunction with it would have justified all those in whom they had been found Those Ordinances Vestments Ceremonies and Observations recorded and described Levit. 8. and elsewhere as enjoyned by God under the Law for the creation and consecration of Aaron and his Successors together with the inferiour Priests of the Tribe of Levi into their respective Offices of the Leviticall Priesthood were simply and in themselves considered very comely and proper for the investiture and making of Priests of this Order yet would no use or application of them to any person or persons of what Tribe or Family soeve● have made any Priest to serve at Gods Altar either with acceptation unto him or benefit unto the people had there not a Divine Institution or Law from God interceded for the authorizing or validating of these things to the making o● constituting of such Priests In which respect the Law is sayd to make men high Priests Heb. 7. 28. and consequently may as well be sayd to make Priests of the inferiour Order likewise In like manner though the●e be an aptitude in Faith in Christ above any other Grace or qualification for the justification of a Sinner yet that which makes it actually and effectually justifying is the Decree or Will of God in that behalf Yea the death of Christ it self would not be justifying as now it is did not the Will of God interpose for the authorizing of it in that kind according to what we read Heb. 10. 10. By the which Will viz. of God we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all So that the Offering of it self of the body of Jesus Christ doth not sanctifie and by the same reason doth not justifie men but as appointed or ordained by the Will of God hereunto or to speak more warily and properly not without the authoritative concurrence of the Will of God with it for the exhibition of such a benefit or blessing unto the World Sect. 4 Fourthly The Authority of God being as hath been sayd soveraign and supream and so the act award and determination of it not obnoxious to any defeisance check or annulment by any other Authority whatsoever contributes unto the justification of a sinner I mean unto the Justification which himself hath contrived and declared for such in his word full and finall and irreversible ratification and establishment This is that which the Apostle cleerly supposeth or implies where he demands Who shall lay any thing to the charge of Gods Elect i. e. Of those who believe as is evident It is God that justifieth as if he should say If it were any other but God who should justifie them although in the same way wherein God now justifieth them yet might their Justification be repeatable at least by God and further matter of accusation might be layd to their charge But now God being he that justifieth them and there being none above him nor yet equall unto him in Authority the●e is no fear that their justification should be obstructed recinded or made invalid by any whosoever or that any further Crime or matter of guilt should be charged upon them that should be of force by any equitable Law whatsoever or otherwise to condemn them Sect. 5 Fifthly Christ as God may be sayd to justifie in all those considerations or respects wherein Justification hath been ascribed unto God yea being one and the same God in nature and essence with the Father he acteth and doeth all the same things in reference to the Creature in conjunctiou and communion with him Secondly Being {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} God and Man or Man subsisting in the humane Nature personally united to the Godhead by the willing offering up of himself as a Lamb without spot in Sacrifice unto God the Father he made Attonement for Sinners in such a sense wherein the Scripture is to be understood when it so speaketh notwithstanding his Justice and perfect hatred of sin yea notwithstanding his threatning of Adam and all his Posterity with death in case of his sinning The death of a Person of that transcendent worth and dignity was in true esteem and so judged by the un-erring understanding and wisdome of God a valuable and equitable consideration why he should actually and without any other thing intervening pardon the ●in of the world as it is called Joh. 1. 29. that is the sin of Adam as imputed or communicated in the guilt of it unto all his Posterity together with all the actuall sins of all such of his Posterity as should believe in him To say that Christ by his sufferings merited either the justification or salvation of those who should believe in him as it is no Scripture expression so neither is it exegeticall or explicative of any Scripture expression nor as far as at present my memory serveth me expressive of any Scripture notion and however it is too narrow and scant an expression of that Grace of of God in the death of Christ herein commended by him both unto men and Angels unless we shall exclude from this Grace all Infants dying in Infancy or before they are arriv'd at a capacity of believing And as it is not so proper to say that the blood of Bulls and Goats c. under the Law merited those Leviticall purgations or sanctifications which yet they who were ceremonially unclean obtained by them as to say that they were a competent and sufficient satisfaction and so esteemed by God for such uncleannesses and so dissolved the guilt contracted by them In like manner it is more agreeable to Scripture both notion and phrase and to the nature of the thing it self to say that Christ in or by his death being so highly considerable as it was made or gave satisfaction for the sins of men and hereby made way for the pardon and remission of them by God then to say that by his death he merited the pardon of these sins or the
{non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} very often signifieth ot to make perfect i. Compleatly to qualifie the Captain of their salvation Christ that was to procure their deliverance from death by making Attonement for them through sufferings proportionable to so great ●n Atchievement and consequently to put him into a capacity of suffering by investing him with the humane Nature as is plainly layd down v. 14. the Apostle I say having asserted this he gives this account of it in the words following For both he that sanctifieth and they that are sanctified are all of one meaning that the one and the other are both of one and the same Original or Descent as viz. From God by the Line of Adam and likewise of one and the same nature or blood as Act. 17. 26. And hath made of one blood all Nations of men And withall that it was meet that thus it should be for conformity sake unto the Leviticall Type where the high Priest and those that were Legally purified or sanctified by him were both of one and the same nature and likewise descended from one and the same Progenitors 2. It was very agreeable both to the goodness and wisdome of God that he who by his appointment and at his instance should serve Adam and his posterity in so arduous and difficult an undertaking as by his own death to re-instate them in a condition of life and peace should be satisfied with and enjoy this sore travail of his Soul and not sink or be wholly crushed under it and consequently that he should not only suffer death but overcome death or which is the same be raised again from the dead that so he might be capable of that great recompence of Reward which so transcendent a Service both unto God and men well deserved Upon this account also the Lord Jesus Christ was the only person either in actuall being or in possibility of being that was accomplished or meetly qualified for that great undertaking of raising up the Tabernacle of Adam which was fallen and of saving that which was lost For were it granted or supposed which yet I cannot encourage any man to suppose that some Creature might have been found or else made so holy harmless undefiled and separate from sinners the shedding of whose blood or whose death for Adam and his posterity might have been so considerable in the sight of God as that he could have judg'd it competently salvant of the glory of his wisdome and of the awfulness and dread of his Soveraignty to have remitted the transgression of Adam and his upon the account thereof yet is it no wayes probable that the considerableness or worth of this Sacrifice would or could have ab●unded so high above the purchase or procurement of the redemption of Adam and his posterity as to in-title or to in-right him that should have offered it to a glorious Resurrection also such as was meet for him that had been the Author of salvation to a lost World And if the Glory wherein Christ appeared upon Tabor was so exceeding great that it only became the only begotten Son of God being a Garment too above measure rich for any person to wear but the only Son of the King of Kings to which sense many of the Expositors carry that of the Evangelist Joh. 1. 14 much more would such a transcendency in Glory wherewith God hath judged it meet to invest and dignifie him that is now the Saviour of the World As the making him higher then the Heavens placing him at his own right hand giving him a Name above every Name that is named c. have been vastly disproportionable to the Line of any meer created Being whatsoever And yet the Apostle plainly declareth that such an high Priest became us i. Was necessary for us to have in respect of those high and vast Concernments which were to pass through his hands and to be transacted by him who amongst other glorious Prerogatives should be made higher then the Heavens Heb. 7. 26. In these Considerations and haply in some others like unto them the contributions of the passive Obedience and Sufferings of Christ were soveraignly necessary to render the high transaction or dispensation of God the justification of sinners worthy of him and of a regular and cleer consistence with his Glory As for the Tenent of those who resolve this great Act or Dispensation of God we speak of I mean Justification partly into the Soveraignty of his Greatness or Authority and partly into the abundance of his Grace and Goodness and liberty of his Will and partly into the Obedience and regular Conversation of men themselves excluding the death of Christ from any part or fellowship therein at least by way of Attonement or satisfaction for sin I conceive it to be broadly inconsistent with the tenor and purport of the Scriptures in places and passages without number 8. The Resurrection or raising of Christ from the dead Sect. 8 in conjunction with his Glorification which followed upon it advanceth the business of Justification by the assurance given hereby from God unto the Souls and Consciences of men that he is well a paid and fully satisfied concerning that great Debt of the sin of the World the discharge whereof was undertaken by Christ in his death hereby encouraging men who had incur'd his displeasure by sinning to believe in him accordingly for their justification This is the express Doctrine of the Apostle Peter Who verily was fore-ordained speaking of Christ before the foundation of the World but was manifested in these last times for you who by him do believe in God that raised him up from the dead and gave him Glory that your Faith and hope might be in God and consequently that you might be found or put into a state of justification without which Faith and hope in God were little available 1 Pet. 1. 20. And in this consideration doubtless it was that the Apostle Paul affirmed Christ to be raised again for our justification Who was sayth he speaking of Christ delivered viz. unto death for our sins and was raised again for our justification Rom 4. 25. meaning that he was raised again from the dead including in his Resurrection by a kind of Synecdoche the great Glory and Dignity given him by God upon it that hereby a rationall way might be made for sinners to believe in him or in God for the Gospel indifferently useth the one expression and the other to the same effect in order to their justification Whilst the Surety o● he that hath undertaken the payment of a Debt is kept in Prison there is no likelyhood that the debt is payd or the Creditor satisfied And upon this ground the Apostle Paul reasoneth first thus But if Christ be not risen then is our Preaching vain and your Faith is also vain 1 Cor. 15. 14. And again vers. 17. And if Christ be not raised your Faith is vain yee are yet in your sins
highly acceptable with God as being every wayes qualified with Innocency Righteousness Holiness c. and so meet by his death to make Attonement for the sin of the World So then as that which the unblemishedness of the Beast for Sacrifice under the Law exhibited towards that Attonement which was made by the offering of it was the meetness of this offering of it for acceptance with God and consequently for this acceptance it self in order to his pardoning or passing by that ceremoniall impurity or uncleanness for which it was offered In like manner the active Obedience of Christ in conjunction with the absolute holiness and inward purity of his person rendered his death or the Oblation of himself a Sacrifice every wayes meet and worthy acceptance with God and consequently accepted with him for the expiation or Attonement of the sins of all men If Christ had been so much as touch'd with the least tincture of defilement with sin he had not been a Priest after the order of Melchisedech holy harmless undefiled separated from sinners c. but rather after the order of Aaron who needed to offer Sacrifice for their own sins Neither had he been in any condition or regular capacity to have made Attonement for the sins of others untill he had first fully expiated his own That the active Obedience of Christ doth not operate in or about or towards justification in that way or notion which some have conceived as viz. by an imputation of the particular acts thereof in the letter and formality of them unto those that believe whereby they should be constituted or made properly and formally righteous we have demonstrated at large in a just treatise upon that Subject where it is made good upon several accounts that the sayd notion hath neither countenance from the Scriptures nor any tolerable consistency wth the clearest Principles of reason Sect. 7 7. What place or interest the Death or passive Obedience of Christ hath in or about justification we have in like manner Briefly intimated in our Fifth Section It rendereth that great Act of God in the justification of a sinner every wayes comely and honourable unto him and worthy of him and consequently makes him most willing and free to it The Holy Ghost speaks plainly enough of that comeliness which the sufferings of Christ put upon the justification of a sinner by God giving some intimation withall that unless this Act had by one means or other been made thus comely for him he would never have lift up his heart or hand unto it For it became him for whom are all things and by whom are all things meaning God in bringing many Sons unto Glory to consecrate or make perfect the Captain of their salvation through sufferings Heb. 2. 10. That meetness or comeliness for God here spoken of intending the salvation and glorification of many to effect it in noother way then by the sufferings of him who was to be the Prince or Captain of their salvation respecteth mainly if not solely his Act in justifying them in order to their salvation and glorification For otherwise supposing them already justified there needed more the life then the death of Christ to save them according to that of the Apostle Paul But God commendeth his love towards us in that while we were yet sinners Christ dyed for us Much more then being now justified by his blood we shall be saved from wrath through him For if when we were Enemies we were reconciled unto God by the death of his Son much more being reconciled we shall be saved by his life Rom. 5. 8 9 10. We see here 1. That our justification is ascribed unto the blood or death of Christ and 2. That our salvation our justification or reconciliation unto God presupposed unto his life i. Unto that power which is given unto him in that life which now he lives in glory at the right hand of the Father to exercise for the saving of all those that believe in him Life frequently imports vigour activity liveliness of strength or power for action as death imports weakness and imbecility for action If you ask me But how or in what respect doth the passive Obedience or death of Christ render the act of justification as now it is exerted or performed by God so comely or honourable for him Or how may we conceive that either it would have been uncomely or less comely for him to have appeared in it in case his hand had not been strengthned by the death of Christ unto it Or doth it not well enough become the great God to forgive sin freely and without satisfaction I answer 1. Whether we conceive the import of those words spoken by God unto Adam and in him unto all his Posterity being yet in his Loyns In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt dye the death either in the nature or notion of a dreadfull threatning in case of disobedience or of a most sacred and severe Law to restrain sin and disobedience the difference I confess is not much materiall as far as at present I apprehend it was no wayes honourable or comely for God to suffer either the one or the other to be trodden or trampled under foot by the Creature to whom they were given without looking after them or calling for some satisfactory account for the contempt measured out unto them It cannot reasonably be thought but that God by the denunciation of such a threatning or promulgation and sanction of such a Law awakened and amused both Heaven and Earth and raised great expectations in both what the issue or consequence would be Now then Adam and his Posterity being as was sayd now in him rising up in disobedience in the very face as it were and presence of so terrible a threatning if God should have passed by and made no words of this high mis-demeanour he might seem either on the one hand to repent that he had so sorely threatned them and therefore now proceeded not to execution or else on the other hand that he was content and willing enough to be neglected or affronted by his Creature both which would have been very uncomely and dishonourable unto him Nor would it have been of much more comely an interpretation had he accepted any thing of an inferiour value or less considerable instead of a Compensation or satisfaction and had not stood upon a just and full vindication of his Soveraign Authority his excellent Wisdome his Righteousness and Equity in his proceedings with his Creature the glory of all which were very injuriously handled and suffered deeply in Adams prevarication So then Adam and his mis-carrying with so high a hand of disobedience there devolved a necessity upon God if he meant to glorifie himself like himself and as God either to punish the whole brood of Transgressours according to the full exigency of their demerit or which is the same according to the tenor and import of the threatning or
else to find out some other person to suffer for them whose punishment or sufferings might be altogether as considerable and argue as great respects to his Authority Wisdome and Righteousness as the punishment of Adam and all that were now Delinquents in his Loyns i. His whole Posterity the second Adam only excepted up to the line of their transgression and guilt would have done And thus the Apostle as we lately heard layeth it down indefinitely and in the generall that if God meant to save and glorifie any number of Adams Posterity it concerned him in point of glory to provide that he who ever he should be by whom they were to be saved should suffer to perfection i. Proportionably to what they ought to have suffered whom he intended to save by him For this I conceive to be the sense and import of these words For it became him for whom are all things and by whom are all things in bringing many Sons unto glory to perfect or make perfect the Captain of their salvation through sufferings Heb. 2. 10. That Description or Periphrasis of God For whom are all things and by whom are all things importing his transcendent Soveraignty and greatness seems to imply that these were considerations that made it necessary and comely for him in case he intended salvation to Adam and his Posterity to take that course which now he hath taken for the effecting it viz. To impose such sufferings upon him by whom it should or was to be atchieved which might in a rationall estimation answer the sufferings which they had deserved and that had it been any but God or had God been any but himself the omission of such exactness of severity or justice in or about the accomplishment of the Design would not have been so uncomly for them as now it seems it would have been for God to dispense with it his Augustissimall and unparralleld Majesty and Greatness being as hath been sayd considered For it no wayes at no hand becomes him to whom the whole Creation Heaven and Earth with all the Hosts of them stand bound to do the deepest homage and service and whose wisdome and power have so gloriously quitted themselves in the beautifull Fabrick of the Universe and in all the parts and parcels of it either to confess himself either unadvised or over-severe in making a Law for the Nurture and Government of his Creature or to minister any occasion in the least unto his Creature so to judge or conceive of him which he should have done had he taken a company of his Creatures who had despised and broken this Law into his Bosome yea into part and fellowship with himself in his own blessedness and glory without a just compensation for these transgressions and fully commensurable in one kind or other thereunto Now there being no Creature no person to be found either in Heaven or in Earth nor any to be framed nor made by any appropriate or new Act of Creation at least as far as the understandings of men are well able to reach capable of suffering upon the terms mentioned in regard of the unpreventible inconsiderableness of their beings Comparatively and of their sufferings accordingly and so not competent to make a just satisfaction for the high misdemeanour or provocation of so many hence there arose a necessity a necessity I mean for Divine conveniency and a salvage of Honour either that the Son of God being first put into a suffering capacity by being made flesh should willingly undertake and perform this suffering Service for the Transgressors or otherwise that the Transgressors themselves from the first to the last should have born their own sin and fallen under it and have perished by it for ever 2. Suppose we that some Creature might have been either found or made yea suppose we that some man might have been made upon like terms with Adam whose sufferings might have amounted to a satisfactory consideration for Adams transgression together with all theirs who sinned in him and with him yet first if he in one respect or other had not really and truly descended from Adam as Christ did the satisfaction made by him had not been so proper or so clearly salvant of the Glory of the Wisdome and Soveraignty of God in the Threatning or Law mentioned In that day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt dye the death as that now made by the death of Christ For Christ was not only of the same nature with Adam but also lineally though not according to the course of common propagation descended from Adam Luk. 3. 23. compared with vers 38. and the Verses intermediate In which respect the threatning or penalty of the Law In the day that thou eatest c. was inflicted upon him to whom the Law was given though not upon his Person personally considered but as subsisting and having a Being in that speciall Branch of his Posterity Christ as he had a Being likewise in every other Member of this his Posterity even as they also in a reciprocall consideration had a being in him whilst as yet they actually were not In this kind of Dialect God kept Covenant with Abraham when he performed those Promises unto him as subsisting in his Posterity or Seed which yet he made unto him personally unless we shall say which haply may be true and proper enough that this and such like promises made unto Abraham remain yet to be performed and made good unto him personally in the first Resurrection and during the Reign of Christ and of the Saints on earth for a thousand years Thus he promised unto him yet personally subsisting and present that he would give him the Land of Canaan Arise walk through the Land in the length of it and in the breadth of it for I will give it unto thee Gen. 13 17. So elsewere And in thee shall all the Families of the Earth be blessed Gen. 12. 3. which yet was not verified in him personally considered but as subsisting in that most glorious and flourishing Branch of his Posterity Christ In like manner Christ assuming the humane Nature wherein he suffered from one of Adams naturall Race and consequently from Adam himself though in an appropriate and supernaturall way the penalty of the Law In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt dye the death being inflicted upon Christ may in a sense and this not much remote from that which is literall o● proper be sayd to have been inflicted upon Adam himself The Apostle having as we lately heard affirmed that it became God in bringing i. pu posing or designing and accordingly attempting to being many Sons as viz. His Son Adam Luk 3. 38. and all his Sons which were many and who by reason of their descent from Adam may properly enough be tearmed the Sons of God also the Scripture frequently giving the appellation of Sons or Children to all lineally descending from the same Progenitors unto glory to consecrate for so the word