Selected quad for the lemma: death_n
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A66345
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An end to discord wherein is demonstrated that no doctrinal controversy remains between the Presbyterian and Congregational ministers fit to justify longer divisions : with a true account of Socinianism as to the satisfaction of Christ / by Daniel Williams.
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Williams, Daniel, 1643?-1716.
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1699
(1699)
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Wing W2647; ESTC R26372
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65,210
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134
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Satisfaction still interposeth between the Justice of God and a believing Sinner Neither are they backward to ascribe to efficacious Grace that Virtue whereby we are enclined and enabled to believe Men may expose each other by fiery Debates after such Concessions but he who expresseth most Heat discovers the more ungospel Spirit if not the weaker Cause and weaker Judgment 2. As for such who own Christ's Righteousness in se to be imputed in the second sense and those who say it 's not imputed in it self but as to Effects if they contend the first must quarrel the other for denying in words what he grants for substance and the latter must be warm against the former because he will not join with him in offending the weak and hazarding Truth by rejecting a Phrase which well explained doth properly express what both intend CHAP. IX An Abstract of what helped me to avoid some Perplexity concerning Iustification with some account of our being justified at the Creator and Redeemer's Bar. THO I avoid arguing any Controversy in these Sheets which are designed for Peace yet I think it may promote this healing Design to give a short Abstract of some Thoughts whereby I arrived to Satisfaction in the Doctrine of Justification § 1. Justification being a forensick Act our Thoughts ought not to wander beyond what 's necessary to it as a judicial Sentence nor disregard whatever belongs to that Here the principal Considerations are the Judg the Rule of Judgment the Cause and Person to be tried by that Rule and the Sentence to be past by the Judg on the Person whose Cause is so tried which must be no other than what that Rule of Judgment duly applied containeth Hereby what some call Constitutive Justification is strictly no other than the Conformity of the Person to the Rule of Judgment by which he is acquittable or rewardable or both Passive Justification is no other than the Effect of the judicial Sentence or the Person 's State considered as absolved or to be rewarded or both by the Sentence now judicially past upon him and supposeth a Sentence and is measured by it § 2. A justifying Sentence is past upon every justified Person and continues to pass upon him by the Gospel-Promises applied by an Omnipresent All-seeing Infallible Faithful Almighty God Rom. 5. 1 2. The Gospel-offer is the Rule of Judgment the Gospel in its respective Promises complied with is God's justifying Sentence and that conclusive and effectual tho not so discernable by us as if it were solemnly pronounced 1. Here the transcendent Perfections of God must raise our Minds above Human Judicatories he needs no Evidence because he knoweth all things there needs no Summons to appear for he is ever with us he cannot err in Judgment for he is inflexibly righteous and knows the Rule of Judgment in its extent and allowances 2. We know not what Solemnity this Sentence may be pronounced with concerning us tho out of our hearing what in Heaven where there is Joy for the Conversion of Sinners what at the Throne where Christ is our interceding Advocate c. And sometimes God condescends to make it audible to our own Consciences by the received Testimony of his Spirit 3. This Sentence is in part executed upon every Believer as to what is promised for the present as well as his Title is adjudged to what is reserved for the future The in-dwelling Spirit Assistances peculiar to Christ's Members Answers of Prayer the Comforts of the Holy Ghost and whatever special Actings of Providence belong only to God's adopted Ones are the Execution of the justifying Sentence and suppose such a Sentence past as well as that it is a gracious one 4. God still pronounceth a justifying Sentence according to the variety of his Gospel-Promises tho that great one which alters our State passeth upon our first believing As he adjudgeth us to Pardon and Adoption upon our first acceptance of his Grace so he adjudgeth us non-forfeiters upon our abiding in Christ or persevering acceptance instanced as the various Promises describe the Heirs thereof § 3. The same justifying Sentence that God past by his Promises applied by himself in this Life will be more solemnly and convincingly pronounced at the judgment-Judgment-day when the full and perfect Execution of the Sentence is to take place 1. We shall be as truly judged at that day as if we had not been sentenced or the Sentence executed at all in this Life or at Death The wise God who knows the Subserviency hereof to Practical Religion doth oft and most expresly deliver it and in words as if we were all to be among those found alive when the Trumpet sounds 2 Cor. 5. 10. We must all appear before the Iudgment-seat of Christ that we may all receive c. Rom. 14. 10 12. Every one of us shall give an account of himself to God 1 Pet. 4. 5. And what must we give an account of Our Words Mat. 12. 36. Secrets of Hearts Rom. 2. 16. use of Talents Mat. 25. Heb. 13. 17. our Works c. that is every thing as gives Evidence concerning Mens Condition as it 's determinable by the Rule of Judgment and principally centers in this Have they sincerely accepted of the Salvation offered by the Redeemer 2. The Rule of Judgment and Sentence at that day will be the same as that by which every Believer is justified on this side Death it 's no new or other Sentence but the same more solemnly declared unless you 'll say it includes the entire extent of the Rule for the time of trial as well as that which changed our State 3. The great design of that solemn Process and open Sentence is to vindicate God in Christ as no Respecter of Persons in the extremely different State of the Damned and the Saved both in this Life and Eternity especially such as lived under the offers of Salvation and withal to vindicate his own mysterious Methods towards the Justified in their past Life as also them from unjust Aspersions 2 Thess. 1. Dan. 12. Mat. 22. 25. But to instance no more than the first he 'll convince Angels and Men by manifested Instances that they whom he justified and now saveth were Persons justifiable by that Rule of Judgment whereby the others are condemned and that the Sentence he pronounceth and executes on each is the very Sentence which that Rule impartially applied to their real Cases denounced § 4. The Rule of Judgment in its nature and scope is to be principally regarded in order to right Apprehensions concerning the justifying Sentence This determineth what is a justifying Righteousness and what is not this declares the nature of the adjudged Title whether it be of Grace or Debt dependent or independent thereby is evident what we are adjudged to and whether the Sentence passeth upon several complex Conditions or one particular one for we must be free from whatever the Rule of Judgment denounceth condemnable and not be
always have access to God and obtain eternal Life Socin Tom. 1. 788. Truth Jesus Christ was by Divine Adjustment a middle Person between God and Sinners and as such laid his hand on both undertaking to appease God's Wrath and procure Salvation for us at his hand and also to make God and the way of Salvation known to us for our Reconciliation and Obedience to God and by him God still imparts his Blessings to us and admits us free access to himself Error 5. Christ is called a Surety as a Sponsor or Messenger on God's part to us but he promised nothing to God for us Crell vol. 1. p. 612. Truth Tho Christ was not a joint federating Party with us in the Covenant of Works yet he was not only a Surety on God's part to us but he was a mediating Surety on both parts and as such he engaged in the Covenant of Redemption to make Atonement for us and in the Gospel-Covenant that all true Believers shall persevere to the obtaining of eternal Life Error 6. Christ was not an High-Priest while on Earth nor was his Blood offered by him to God but it was himself was offered and that not on the Cross but when he entred into Heaven yet the Death of Christ so far belongs to his Priesthood that he was prepared by his Death to become a High-Priest and to offer himself a perfect Sacrifice for Sin in Heaven neither of which could be according to the Decree of God if his Death had not intervened Crell vol. 2. Resp. ad Grot. cap. 10. vol. 1. 613. vol. 2. par 1. 162. Socin Tom. 1. Praelect Theol. cap. 23. Truth Christ was an High-Priest while he was on Earth and as such upon the Cross offered up himself by his bloody Death a perfect Sacrifice whereby his Blood was a propitiatory offering at the very time it was shed and tho in the virtue thereof the Saints were saved before his Incarnation and Christ for ever intercedeth in the Heavens yet the presenting of himself or it there makes no addition to the Perfection of it as a Sacrifice Error 7. There is no use nor place in the Priesthood of Christ for appeasing God's Wrath or offering any Sacrifice no not in Heaven as a Condition of obtaining Remission properly as from God or impetrating the same but Christ's Death is a means of our enjoying that Remission from God and it was indirectly a Condition thereof as to be given to us i. e. it was a Condition imposed on Christ without which by the Divine Decree he was not to obtain Authority from God to forgive us our Sins and it may be called a Sacrifice to God's Mercy as of his own free Grace reconciled but not as offended with Sinners Socin Tom. 2. 665 666. Crell vol. 1. 612. Wolzog. in Ioh. 3. 16. Truth The first and principal use of Christ's Priesthood was to offer on the Cross a Sacrifice to appease God's Wrath against Sinners and to impetrate Remission and eternal Life that so God the offended Governor might consistently with the Honour of his Law and of all his Divine Perfections be at liberty and inclined as well to give the said Blessings as that we might become actual Partakers of them from Christ as authorized to apply them to us And all the other Sacerdotal Acts of Christ do refer to this Error 8. Redemption mentioned in the New Testament signifies no more nor other than a freeing us from the Punishment of Sin without any proper Price intervening And when it 's said Redemption is obtained by the Blood of Christ it 's not meant that the Blood of Christ could move God or that God was thereby obliged to grant us Deliverance from the Punishment of our Sins but that the shedding of his Blood ought to intervene that we might be moved thereby to accept that Deliverance when offered to us Neither did Christ buy us but God by Christ asserted his Right to us and tho our Deliverance from Punishment is gotten as if by a Price yet this is not as if the Blood of Christ were paid to any Socin Tom. 〈◊〉 Prael Theol. cap. 19. Tom. 2. 145 147. Slicht in Rom. cap. 5. v. 10. Truth Redemption by the Blood of Christ is that we are bought by his Blood as a proper Price and delivered from the Curse of the Law and Captivity under Sin and Satan as by a proper Ransom paid to the just Governor of the World Error 9. Christ by his Death did not reconcile God to us but he reconcileth us to God by his Death i. e. we come thereby to be converted to God and cease to offend him yea God's Anger was so far from being appeased by the Death of Christ that thereby it was declared that God was before pacified to us Socin Tom. 1. 144 145 665 666. Crell vol. 3. Resp. ad Grot. 154 155 107. Slicht Tom. 2. 214 401. in Rom. 5. 10. 2 Cor. 5. Truth We being Children of Wrath because of our Sin the Lord Jesus did by his Death atone our offended God who became thereby so reconciled that he offereth Peace to Sinners and requireth and urgeth us by believing aright to accept thereof and upon our penitent believing he becomes actually reconciled to us delighting in us and dealing with us as Objects of his restored Favour Note 1. Crellius Resp. ad Grot. cap. 8. part 3. disputes against this as the Error of Grotius and the rest of the Orthodox stating it in these words God was before angry but being appeased by the Death of Christ he determined to lay aside his Anger and upon our believing and repenting he doth actually lay aside his Anger 2. Grotius de Satisf cap. 7. distinguisheth the Actings of the Divine Will 1. As before Christ's Death is decreed c. then God is angry with the Sinner yet so as not to be averse to all methods of Reconciliation 2. Vpon Christ's Death as well when fixed as when undergone then God not only appoints the way but promiseth to be reconciled 3. When a Man believes in Christ with a right Faith and Christ according to the Tenor of the Covenant presents the Believer to God then God lays aside his Anger and receives the Person into Favour or is actually reconciled 3. How little do well-meaning Antinomians consider that not only in the third Error c. but in this last Error they agree with the Socinians and that in a Point whence most of their false Notions about Christ's Satisfaction proceed For see you not they hold that after God's absolute Decree to justify us there 's no Wrath in God to appease the change is only on our part And no Reconciliation but on our side whom God begs to be reconciled to him he being already at Peace with us Error 10. By Christ's dying for our Sins as being laid on him is not meant that Christ according to his Sponsion satisfied Divine Iustice for our Sins or that he paid to God