Selected quad for the lemma: death_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	resurrection_n	rise_v	sin_n	6,756	5	4.9718	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A96866	Justification by faith: or, a confutation of that antinomian error, that justification is before faith; being the sum & substance of a sermon / preached at Sarum; by Benjamin Woodbridge, minister of Newberry in Barkshire. May 26. 1652. Imprimatur, Edmund Calamy.	Woodbridge, Benjamin, 1622-1684.	1652 (1652)	Wing W3424; Thomason E673_18; ESTC R207183	23,288	41

are justified in Christ then we are justified before we believe But we are justified in Christ Ergo. Answ We may conceive of a Threefold Justification 1. a Justification purposed in the decree of God Gal. 3. 8. The Scriptures foreseeing that God would justifie the Gentiles through Faith 2. A Justification purchased and impetrated in the death of Christ who by his death hath obtained eternal Redemption for us Heb. 9. 12. which Redemption is the Remission of sins Eph 1. 7. 3. There it also a Justification exemplified in the resurrection of Christ who himself was justified in his own resurrection and thereby became the exemplary cause of Justification to believers by vertue of which themselves shall also be justified in such time and upon such terms as shall be agreed upon between the Father and Christ I use the term of an exemplary cause rather then of a common person because a common person may be the effect of those whom he represents as the Parliament of the Commonwealth but Christ is such a common person as that he is the cause of those whom he represents in every thing in which he represents them so that when we say We are justified in Christ the meaning is no more but this That Christ is made the cause and patern according to which Justication shall certainly follow on them that believe But what is this to our deliverance from condemnation or what benefit do we receive by it before we believe Should a man argue thus in any other benefits we receive by Christ and from Christ as the exemplary cause he would make himself deservedly ridiculous For example We are said to be risen with Christ Christ himself being risen from the dead and become the first fruits of them that slept 1 Cor. 15. 20. So that Christ in his resurrection is the exemplary cause of our resurrection in which we are therefore said to bear the image of the heavenly Adam verse 49. Would any sober man infer Therefore our own personal resurrection is past already to wit before our selves are dead or that we are not to be raised at all because we are risen already in Christ Yet no man living can shew any reason of difference why we may not as justly infer that our resurrection is passed already because we are risen in Christ as that our Justification is past before we believe because we are justified in Christ No doubt but most men would account the just contrary a necessary consequence Again We are sanctified in Christ as well as justified in Christ Our old man is crucified with him Rom. 6. 6. and he is said to be made Sanctification to us as well as Righteousness 1 Cor. 1. 30. And why then may we not inveigh against Regeneration and personal Sanctification as well as against personal Justification for if we are sanctified in Christ then we are sanctified before Faith and we need not mortifie sin and dye to the world c. all this is done already in Christ in whom we are sanctified before Faith we need onely to have it declared to us that we are sanctified To draw up the Answer more close Justification is either causal and virtual or actual and formal The former is no other then a Justification of Christ himself with a connotation of others who by virtue of this Justification of his are themselves to be justified in due time as our resurrection in Christ is nothing else but Christ himself risen as the first fruits of them that slept and so become the exemplary cause of a resurrection afterwards to follow us but as the resurrection of Christ makes no real change in us till our selves be risen so neither doth the justification of Christ make any moral change in us from death to life till our selves be justified Actual and formal justification is when we are acquitted from the guilt of sin by the gracious sentence of the Gospel He that believes shall not enter into condemnation Now then if we speak of Justification formal then I deny that we are justified in Christ which is the opponents Assumption And if we speak of Justification causal then I do utterly deny the Proposition viz. That if we are justified in Christ then we are justified before we believe the Reason is because to be justified in Christ is not to be justified simply no more then to be risen in Christ is to be risen simply or to be glorified in Christ is to be glorified simply and therefore the inference is a dicto secundum quid ad dictum simpliciter They are credulous souls I 'le assure you that will be drawn by such Decoys as these into Schism and Faction to the hardening and discomforting of more hearts in one hour then the Opinion it self should it obtain will do good to while the world stands Object 3. The last and great Argument succeeds and that is this If we are in Covenant before we believe then we are justified before we believe But we are in Covenant before we believe Ergo. Answ Were it supposed that we were in Covenant before Faith yet would the Proposition be faulty The Reason because the Blessings of the Covenant have an order and dependance one upon another and are enjoyed successively one after another God in his Covenant promises Holiness and Glory as well as Justification yet he would argue most absurdly that should say We are sanctified and glorified before Faith because we are in Covenant bfore Faith But I am unwilling to multiply quarrels If the great difference lay here it were an easie matter to be reconciled 2. I do utterly deny the Assumption viz. That we are in Covenant with God before we believe if at least the Phrase of being in Covenant be understood properly for such an interest in the Covenant as gives a man right and title to the Blessings of the Covenant That in this sense we are not in Covenant before we believe is that which I shall prove by and by But first I shall give Mr. Eyre a fair hearing though he would not give it me and I believe is resolved to give it to no body else whiles the judgement of the cause must be left to the people The proof of the Assumption stands thus If the Spirit be given us before we believe then we are in Covenant before we believe But the Spirit is given us before we believe Ergo the proof of the minor is from the tenor of the New Covenant Heb. 8. 10 11. I will put my laws into their minde and they shall all know me which is a promise of giving the Spirit to work Faith Answ The Explication of the terms of this Argument is a sufficient refutation of it God is said to give in Scripture sometimes when no receiving follows and thus the Word Give signifies no more then the will of God constituting and appointing Thus God gave his Son unto death that is constituted and appointed that he should die There is

remove those Objections which seem of weight to Mr. Eyre for confirmation of his Opinion The first is drawn from those Scriptures which seem to hold forth an immediate actual reconciliation of sinners to God upon the death of Christ without the intervention of Faith As Matth. 3. 17. This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased viz. with sinners and Rom. 5. 10. We were reconciled unto God by the death of his Son Answ To the former of these places I answer 1. That the well pleasedness of God need not be extended beyond the person of Christ who gave himself unto the death an offering and a sacrifice unto God of a sweet smelling savor Eph. 5. 2. 2. If we should extend it also unto men which is neither necessary nor probable yet will the words prove no more then that it is through Christ that God is well pleased with men whensoever it be that he is well pleased Verbs and Participles of the present Tense though the Verb in this place be not the present Tense but the first Aorist have sometimes the signification of the future Tense as John 4. 25. The Messiah cometh that is will shortly come and chap. 5. 25. The hour is coming and now is that is will shortly be and 14. 3. If I go I come again so in the Greek that is I will come again 2 Cor. 3. 16. When it namely Israel shall turn to the Lord the vail shall be taken away The Verbs in the Greek are both of the present Tense hundreds of the like instances are obvious somtimes they are Notes of affirmation without reference to any determinate time as Rom. 8. 24. By hope we are saved not presently for it follows immediately hope that is seen is not hope for what a man seeth why doth he yet hope for Ergo to be saved by hope imports that a man is not yet saved but the meaning is That it is in the way of hope and patient expectation that men are saved whensoever it be that they are saved So 1 Cor. 15. 57. Thanks be unto God that giveth us the victory to wit the victory over death by and in the Resurrection and the meaning is That it is through God that we have the Victory be it when it will be that we have it for if the words must needs be understood as if we had the Victory presently then Paul and the Christians of his age were raised before they were dead and the Christians of following ages before they were born So Heb. 10. 35. Your confidence hath a great recompence of reward that is shall have Jam. 1. 17. Every good gift cometh down from above not as if it must needs be coming down when the Apostle spake those words but that whensoever any receives a good gift it is from God But why do we fight against God Is it not the testimony of the holy Ghost as express as words can deliver it That without Faith it is impossible to please God or to be pleasing unto God as Enoch was by Faith Heb. 11. 5. 6. It was a poor answer that Mr. Eyre gave to Mr. Good when he asked him Whether God were well pleased with unregenerate men to say He was well pleased with unregenerate men but not with their unregeneracy as if God were well pleased with unregenerate men whiles unregenerate but afterwards were well pleased with their unregeneracy also The like Answer I give to Rom. 5. 10. we were reconciled unto God by the death of his Son to wit That Christs death was the price of our Reconciliation and and so it is through the death of Christ that we are reconciled be it when it will be that we are reconciled Here then we must distinguish as it were of three Periods of the will of God 1. As it may be conceived immediatly after sin committed before the consideration of the death of Christ And now is the Lord at enmity with the sinner though not averse from all ways and means by which he may return to Friendship with him again 2. As it may be conceived after the consideration of the death of Christ and now is the Lord not onely appeasable but doth also promise that he will be reconciled with sinners upon such terms as himself shall propose 3. As the same will of God may be considered after an intercession on Christs part and Faith on the sinners part and now is God actually reconciled and in Friendship with the sinner when then the Apostle says We are reconciled through the death of Christ he doth not mean That immediatly upon the death of Christ we are actually reconciled unto God for in the very next verse he saith That through Christ we have now and not before received the atonement or reconciliation which in plainer terms is this That now that is since we are Believers we are actually reconciled unto God But his meaning is That through the death of Christ it is that the promise of reconciliation is made by and according to which we are actually reconciled unto God after we believe suitable to that of the Lord Jesus This is the new Testament in my blood obtained and sealed by my blood which was shed for the remission of the sins of many Matth. 26. 28. The ground of all this is because the death of Christ was not solutio ejusdem but tantidem not the payment of that which was in the obligation but of the equivalent being not the payment of the debtor but of the surety and therefore it doth not deliver us ipso facto but according to the compact and agreement between the Father and him when he undertook to be our surety If a debtor bring me what he owes me it dischargeth him presently but the payment of a surety is a payment refusable of it self and therefore effects not the discharge of the principal debtor but at the time and according to the conditions agreed upon between the Surety and the Creditor If then our Adversaries could prove either that it was the will of God in giving up Christ to the death or the will of Christ in giving himself to the death that this death of his should be available to the immediate and actual Reconciliation and Justification of the sinner without any condition performed on the sinners part it were somthing to the purpose But till this be done which indeed can never be done they were as good say nothing When Christ gives us an account both of his own and his Fathers will in this matter he tells us That this is the will of him that sent him That whosoever seeth the Son and believeth on him may have everlasting life John 6. 40. without which Faith Christ shall profit us nothing Gal. 5. 4. 1 John 5. 11 12. He that hath not the Son hath not life So much for that Objection The next which was one of the two made use of against me after Sermon is this Object 2. If we

no other name given under Heaven Acts 4. 12. that is no other name appointed so Eph. 1. 22. and 4. 11. and a hundred other places In this sense the giving of the Spirit is no more then the sending and as it were the constituting of the Spirit to be by way of specialty the worker and cause of Faith 2. The word give doth sometimes include a receiving and possession of the thing given as in the ordinary use of the word and thus the Spirit is given when we receive him and are as it were possest of him and he becomes ours and dwells in us Thus the Lord promiseth to give the Spirit to them that ask him Luke 11. 13. and we are said to receive the spirit by Faith Gal. 3. 14. and the Spirit is said to dwell in us by Faith Eph. 3. 16 17. with Rom. 8. 10 11. and of this latter way of giving the Spirit is the Question to be understood 2. The Spirit may be said to be given three ways 1. Essentially 2. Personally 3. In reference to his operations The Spirit is not given to us essentially for so he is God and is equally every where nor can he be more peculiarly in one then in another Nor 2. Personally for that cannot be conceived without a personal union which would denominate us as truly to be the Spirit of God as the like union in the man Christ Jesus did denominate him to be the Son of God 3. The Spirit therefore must be said to be given to us in regard of some peculiar operations which he worketh in us which are incommunicable to those which have not the Spirit so that common convictions illuminations humiliations some joys of heart and the like which are transient Works of the Spirit common to them that are saved and to them that perish Heb. 6. 4. Matth. 13. 20. and all other works which may either go before or be without Faith these are none of them such kinde of works as that in respect of them the Spirit should be said to be given to us wherefore there being no peculiar work of grace before Faith it self which may not be wrought in a Hypocrite which hath not the Spirit as well as in a childe of God therefore the Spirit is neither given nor received before Faith be wrought but is given and received together with Faith in the same instant of time and not before Indeed as every cause is in nature before its effect so the Spirit also in order of causes is before Faith but that he is therefore given to us in the least atome of time before the being of Faith is a meer non-sequitur and contrary to the received maxime Posita causa in actu ponitur effectus which rule Mr. Eyre hath often abused to prove a Justification immediatly upon the death or resurrection of Christ and yet here he cannot understand it so that as a man doth first build himself an house and then dwells in it So the Lord Jesus by his Spirit doth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Heb. 3. 3. build and organize and prepare as we render the Greek wood Luke 1. 17. the soul to be a house unto himself and then by the same Spirit dwells in it immediatly And this is that which I would have spoken publiquely in answer to this Argument if Mr. Eyre had not been beyond measure obstreperous Yet here it may be demanded Whether Faith it self be not given to us by vertue of the Covenant made withus Answ Faith is not given to us by vertue of the Covenant made with us but by vertue of the Covenant made with Christ that is God hath promised and covenanted with Christ that if he will lay down his life for the redemption of sinners those sinners shall be drawn to believe in Christ and thereby to partake of the benefits of his death That this is so the Scriptures are plain Isa 53. 10. When thou shalt make his soul an offering for him he shall see his seed He shall see of the travel of his soul by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justifie many so Isa 55. 4. 5. Behold thou shalt call a nation that thou knowest not and nations that knew not thee shall run unto thee because of the Lord thy God and for the holy One of Israel for he hath glorified thee Psal 2. 8. Ask of me and I will give thee the heathen for thine inheritance c. So Psal 110. 3. Matth. 12. 21. And why did the Lord appoint Apostles and Ministers to carry the sound of the Gospel from one end of the earth to the other and subdueth Nations to the obedience of the Faith but that he may accomplish his promises made to his Son such as are recorded in Psal 89. 25 26 c. Now to the words of the Covenant Jer. 31. 31. repeated by the Apostle Heb. 8. 10. This is the Covenant that I will make with the house of Israel I will put my laws into their mindes and write them in their hearts and I will be to them a God and they shall be to me a people From whence Mr. Eyre infers That the Spirit and Faith is given by vertue of the Covenant made with us But I answer 1. That if Mr. Eyre will urge the words of this Text rigorously they would prove more then he would have For it is manifest That this Covenant contains a promise of sending Christ into the world and giving him up to death for our sins as the Apostle doth directly prove Heb. 10. 14 15 16. and why then may it not be inferred That the elect are in Covenant with God not onely before they believe but also before the death of the Mediator and so his death was not to obtain all or any of the blessings of the Covenant but onely as the Socinians to declare and confirm to us That we may believe that God of his own meer good will without expecting any satisfaction will do all this good for us for if it be a good consequence We are in Covenant before we believe because the Covenant promiseth to give us Faith Then is this also a good consequence We are in covenant before the death of Christ because the Covenant promiseth to give Christ to death And what answer Mr. Eyre will give to avoid this consequence for I presume he will not grant it and to defend his position that we are in Covenant with God upon the death of Christ and not before notwithstanding the Covenant Promise to give Christ the same Answer will serve my turn for the vindication of my Assertion That we are in Covenant with God upon believing and not before notwithstanding the same Covenant promise Faith 2. But upon a most serious perusual of this Text I finde it so contradictory to Mr. Eyr's purpose that I cannot but wonder what he means to shelter his Opinion under the protection of it If we read the words in Heb. 8. 10. or Jer. 31. 33. and