Selected quad for the lemma: faith_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
faith_n	conscience_n	good_a	shipwreck_n	6,895	5	12.1671	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
B06542	A brief, and plain apology written by John Wheelwright: wherein he doth vindicate himself, from al [sic] those errors, heresies, and flagitious crimes, layed to his charge by Mr. Thomas Weld, in his short story, and further fastened upon him, by Mr. Samuel Rutherford in his survey of antinomianisme. Wherein free grace is maintained in three propositions, and four thesis [sic] ...	Wheelwright, John, 1594-1679.	1658 (1658)	Wing W1604; ESTC R186427	40,565	36

my outward man I must needs say you have laboured to the utmost to bring me to ruine in my self Wife Eleven children Family posterity by such acts before in and after my banishment as I shal not now mention for I love not to complaine I serve no hard master the Lord is my sheild and my exceeding great reward yet even in this regard hath not the Lord delivered me over unto the wil of my adversaries blessed be his name If I and mine be ruinated by you temporally and prosper spiritually ye shal do us no great hurt by such a ruine What though ye thought evil against me the Lord meant it unto good But why do you cal your doings in exiling and afflicting of me the Lords marvellous doings The question then is this whether your proceedings against me be Gods work or yours This may easily be thus determined If you can make it appear that I am an Antinomian Familist Libertine Seducer guilty of Contempt of Authority and Sedition The Author of al these errors and heresies to which you relate me in the short story that I am such a flagitious heretick evil man and seducer and vile miscreant as you paint me forth to be then may the proceedings be accounted Gods worke If you cannot make this apparent then is your proceedings against me your own injurious unrighteous and more sinful work in which you live impenitent to this day by a dangerous defect which lyeth in your wils I do acknowledg that this worke of which you so much boast was the Lords marvellous decreed and permitted work but if you cannot make it evident that it was the Lords marvellous commanded and approved doings it makes nothing against me nor for you The Lord in mercy grant that this work which you have made with me that you so highly extol magnify and put upon record amongst Gods marvellous doings be never layd to the charge of New England If I should answer to al the objections and criminations made against me by the short story I should to little purpose weary out my self and the reader What I have thought required any reply to that I have answered the rest I pass by in silence committing my self and my cause unto him who judgeth righteously Mr. Samuel Rutherford in his survey of Antinomianisme finding me deeply wounded and cast out amougst a company of Antinomians Familists Libertines as their head and leader by the writer of the short story falls upon me smites me 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 shoots many a deadly Arrow through the very heart of my good name The passages which I take notice of in the survey relating to me are these following 1 Except my heart deceive me give me leave to borrow an expression of Job if I lift up my hand or a bloody pen against the truly Godly or have a pick at holyness let my arme fal from my shoulder blade and mine arme be broken from the bone Job 31.21.22 Epist Page 1. 2 It was observed in New England when Familists grew and in other parts of New England Familists devised such a difference between the Covenant of works and of grace especially after a Sermon preached by Mr. Wheelwright a prime familist c. Page 38. 39. 3 If Familists have such revelations 1. They see the visions of God 2. They speak as acted by the spirit immediatly and so we are by the same certainty of faith to beleeve what H. Nicholas Wheelwright c. Pag. 40. 4 Mr. Knop prophesied of the hanging of the Lord of Grange Mr. John Davison uttered prophesies known to many of the Kingdom divers holy and mortified preachers in England have done the like No familists or Antinomians no David George nor H. Nicholas no man of that Gang Randal or Wheelwright or Den. c. Page 42. 5. The first author of these wicked opinions were N. Wheelwright some adherents to Mr. Wheelwright c. Page 176. 6 Mr. Wheelwright and others were convened before a civil Court in Massachuset October 2. 1637. For disturbance of the publick peace where in the Month of March Mr. Wheelwright was convict of Sedition upon occasion whereof a number of Familists gave in a petition or remonstrance complaining that their beloved Mr. Wheelwright was condemned for no fault whereas his doctrine was no other then the very expressions of the Holy-Ghost himself though he had said expresly that Magistrates Ministers and most of the people were under a Covenant of works and therefore were enemies to Christ such as Herod Pilate Scribes Pharasees and encouraged the people to rise up against them as Phylistins c. Page 177. 178. Part. 1. By what I have here transcribed out of the survey it is evident that Mr. Rutherford makes himself my judg Severing me in his notion from the sheep and sets me amonst goats condemning me amongst the rest as a man not truely Godly And that he so judgeth he sweares oppignorating his Arme to the Shoulder blade This is a dreadful sentence which is passed against me in respect of my personal standing by Mr. Rutherford If he had thus judged me according to the Gospel I should have trembled but because it is done according to his own imagination and especially the short story I despise it Whether I truly feare God or no is better known to me then Mr. Rutherford I do not love to speak of any great matters concerning my self the cheif of al sinners yet seeing I am called and compelled thereunto I shal a little glory in the Lord. After seven yeares spirit of bondage as I remember for the space of this five and twenty yeares or there abouts ever since the loving kindness of our Lord and Saviour did appeare to the eye of my faith justifying of me freely by his grace I have through Gods infinite mercy known in whom I do beleeve and though I have been assaulted with innumerable temptations outward and inward in these perillous deluding times yet have I not through mercy put away a good Conscience or made shipwrack of my faith Doubtless Mr. Rutherford is a very learned man and I hope a Godly man yet is he but a man and this judgment of his is meerly mans judgment it proceeds not from God With me it is a very smal thing to be judged of him or of mans judgment but he that judgeth me is the Lord. By the grace of God I am what I am After that he hath thus judged my person then he comes to condemne my doctrine and practise He cals me a Familist a prime Familist Author of those wicked opinions mentioned in the short story a man convicted of Sedition and what not If I were such a man as he describes he might wel judg me to be a man that doth not truly feare God he might know me by my fruit But this fruit is the fruit of my adversaries vain imaginations and through Gods great goodness did never grow on me If I had been such a man as you

a sense as the words seem to carry considered by themselves without any Relation to that which goes before or follows You dis-member wrest torture by putting upon the rack some broken Notes of an extemporary Sermon and make them speak what you think good against the Preacher and where they are altogether silent and speak not one word you put in words of your own which makes for your purpose Let such dealings pass for current what Sermon can be Preached by any Minister of the Gospel which ye may not arraign accuse condemne banish as guilty of Heresie contempt of Authority Sedition and what not No man can say with a good Conscience That I did at any time in publick or private in Old England or in New deny true Sanctification to be a good evidence I look at Works of Sanctification to be no dubious nor litigious evidence but demonstrative and infallible without which the imagined spirits witness is delusory and al supposed Faith is vain The Sanctification which I denyed to be any good evidence are certain effects of the spirit of bondage and works of the law and I taught That an act of Faith founded upon them is not saving and according to the Gospel but legal against them who never knew their inward call or hear and learn of the Father and so by Faith come unto Christ The inward witness of the Spirit in a simple promise of grace is not immediately and in it self discerned by them but by their legal Reformation going under the name of sanctification These are my apprehensions concerning our evidencing a good estate The immediate foundation of that act of Faith by which we are perswaded That Christ and his benefits is ours and by which we do receive him is the free simple absolute promise of grace applied by the spirit in our effectual call which is called throughout the Gospel by way of excellency the promise and therefore al Gods children are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the children of the promise Rom. 9 8. This Promise indeed is indefinite yet is it determined to every Elect person in his efficacious call The indefinite Promise with a commandment to believe and make it particular comes not in word only but also in Power and in the holy Ghost from whence he can thus conclude I am perswaded to believe by Christ not only outwardly in his words but inwardly by his Spirit in my heart that the promise and Christ promised belongs unto me therefore Christ with al his benefits is mine The medium of the particular Application of the general Promise is the inward witness of the spirit of Adoption who as Mr. Perkins saith in his Sermon entituled Christ the true and perfect gain beareth witness to our consciences of such things as God hath given us in particular and are only in general manner propunded in the Promise The Apostle Paul grounded his Faith upon this simple promise The indefinite runs thus Christ loved the world and gave himself for the world Christ came into the world to save sinners Paul applies it and makes it particular according to Christs command for thus he expresseth himself He loved me and gave himself for me Gal. 2.20 Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners of which I am chief 1 Tim. 1.15 How came Paul to make this application Because he was perswaded thereunto not only outwardly in the word but inwardly by the spirit in his heart 1 Cor. 10.12 The Apostle John saith That he that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself 1 Joh. 5.10 Believing on the Son of God is the effect the witness in himself the cause Mr. Calvin thus expounds it Non dicit Deum extra loqui sed unumquemque fidelem intus in seipso sentire fidei suae authorem If it be objected That our first act of Faith cannot be a perswasion that Christ is ours because he is not ours antecedently to our act of believing that seems to me easily to be answered Christ unites himself unto us by his Spirit in our effectual call infusing the seed of Faith and al other saving graces is in us novo modo operandi gives us a new heart and puts his spirit within us Ezek. 36.26 27. Christ is ours by a passive Reception antecedently in order to our act of believing Christ unites himself unto us by his spirit before we joyn our selves to him by an act of believing Phil. 3.12 Faith being thus founded upon the free simple promise of grace applied by the spirit of promise is confirmed divers wayes 1. First by works of Sanctification the immediate proper effects thereof For though the habit of Faith be not the cause of the habits of other Christian vertues yet is the act of faith the spirits instrument to produce al acts of sanctity as being apprehensive of Gods grace mercy love in Christ and other motives and perswasives to induce to good works receiving strength from Christ enabling us to perform them So that true faith works by love which love with other Christian vertues wherein we do resemble Christ to whom we are united are unto us a seal of that fellowship we have with him according to that of the Apostle In whom after ye believed ye were sealed with the holy spirit of Promise Ephes 1.13 The spirit in sealing of us imprints in some measure the very image of Christ upon us consisting in righteousness and true holiness being not only holy in his essence and nature but in regard of his gracious effects in us All these works of Sanctification are so many arguments of the truth of our Faith 1 John 2.3 3.14 They are distinguishing marks and put a manifest difference between the children of God and the children of the Devil 1 John 3.10 They who do not know God to be their God as wel by putting his law in their inward parts and writing it in their hearts as by forgving their iniquities were never truly taught of God Jer. 31.33 34. This is one end of the spirits giving that holy spirit that spirit of sanctification not only to work sanctification but to teach us to know it amongst other things which are freely given us of God 1 Cor. 2.12 This hath been practised by Job David Hezekiah Paul and the whole Church of the Elect believers and saints from time to time in al generations who after that they had built their Faith upon Christ revealed offered given in the free promise did under-prop confirm strengthen the same by works of sanctification 2. Secondly by the immediate testimony of the holy Ghost There is an inward testimony of the spirit common to al true Christians Rom 8.16 which I take to be an act of the spirit applying the Gospel with such power as we perceive it is the spirit who speaks and it be gets in us an affured Faith 1 Thess 1.5 This is immediate in and by the word of grace for of his own wil begat he us

the truth and shall assure our hearts before him doth thus Comment Semper autem me minerimus non habere nos ex charitate notitiam quam dicit Apostolus quasi inde petenda sit salutis certitude certe non aliunde cognoscimus nos esse filios Dei nisi quia gratuitam suam Adoptionem cordibus nostris per spiritum suum obsignat Et nos certum ejus pignus in christo oblatum fide amplectimur This is the question here determined by Mr. Calvin How we come first to know that we are the Children of God and by the like reason justified He denies that it is by any argument taken from our love How then By the inward witness of the Spirit perswading us of our Adoption What use then are we to make of our love to the Brethren in point of evidencing It under props saith he and strengthens our perswasion These are his words Est igitur charitas accessio vel adminiculum inferius al sidei fulturam non fundamentum quo nititur Zanchie upon Ephes 5.1 draws this as an inference from that text Sciamus ergo pro fundamento christianae Pietatis teneamus hoc primum principium fidem i. certissimam perswasionem de remissione peccatorum ex solâ paterna clementia condonatorum causam esse omnium virtutum omnium bonorum operum omnisque verae obedientiae They who stand for the first evidencing of Works overthrow this fundamental principle The Answer which Mr. Cotton gives to this Question Whether some saving qualification may be a first evidence of Justification is thus set down by himself in terminis A man may have an Argument from thence yea I doubt not a firm and strong Argument but not a first evidence In his Answer to Mr. Baylie Object 1. Keeping Gods Commandments and love to the Brethren are brought in by the Apostle John as first evidences of Justification 1 John 2.3 3.14 Answ These and the like Scriptures strongly argue That works of Sanctification are cerrain evidences of a good estate which is a truth so clearly held forth in Gods Word as if it were written with a beam of the Sun But can it be concluded from hence That John and the Christians to whom he wrote amongst which they of the lowest rank did know the Father had received an unction from the holy One and knew all things had no former evidence of their justification Did they never hear the inward witness of the Spirit nor see their Falth by which they did receive this witness Did they conclude a good estate by reflecting upon their keeping Gods Commandments and love to the Brethren without any immediate discerning of their inward Call or their act or acts of believing as precedent in order to their works Whether was this keeping Gods Commandments and love to the Brethren the procreant cause of their knowing and believing the love of God to them or the contrary The Apostle puts it out of doubt 1 Joh. 4.16.20 We know and believe the love that God hath to us What effect doth this produce We love him because he first loved us It is our knowing and believing that God loved us first even from eternity that makes us love him This is then the Apostles meaning We who have received the Spirit of Adoption whereby we cry Abba Father we who are believers are confirmed in our Faith because it is operative and works causing us to keep Gods Commandments and this special Commandment of loving the Brethren What is the keeping of Gods Commandments but charity out of a pure heart and Faith unfeined 1 Tim. 1.5 Faith whereby we are truly perswaded of Gods mercy towards us in Christ is the mother of a good Conscience and charity What is love to the Brethren but an holy affection wrought in us by the Holy Ghost whereby upon the apprehension of Gods love to us in Christ we do from our very hearts wish well unto them and study to do them all the good we can 1 Joh. 4.16.19 20. Truly we should neither love God nor the Brethren nor his Commandments did he not first make known his love in Christ to us Mr. Calvin upon these words 1 Joh. 2.3 And hereby we do know that we know him if we keep his Commandments writes thus Notandus est hic orde quum dicit nos cognoscere quod noverimus Significat Dei obedientiam sic conjunct am esse scientiae ut tamen haes ordine fit prior ●cuti necesse est causam effectu suo esse priorem Object 2. An Effect argues the Cause as well as the Cause doth its Effect Why may we not begin with keeping Gods Commandments and love to the Brethren to evidence a good estate and make them our first evidences We can know by fruit that there is a tree upon which it did grow and by streams that there is a fountain from which they did flow though we never see the tree or the spring Answ The tree doth naturally bring forth its fruits and the fountain sends out its streams without any act of ours whether we see them or not But Justification which is a gracious act of God acquitting of us from our sins and accepting us as just for the righteousness sake of Christ received by Faith doth not cause us to bring forth works of Righteousness and true holiness by a meer Physical force but as apprehended by Faith which works by love Gal. 5.6 The perswasion that Mary Magdalene had of the pardon of her many sins made her love much Luk. 7.46 If a tree did not bring forth fruit nor a fountain send out water but by our looking on them as the instrumental cause surely we should see the tree as going before the fruit and the spring-head before the streams Good works are such effects as are caused by our apprehension of Gods mercy towards us in Christ Object 3. No man can limit God to what evidence he shall first bring into the Conscience of a justified estate Answ True yet can God limit himself He can do more by his absolute power than he doth by that which is actual If the Lord wil have all works of sanctification to be done in Faith out of love without a slavish fear as so many acts of gratitude for our Redemption through Christ they who deny sanctification to be the first evidence do not limit God but are limitted by God The Gospel is as immutable in the order as in the substance of its parts being an everlasting Gospel Rev. 14.6 Object 4. Many of Gods Children can evidence to themselves a good estate by their love to God his children and commandments who never were perswaded of Gods love to them by any argument taken either from the inward testimony of the holy Ghost or their act or acts of beleeving Answ This is asserted gratis but not proved How did those Children of God come unto Christ Surely they were taught of God and heard the spirits inward call He

Assurance of Faith Assurance of Faith may be taken in a Twofold sense 1. Largely for whatsoever assurance we have of Gods special love to us in Christ from Scripture-grounds in which sense a conclusion deduced from true Works of Sanctification is a conclusion of Faith beleeved in its premises or one of them the other being known by spiritual sense The witness which the spirit gives in a conditional promise is as true as that which he bears in an absolute promise No man living saith Vega should ever draw me to doubt of my being in the state of Grace if I might infer it out of two Propositions the one beleeved and the other made some way evident unto me 2ly Assurance of Faith may be taken strictly and properly for our first perswasion we have of Gods mercy towards us in Christ 1 Thess 1.5 This distinction is in use amongst Protestant Writers and the Papists understand them in this sense Certainty saith Mr. Perkins is either of Faith or Experimental which Papists call Moral Certainty by Faith is to apply the promise of salvation to our selves and to beleeve without doubting that remission of sins belongs unto us Moral certainty is that which proceeds from Works of sanctification as signs and tokens of true Faith Treat of Con. cap. 3. Bellarmine doth acknowledge this Moral certainty with this difference from us That it is only conjectural but he will by no means admit of that absolute perswasion precedent to our works calling it the Lutheran presumption They saith he will have their certainty to go before their works and not to follow them Tom. 4. Cap. 9. De Justificatione So that in this Thesis I do not deny simply that we have any assurance of Justification from our works of sancttification far be it from me but that the assurance which we have from our works is our first perswasion of Gods Grace and mercy towards us in Christ which properly in strictness of speech is called an assurance of Faith is denied by me In which respect I said in my Sermon That our first perswasion of Gods love was not by faith it self 1. By faith as an argument though it be by faith as an organ or instrument Consonant to this is that which is affirmed by Zanchy in his dispute with Mazhacchius about the order of evidencing our election page 361. Thus he writes Quis hic non videat apertè qualis fuerit sententia Buceri in hâc materiâ Nimirum ut incipiamus à priori id est contemplatione soluis divinae bonitatis gratiae in Christo oblatae in Evangelio revelatae Et inde certam persuasionem concipiamus nos vere fuisse ad aeternam salutem electos ideoque nunc efficaciter vocari Deinde descendamus ad id quod etiam revera est posterius nimirnm ad certum fidem assensum obsequium vocanti praebendum This is all which I do herein assert That our first perswasion of Gods mercy towards us in Christ is not founded upon any arguments taken from our works of sanctification which I have aboundantly proved in my second Proposition whether I refer the Reader THESIS II. That Justification goes in order before our Beleeving Justification by a passive Faith goes in order of Nature before our act of beleeving which is thus confirmed 1. We have the Spirit of Adoption are made partakers of divine Nature become new creatures before we put forth any act of Faith 1 Joh. 5.1 Joh. 1.12 13. This is Mr. Calvins Note upon this 13. vers Negat Evangelista posse quemquam credere nisi qui ex Deo genitus est Now whereas it seems by the twelfth verse that we are not the sons of God but consequently to our act of beleeving he doth thus answer it In respect of our sense we do not begin to be the sons of God but after faith 2. We are no sooner living in the first Adam but his sin is imputed unto us before we commit any actual sin Rom. 5. and by the like reason as soon as we live in the second Adam his righteousness is imputed unto us before we put forth any act of righteousness As in carnal Generation all men are born sinners even by imputation So in spiritual regeneration all men are born righteous having the righteousness of Christ imputed to them 3. If we be not justified antecedently to our act of beleeving then can a man in the state of condemnation do that eminent work of God to beleeve on Christ whereas except we be in Union with Christ and so by consequence in the state of Grace we can do nothing Joh. 15.5 To Beleeve is the act of a Person either in the state of Grace or in the state of condemnation Not of condemnation therefore of grace and we are justified before our act of Faith 4. Elect Infants dying before they come to years of discretion or sanctified in their Mothers Wombs are justified by the habit of Faith Persons in this state of Grace being adulti cease not to be justified when they fall into sownes or otherwise put forth no act of Faith which I suppose would follow were they not justified by the seed of Faith If the seed failed in such a case so much as the act doth by what band should they be united unto Christ And how could persons out of union with Christ be justified The Belgick Professors in the Synod of Dort give this as a reason Why the Faith by which we are first converted and from which we are called Beleevers is not an act but an habit infused of God because otherwise oft upon one and the same day we should be Beleevers and Unbeleevers the children of God and the children of the Devil It would I conceive upon the same ground follow That were we not justified by rhe habit of Faith but only by the act we should many times be successively justified and unjustified Chamier thus expresseth himself I say it is most true That justifying Faith doth follow if not in time yet in order justification Mr. Cotton saith in his New Covenant page 55. A man is as passive in regeneration as in his first generation only God giveth his spirit that doth unite us unto Christ which is received by Faith together with Adoption and Justification and yet by the act of Beleeving we are justified also Gal. 2.16 that is manifested to be justified in our own consciences Object 1. This is against the judgement of our Orthodox Divines who generally make Faith an instrumental cause of our Justification Answ They who do affirm That in our active conversion we perceive and receive Christ by an act of Faith do not deny a passive reception precedent to that act in our conversion wherein we are altogether passive Object 2. The Scripture never saith That we are justified by the habit of Faith but rather by the act Answ The Scripture doth not say That we are justified by the habit or act of Faith in