unworthy of this salvation whereof it hath pleased God in the Riches of his Grace to esteem us worthy therefore let it be your work to Rely upon and Rejoyce in this Grace and Favour against all the Suggestions of Satan and your own Heart touching your Weakness and Vnworthiness and let not these ore whelm you but rather plead them as the occasions by which Grace will be manifested and shew it self to be what it is Thus did Paul who when speaking of Christ's dying for sinners says 2 Tim. 1.1 of whom I am chief Thus David Psal 25.1 Luke 15.1 in begging the pardon of his sins says for they are great Thus the Prodigal I have sinned against Heaven and before thee Here is no mention of any Worthiness or Towardliness in them above others No there is none of this Stuff in any of their Pleas they quit all that to rely on Free Grace and meer Mercy they knew that to look for Salvation from any thing on this side that would be to forsake a Living Fountain and rest on a Cistern a broken Cistern and feeding themselves with Dreams and Fancies which when they a woke would leave them hardly bestead and hungry and therefore would by no means sit down under the shadow of that Gourd Vse 3. Thirdly Is it so thao we are saved by Free Grace and undeserved Favour Then by way of Exhortation be stirred up to Two Things First To be Adorers of it And Secondly Endeavour a walking suitable to it And First Is it so that we are saved by meer Grace Then magnifie and adore the Matchless Love of God in the discovery of his rich Grace to any of your Souls It is rich mercy that God would not betrust us with salvation in our own keeping but has laid it on the sure Foundation of his own Grace but the mercy is heightned and so might our Praise in that God has not only done thus for us but also revealed it to us Oh! The heighth and depth of this Love that what has been hid from Ages and is at this day hid from Millions of Souls should be revealed to such worthless Creatures that others should be left groping in their Natural Darkness seeking for help and find none And that God should make our way so clear is a mercy we can never admire enough Alas Had we a Thousand Hearts and every heart cut into Ten Thousand Peices and every peice capable of Admiring and Adoring this Love it were all too little But then Secondly As we must be adorers of it so we must endeavour a walking suitable to it where we Read That the Grace of God bringing salvation hath appeared unto all Men We see what Lesson it teaches 〈◊〉 2.11.12 That denying Vngodliness and worldly Lusts we should live Soberly Righteously and Godly in this present World Beware of turning the Grace of God into wantonness when Ministers Preached up the Riches of Gods Grace don't think it is to bolster you in your Sins but that by a Sense of the Riches of Gods Grace your hearts might be drawn out to walk worthy of it unto all pleasing as the Apostle expresses it Pos 1.10 If it have not this effect then hear your dreadful Doom that thou art yet in the Gall of bitterness and bond of Iniquity And have as the Apostle told Simon Magus Neither Lot nor part in this matter 〈◊〉 8.21.23 Tho salvation is made sure to us by Grace Yet self-denial and duely walking is what we must press after as the matter of our Imployment in this Life and as that which clears up our further hopes of salvation by Grace in another And altho we are saved by Grace yet let us not sin that Grace may abound Let us take heed of that for that would be a horrid conclusion To take encouragement to sin from the Freeness of Gods Grace would be a baâ—e requital Salvation by Grace requires another Guess kind of requital than this a requital of the highest Love Gratitude and Obedience that can be manifested Any Ingenious Spirit must needs confess that it is highly base and ingrate to requite Evil for Good seeing we are saved by rich free Grace and meer Mercy Let the Apostles Exhortation to the Romans prevail with you I beseech you therefore Brethren by the Mercies of God Rom. 1â— that you present your bodies a Living Sacrifice holy acceptable unto God which is your Reasonable Service Oh! be intreated by that matchless mercy of Free Grace that you don't trample upon God's Love but seeing we have such Promises of Life and Salvation by Grace be Honouring of it in a walking suitable to it Oh who would Abuse Love by taking Liberty from the Freeness of God's Grace to sin Who among you is not ready to blame Judas for betraying so good a Master And who would not abhor the Conspiracy of such a Subject whose Life his Prince hath spared of meer Grace The Prophet Ezra argues thus with the People Ezra â— after their Deliverance out of Bondage Seeing that our God hath punished us less than our Iniquities deserve should we again break thy Commandments Let us Reason thus with our own Souls seeing God in the Riches of his Grace is inclined to save such a worthless Creature as I am and to bring me to the Glory and Dignity of Saints and Angels shall I go on to sin against such Endearing Love as this Some says an Holy Man of God please themselves with a strange kind of Doctrine such as never entred into the mind of God That seeing they are saved by Grace they may live as they list in Rebellion to God and Godliness following Iniquity with greediness and yet go to Heaven Certainly had God opened such a Gap to Wickedness He could never have justly complained of the Deluge of Impiety that overflows the World Far be it from the Holy God whose Purity abhors Impiety to allow such Licentiousness No no God's Aim in the Large Discoveries of his Grace is to make you and I and every Soul in Love with it and to fall down in highest Adoration before it For when the Soul is truly made sensible of the Free Grace of God in Christ it makes that Soul cry out in Joseph's Language Gen. 39 9. Oh how shall this Soul thus saved by Grace dare to sin against the God of all Grace Oh that this might be the continual Frame of our Souls that the God of Grace may have no Cause to complain of us as of Israel Deut. 32.6 Do ye thus requite the Lord O Foolish People and unwise Salvation laid on its Right Foundation SERMON II. EPH. II. 8. For by Grace are ye saved through faith and that not of your selves it is the gift of God HAving finished the former part of the Text wherein we have proved the Doctrine of Salvation by Grace we come to see the way God takes in conveying this Salvation down to us through Faith
most humble Supplicant at the Throne of Grace R.C. Jan. xxix 1698. A Word to the Admirers of Free Grace especially those who were hearers of these Sermons Dear Friends ONE would think the Doctrine of Free Grace is so Illustrious in Scripture as not to be spoken against but seeing it meets with great opposition from the Arminian Party who are desirous not only to be Teachers but Thunderers of the Law understanding not what they say nor whereof they affirm especially when they charge Antinomianism upon the Preachers of Free Grace who are so far from being Enemies to the Law that it may be easily made appear they are better Friends to it than our Opponents who instead of yeilding a full and perfect Obedience to the Law put it off with Lame Imperfect Performances when the Admirers of Free Grace are for having it satisfied to the full in that they plead the compleat and plenary satisfaction made by their Elder Brother the Lord Jesus 〈◊〉 1. The Opposition I say the Doctrine of Free Grace meets with was a means to Midwife these Sermons into the world which otherwise would have been buried in Oblivion the Author retaining a deep sense of his Inability for such a work as also the great discouragement he at present lies under having of late been toss'd upon the blustring Waves and Billows of Envy and Reproach which Storm was so violent and tempestuous one Wave beating in upon the Neck of another that his sinking Spirits are scarce recover'd in which Storm he 'll not tell you now how sorely he was shot at by some nor how Indecorously he was dealt with by others seeing it may be said of all these Storms as of Julian's Persecution Nubecula cito Transitura they 'll soon be blown over and then follows a perpetual Calm This short Night of Sorrow will produce such a bright and lasting Morning of Joy as will never suffer Eclipse more in which you 'll see many Heirs of Grace in Heaven whom you thought hardly sit to live upon the Earth And a matchless mercy it is that God sees not as Man sees Man looks at the outward Appearance the Worthiness and Towardliness in us above others but God looks upon us as cloathed in the Righteousness of his own Son which he of his Free Grace hath bemantled us with and wrapt us in The Design of the ensuing Discourse is to magnify God's Grace and the Freeness of it and to prove we are saved wholly by Grace from first to last our Election Redemption Conversion all is from special Discriminating distinguishing Grace we have not the least thing to Glory in as if we had made our selves to differ from those that Perish But we must wonder here and to all Eternity in Heaven that we should find Grace in the sight of the Lord. In handling the point I have endeavoured the avoiding all Rhetorical Flourishes as no way Condecent to a Truth so weighty and misterious in it self and in this it is masticated and prepared for the more unintelligible Reader The Author hopes those many Reflections cast upon him which were exhal'd out of the Bog of Ignorance and Malice will not prejudice those to whom he is known against the Truths treated upon in the following Tract because Published by him and also that his real weaknesses which he humbly acknowledges to have been not a few Will no ways Impede the chearful Embracing of and closing in with the Soul-Refreshing Truths laid down in the following Discourse He is sensible it has been his Lot to have his Actions viewed with the Green Spectacles of prejudice and you know through a Green Glass every thing appears Green and he also knows it is the Easiest thing of a Thousand for a malicious mind to soyle the Glory of the bravest and most beautiful Actions with ill and wrong Interpretations And it were well if both Ministers and People would Learn more tenderly to handle the Reputation of one another it being like a white Ball which sully's by being tost from hand to hand professors themselves being in this case too well acquainted with Addition and Multiplication And where is that Man which does not sometimes such Actions as he would not have discretion scan Integrity it self would not be aw'd by a blabbing spy It is therefore to be wisht that Men in all their Commerce would make appeals to their own Consciences would I have this measure meeted out to my own Soul And Oh! That Men would abhor speaking that of another which they would not have another speak of them or Condemn that in any one which we would not but have pardoned in our selves And Oh! know if that Man or Woman you defame be a Child of God you must expect to pay dearly for it What says God to Aaron and Miriam Saints 〈◊〉 12.8 Were you not afraid to speak against my Servant Moses seeing they were not Miriam suffers sorely for it Ver. 9.10 And so shall those who upon the Malicious Instigation of a Viperine Brood or their own base Hearts deride Reproach or disgrace any of the Members of Christ For most dangerous it is to Rake in those sores which the Blood of Christ hath healed The Author would not have dwelt so long upon what is so disgressive from the matter contained in the subsequent Tract had he not been sorely pounded in the morter of Reproach In which State he through Grace being free from that Gun-Powder Spirit which every little spark blows up has pressed after having a heart fraught full of Holy Magnanimity and Heavenly Greatness which walks so high as to slight and disregard the Frowns of Honoured Insolency and to Trample upon the Scorns and Taunts of Dunghill Malice still keeping on his way of admiring Free Grace and Relying upon it To conclude the Sermons you are presented with might have been more Polite and Accurate had the Author designed the Accumulating any praise to himself which he being no ways Ambitious of offers them to you as they are begging that for you which he often does for himself even that your Souls may be gathered to that People who have a Principle and Heart given them of God 〈◊〉 15. to say to Eternity Not unto us O Lord not unto us but unto thy Name be all the Praise of the hopes of our Salvation R. C. Salvation laid on its Right Foundation SERMON I. EPH. II. 8. For by Grace are ye saved through faith and that not of your selves it is the gift of God AS this Great and Blessed Apostle was Eminently carried forth in Magnifying the Riches of God's Free Grace in all his Epistles so was he in a Superlative manner in this to the Ephesians which in general may be called by the Apostle's own Direction his Knowledge in the Mystery of Christ Chap. 3 Ver 4. In the Two First Chapters he discourses of Election the foundation of every Believers happiness shewing the freeness of God's grace in saving his
people by Christ Gentiles as well as Jews In the Third Chapter he recapitulates or repeats his Doctrine to the Church of Ephesus begging that they may have the sense use and comfort of it in those troublesom times into which the Churches were soon cast In the Three last Chapters he exhorts them to all holy Duties as best suiting with that holy Doctrine he had delivered and if in these Church-rending Times this blessed Apostle were consulted withal as such a famous Oracle deserves we should be more free from that Soul destroying Errour of Arminianism on the one hand and from that Spirit of Prophaneness which turns the grace of God into Wantonness on the other hand In this Chapter of the Text the Apostle shews first what we are by nature 〈◊〉 3. ◠5. ◠3.2 scil dead in Trespasses and Sins Secondly What we are by grace that is saved as Firebrands pluck't out of the burning snatch'd or delivered out of a State of Nature and placed or set over into the Kingdom of Grace Thirdly Here is what Grace makes viz. fruitful in good Works By Grace are ye saved through Faith and that not of your selves it is the gift of God The Apostle having in the aforegoing Verses shewed the Ephesians now quickned in Christ what they were by nature and giving every one of them to understand withal that God did only thus for the manifestation of the glory of his rich grace supposing that they would thus conclude if God hath done all for us out of our selves in Christ if there is nothing but his rich grace that may glory then it seems all our Salvation is of grace This conclusion the Apostle readily grants and lays down this Apostolical Doctrine more at large so as he pulls down every thing which would advance it self against this great truth of God and this he does by laying down the true causes of our Salvation positively in this 8th verse By Grace are ye saved Secondly By rejecting in the Verse following the false supposed Causes negatively not of Works we shall give you the Explication of the Words and so come to a Doctrinal Observation By Grace are ye saved Grace is put sometimes for the Favour of God sometimes for the Effect of God's Favour in us when the Apostle says Not I but the grace of God in me Here it is to be understood of the rich grace in God out of us which only stands in love good-will and kindness in Christ and Works and the new Creature which is the life of Grace are afterwards executed Now the favour of God is Two-fold First a more common and inferiour Grace Secondly a more special rich Grace not Grace derived from the Law but Rich Gospel Grace in which the New Testament with all the Benefits of it have their Foundation We are Saved there is a double Salvation for Man God is the Saviour of all He Saves Man and Beast but He is in an especial manner the Saviour of them that Believe Now this Salvation is to be considered two Ways either as begun or compleat Now He speaks roundly and fully of our Salvation from beginning to the ending as the Context clears against all Exception By Grace are ye Saved through Faith Faith is considered two Ways the one absolutely in it self as a Virtue and a Radical Virtue the other in Relation to Christ Thus we are here to understand it Faith on Christ Christ now believed on and Faith which is through Him are equipotent of equal Force taken both as one Faith therefore notes Christ applied in us by Belief these two you may see ranked under Grace as which can only stand with it Rom. 3.24 we are Justified freely by His Grace The Apostle comes to prevent the Corruption of Man thus surmising that if we are to be Saved by Faith then something is to be given to us why because we of our own free will Believed no tho of Faith yet you can't challenge any thing because it is not from any strength in you by which you Believed but the Lord He bestowed this upon you He drawed you or you could never have Believed and therefore the Apostle adds it is the Gift of God Whatsoever we can do it is not to be trusted upon nor rejoyced in because it is of God and this is your bounden Duty Ver. ◠as being Created to this very purpose That which we are not of our selves we must not boast our selves as deserving the same but our Salvation is not of our selves it is of God Whatsoever you are you are it of God His Grace makes you to differ and therefore we have no Cause or Matter to trust upon or rejoyce in not of your selves not by reason of any desert of Graces in us or good Works that come from us as is Confirmed in the Verse following Ver. 9. So then what we may collect and gather by way of Doctrine or Observation is this Doct. That the Free Grace of God or God's Free Favour is the Ground of our Salvation and the Reasons why God will Save his by meer Free Grace and undeserved Favour are these Rea. 1. First That in the Ages to come He might shew the exceeding Riches of His Grace in His Kindness towards us through Christ Jesus and that this is the very Reason the Apostle himself produces to Confirm the Doctrine of Salvation by Grace clearly appears by comparing the fifth Verse with the Seventh God Saves His by meer Free Grace and undeserved Favour because He will make way for the Manifestation of the exeeeding Riches of his Grace to after Generations Which Grace would have lain hid and never have been admired and esteemed if we were to be Saved either in whole or in part by our own Performances if the Saints as a Holy Man of God was wont to say were not Saved by Free Grace by meer Grace and nothing else they would make but poor Musick in Heaven for they would be ready to ascribe the Praise due to the Riches of God's Grace to their own good Works and look upon their Performances as their Saviours they would look upon what they have done as the procuring Cause that brought them thither and then you may easily imagine their would be but cold Singing before the Throne of God but little setting forth of the Riches of his Grace to lay Salvation upon any other Basis besides the Free Grace and Favour of God would be to frustrate the principal end of Man's Salvation namely the Glory of God's Grace which Attribute of all the rest he will not have Eclipsed nor Intrenched upon 't is so Divinely Sacred as not to admit the least Humane touch for which very Cause the Lord hath so contrived that blessed Design of his Glory That all boasting is shut out and no Flesh suffered to Glory in his Presence But if any thing in the Creature be intituled to the Causalty of Salvation Cor. 1. Flesh will
glory and instead of excluding Man's boasting Grace it self will be excluded which is far from a Glorifying of it as is plain from Rom. 11.6 So that this is one Reason why God will Save His by Free Grace and undeserved Favour because He will make way for the Manifestation of the Riches of his Grace to after Generations that they may be Admirers of it and rely upon it Secondly A Second Reason why God will Save His by meer Free Grace and undeserved Favour is because He will utterly Exclude Works Grace and Works being Inconsistent in the Cause of Salvation the Scripture is very wary and cautelous of admitting any thing as a Co-Partner with Grace in this Matter the design of which is to take us off from Leaning on the Graces in us or good Works that come from us and that God takes this way in Saving His People is very clear and evident from that Weighty and Soul-Refreshing Scripture 2 Tim. 1.9 Who hath Saved and Called us with an Holy Calling n t according to our Works but according to his Purpose and Grace which was given us in Christ Jesus before the World began Whence it doth undeniably appear That it is not from any thing in us but God's Favour which doth work all for us Now that this may shine the clearer let us consider the difference between the Covenant of the Law and of the Gospel For the First there was the Grace of God in this that He would stoop so low as to Contract a Covenant with Man of Righteousness and Life when a l that Man could do were Offices due for that which he had already received in his Creation But first this Covenant was not stricken or made up in a Mediator Secondly this Covenant was not to be performed for any other but for the Righteousness which should have been found in our selves Thirdly we should in this Covenant have procured the Blessings of God unto our selves so that though there was Grace in a large Sense that God would enter into Covenant when He was not 〈◊〉 yet 〈◊〉 consider that in the Gifts inherent in us by Creation 〈◊〉 founded that for our Righteousness and Works we should have had the things covenanted applied that we should then have procured these things Here is Grace that God entered into Covenant but it is not Rich Free Grace because Man if He had stood might have challenged his Justification and Life as a Debt due for his performances not as a meer gift from Grace But now the Lord does all of Grace For First The Foundation of our Righteousness and Life he hath made out of us in his Son Jesus Christ Secondly The Lord for his Christ apprehended by us performs all things not for any thing in us but for his Christ He does not make us procurers of those things but in Christ does himself prepare them for us that our Rejoycing might be in him In this there is Grace yea and Rich Gospel Grace that God doth covenant in the Mediator that He bestows his Precious Son upon us and reveals him to us and does for him make us partakers of Righteousness and Life Here is Grace othergates Grace than that under the Law for that required inherent Righteousness as that which alone could Justify us This Rich Grace Pelagians Arminians Free-willers c. are strangers too they are unacquainted with the Grace of the New Covenant for this is not that Rich Grace because God having pardoned our Sins does give us the graces of His Spirit that we might be Righteous and Live for if this were all that we are saved And First of Grace because God undeservedly hath given those Graces which makes us Righteous and deserve Salvation Then Adam thus standing might be saved by Grace because those deservings were given him of the Grace of God So that the point is very clear that God in the Riches of his Free Grace and Favour doth justify us 2.11 The Grace of God bringing Salvation unto all Men hath appeared So that the meer Grace of God not excited by any works but working of its own accord hath the whole stroke in the matter of our salvation and this is what was well known in the time of the Old Testament The Lord having declared himself a God Gracious to whom he would be Gracious Exod. 33.19 and God will thus save his in a way of excluding works because his Glory is most dear unto him He has said Isa 42.8 He will not give it to another God will have no Co-partner with him in the work of salvation he hares and abhors that Arrogance and Impudence in Man in going about to Intrude something of his own so be sharers with him in that Great work and therefore God doth so save us to the barring and shuting out of Works and so work in the business of our Salvation that Man may have no matter of rejoycing out of God Who doth all this work in himself out of man that whoso rejoyceth might rejoyce in the Lord according to that of the Apostle He that Glorieth let him Glory in the Lord. Notwithstanding 1 Cor. 1. ult all which we readily joyn with and bow before the Apostles assertion That they which believe Tit. 3.8 ought to maintain good works Grace does not exclude works in the way of salvation only when they are brought in as Co partners or joynt causers thereof and in this case they are to be wholly excluded Grace being the true and only cause of our salvation and works if right and truly good will always be ready to own their Original and to keep in their own place where also they will appear most amiable and be most serviceable But Thirdly a third Reason Rea. 3d. why God will save his by meer Free Grace and undeserved favour why Free Grace is the ground of their salvation Is because it could not consist with the wisdom and goodness of God to found the salvation of his People on a failable bottom which it must be said to be if dependent on any thing besides his unchangeable Grace and Love for whatever it was that salvation had being from by that also it must be maintained What then would have become of it if built on that Goodness Which is as the Morning Cloud and early dew Hâ—â— 6.4 God therefore build it 〈◊〉 a firmer Foundation Viz. His own Free Grace 〈◊〉 the Creatures Goodness even whilst in a State of Perfection to be too sickle and slight a thing to build so great a work upon Fourthly a Fourth Reason Why Free Grace is the ground of our salvation or why God will save his by meer grace and undeserved favour Is because such is the Nature and Substance of the Covenant of Grace to give freely without being moved from any thing in Man All that God does for those he will save is for his Names sake which Name is recorded in Exod. 34.5 and 6. The Lord God