Selected quad for the lemma: ground_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
ground_n	believe_v	faith_n	receive_v	1,549	5	5.5472	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A38139	A short review of some reflections made by a nameless author upon Dr. Crisp's sermons, in a piece entituled Crispianism unmask'd with some remarks upon the union in the late agreement in doctrin among the dissenting ministers in London : subscribed the 16th of December, 1692, and that as referring unto the present debates ... / by Thomas Edwards, esq.	Edwards, Thomas, fl. 1693-1699.; Crisp, Tobias, 1600-1643.	1693 (1693)	Wing E236; ESTC R31409	64,054	46

then to pray for the forgiveness of our sins is no more but to pray that God would manifest to us that God hath forgiven our sins and that it may be clear that God hath forgiven our sins before we do pray for the forgiveness of them And that Prayer is grounded upon God's act before hand made Consider this one thing I would ask this of you you that pray for forgiveness of your sins do you pray in Faith or do you not If you pray not in Faith mark what the Apostle James saith He that prayeth let him pray in Faith nothing doubting He that wavereth let him not think he shall obtain any thing at the hands of the Lord Beloved your Prayers stink and are abominable in the Nostrils of God if you do not pray in Faith Well you pray in Faith you will say if you pray in Faith if you pray for the forgiveness of sin in Faith what is the ground of your Faith If you do believe you have a ground for your Faith You will say the Grant and Word of God is Page 370. the ground of your Faith Well if the Grant of God be the ground of your believing then the Grant hath a being before your Faith and so consequently before your prayer is made And do we not know that we ought to pray for the Fall of Babylon and that from this ground That she is fallen already in the irreversible determination of God Rev. 14. 8. And though she be not yet actually fallen must we not therefore pray for her fall Unless we can bring God's Decrees and irrevocable Purposes actually to depend upon our own Duties and Prayers This is our Author 's constant practice That he would assign more to our Duties and Graces nay so displa●e them that they are neit●er Duties indeed nor Graces for the obtaining of this or the other benefit and mercy than unto God himself as the express and fixedly donor of them even before we ask them upon which it is indeed that both our requesting d●sposition receptive and improving ability wholly depends Hence it is under which he betakes himself as unto a forlorn refuge p. 16. That if so how can we pray for the hallowing of God's Name or that his Kingdom should come whereas if both of the same had not been absolutely determined of God the matter of Prayer as enjoyned of Christ upon his Disciples would have been wholly in vain so the same as to the forgiveness of sins or trespasses he quotes p. 369. out of the Dr's Treatise which I cannot find though the substance of the place has been cited already And further proceeds in his quotation from p. 561. That the Dr. is an enemy to Prayer whose citation and the Dr's end therein I shall lay before thee Thus much he quotes out of him and annexes it barely unto an act of duty not regarding wherefore or for what ends the same was spoken which take as follows Beloved Christ became our Surety God accepted of him for our Debt he cl●●'d Christ in Goal as I may so say for the debt God Dr. Crisp's Works Vol. 3. p. 560. took every Farthing that he could demand of us he is now reconciled unto us he hath acknowledged satisfaction it is upon Record And now shall he come upon them again with fresh wrath for whom Christ hath done all this Shall he charge the debt upon them again He hath forgotten the Death of Christ it seems if this be true Therefore know thus much that it is against the Death of Christ it is the making of it of none effect it makes the coming of Christ to be in vain to say that the wrath of God will break out upon Believers mark the word if they commit such and such sins And for this that I have said Now our Proctoring Author comes in if any man can produce one Scripture against it if any man can shew in all the Book of God that it is any otherwise than I have delivered for my part I shall be of another mind and willingly recant my opinion But leaves out what follows But I see the Scripture runs wholly in this strain and is so full in no●hing as in this that God hath generally discharged the sins of Believers Oh then take heed of falling into that error of the Papists that say that God hath taken away the p. 561. sin but not the wrath of God due to sin that he hath forgiven our sins but not the punishment of sin But I beseech you consider that as our sins were then upon Christ he was so bruised for our iniquity that by his stripes we are healed and the chastisement of our peace was so upon him that he being chastised for our sins there is nothing else but peace belongs to us And the chastisement of our sins was so upon him that he beheld the travel of his Soul and was satisfied NOW Reader thou mayst see who this Author is and what also his design is and his false representation of the Doctor meerly because he abhors Duties and Graces in a Popish and meritorious sense This is the plain Grammar as latently radical of all his virulency against him As to the Fourth Charge IV. HE tells us that The Doctrin contained in these Sermons strikes at all Godly Sorrow Contrition Humiliation Confession and Lamenting of sin and Repenting of it and renders them useless and insignificant in the Life of a Christian Now what Warrant he hath had for this his bold assertion Crispi unmask'd p. 18. a plain unminced and uncurtailed quotation of the Dr. will fully satisfie and also discover unto thee and therein not only our Author 's false and disingenious proceedings with the Dr. but the ends for which he doth so as also the Principles by which he is acted in the same I must confess unto thee Reader before we go any further That unless this Author according to the complex account that this his Treatise gives of him be a ROGERVS L'ESTRANGE REDIVIVVS or as genuine a Spawn dropt from him in one sense or another as possibly can be imagined I am wholly at a loss to find him out And for this observe p. 19. where he cites the Dr. p. 317 319 320. where he never regards in any one of them the distinct yea verbally expressed ends of the Dr. therein Suppose there be a sin committed it may be more scandalous than ordinary which sin peradventure to sense wounds the Spirit the Question now is What it is that must or doth aid the Spirit of such an one of the sting Dr. Crisp 's Works Vol. II. Serm. 6. Page 317 318. and of the guilt of this or such like transgressio●s committed What doth discharge the soul of such a sin Now our Author ●●mes in Usually it is taught amongst us by those which would be accounted the greatest Protestants and the greatest haters 〈…〉 that the proportion of Repentance and Tears and Sorrow

this day He says My second is that which is procured for any one thereunto he hath a right The thing that is obtained is granted by him of whom it is obtained and that to them for whom it is obtained To this is answered 1. In the Margent that I should make Appendix to Dr. Owen 's Answer to Biddle p. 35. great Changes in England if I could make all the Lawyers believe this strange Doctrine but of what the Lawyers believe or do not believe Mr. B. is no Competent Judge be it spoken without Disparagement for the Law is not his study I who perhaps have much less skill than him self will be bound at any time to give him Twenty Cases out of the Civil and Cannon Law to make good this Assertion which if he knows not that it may be done he ought not to speak with such Confidence of these things Nay amongst our own Lawyers whom perhaps he intends I am sure I may be informed that if a M●n intercede with another to settle his Land by conveyance to a third Person giving him that Conveyance to keep in trust until the time come that he should by the Intention of the Conveyer enjoy the Land though he for whom it is granted have not the least knowledge of it yet he hath such a Right unto the Land thereby created as cannot be disanull'd This is the very thing for which it is that Dr. Crisp brings in this Text and Beza's Annotation thereupon and that in the very Page whence the Charge is fetcht Namely that Justification is truly and properly the work of God himself and cannot be the work of Faith Nay he goes farther Suppose says he Dr. Crisp's Works Vol. 2. Pag. 325. you should have the words to run as they are commonly render'd I answer Then are we to distinguish in Faith of two things there is the Act it self of believing and the Object on which we do believe and so the words may be understood thus Being justified by the Righteousness of Faith or by the Righteousness of Christ which we do believe We have Peace with God and so ascribe our Justification to the Object of our believing the Righteousness of Christ and not to the Act of Believing The truth is Beloved the Act of Believing is a Work and as much our Work as our Fear and Prayer and love is and the Apostle should contradict himself when he saith We are saved by Grace through Faith not of Works if he mean the Act of Faith And he might as well have said We are not justified by Works but we are justified by Works This he further distinguishes in the same Page unto which I refer thee which our Author with various huffing Reflections and rotten Inferences most partially and falsly quotes in his 6th and 7th Pages That to be short there is not only a distinction between the Act and Object of Faith and that as properly relating unto our Justification and Righteousness therein but also to God's Act of our Justification in Heaven as fully Precedaneous to the termination thereof in Conscience Dr. Owen upon the 1 Cor. 1. 30. in his refutation of Socinus and Bellarmine tells us That Christ is made of God Righteousness unto us in such a way and manner as the nature of the thing doth require Say some it is because by him we are justified However the Text says not That by him we are justified but he is of God made Righteousness unto us which is not our Dr. Owen of Justification p. 502. Justification but the Ground Cause and Reason whereon we are justified Righteousness is one thing and Justification is another Now either this Righteousness is in an eternal decretive and material sense truly and irrevocably theirs before they believe or upon what Grounds is it that God can be reckoned just in his justifying of them even when they believe But there is a secret grub lies at the bottom of all this our Author's Indignation which we must endeavour to find out See Dr. Owen against Mr. Baxter in the fore-mentioned Appendix Now I say that in the sense wherein I affirm that Justification is terminated in Conscience I may yet also affirm and that suitably to the utmost Intention Dr. Owen 's Appendix against Mr. Baxter in his Answer to Biddle pag. 19. of mine in that expression that Justification by Faith is not a knowledge or feeling of Justification before given nor a Justification in or by our own Consciences but somewhat that goes before all such Justification as this is and is a Justification before God And is not this true How many scores of our ancient solid Reformers might be brought in to attest this truth wherein and whereby they distinguish'd themselves in a Fundamental sense as Protestants from Papists But it seems as our Author thinks Dr. Crisp did not pitch upon a right Text in this of Rom. 5. 1. though it and it s Context undeniably prove he did to fix this his Discrimination upon and therefore alters the Scene of the Charge against him i e. from a distinguishing to a confounding Explication p. 7. where he to his own Admiration no doubt Learnedly explains Gal. 3. 24. for if the Apostle's Sense or Meaning be the same in one place of his Epistles as well as in another when he speaks more especially of being justified by Faith which our Author firmly asserts why then should he make a distinction between the Act and Object of Faith from Gal. 3. 24. which he denies unto the same Apostle from Rom. 5. 1. in Beza's Interpretation and the Doctor 's Quotation of him for that end A strong Memory I see is exceeding requisite for a Lying and Prevaricating Spirit This is not far unlike the Devil's Proceedings with Job who when he saw that his Accusation of him before God for an Hypocrite did not prove true or hold Water then does he slily seek by his Wife in an Instrumental Sense to cause him to part with his Integrity Just thus it is that our Author most shamefully spews out his own Treachery Dr. Goodwin upon Eph. 2. 6. saith that Our Salvation is in God's Gifts and in Christ's personating of us mark this piece of Crispianism and apprehending of us it is perfect and compleat though in our Persons as in us it is wrought by degrees Further. pag. 218 219. He Doct. Goodwin upon the Epistle to the Eph. ch 2. 6. p. 217 218. 219. tells us You see the distinction between in Christ and with Christ we are said to be quickned with Christ why because that Work as it is wrought in Christ once for us hath now some Accomplishment in us but speaking of the Resurrection to come he does not say we are raised up in Christ but raised up with Christ do but learn to distinguish for the want of this makes many Men to mistake A Man before he is called he is justified in Christ but not with Christ that is

whether in this our Author it be not an amphibious prevaricating and Delphian Oracle Case And to put the matter beyond dispute consider Reader That to be justified doth not only import but irresistibly presuppose an actual as distinguished from a personally possessed interest in such a righteousness as that wherein God may salva justitia and that not in a remote meritorious but immediate and substantial sense without the least interfering with the infinite unlimited spotless Justice and Holiness of his Divine Nature whence this Righteousness is reckoned the Righteousness of God received by Faith or the compleat and perfect demands of the Law whence it is also that Christ as being made under the same is accounted in an immediate sense THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS the latter being a full revealed Transcript of the former or can groundedly and positively in his very act of justification without any manner of reserves pronounce us just and that not in a bare meritorious and as such subservient sense of the same the Diverting Kettledrum of these our Spiritual D●agooners to stave us off from our diligent attendance upon the Carb●nado'd and traduced Martyrs and Witnesses of our blessed Jesus in their distinct as well as materially faithful Testimonies concerning him from and in such a Righteousness as actually adequately and materially corresponds with the forementioned Perfections of God both in his Nature and Law for as possession properly such gives no man a juridical Title unto that whereinto he enters by possession so neither does Faith which is in this case at most a meer possessing grace entitle even an elect Vessel unto any one of the least of the promises in the whole of Scripture but it is his juridical forensick though founded in grace relation unto and interest in this Righteousness that gives him an undoubted Title and Right unto his Justification and all that is consequential of the same hence it is that Faith follows and that in two respects 1. AS a manifestating or evidencing Instrument with all it's Adjuncts Concomitants and Subsequents whence it is that Christ as the Author and Finisher of the same becomes the Wisdom of God unto such a Soul 2. AS an uniting applying clothing grace-conveying heart-renewing and fruit-bearing instrument and that in all the vigorous exercitious actings thereof both objectively and subjectively whence it is also that Christ as the Author and Finisher of the said Faith becomes the Power of God unto such a Soul but all this is meerly the fruit of a previous Title otherwise God could not be just in justifying neither could his elect ones be justly reckoned upon as Sons but rather Bastards or Impostors But all this blunder in our Author as in the close of this Charge p. 10 11. is no more but to bring in the Vertues and Graces of the Spirit as the matter of our Justifying Righteousness provided that Faith as an Instrument will but eye and betake it self unto the Righteousness of Christ and engagge the Soul to rest wholly upon the same in the bare merits thereof for it's Justification before and Acceptation with the Lord. Projicit ampullas sesquipedalia verba Hor. AS to the Second Charge II. HIS Second Charge p. 11. is That the Doctor Asserts and Defends that Doctrin which is the bane of all godly Fear and Dread of all suspicion of our selves of Spiritual Watchfulness and a wary and cautious behaviour Crispianis unmask'd p. 11 which yet are Graces and Duties much commended in Holy Scripture and greatly practised by the Servants of God This false imputation of his is managed with the same scurrilous and lying Spirit and to the same ends that his former and subsequent ones are produced for against the Dr. As 1. THAT he never gives thee an account upon what grounds it is that the Dr. urges this or the other discerpted sentence that he for his own vile ends does continually throughout his Pamphlet quote 2. NEITHER does he declare for what ends and from what principles as tending thereunto together with their uses and advantages as assigned unto them of the Lord in their proper places it is that the Dr. speaks for or against both duties and graces As for instance He tells us That the Dr. a bold and fearless man laughs at such silly creatures as fear and distrust their having Faith or no and being regenerated and sanctified or no and withal that he merrily brings in such an Crispianis unmask'd p. 11. one complaining thus I have neglected the Day of my Visitation I had once the Opportunity the presence of the Spirit of God Alass My fear is that that was the Day of God's Grace to me and now there is no more hope left for me And thereupon concludes Which words as you 'll find he speaks in way of Mockery And in several other places you will find him deriding such whining timorous Christians as these representing them as Persons of shallow Understandings and of a Temper not becoming the Gospel What Ground he hath received for this frontless and wretched Branch of this part of his Charge let the very place from whence he cites it determine p. 345. where speaking of God's laying Iniquity upon Christ that it is so entirely his own Act that none of our Duties be they the best that we can perform can have any Hand therein Therefore I shall be the more large in transcribing the Doctor even in this Page and that which follows that thou mayst apparently discern into the villanous Treachery of this Author and justly guess thereby at the base ends in the same The Doctor speaking from those words in Isa chap. 53. 6. that our Sins are already laid on Christ tells us It should therefore serve to put the People of God upon the Admiration of the great love of God seeing it is only the Lord that layeth Iniquity upon Christ to give unto the Lord the Praise of the Glory of his Grace Oh! Dr. Crisp 's Works Vol. II. Pag. 345. let nothing go away with that seeing none but the Lord doth the thing And to this end Beloved the Lord must open your Eyes that you may see It it is he alone that doth it but till you see it what ever you may think of your selves you will sanctifie to Nets and Drags instead of them If Righteousness seem to be the easing of burthens in Spirit then Righteousness shall be and will be exalted above measure From whence proceeds these strange Expressions Oh the Omnipotency of Fasting and Prayer and Repentance I What is this but to give the Glory of the Lord to our services as if they discharge us of our Sins when it is the Lord only that doth discharge us of them But I must hasten THERE is another observable Passage in these words more observable indeed than heeded by the most of them and that is to be taken from the circumstance of Time when the Lord laid Iniquity upon Christ The Text saith

thus and thus Holily and do these and these Works they shall come under Wrath at least God will be angry with them what do we in this but abuse the Scriptures These are his very words saith our Author from p. 559. so they are indeed but not wholly his words nor sense which are as follows If they should terrifie them and make them to believe being Believers for of those I speak if they commit these and these Sins they shall be damned and so come under the wrath of God Then comes our Author in with his Charge before-cited leaving out also what follows as that we undo all that Christ hath done we injure and wrong the Believers themselves we tell that God he lies to his Face for if we tell Believers that except they do these and these good Works they shall come under the Wrath of God what is this but to tell God he lies and to bring the Faithful under a Covenant of Works Look into the 54th of Isaiah ver the 9th and you shall see how it is a belying of God to say that Believers may come under Wrath and Damnation except they do thus and thus Further he quotes the Doctor p. 363 364. very partially omitting what introduces the same namely that some conclude that Elect Persons are in a damnable estate in the time they walk in excess of Riot before they are called Where the Doctor speaking of the nature of Election he wholly omits his purpose therein and therefore also he leaves out what immediately follows which he knew would have overthrown his design viz. It is true such an Elect Person not called is never able to know individually of himself that he is such an one that God hath nothing to charge upon him because till calling God gives not unto Persons to believe and it is only believing that is evidence to Dr. Crisp ' s Works Vol. II. Serm. 9. Pag. 364. Men of things not seen Things that are not seen are hidden and secret and shall not be known I mean the things of God's Love to Men shall not be known to particular Men till they do believe but considering their real condition the Lord hath not one sin to charge upon an elect Person from the first moment of conception till the last minute of his Life there is not so much as Original Sin to be laid on him and the Ground is The Lord hath laid it on Christ already He did lay Sins on him When did he lay them on him When did he pay the first price of them Now suppose this Person uncall'd commits Iniquity and that this Iniquity is charged upon him seeing that his Iniquities are laid upon Christ already how comes it to pass that they are charged upon this elect Person again How come they to be translated from Christ again and laid upon this Person Once they were laid upon Christ it must be confessed For the Blood of Christ cleanseth us from all sins 1 Joh. 1. 7. saith the Apostle and by one Sacrifice he hath perfected for ever them that are Sanctified Heb. 10. 14. Was there by one Act of Christ the expi●tion of Sin and all at once that are commited from the beginning of the World to the end thereof how comes it to pass that this and that Sin should be charged upon the Elect Persons when they were laid upon Christ long before He did by that one Act of his expiate all our Sins or did not If he did not expiate them fully then he did not save to the utmost all them that come to God by him But if he did then all Iniquity is vanished and gone he did extract it out ●s some Plaister of excellent Virtue doth extract out the Venom of a plague-sore So Christ by once offering up himself did take away and evaporate all the Sins of the Elect at once Again our Author to level his secret Armisian stroke against Election here as formerly against the Doctrin of Justification in the materi●● Righteousness thereof he defiles and pollutes if possible even Scripture it self and 〈◊〉 li●e a bold Impostor for it to speak for him and against its Divine Author and in order 〈…〉 he cites Eph. 2. 13. chap. 1. 1. chap. ● 2 12 13 14 15 16. 〈◊〉 2 3. John 3. 36. and from hence concludes Observe it ●efore they were converted they were Strangers and Aliens Crispi unmask'd Pag. 36. they were with at Christ without God without Hope they were at Enmity with the Father and the Son and there was no more to be laid to their charge at that time than to the glorified Saints above When they were without Christ in the time of their Unregeneracy and living in all Excess of Riot were they not only in God's Favour but as much as the Saints in Glory How then was Christ their Peace How is it said they were reconciled v. 16. Reconciliation supposes falling out it implies being at enmity Those who are now reconciled and made Friends were once Strangers and Enemies and were they at that very time Favourites of God yea as great Favourites as the blessed glorified Spirits Who hath the Confidence to say this but Dr. Crisp And who hath a Heart to believe it but one that dis-believes the plain Testimony of Holy Scripture Hence observe Reader the Doctor having spoken of Election apart and therein in●lusively notes That as such it is a Doctrinal Truth wherein the irrefragable safety and unerring security of all such comprehended therein doth radically lie and this arising from a distinguishing love in God whence a further free act of his Grace towards them did spring and that in sending his only begotten Son into the World as their representative Head charged with their Sin to remove the same upon the performance of which inferred from the word upon the Cross It is finished a door passage or entrance was made or laid open without the least impeachment of any of the Attributes of God for the actual conveying in a way of Application by faith that Reconciliation Life and Peace that God had in store for them from all Eternity therefore said to be in Christ reconciling them unto himself even before they become by faith reconciled unto him for it is not Faith that gives a being unto this Reconciliation in God no nor yet the Blood of Christ himself though it make way to the uttermost for the communication of the same without which it would have been for ever hid even from the Elect but receives it which the Apostle expresly declares to be the very Ministry given unto him and others and adds hereunto the reason thereof the so much despised fundamental truth this day by way of encouragement to bring poor sinners in Dr. Crisp's own method for he hath made him to be sin for us who knew no sin that we might be made the Righteousness of God in him 2 Cor. 5. 18 19 20 21. Now doth it follow that because the Elect