12th ver of that Chapter to the end of it is evidently to prove these two things First That as sin came first into the world by Adam's disobedience and death by sin and did not only seize on him but descended upon all his Posterity even upon them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression that is against a Law promulgated as he did he begetting them in his image after his Fall in his apostate state and not in his innocncy So from Christs obedience and satisfaction for sin came righteousness life and salvation In three things the Apostle makes the Feadship of Adam and that of Christ to run parallel First As Adam had a publick Station and stood so related to others that he had power to involve them in his own condition So had Christ Secondly the Effect of Adams sin was Vniversal came upon all The Effect of Christs obedience is so comes upon all that is both upon Jews and Gentiles without distinction which is the grand point the Apostle is all along making good Thirdly the first Adam by his disobedience was the general Author of death Christ the second Adam by obedience is the Great Introducer of life And secondly That there is not and exact equality and even proportion between the Headship of Christ and the Headship of Adam So the Apostle tells us in the 15 and 16 ver But not as the offence so also is the free gift For if through the offence of One Many be dead much more the grace of God and the gift by grace by one man Jesus Christ hath abounded unto many And not as it was by one that sinned so is the gift I or the judgment was by one to condemnation but the free gift is of many offences unto Justification The Advantage lyes much on Christs side in the comparison and that in three respects First Christs spiritual seed Believers are not so like him in degrees of holiness as Adams natural posterity are like him in degrees of sin And yet Life reignes as triumphantly amongst them as Death did over the posterity of Adam Secondly it was one sin of Adam that introduced Death But Christs obedience and the gift brought in by him was not upon the occasion of that or any other one sin but of many is the abundance of grace and procures forgiveness not only for that sin but for all other sins whatsoever that have ensued thereupon And thirdly there is a disparity between Adam and Christ in this and the advantage lyes much on Christs side That one sin one act of disobedience was enough to condemn But more the one act of obedience was requisite to procure our pardon And so although Christ do not save by his obedience so many as Adam condemned by his disobedience yet the second Adam is much more potent then the first because there is much more efficacy required in the Saving of One then there was in the Condemning of Many As the restoring of One dead to life is much harder then the destroying of the lives of many Now How by one mans disobedience were many made sinners Why Adam who had all mankind vertually in himself turning a Rebel and an Apostate his natural state was thereby changed his nature was attainted and became sinful and so fell under the sentence of death and that was included in the penalty threatned In the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt dye Thy Natural state shall be changed and subjected to death And this falling out before he had propagated any of his kind he begat all his posterity in the same sinful Mortal state with himself So the Apostle tells us that in Adam all dye That is he becoming Mortal all were so propagated and Death reigned upon that account So on the contrary by one mans â—â—â—obedience many are made righteous As all meer men sinned in Adam being all in him and undergo the Effects of that sin So all Believers have virtually satisfied for sin in Christ By Christs obedience and satisfaction we come to be pardoned accounted of as righteous and saved But still 't is as an effect of Christs obedience that we come to be made righteous for the Apostle does not say In one mans obedience many shall be made righteous but By one mans obedience as a consequent and Effect of it many shall be made righteous As the effect of one mans disobedience many come to be shapen in iniquity and brought forth in a sinful condemned nature so as by the Effect of one mans obedience many come to be new born and brought forth in a righteous and a saving sfate A third Text insisted on is that in the 3d. chap. to the Philip. ver 9. And be found in him not having mine own righteousness which is of the Law but that which is through the faith of Christ the righteousness which is of God by faith To this Text a short Answer will suffice No more is requisite then to read from the 4. v. where the Apostle is discoursing of his Attainments under the Law Though I might sayes he have confidence also in the flesh if any other man thinketh he hath whereof he might trust in the flesh I more circumcised the eighth day c. and so he goes on And in the 7th ver But what things were gain to me those I counted loss for Christ yea doubtless I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord for whom I have suffered the loss of all things and do count them but dung that I may win Christ and be found in him not having mine own righteousness which is of the Law but that which is through the faith of Christ the righteousness which is of God by faith By which it is as plain as words can make it That the righteousness he desires Not to be found in was his own as he was a Jew and a Pharisee And to be found in Christ was no more then to be found ingraffed by Faith into the Christian Church to be found in that righteousness which is of God by faith which is the Gospel-righteousness No sober minded man can imagine the Apostle did not desire to be found in Gospel-righteousness or that by his own righteousness he meant that For 't is that alone can intitle us to the benefits of Christs righteousness And he himself every where so earnestly presseth men to strive for it as indispensably necessary to salvation and rejoyeeth in it telling us what comfort he had took to conling sider that he had fought a good fight had finished his course had kept the faith and that as a reward of so doing a crown of life was laid up for him in Heaven Nor is there any one passage of St. Pauls Epistles against works but 't is very plain from the context he intends the works of the Law and no other For as he opposeth faith to works so he also opposeth faith with Gospel-obedience
to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself That was the grand thing typified and intended by the sacrifices to be done and that which our Saviour by his coming actually did do as we are told in the 1st chap. of the same book in that expression When he had by himself purged our sins he sate down on the right hand of the Majesty on high That is When he had fully accomplished that great End for which he came into the world which was to procure pardon of sins he then ascended to his Mediatory Throne and the exercise of that Authority If we look into the Gospel in the 26 of St. Matt. where our blessed Saviour first instituted and solemnly himself administred that Sacrament wherein Himself and all the saving Advantages appurtenant to him are represented and conveyed He there calls his Blood the blood of the New Testament shed for many for the remission of sins Declaring that to be the grand Effect of his purchase and the great attainment of the Gospel from whence all our happiness is derived In the 1st of the Ephes v. 7. the Redemption we have by Christ is called the forgiveness of sin In whom we have redemption through his blood the forgiveness of sins In the 2d of the Acts vers 38. St. Peter there perswades the Jews to embrace the Christian-religion in these words Repent and be baptized for the remission of sins as the great End attainable by the Gospel and all the Institutions of it St. John in the 1st chap. of his 1st Epist tells us that If we walk in the light as he is in the light we have fellowship one with another and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son Cleanseth us from all sin That being the great End of all Gospel faith and obedience to be cleansed from all sin and the in-let to all happiness And 't is that which all the Saints the whole Church unitedly do una voce adore the Mediator for as the grand Effect of his undertaking That he has washed them from their sins in his own blood and thereby made them Kings and Priests unto God and intituled them to all happiness and Glory In a word our Saviour himself summs up and Epitomizeth all those blessings he came to purchase for and confer upon the world and seems to be in the Supreamest exercise of his Mediatory Authority in pronouncing that Benediction Thy sins are forgiven thee Thirdly Whatever other expressions the Scripture makes use of to signifie and represent Justification to us by they all relate to the pardon of sin and give us this sense and signification of it The Scripture expresseth our Justification by three other Terms Sometimes 't is called Redemption sometimes Remission and sometimes Reconciliation And all these have a reference to sin and its forgiveness 'T is called Redemption with respect to that captivity and bondage that is in sin Remission with respect to that guilt and obligation to punishment that is in sin And 't is called Reconciliation with respect to that enmity and opposition to God that is in sin All which we are freed from by the pardon of sin as the great priviledge of a justified state and that wherein it consisteth Fourthly The great Blessing that the Scripture foretold and held forth to the world in the coming of the Messiah and that Covenant of Grace that God would graciously enter into with Mankind was the Remission of sin and blotting out of iniquity Instances of this kind the Scripture abounds with The great effect of Christs coming we are told should be To save his people from their sins and to make reconciliation for iniquity And in divers of the Prophets God declares the Grace of his Covenant to lye per eminentiam in this The pardoning of our iniquities and the remembring our sins no more So St. Peter declares Act. 10.43 To Him give all the Prophets witness that thorough his name whosoever believeth in him shall receive Remission of sins And when God was pleased to make the Attributes of his Mercy and Goodness in an especial manner to pass before Moses and to reveal it to him as it relates to Mankind 't is expressed by That as the Grand and Transcendent Effect of it the pardoning iniquity transgression and sin A third consideration to clear up the truth of this Definition I have given of Justification and which is of great prevailing in the case is this That whenever God pardons any mans sin He looks upon him as a Righteous person does cerstitute him so thereby and deal with him accordingly Where he sees no iniquity there his Countenance is as upon the righteous This I shall make out First from the Reasons of the Thing in it self abstractedly considered that it ought so to be Secondly from plain and positive Scriptures in the case whereby it appears to be Gods ordination that so it should be And thirdly from the Method God is pleased in his wisdom to take in the pardoning and justifying Offenders and the manner of his procedure therein whereby his Righteousness and his Justice become very evident in so doing There be these five Reasons result from the Thing in it self abstractedly considered for the proof of this point First Man in his primary Make was righteous and just that was his Original constitution Sin is but an Accidental Deprivation And therefore when all Sin and Guilt contracted is Legally removed and wholly obliterated 't is but reasonable he should be judg d of by his first state and it falls in naturally so to be Sublata privatione ponitur habitus is a firm Axiom in Logick Not that I am here about to prove that a man is restored barely to the state of Adams Original innocency by the Redemption and Forgiveness of the Gospel for by Gods gracious Ordination we are instated in much more I urge this only to evidence thus much That man being made Righteous and having made himself a Sinner his sin being pardoned and obliterated were there nothing else in the case 't were Just with God to account of him according to what at first he made him Nor can we with any good Reason abstractedly considering him so circumstanced judge of him otherwise then as in a righteous and so happy condition Secondly Remission of all sin is in its own nature constructively and properly enough so called a Righteousness According to that noted saying among the Antient Christians Hominis justicia est Dei Indulgentia He that is chargeable with no offence at Gods Tribunal as he is not that has all his sins both of omission and commission judicially and authoritatively forgiven must needs be Reputed upon even terms with an Observer of the whole Law and have a right to all the advantages appurtenant to an innocent person To want any of them were paena damni and a part of punishment which can have no place where there is no Sin nor Transgression Thirdly Man is a Subject in which
or in Judgement Not by infusing a habit for it is evident that both the Hebrew and the Greek Verbs from whence we must fetch the true sense of the Latin and English are Judicial and Forinsical words and arc scarce ever taken throughout the Bible to Juslify by making inherently Just or Just by Infusion The natural and primitive signification of them both is to justifie Legally and Judicially to make just by Plea and in Judgement And in that original sense or in a sense relative to it and derivative from it are the words generally taken in Scripture When either God is said to Justifie man or man is said to justifie God or one man is said to justifie another or one and the same man to justifie himself for all these wayes we read of Justification in Scripture 't is still without any signification of infusing righteousness or making just that way But that which is intended by the word is to make just defensatively declaratively judicially and not qualitively To give some instance of many Rom. 2. v. 13. Not the hearers of the Law but the doers of it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 shall be justified That is pronounced and declared Just in judgment In the 11 Chap. of Job v. 2. Should a man full of talk be justified that is should he be defended and acquitted upon that account because he is full of words Shall that be a sufficient Plea for him So when we are told Pro. 17. v. 15. that To justifie the wicked is an abomination to the Lord 't is meant to justifie them by pleading for them and defending them or to justifie them in judgment while wicked For to justifie them in the other sense to make them inherently just and righteous is no abomination to the Lord but a thing he has every where declared himself to be well pleased with In the 8 of the Rom. St. Paul puts this question Who shall lay any thing to the charge of Gods Elect 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is God that justifieth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Who shall condemn where by Gods justifying is meant his acquitting and clearing in judgment 'T is evident to be such a justifying as stands in opposition to charging and condemning Of the same import are the words most generally wheresoever we find them used by the Holy Ghost either in the Old or New Testament And this we have acknowledged by many of the Papists on the one hand and some of the Socinians on the other though both of them endeavour to prove that Gods justifying men is not his pronouncing them just and his declaring them so in a judicial way but his infusing of habits and making them in themselves actually and habitually righteous Justification in general may be considered as it may relate to two sorts of men First to righteous and innocent men and Secondly to Offenders Justification in both cases supposeth Charge and Accusation and stands in opposition to Condemnation A Righteous person when he is accused and found faultless that is inherently Righteous and Just he is by his righteousness made evident thereby justified that is declared and approved to be just acquitted and cleared both from accusation and condemnation David hath an expression to this purpose of God Psal the 51. That thou mightest be justified when thou speakest That is be justified by being manifested to be really righteous and just So Good men are sometimes said to be justified by their works that is defended and vindicated against false accusation and charge approved and declared to be just thereby A person so qualified is justified because he appears to be in himself righteous and just not righteous and just because justified Secondly an Offender when he is accused he can be no other way justified that is defended against accusation and acquitted in judgment but by pleading ample and proportionable satisfaction made for an offence and an acceptance of that satisfaction as such and procuring a remission of the offence thereupon 'T is not possible to contrive any other way of Justification in that Case For free and absolute remission of an offence cannot well be called Justification The more freely a man is pardoned without any sort of satisfaction the less he can be properly said to be justified Such a man now is not justified because he is found to be inherently just and without fault but he becomes Just is brought into the state of a just man because he arrives at a Legal Justification and upon satisfaction made obtains an acquitment in judgment Justification in scripture as 't is an act of God relating to Men is ever spoken of in this later way 'T is never meant to excuse or justifie a Sinner from being a sinner but to justifie a sinner supposing him a sinner to the utmost All Gospel-justification being founded upon Satisfaction as the grand fundamental of it But to come more nearly to the Scripture-sense and meaning of Justification by which we are generally told that all Sinners unpardoned are under Divine Wrath and stand Condemned at Gods Bar and that such whom God is pleased in the method of his Grace judicially to pardon and receive into favour he is thereby said to justifie To be justified therefore in Scripture sensee is to be Cleared and Discharged before the Tribunal of God from the Guilt of sin resulting from the breach of his Laws and Absolved from the Punishment due from Divine Justice thereunto This without any obscuring Speculation about the nature of Justification in general is that practical account we find the Scripture to give us of it suitable to its nature as it relates to sinful offending Man for it must still be remembred that Gods justifying in Scripture is his giving sentence with the Guilty party and so we can only be righteous because justified and justified by being pardoned and according to what it Operates and effects upon the subject by which also 't is best understood and becomes most accountable to every Capacity I include not herein the Cause of Justification nor the Condition of it but speak of it in its own proper form and simply in it self considered For had I so done I would after this manner have expressed my self Justification is an act of God whereby he does for the sake of Christs Satisfaction to his Justice upon mens sincere Beliefe of the Gospel account their faith for righteousness pardon their sins and Acquit them in Judgement That this Description I have given of Justification and our being justified is that which ought to be given and the direct account we have of it in Scripture will evidently appear from these four considerations Fist Sin being a transgression of Gods Law and so an Offence accountable for to Him nothing less can justify a sinner then the Supream judgement of God Himself as the Soveraign Lord and Judge of all the Earth The Apostle tells us that in few words It is God that justifies And He does it as an
act and exercise of his Supream Justice according to that passage Rom. 3. v. 26. That God might be just and the iustifier of him that believeth in Jesus Secondly Gods justifying men stands in opposition to Accusation and Condemnation which we have plainly expressed in the forementioned 8th to the Rom. where the Apostle opposeth Gods justifying to Charging and Condemning Who shall lay any thing to the Charge of Gods elect It is God that justifieth Who is he that condemneth So that if you know what it is to Charge and Condemn you will know what it is to justifie it being naturally evidenced by its Contraries And as Condemnation is the result of a Law so is Justification We stand Condemned by the Law of works and are justified by the Law of faith Now what is it that Mankind is publickly accused of and charged with in Scripture 'T is Sin What is it that men stand condemned for at Gods Bar 'T is Sin And therefore their Justification must needs be a Clearing and Discharging some way or other from it And that which the Scripture every where intends by Justification is the Remission of Sin and Gods acquitting us in Judgment from the Charge Guilt Condemnaâ—ion and Punishment of it This is judiciously observed by Grotius Justificatio ut notum est passim in sacris literis sed maxime in Paulinis Epistolis Absolutionem significat quae presupposito peccatâ— consistit in peccatorum remissione ipso Paul semet clare explicante pr sâ—rtim Rom. 4. Pe Satis Chris chap. 1. pa 38. And this I shall endeavour to prove these several wayes First by producing divers Texts wherein the Foly Ghost speaks expresly of Justification and Forgiveness of sin in the Gospel way as one and the same thing Secondly by shewing that the whole Advantage of that satisfaction upon which as the Ground of it we are justified is generally issued in Scripture into the Forgiveness of sin Thirdly by shewing that whatever other expressions the Scripture at any time makes use of to signifie and Explain Justification to us by they all tend to give us this sense and signification of it and to express it to us as consisting in the forgiveness of sin And fourthly by shewing that the Grand Blessing that God still promised the world should partake of by the Covenant to his Grace and the sending of his Son from whence our Justification has its rise was the Pardon and forgiveness of sin And when I have done this there will be no need I hope to say more for the satisfaction of any under this Consideration For the first In the 4. chap. to the Rom. where St Paul treats more fully and more Critically of Justification then he does in any other place he there describes it in a Quotation out of the Psalms by the forgiveness of sin and the non imputation of iniquity But to him that worketh not but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly his faith is counted for righteousness Even as David describeth the blessedness of the man unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works saying Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven and whose sin is covered Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute iniquity Cometh this blessedness then upon the circumcision only or upon the uncircumcision also Where 't is not to be fairly denyed but that he describes the blessedness of a Justified person by the blessedness of a Pardoned person as being one and the same In the 9 ver Cometh this blessedness sayes the Apostle upon the Circumcision only or upon the uncircumcision also What blessedness Why the Blessedness he is treating of the Blessedness of being justified before God which he proves descends both upon Jew and Gentile in the Gospel way of faith and believing And what is that blessedness of being justified before God Wherein lyes it Why 't is the Blessedness he tells us that David describes of having our iniquities forgiven and our sins covered the Blessedness of having God not to impute sin to us 'T is plain the Apostles whole scope and drift is to prove that Abrahams justification was his pardon upon which acccount the Gentiles though great sinners might be justified as well as he and that Justification before God is not by works and so not from the merit of any inherent righteousness of our own but by Gods gracious Imputing righteousness without works which he makes to consist in the Pardon of sin and Not imputing of iniquity and to be the same thing with it In the 13th of the Acts the 38 and 39 verses we find the Apostle again expressing himself to the same purpose Be it known unto you therefore men and brethren that through this man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins And by him all that believe are justified from all things from which they could not be justified by the Law of Moses Where he speaks of remission of sins and Justification Equivolently as terms importing the same thing In the 18th of Luke where the Publican is said to smite upon his breast and seek for pardon and forgiveness in that expression God be merciful to me a sinner our Saviour says He went home to his house Justified that is Pardoned rather then the proud Pharisee The one justified himself and asked no forgiveness the other condemned himself and sought for the pardon of his sins And by our Saviours own determination took the right method of attaining Justification thereby In the 5th of the Rom. v. 16. The Apostle treating of the difference between Adams sin and the condemnation introduced thereby and the Salvation we have by that tells us And not as it was by one that sinned so is the gift for the judgement was by one to condemnation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but the free gift is of many offences unto justification By the free gift of many offences is meant the pardon of them and the pardon of them is unto Justification that is pardon of sin amounts to Justification and upon pardon we are actually justified We are often said in Scripture to have pardon and remission of sins by Christs blood And in the 5th of the Rom. and the 9 vers we are there said to be justified by his blood Much more now being justified by his blood shall we be saved from wrath through him By all which we are told that the scripture generally intends by justification and pardon one and the same thing Secondly The whole advantage and benefit of that satisfaction upon which we come to be justified before God is often issued into the pardon of sin and by the Scripture comprized therein If we look to the Types and Prefigurations of that satisfaction under the Law the grand end and signification of them was the removing and purging of sin This the Apostle tells us Heb. 9.22 Without shedding of blood is no remission And in the 26 ver he sayes Christ had once appeared in the end of the world
righteousness or unrighteousness do necessarily inhere and to which by virtue of his Constitution and Relation they are inseparably appertaining Just as light and darkness necessarily relate to Aire health and sickness to our bodyes And they are contraryes that expel each other and from a necessity in their own Natures succeed each other in their Existance in such Subjects Air perfectly free from all darkness must of necessity be supposed to be light If a body be free from all sort of sickness it must needs be supposed in perfect health So if a Man be freed wholly from all sort of unrighteousness he ought not nor cannot be otherwise judged of then as a Just and a Righteous person there being no third state imaginable in such cases Fourthly If Gods Pardon of all a mans sin should not ipso facto instate him in a Righteous condition and render him perfectly a Righteous person one of these two things would unavoidably insue Either that there must be some third state of a man that is neither Righteous nor Unrighteous which is in the nature of the thing utterly Impossible to be or else that God might fully pardon an unrighteous man that is a man after his pardon Continuing still so to be and that a man might remain unrighteous and so obnoxious to Punishment miserable and unhappy contrary to what the Psalmist so often sayes That he is blessed that has his sins forgiven after all his sins are Pardoned and he has reaped the whole benefit of Gods Forgiveness To imagine either of which were either extreamly Impious or Foolish or Both. Fifthly The Apostle tells us that All unrighteousness is sin the Scripture carryes us no farther and all sin is some way or other a breach and transgression of some Law Now where all sort of sin is Forgiven both of Omission and Commission a man is in the same state as if he had never offended and if so capable of no charge of sin and so of no charge of unrighteousness and so cannot by strict rules of Justice be otherwise adjudged and accounted of then as a Righteous person Freedom from all unrighteousness which Pardon of all sin necessarily includes does ipso facto constitute a man Righteous and denominate him from the Reason of the thing so to be And the truth is a person whose Fault is remitted and he judicially acquitted upon plenary satisfaction made is in point of true and legal Justification and being accounted Righteous thereupon upon even termes with him that is Accused and Justifyed by being found innocent Because the Rule of Righteousness and Justification is the Law and the Judgement resulting from thence Most especially when we are acquitted at the infallible Tribunal of God according to His righteous Laws The Apostles Question so pregnant Negative may very well be asked If God justify who shall either Charge or Condemn Secondly It appears by several Texts that whomsoever God pardons he reckons as Righteous and is in the Scripture-acceptation said to justify thereby In the 4th of the Rom. where the Apostle is proving that Righteousness and Justification is not by works and merit but by free forgiveness in the Gospel way of Believing he sayes in the 6. ver Even as David also describeth the blessdness of the man to whom God imputeth righteousness without works Here the Apostle gives you Davids sense in his own words and then quotes Davids words saying Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven and whose sins are covered Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute iniquity By which it is plain past all denyal that imputing righteousness without works and free forgiveness of sin and not imputing iniquity are the same if this be but admitted that St. Paul know how to interpret the words of David In the 2d Epist to the Corinth chap. 5th the Apostle there tells us that God is in Christ reconciling the world unto himself not imputing their trespasses God upon not imputing sin is reconciled Now it upon Not imputing sin He did not account of us as Righteous 't were impossible he should be so Reconciled God cannot be reconciled to any man continuing unrighteous and under the notion of a Sinner In truth Throughout the Scripture all the characters of a righteous person of a Happy and Blessed person are still given to a Pardoned person As all misery was introduced by sin to manifest Gods extream hatred of it So all happiness is attained by the forgiveness of it to tell us of what value Gods forgiveness is and what an inestimable price it cost In the sense of the Gospel which is a Law Enacted that peculiarly provides for the Justification of an Offender a righteous person is a pardoned person to Calvin observes Cum veniam peccatorum fuerimus consecuti Justi habemur coram Deo Instit lib. 3. ch 17. And a pardoned person is a justifyed person and a justifyed person is blessed person Pardon Justification Righteousness Blessedness are inseparably Conjoyn'd The 4th of the Rom. and other Texts are a sufficient Proof of it Thirdly From a due consideration of that Order and Method God is pleased to use in the Pardoning of Sinners ' This truth will be farther manifest and appear to be immoveably sixed upon these two foundations First Every sinner is pardoned upon the soore of such a Satisfaction made as honour and satisfies the Law as much as if it had never been broken or as if being broken the utmost penalty had been inflicted Now such satisfaction is in it self vertually Righteousness and when accepted in judgement is Actually so Secondly Every sinner is in fact pardoned and not before upon the performance of such a Condition as God is pleased by the Covenant of his Grace to account for righteousness and so to accept And that is Believing and being possessed of Gospel-faith Which Faith we are often told is imputed for righteousness Whoever believes is Righteous in the Judgement of the Gospel Law for it is performing the condition required by it on our part to be performed and is our Covenant-Keeping Now whosoever is so Circumstanced in a judicial pardon obtained from the Great and Infallible Judge of all the Earth upon such a satisfaction made and such a Condition performed is certainly well intituled to a Righteous state and condition A Fourth consideration to make good the Definition I have given shall be this Gods Justifying a sinner is as has been said his giving Sentence with the guilty party Now God whose Judgement is ever according to Truth cannot give Sentence with a Guilty person upon the score of Innocency His Justification therefore of such a one consider it which way you will must needs be included in his Forgiveness of him He must of necessity be restored to a righteous condition in a way of pardon and cannot be so upon any other account That which some say That Justifying and bare and absolute Forgiving are in themselves considered two distinct things
is Davids blessedness of pardon Now 't were absurd to imagine that the Apostle should tell us that the Blessedness of Justification which must needs relate to the whole of it does consist in imputing righteousness without works which he makes to be all one with the pardon of sin and not imputing iniquity unless Justification were fully compriz'd therein and if it were so the form of it that it did as we say dare esse to it For nothing else can properly contain the Blessedness of it If it be meant by those that thus Object That by Pardon of sin the Scripture does not express the whole Effects that accrue by Justification That will be readily granted for our Pardon and Justification is but our Title in Law to the Grace and Glory of the Gospel is not the very things themselves though they are all virtually contain'd therein and inseparably conjoyned to it by the institution of God For Whom he justifies them he sanctifies and whom he sanctifies he glorifies And the Apostle in the 26 of the Acts conjoynes as inseparable forgiveness of sin and having an inheritance amongst them that are sanctified But if the meaning be That the whole form of a sinners Justification properly taken and as we find it spoken of in Scripture be not compriz'd in the Forgiveness of sin 't will appear to be a Mistake Those that thus Object tell us our Justification consists of two distinct parts First Remission of sin Secondly Adjudging to be Righteous Each standing upon a distinct bottom the first upon Christs passive obedience and the other upon his Active though in the Scripture we read not one Syllable of any such thing These two I have proved before are in the Scripture-method conjoyned Whoever is by God upon the belief of the Gospel for the sake of Christ judicially pardoned is thereby Justified and accounted as Righteous and the satisfaction of Christ is reckoned and imputed by God to all Believers in those effects and for those ends and purposes nor can it be rationally supposed to be otherwise imputed For no other persons Righteousness performed or Satisfaction made on my behalf can come to be any other way justly accounted mine then in the effects and advantages of it It can never be a Just Judgment to adjudge me to have Personally performed my self what was actually done by another though it was done on my behalf and be reckoned to my account There is no other possible way by which any man can come to be accounted Righteous in Judgment but either by a righteousness inherent in our selves which does constitute us innocent or by the Righteousness of Christ made ours in a way of personal imputation which must make us also to be justified as innocents and not as offenders The first is affirmed by the Papists and the later by many Learned Protestants The Overthrow of both which opinions I shall hereafter endeavour in this Discourse and thereby fully return Answer to this and all other Objections of this nature That Text Rom. 4. v. 25. is much pressed and insisted on But upon great Mistake as will easily be made to appear The words are Who was delivered for our offences and was raised again for our Justification Which words are not to be taken as if there were two distinct ends in Christs Death and Resurrection the one to obtain pardon of sin and the other to justifie And so to divide between them two whereas in truth the Apostle makes them one and the same thing But the natural meaning and intendment of the Holy Ghost in that text is this That All that Christ did and suffered was upon our account He was delivered to death upon the account of our sins 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for our greatest sins and utmost Apostacy for that sense is included in the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and rose again upon the same account to justify us from the condemning power of them By being delivered for our offences and rising again for our Justification the Apostle intends the same thing which is to justifie and save us from our sins And the latter expression is exegetical of the former 'T is to instruct us that Christs Death and Resurrection the whole that he transacted had one tendency and was all in order to one and the same end For in some Texts we are said to be justified by his Death and by his Blood so that he Dyed for our justification as well as rose again for it The Scripture no where affords us the least warrant to assign one distinct end to Christs death and another to his resurrection Nay the Apostle himself upon another occasion Rom. 14. ver 9. positively conjoyns them as inseparable in their ends For this end says he Christ both dyed and rose again Whatever Christ dyed for he rose again for His Rising again did not induce any farther or other ends then were his Death but only compleat and perfect the whole Design and Intendment thereof For although Christ dyed for our sins yet if he had not Risen again we could not have reap't the Fruit and Effect of his Death His own Justification as Mediator and so ours depending upon his Resurrection as the supream and Glorious Effect of his Deity and that whereby he was declared to be the Son of God mightily from heaven Secondly 'T is Objected That Remission of sin doth only take away the guilt or ordination to punishment but doth not remove the Sin it self and therefore Justification cannot consist in it Although pardon of sin do make as if sin had never been in respect of the guilt of it yet not in respect of the denomination of the Subject Although David was pardoned yet his pardon did not make him a Just man in those acts of his Murder and Adultery He was truely a Murderer and an Adulterer notwithstanding Justification doth not denominate a man to be Just and a righteousness is requisite unto it A man is not Justified and therefore Just but must be Just and therefore Justified in the order of Justification To this I Answer in these three things First by Gods forgiving of sin in a Judicial way as much is done to obliterate and extinguish it in its proper denomination as is possible and nothing but Gods forgiveness could have done so much For he forgiveth as the Supream Soveraign and Lord of all And his forgiveness is not only the effect of his mercy but the result of all his infinite Attributes He is pleased with a redundancy of Grace to express himself in Scripture to us about this matter that we might have a strong consolation therein As first That he will turn his face from our sins Psal 51. Secondly That he will remember them no more Isa 42. Thirdly That he will not impute them Psal 32. Fourthly That he will cast them into the depths of the sea Mica 7. And fifthly that he will cast them behind his back Isa 38. Now I say
Where God hath so forgiven sin all the effects and consequences of it as such an Action are utterly extinguished and so it self ceaseth after a sort to be And he that hath committed Acts of sin when he is Legally pardoned is no more a Sinner nor ought he in Justice so to be accounted For 't was the judgment of the Law by which he is Acquitted that â—â—â—de him so to be 'T is true those sinful Acts do not naturally cease to be but all that was in those Acts obnoxious to the Law from whence their sinfulness arose upon Judicial pardon legally ceaseth to be and that is sufficient in this case For we are not in the discourse of this point making inquiries into a natural or metaphysical existence of things but only into a judicial and legal Secondly Let it be thus farther considered that nothing can more extinguish the denomination of sin and sinner then Legal and Judicial pardon As take it in the present instance of David in those sinful Acts of his The Acts 't is true were the same naturally considered after his pardon that they were before but legally and forensically considered they were not And how is it possible to be otherwise but that the very acts must be still naturally the same For suppose the righteousness of Christ to be personally imputed to David as those that thus Object would have it to be to denominate him a Righteous person and so render him a fit subject for Justification such Imputation will not make the Actions of his own sin to be naturally otherwise then indeed they are nor the Obliquity of them more cease to be then it does by Forgiveness There being no other possible way to bring an offender in the judgment of the Law into a righteous estate and condition but by Judicial pardon And if after such pardon what is here objected be true that the denomination of sin and sinner as such notwithstanding remain it will unavoidably follow by the strict Doctrine or personal imputation that a man may be under the proper denomination of a righteous man and a sinner at one and the same time which implyes a loud Contradiction For a man may be accounted righteous in respect of Christs righteousness personally made his own by imputation and yet he may be justly denominated a sinner however For although his sins be pardoned and cease to be in respect of the guilt of them yet not in respect of the denomination of the subject as 't is here Objected Whoever that was once an offender comes to be justly accounted righteous must first be fully cleared from the denomination of an offender for those two are visibly inconsistent in one subject And nothing else can more Effect that then forgiveness Thirdly To the latter part of the Objection That Justification doth denominate a man to be just and a righteousness is requisite to it A man is not justified and therefore just but just and therefore justified in the order of Justification I Answer The first thing affirmed herein That Justification doth denominate a man to be just and a righteousness is requisite to it is thus true That Justification necessarily supposeth a man to be just and it includeth the notion of his being so one of these two wayes either inherently or legally and judicially the one relates to an innocent persons Justification the other to an offenders And when justified they are both alike just in Law-sense though differently to be considered in the manner of their Justification and in their antecedent condition to it He that is not justified upon inherent righteousness but is an offender he can only arrive at the state of a just man by Legal acquitment in judgment and by having a sentence in law pass for him For whatever satisfaction he makes though it be true that there is virtually contained a righteousness in satisfaction yet being actually an offender in the judgment of the Law till the Plea of his satisfaction be accepted and he thereupon judicially acquitted he can never be accounted of as righteous and so can never be righteous previously to his Justification To speak of a previous righteousness properly so called requisite to an offenders Justification such as will justifie and defend him in Judgment has no tolerable sense in it For it supposeth a man to come under the notion of an offender and a righteous person at the same time This only is true in that case that a sufficient reason must be pleaded for the pardon and Justification of an offender before a righteous Tribunal And that alone can be plenary satisfaction and cannot be any thing else And that upon acceptance must needs produce Pardon And the natural End both of satisfaction and pardon is to re-instate an offender into a righteous condition The second thing affirmed That a man is not justified and therefore just but just and therefore justified is a great Mistake For it relates Justification solely and singly to innocents and renders the Justification of offenders about which the Scripture is only conversant utterly impracticable and impossible Persons inherently righteous are justified because found so and their Justification is but affirmative and declarative of such inherent righteousness But offenders are brought into the state of Just men upon legal pardon and discharge Nor can any Satisfaction in its nature operate farther Thirdly 'T is Objected That God requires a positive righteousness of us conformable unto his Law in the perfect obligation of it And therefore it follows that meer remission of sin under what distinction soever cannot be our righteousness Remission of sin frees from punishment but 't is perfect obedience that entitles us to eternal happiness To this I answer Legal sinless-righteousness which the Law requires God accepts satisfaction for in Christ 'T is Gospel-righteousness we are now to enquire after If God had not accepted Christ in our stead and his satisfaction to answer for all our obligements to the law as a Law of works and super-induced a better covenant thereupon this Argument had been good But seeing he has 't is of no force at all The Apostle tells us Rom. 10.4 that Christ is the end of the Law for righteousness to every one that believeth To understand which expression of the Apostle aright we must consider Finem alicujus rei as the School-men speak dici dupliciter in quem tendit res vel naturaliter vel ex ordinatione Agentis The End to which the Law naturally tended was such a particular personal sinless-righteousness in each man as he might justifie himself upon and claim the reward promised as a debt due This end the Jews pursued and sought after and the Apostle rejects as appears in the 3d ver But the end to which the Law tended by the ordination of God was Christs righteousness to make satisfaction for our disobedience and thereby to introduce another method of Justification in a way of saith and believing that we might no
of our case and a thing easie to be understood By the other we are made to be justified as Innocents which is not the truth of our case unless we will suppose God to account us to have done all that Christ did that is to have performed all righteousness without sin which in fact was not so This Objection therefore is wholly grounded upon a Mistake We obtain not Heaven as the reward of the Law but upon the promises of the Gospel Our concern is not upon what Terms the Law does justifie but how the Gospel does justifie Our own sins have rendred impracticable the justifying power of the Law and Christs righteousness and satisfaction has superseded the condemning power of it SECT III I Come in the second place to consider What is the material procuring Cause of Justification before God And the Answer to it in general is this 't is a Satisfaction made suitable to his Justice for the breach of his Law And this satisfaction consists in the whole Active and Passive obedience of our Saviour intirely taken together and the infinite merit thereof with which God declares himself so abundantly satisfied and well pleased that he Relaxeth the Law of Works thereupon dispenseth with the rigour of it and superinduceth another Covenant upon the terms of which we are justified and saved God does not upon satisfaction made for the breach of the Covenant of Works thereupon immediately pardon and save us by that But he relieves and releaseth us from the obligation we lay under to it and proclaims a new Law and enters into another Covenant And 't is upon the terms of that we are actually pardoned and justified The Righteousness and Satisfaction of Christ fully answers for us in respect of the Law We stand no more obliged to it a 't is a Law of Works and 't is the procuring Cause and formal Reason of the new Law of the saving Covenant upon the terms of which we are pardoned and justified and which is in its nature but a method of forgiveness and that place the Righteousness of Christ bears in point of Justification So that the whole is Originated in our Redeemers Satisfaction and purchased thereby the inestimable value and merit whereof results from these four things the dignity of his Person the freeness and spontaniety of his undertaking the undertaking it self and the ordination of God in the case had there not been a concurrence of all these the satisfaction had been defective and ineffectual the Gospel had never been published Death and Condemnation had still reigned and the Law had continued still in its full force and vertue First What a stupendious dignity was there in Christs Person in whom the fulness of the Godhead dwelt bodily 'T is no wonder we should be redeem'd by his blood when it was the blood of God and that the righteousness of this one should redound to All for the Justification of life as 't is expressed Rom. 5 18. when in him dwelt all fulness The Actions and Sufferings of such a person must needs be of unspeakable value because of his own transcendent Eminency above all creatures yea even Angels for he is Gods Fellow and was in the form of God Whatever was done and suffered by a person so qualified in whom concentred all the perfection both of the Humane and Divine nature must needs be of infinite value and of desert and merit beyond all bounds of imagination 'T is no wonder we should be bought with such a price and yet nothing less then this can we suppose without impeaching the wisdom of God who saw to bring it about this way could have answer'd for mans disobedience have stopt the current of Divine Justice and made a satisfaction for that Eternity of punishment that became due to us Secondly How free and voluntary what a meer act of Choice was Christs sufeeption of his Mediatory work How far was he exalted beyond the reach of all obligation or possibility of any Addition No Creature could oblige him that was God nor could the Divine nature lay a Constraint upon it self 't is an essential property of the Godhead to act freely 'T is true when he was man he was obliged as a man but he was under no engagement to become man A Servants work and a Creatures homage was due from him indeed when a Creature and a Servant but 't was his own free choice that brought him into the state of either Nothing but the workings of his own infinite bowells of Compassion over the fallen posterity of Apostate Adam could bring him to Tabernaclo in flesh and take up his abode with the children of Men. In a word he freely and out of choice became man and lived a life Natural And as freely resign'd up his life unto death and became a free-will-offering to God So himself declares Joh. 10. ver 17. I lay down my life no man taketh it from me And Mark 10.25 he tells us He came to Give his life a ransom for many And had not this been so God who is infinitely just could not have punished him in whom there was found no guilt Nor had it been Equal with God to accept him on our behalf unless he had freely espoused our interest Thirdly How admirable is the undertaking of Christ in it self First to assume humane nature from the very first moment of which assumption began the state of his humiliation and in that nature to yield a perfect obedience to all the Laws of God to which mankind were obliged and in the same to undergo the penalty due upon their breach submit himself to become a Curse for us What an amazing consideration is it that the Lord of all should become man in the form of a servant and subject himself to an obedience to all his own Laws yea even of those that were but the shadow as were the Ceremonial of which he as man incarnate was the substance And that he that was without all sin should submit to those Institutions that were grounded upon the supposition of sin and whose End and Tendency had a direct relation to it such was Baptism and Circumcision And yet so he was pleased to fulfill all righteousness to do all the Law required and yet to suffer what it threatned Now considering that he lay under no obligation with respect to himself for the doing of any of this what a vast stock of Merit must needs be treasur'd up for those to whom He and the Father shall please to impute it 'T is this undertaking of Christ that could alone face divine Justice and at the dreadful Tribunal of the great and eternal Jehovah be admitted as a sufficient Plea and Satisfaction for an open Rebellion from dust and ashes against Him His obedience to the Law qualified with such infinite perfections and representing us in our nature being both the Son of God and the Son of man redintigrated the honour of the Law to as great a degree as
if it had never been broken And his voluntary subjecting himself to the Curse and penalty of it made as great and honourable a satisfaction to it as if being broken the utmost penalty had been insticted upon every particular Offender Fourthly That which compleated perfected and crowned this satisfaction was Gods ordination A Statute made in Heaven that so Christ being himself freely willing should do and that should be accepted in so doing obtain his End and see the travel of his soul and be satisfied In the 10th of the Heb. we find this fully expressed by a Quotation out of the Psalms where David speaks in the person of Christ Then said I lo I come in the volume of the book it is written of me to do they will O God And in the 10th ver the Apostle tells us By that Will we are sanctified by the offering up of the body of Christ In the 3d. of St. Mat. upon Christs being baptized a voice came from Heaven and declared This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased Not only with his Person but his Office with his mediatory work and imployment as being of mine own ordination and appointment Upon Christs voluntary undertaking to assume our nature and in that nature to represent us and to subject himself to a Law of Mediatorship such a Law as the performance whereof would contain a compleate satisfaction to Divine Justice God was pleased to ordain it so to be and that all that he Did and Suffered in that Nature should be accepted on our behalf and reckoned and accounted to our advantage and that Mankind should obtain salvation thereby This Ordination of God was the Broad Seal of Heaven affixed to all Christ did This ratified on high was done here below and made all the transaction of Christ on Earth to pass currant in Heaven Had not this been coincident nothing could have prevailed Had not God determin'd above that what Christ did and suffer'd on earth should be that satisfaction to his Justice for the sins of the world in which he would acquiesee and be well pleased and upon which he would ordain the Blessing even Life for evermore No pardon had been proclaimed we had been yet in our sins and the state of all mankind had been no better then that of the fallen Angels and final Impenitents even a fearful looking for of Judgment Two great Mistakes have arisen in the minds of many and of many Worthy and Good men about this matter the rectifying of which is of great and necessary importance First Some have supposed that The whole of Christs satisfaction for our sins consists in his Passive obedience And that his Active obedience is imputed to us to constitute us Personally righteous in God account And so Disjoyn the Active and Passive righteousness of Christ and apply them to Distinct ends and purposes This will appear in it self no way Reasonable and without the least warrant from Scripture First Each of these have their proper Interest in and do respectively contribute to the repairing the honour of Gods injured and violated Law and do joyntly compleat Christs satisfaction The honour of the Law is in a twofold respect to be required in the preceptive part and in the threatning part To what a degree is the Law honoured in the first respect by the perfect obedience of God-man How is the Justice Holiness and Goodness of it proclaimed and solemnized thereby when he disdained not to become obedient to it And to no less a degree is it honoured in the other respect for by his dying and suffering 't is eminently declared what sin deserved And the Justice of the Law is highly evidenced in its threatning and penalty So that these two are by no means to be severed for they contribute inseparably by their Effects to the great work of making one intire satisfaction for the sins of the world and procuring our Pardon Secondly They are in their own nature conjoyn'd and mutually participate of the qualities each of other For Christs active righteousness was all passive His coming from Heaven in the form of a Servant and yielding obedience to the Law here upon Earth had all vast humiliation and suffering in it And he himself was active also in all he suffered to the highest degree for 't was an act of his own free choice without the least constraint so to do No man could have taken his life had not himself made choice of death Thirdly To disjoyn these two and ascribe to them Distinct and Different ends to say that Christs passive obedience is imputed to us to procure pardon of all sin and his active obedience is imputed to us to constitute us righteous seems dangerous in its consequence and tends to make one of them appear altogether useless For if all sin original and actual of omission and commission were fully answered for and pardoned what need we more We must needs be brought into a righteous condition thereby Because the least defect of righteousness is some degree of sin and where there is no degree of sin there must needs be perfect righteousness So if all the active righteousness of Christ were personally by God in judgement reckoned to be ours we could not at the same time be accounted as sinners but in the utmost perfection of innocents And if so What need were there of Christs suffering or of any expiation for sin The Law did not require suffering and obedience both but obliged us either to obey or else to undergo the penalty How much better is the plain Scripture-account of this matter where these two are by God and Christ himself in their end every where conjoyn'd By which we are told that the whole of what Christ did and suffered in all its circumstances unitedly considered is as one intire price of inestimable value by way of satisfaction and valuable consideration paved unto God and by him so accepted for the redemption and Salvation of all such who submit to the terms and perform the condition of the Gospel A second Mistake about this matter is this Some have conceived that both the Active and Passive righteousness of Christ are so made ours by a personal imputation that we our selves are accounted by God in judgment to have done and suffered those very things that Christ himself in his own person did and suffered This conception is so Gross that it is not only to be reckoned amongst such things as are hard to be understood but amongst such things as are impossible to be accounted for to any common understanding The notion of imputation in general is no way to be opposed though we are no where told in Scripture in terminis that Christs righteousness is imputed to us that is 't is impossible for us to partake of the benefits and advantages of what was done by another as done in our stead and upon our account without some sort of imputation God is pleased that the whole of what
Christ did and suffered in the effects and advantages of it should accrue to us and our account because he accepted him on our behalf and in our stead and that we should reap all the fruit and benefit of his Mediatorship And in this sense God is pleased to impute his whole Mediatory transaction unto us but no otherwise The whole of Christs satisfaction is imputed to us as made For us and so he is the Lord our righteousness but not as made By us but actually made by him And what can be more desired then to reap all the benefits of Christs whole undertaking and upon the account of it and its being accepted of God on our behalf to be pardoned justified sanctified and saved and as the Apostle expresseth it to have Christ made to us of God that is as the Fundamental cause procurer and spring of them a common head from whence they are all derived to us as his body wisdom righteousness sanctification and redemption Those that will press the point farther and insist upon personal imputation to every believer what Christ did ought well to consider these things First If every believer be personally righteous before God in the very individual Acts of Christs righteousness one of these two things will thence ensue Either that Christ in his own person did perform all the particular acts of righteousness required as due from each saved person or else that every is saved persons righteousness before God is identically and numerically the same with Christs in his publick capacity as Mediator and so every saved person is personally righteous with a righteousness that has a stock of merit in it sufficient to save the world unless you will say Christ had some righteousness that belong'd to him as Mediator and some that did not which is absurd to affirm for 't is plain all he did he did as Mediator nor had he any any concern in the world but as Mediator and none of his actions can be seperated from his Office being all pursuant of it The first will be granted was not nor had a possibility to be and yet no man can be personally righteous with respect to the Law but by an exact performance of every tittle and iota the Law required from him And the other has two very gross absurdities in it First That we should be accounted to have done that which was done long before we were in a capacity to do any thing And secondly That we should be reckoned personally righteous with the righteousness of God-man When first There is not a possibility that Man or Angel could perform any one Action with the Circumstances or in the Manner as he did Secondly Much of what he did was in its nature unlawfull for any else to undertake And thirdly The Whole of what he did was peculiarly appropriated and appurtenant to his Office as he was Mediator and cannot be suited to any other person nor is any part of it transferrable or imputable to any creature otherwise then in its operations and effects For he neither did nor suffered the very idem that we are obliged to for then he must have particularly done all the Law required from us and have suffered to eternity But he mad such a satisfaction to God for our Non-performance and on our behalf as became him as Mediator and such as that God is pleased thereupon to suspend the strict and rigorous execution of the Law and to bring us under a better Covenant Our case is not strictly that of a Debtor but of Rebellious Subjects nor stand we in our sins related to God as a Creditor but as a Supream Soveraign and Judge Nor did Christ sustain properly the place of a Surety to pay individually and identically our Debt but of a Mediator tomake reparation to divine Justice by another way then putting the Law in execution against us Secondly If every justified person be justified in judgment by the very acts of Christs personal righteousness accounted to him as his own it will then follow beyond any good answer that every man is justified by the works of the Law For Christs personal righteousness with respect to which he was justified as Mediator and approved of God to become a sufficient Saviour was a Legal righteousness and not an Evangelical This if sincere though imperfect will be accepted from us for Christs sake but would not so have been accepted from Christ for our Justification nor can it be well affirmed that Christ believed and obey'd his own Gospel That lyes on our part to perform Now that we should be justified by the works of the law is confuted by many Texts Rom. 3.28 the Apostle sayes Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law And Galat. 3.11 But that no nun is justified by the Law in the sight of God is evident for the just shall live by Faith and so in many other Texts And the whole scope of St. Paul in his discourses of Justification is to establish this point That no man is justified by an unsinning obedience perform'd to the Law and so Not by works but by believing and in the way of Gospel-faith which God is pleased out of Grace to accept and account for righteousness Nor will it be to any purpose to say it is one thing to be justified by our own obedience to the Law and another thing to be justified by Christs obedience imputed For if his obedience be so imputed as that we are accounted by God in judgment personally to have done what Christ did it is all one as to this matter and we are as much justified by the Law and do as much live in the works thereof as if we had in our own proper persons performed an unsinning obedience to it Thirdly if the rigid notion of imputation should be admitted as true then every particular person that is saved did merit his own salvation For if the very Acts of Christ be reckoned as ours and so imputed as if done by us the effects must needs be imputed so too If I am reckoned by God in my own person to have performed that righteousness that does merit my Justification I must of necessity be accounted to have merited my Justification And besides all this many the most dangerous and unsound principles of Antinomianism have their rise from this Doctrine I chuse to express it in the words of Reverend Mr. Gibbons in his Discourse of Justification I inferr says he that they are dangerously mistaken who think that a believer is righteous in the sight of God with the self-same Active and Passive righteousness wherewith Christ was righteous m though believers suffered in Christ and obeyed in Christ and were as righteous in Gods esteem as Christ himself having his personal righteousness made personally theirs by imputation This is their fundamental mistake and from hence tanquam ex equo Trojano issues out a throng of such false and corrupt
Deductions as these as That God sees no sin in his Children That a believer need not pray for the Pardon of fin but only for the Manifestation of it That God loved Noah when Drunk and David when acting Murder and Adultery And many more such consequences that worthy person mentions Those passages of Scripture that seem most to countenance this opinion and are chiefly insisted on for the proof of it are these three 2 Cor. 5.25 He hath made him to be sin for us that knew no sin that we might be made the righteousness of God in him From whence it is thus urged How did Christ become sin for us Not by inherency but by imputation So do we become the Righteousness of God in him In answer to which I say Christ became 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for us that is a sacrifice for sin For so it signifies as well as barely Sin as also the Latin piaculum which is often taken for a sacrifice of expiation as well as Sin And in the Septuagint 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is frequently used to signifie a sacrifice for sin And this is an expression relating to the sacrifices under the Old Testament And the proper rendering of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is a sin offering So that the plain meaning of the Text seems to be this Christ that was without all sin was made that is ordained of God to be a sacrifice for sin that we might be made thereby righteous with the Gospel-righteousness For that is the general meaning every where of the Righteousness of God 'T is opposed to mans righteousness and the righteousness of works which is by the Law If it be pressed farther and affirmed That sin it self was so imputed to Christ as that God in judgment did reckon him guilty and a sinner which the Scripture no where tells us and 't is great impiety to assert He is then excluded from all possibility of merit for the suffered but what was his due and so the whole of Christs satisfaction is subverted But he freely suffered the punishment of sin that was infinitely removed from the guilt and desert of it and thereby redeemed us became sin in that sense that so we might be made the righteousness of God in him Now by the righteousness of God sometimes is meant in Scripture the Personal righteousness of the Mediator who was God-Man and sometimes the righteousness of Faith that righteousness that faith is accounted for and which in the Gospel is conditionally required of every saved person And this is so called because 't is a righteousness of Gods contriving of Gods working and of Gods accepting in and through Christ and for the sake of his satisfaction If you ask me for a Text to prove this latter there are many I will only instance in one For they being ignorant of Gods righteousness and going about to establish their own righteousness have not submitted themselves to the righteousness of God Rom. 10.3 By the righteousness of God here is not meant the Personal righteousness of the Mediator but the Gospel-righteousness of faith and believing by which we are Justified in opposition to the Law which in the next ver the Apostle tells them Christ was the end of for righteousness by his satisfaction so the Apostle expressly calls it in the 6th ver But the righteousness which is of faith speaketh on this wise And if you read to the 9th ver he there fully describes this righteousness of God and tells you in other words what it is That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus and shalt believe in thine heart that God raised him from the dead thou shalt be saved And the whole Context puts it out of all doubt that by their own righteousness is meant the righteousness of the Law which Moses the Apostle sayes in the 5th ver describes in those words That the man that doth those things shall live by them And by the righteousness of God is meant the Gospel righteousness on our part to be performed which the Apostle sayes in the 6th ver Moses does otherwise describe But the righteousness which is of faith sayes he speaketh on this wise Say not in thine heart who shall ascend into heaven that is to bring Christ down from above c. The word is nigh thee even in thy mouth and in thy heart that is the word of saith which we preach If we take it in the first sense then the meaning of this Scripture is this Christ became a sin-offering for us and freely underwent the suffering and punishment due to sin that we might be made the righteousness of God in him that is that the Righteousness of Christ as Mediator in a way of satisfaction might be appropriated unto us And as he underwent the consequences of our sin so we might reap the effects of his righteousness that we might be interested in his righteousness just as he was in our sins He suffered the penalty of our sins and we reap the fruit of his righteousness and so there is a mutual transferring of our sins and Christs righteousness in the effects and consequences of both but no otherwise If we take it in the other sense which is I believe the sense intended by the Apostle then the meaning is That Christ became a sin-offering for us that we might in pursuance thereof and as an effect of it be made Righteousness in the Gospel-righteousness that is that we by believing in him might be accounted for righteous and so accepted of God The Apostle does not say that we might be made His righteousness or that his righteousness might be made personally ours but that we might be made the righteousness of God in him And the phrase In him is not to be taken personally and literally For when we are said to abide in him 't is to continue stedfast in the doctrine of the Gospel to walk in him is to walk according to the rule of the Gospel to Sleep in him is to die in the saith and hope of the Gospel to marry in the Lord is to marry according to the rules he has prescribed So to be Righteous in him is to be righteous according to the rule of the Gospel to be righteous in the righteousness of his procuring and appointing When we read of Christ in the Gospel we are not alwayes barely to understand his natural Person but to consider him mystically and politically to consider him circumstanced as Head King and Law-giver to his Church and upon that account his Name is often taken in a large and comprehensive sense Another Text of Scripture much insisted on for the proof of Personal imputation is Rom. 5.19 For as by one mans disobedience many were made sinners so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous This text upon due consideration will be found to make nothing at all for any such Imputation and Transferring of righteousness as is pretended The Apostles scope from the
is all that he would require on our part conditionally to perform This should constitute us righteous upon the terms of the New Covenant This should legally intitle us by the Gospel to all the Advantages of Christ and to a righteous end justified state and this is so far from such a Justification by works as the Jews rested in and St. Paul disputes against that 't is a Justification that results wholly from grace and favour is the Effect of Christs purchase and of the terms of another Covenant And all merit and all reward that can be claimed out of debt is utterly excluded thereby And thus the two Apostles appear perfectly agreed in their doctrine Abraham was not justified upon terms of the Law and sinless perfection but he was justified as an ungodly person one that had sins and failings about him that needed forgiveness was justified by faith in way of the Gospel And that faith that justified Abraham then and justifies every person under the Gospel now and is by the tenour thereof accounted for righteousness is not a naked assent to the truth what God reveals but such a faith as implyes in its nature and comprizeth a suitable obedience to all he requires of us There is a wide difference as much as there is between the nature and terms of the two Covenants between such works as by an inherent vertue in themselves constitute just and so justifie from an innate perfection as to make the reward to be of debt and such works are in their own nature altogether imperfect and faulty and are accepted only thorough grace and favour and made but conditionally necessary to our Justification another way Works 't is true there are in the case both wayes but of very different natures upon very different Accounts and to very different Ends. Secondly On the other hand we must carefully avoid so to apprehend faith supposing it to comprehend all that the Gospel requires of us to believe and practice as if it had in it self any justifying vertue or were of any innate worth to acquit us before God from the guilt of sins The value of it is wholly from Gods gracious ordination as it is all the condition that is required on our part to be performed by the Law of grace And it is not of our selves neither but 't is the gift and bestowment of God We obtain the precious faith of the Gospel St. Peter tell us through the righteousness of God and our Saviour Jesus Christ Whenever we read of our Justification by faith 't is meant of our being justified in the Gospel way and that is by Christ alone meritoriously and by what he has done and suffered for the Apostle tells us that God for Christs sake hath freely forgiven us Nothing has the least meritorious interest in our forgiveness but Christ Grace and free forgiveness in Scripture is still opposed to our merit and by faith only with respect to its conditional relation to him and that Covenant which he hath purchased and proclaimed and in the method whereof we come to be actually pardoned and justified upon Believing To think otherwise is to subvert the grand design of the whole Gospel which we are often told is to declare Christs Righteousness for the remission of sins and to sot forth him as a propitiation through faith in his blood Faith is no part of the Propitiation but 't is he himself and his blood that is the Propitiation and faith but the conditional means by which we come to reap the fruit and benefit of it The whole Fabrick of the Gospel is bottom'd upon satisfaction made to the Justice of God on our behalf upon a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Our Savior sayes he came down to lay down his life 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a ransome for many And St. Paul to Timothy calls it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a price of redemption We are every where in Scripture said to be ransom'd redeem'd purchas'd bought with a price And that must needs be by a valuable consideration pay'd and by satisfaction made And St. Peter tells us what that price of redemption is that was payed for us and by which we were purchased and ransomed 't was not corruptible things such as gold and silver or any thing we had to offer to God but 't was with the precious blood of Christ as of a Lamb without spot No works nor performances of our own could ever have reached this purchase or so prevailed as to have been accepted for a satisfaction in this case For then a Justifying Righteousness might have subsequently resulted from the Law of Works which St. Paul denyes and tells us expressly Galat. 2.21 that it could not be that way it could not come by the Law For had there been a possibility of it he tells us it should so have been That is could men either pefectly have kept the Law or have sufficiently answered for the Breach of it ex post facto Righteousness would have been that way and Christ had not dyed for his death had been then in vain Two things still may be remembred about Faith by which we may receive some account of the use that is made by the Holy Ghost of this word in Scripture First By faith the Gospel is often denominated in opposition to the Law and the whole of it signified thereby And the Reason of this seems to be because the Gospel is in its nature a Revelation from God proposed to our belief and all that we are required by it to do flowes naturally from what we are first obliged to believe Belief is the spring of all Gospel obedience and does in its nature comprize all other Gospel-graces they being at first produced and ever after upheld and increased thereby Secondly by the tenour of the Gospel and Gods peculiar Ordination therein the whole condition required by it is at the first virtually performed by the bare act of believing as the representative of all other Graces and root of universal obedience 'T is all that at the first is made conditionally necessary to constitute a Justified state though to the after-continuance in it the exercise of every other grace is equally requisite He that sincerly believes in Christ as he is proposed is truely in a Justified state by such an Act of Faith and herein Faith hath the preference of all other Graces in point of Justification if we never live to perform any subsequent Act of Obedience And the Reasons of this may be these two First The grace of Faith has in its nature a Nearer relation to the satisfaction of Christ wherein the Essentials of our Justification consist then any other Grace whatsoever For all we can do with reference to that and the nearest approach we can make to it to receive the benefit and advantage of it is to believe it and to rely upon it Secondly A true and sincere faith and belief of the Gospel supposeth and includeth a firm resolution to
justifies he sanctifies No mans sin is so forgiven as that the least allowance is vouchsafed to it How impossible were if for God openly to tolerate a Rebellion as all sin is for 't is a disobedience to some Law against himself How inconsistent were it with his Holiness and his Soveraignty By the Conditions God has annexed to his Forgiveness 't will evidently appear before men and Angels what a Contrariety and Opposition there is in God to all sin resulting from the essential Purity of his nature And that none but such as are sanctified can be accepted of him Secondly By the performance of these conditions we are made meet for Glory 't is approaching Heaven gradually 'T is impossible without holiness to see God And 't is our great happiness that so great a stress is laid upon our attaining to it That we are under so solemn an obligement to our greatest Interest Doubtless the most effectual way to introduce sanctity was to make it conditionally necessary to our Justification and to oblige us to forsake our sins upon our utmost Peril and greatest Penalty Some things there are also observable in this Gospel method of Pardon by which the grace and mercy of God are made greatly evident and appear in their highest elevation First The Precepts of this new recovering Law of Grace the commands of the Gospel our obedience to which is made conditionally necessary to a justified state They are such as appear to be wholly calculated for our advantage and welfare The yoke of Christ 't is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a gracious benigne bountiful yoke and his burden is a light burden His commands are in no sort Grievous to any man truly and rationally informed of his own welfare God has not arbitrarily commanded us as he might do for we owe him all conceivable subjection but singly oblig'd us to such precepts as are in their own nature absolutely necessary to our present and future welfare In short he has only bid us live a sober righteous religious life here such as is rationally Best for our selves and others and be gradually preparing for those Eternal fruitions that are to come Whoever comes short of Heaven by not performing the Gospel-condition denyes his own present as well as future Interest And 't will be a black Reflection hereafter to consider That whatever brought us to a state of Misery in the Next world made us also unhappy in This That God requited no more of us to qualifie us for future Felicity Then that we would live wisely and profitably to our selves and usefully to others here Secondly Whatever is by the Gospel Conditionally required of us is all freely and fully given to us Faith at first and every other Grace in pursuance of it is the gift of God Whatever we are commanded to do as a peculiar and principle effect of Christs purchase by the Law of Grace we receive a power to perform The Holy Ghost upon Christs ascension was eminently sent from Heaven for that very purpose and will not cease in his operations till all the members of Christs Body are fully inabled to perform the Whole of what the Gospel requires at their hands This is an apparent Effect of the highest Grace and Goodness and renders Christ as free a Gift to the World as if no Condition had been annexed to the proposal of him since the power of performing all is Freely conferred upon us when from the Greatness Holiness and Justice of God and our own present and future welfare it became necessary that such holy Conditions there should be God in his boundless Grace undertakes in Christ and obliges himself by his Covenant to furnish us with ability for their utmost performance By which method the whole will appear perfectly made up of free grace The Satisfaction contriv'd provided accepted and the condition performed And every saved person will appear righteous both before God and the world and 't will be very apparently a righteous thing with God to bring such unto Glory who have Christs righteoussness by way of satisfaction and compensation to answer for them with respect to the Law and their own faith and sincere though imperfect obedience to answer the terms of the Gospel Thirdly This gracious recovering Law of the Mediator 'T is not given as God gave the first Law to Adam and as he after gave the Law upon Mount Sinai requiring exact and punctual obedience in every circumstance of it upon the greatest penalty But 't is given from the hand of a Mediator upon far more gentle and mitigated terms 'T is required by it that we be deeply and thoroughly sensible of the ill of our former state and conversation while without God and Christ in the world and strangers to this grace of Gospel and of our utter inability to procure acceptance with God any other way be rationally satisfied of the excellency of that life the Gospel calls us unto of the glorious reward that will ensue And so make a solemn choice of it to our selves and sincerely resolve as men of Truth and Fidelity ought strenuously to endeavour to attain to it to live in the practice of every duty the Gospel annexes to our state and condition and to depart from every Gospel-sin This conviction and resolution the Gospel makes indispensibly necessary and 't is compriz'd in all sincere and true Faith But 't is thus qualified for the advantage of an offender That that which constitutes and preserves the union between Christ and a Believer the thred that tyes a man to Christ as I may so express it in the whole performance of the Gospel-condition is sincerity of Intention and endeavour and what could the Great God require and accept less from the hand of an Apostate Creature and not perfection of Action And this sincerity too reckon'd as much to our advantage as possible may be That is Whatever can upon the utmost allowances be truly so called shall be so reputed And he that can enter a just claim to the lowest degree of sincerity that is when all the Infirmities that can accompany sincerity and not overwhelm and extinguish it that can consist with its denomination so to be are admitted shall yet be accounted a sincere man and numbred amongst those that are truly so Till this thred of sincerity be utterly broke the union between Christ and a Believer is never Dissolved but he still remains in a justified state before God Though a man sin often through infirmity and strength of Temptation and the best men so sin very often if his Resolution abide firm and sincere for obedience to Christ and holy living he is still reckoned to perform the Gospel-condition and abide in a justified state Such a man is in the first Latitude of Gospel-forgiveness But if a man through the power and prevalency of his Lusts and the violent impetuous assaults of temptation have an invasion made upon his sincerity that is that a man often fails
in point of sincerity sins against his own Light and his Resolutions and Knowledge repeats this again and again does it often for such is mans apostate state by his Fall so fertile is it of all sort of sin that if Christ in this new Law had not considered our frame and remembred with infinite compassion what we are and so dealt with us we had still come short of happiness yet if such a man by the strength and efficacy of grace renew himself again by continued acts of Repentance revive and re-inforce his resolutions return back to his first stated sincerity be in his rational and most Deliberate choice still for Christ and Obedience to his Laws for Christ will not sinally judge of us by our passionate choice but by our rational choice and so carry himself upon the whole matter that Christ is not deposed his soul but still continues his Government there if Satan and the Flesh prevail but by sits and are still dispossessed by an habitual sincerity If a man be always either at the present or upon second and after reviews full of deep and heart-affecting trouble and sorrow whenever he so miscarryes and the fixed state acquiescency and rest of his soul is in living to Christ in a sincere obedience to his Laws and his rational and most undisturbed choice is to do in short if he never comes to be bowed down and subjected to pregnant hypocrisy even in all cases of this nature the Scripture gives us good ground to believe that Christ and his saving benefits are to be had Justification before God attained and future glory possessed upon such gracious principles of condescention is this New Law of the Gospel erected Though it must be withall acknowledged that sins of this nature sins tinctur'd with insincerity are of all under the Gospel the most dangerous border most upon a breach of the Condition required are the most destructive to our present Peace and Comfort the most productive of any of temporal and spiritual Judgements in this life And when they arrive to such a degree that the whole of a mans condition truly and evenly considered for we shall all be weighed in the perfect Ballance of Gods righteous judgement they turn the Scale against sincerity are the more Predominant and Prevailing part they are perfectly Ruinous a Non-performance of the Gospel-condition is returned upon us and no such man will ever have the advantages of Christs satisfaction accounted to him let him have made never so great a progress in all other Gospel attainments Two Fundamental Failures there are in reference to the Conditions required by the Gospel upon the performance of which begun and continued we come to be primarily and finally justified First When men wholly reject the Gospel or with a careless unconcern'd unactive Indifferency which comes in the effects all to one barely assent to its veracity but never prosecute the Ends of it And secondly when men prove false and perfidious in that subjection and obedience Christ requires from them in a Christian course Christ will answer for no man that will not receive him when offer'd as worthy of all acceptation and as an inestimable Jewel of an Infinite value or that does not sincerely intend to obey his Laws and act suitably to such an intention 'T were a mean and unworthy conception of our Saviour to imagine he should account the Precious Effects of his most Precious Blood to any man that would not be throughly sensible of that sin and rebellion against the Highest Soveraign that occasioned his sufferings and to expiate which he became a sin offering and was sacrificed and in the most sincere and solemn manner resolve for the future as the worst of all ills the Wound of Life the Sting of Death and tormenting Plague to Eternity to avoid it And especially that should pretend to do and yet lye against the Holy Ghost and prove false in so gracious a Covenant In a word Nothing keeps men from the good things of the Gospel the blessedness of a justified state but a positive Refusal of Christ or a sloathful careless unconcern'd neglect of him which comes in effect all to one or a prevailing unconquered falseness in the course of Gospel-obedience and that Conformity to his Laws which Christ requires from us And who can imagine that such a Saviour as our Lord is who is God and Man after a stupendious manner united should be provided by the Almighty for any persons in either respect so qualified SECT VI. FRom the consideration of all these things divers material Questions do naturally result To which a due Answer ought to be given First This Question will be asked Does not this diminish the Grace of the Gospel and lessen the free donation of Christ to say he is offer'd conditionally and that no man can be justified by him but upon terms to be perform'd by himself Answ If it appear in truth so to be that no man can be saved by Christ nor be said in the Gospel-Sense to love him that does not keep his Commands if we go further in this matter then to those Limitations the Gospel evidently puts upon it self then this Objection ought not to be made For Gods pleasure is the rule of his own Grace That the Gospel is Conditional is apparent beyond denyal If we live after the flesh we are told we shall certainly dye and if we mortifie the deeds of the body we shall live If we overcome we shall have the Crown if we do not we shall lose the Reward And If we faint we are told we shall not reap 'T is he that holds out to the End in a Christian course that shall be saved And is not this all Conditional And this Conditionality of the Gospel the offer of Christ upon terms does no way Extenuate the grace and mercy of God in the free donation of Christ We are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ though we are justified conditionally by faith and that Faith includes all Gospel-obedience and the whole duty of a Christian Our Salvation is intirely purchased by Christs blood and an ability to perform every Condition required of us is purchased for us and by him freely conferr'd upon us So that he as a gift of inestimable value and bounty from Heaven is a spring of all Grace and freely supplies us with what ever we stand in need of And the proposal of him to the world upon terms and conditions is but that method the only wise God has seen fit to make use of in the accomplishment of so glorious a work of Grace and so free a Redemption as that which tended most to his own glory and will appear at last to be eminently best for us For 't is but first to oblige us and then to inable us to be holy and like Himself in whose image lyes the perfection of all Happiness 'T is but to save us here in part and
that we might gradually possess that Gift of God which is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Quest Secondly By this Doctrine how can we ever come to know we are carefully and compleatly Justified till we have fully perform'd and accomplished all the conditions made requisite to a justified state That is how can we upon good ground be assured of our Justification till our faith and obedience be consummuated Which is not till we dye Answ Every man is then Actually justified according to the Gospel-Law and Compleatly so when he believes in the Lord Jesus Christ with all his heart Because no more is at the first required Legally to constitute a justified state But Justification is a continued act of God and the constant performance of all those duties which a sincere reception of Christ as he is offered in the Gospel implyes are indispensibly necessary to the continuance of it 'T is in this case as 't is in Marriage A Marriage is perfected by a mutual consent But the performance of all matrimonial duties is implyed in that consent The Marriage continues valid till somwhat be done as 't is very possible there may be that does vertually Null and Revoke such consent and what was implyed therein and does ex natura rei Dissolve the Vinculum matrimonij 'T is plain the Apostles did look upon such as declared a firm assent to the Gospel and a sincere and hearty reception of Christ as he is there proposed to be in Christ That is to be in a Justified saved state admitted them to all Gospel-priviledges and never esteemed them otherwise till by their Lives or Professions they contradicted and denyed what by such a faith and consent they had before affirmed and thereby Apostatized from it And of such tergiversation the Gospel every where warns men That they should take heed of an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God And St. Paul tells the Corinthians I am jealous over you sayes he with a godly jealousie for I have espoused you to one husband that I may present you as a chaste Virgin to Christ But I fear least by any means as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ Whoever avows the faith of the Gospel and a sincere closure with Christ upon the Terms thereof and does after fall into an open Rebellion against him and lives in an allowed disobedience to his Laws such a man is as the Apostle speaks of an Heretick 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a man condemned by himself For he that in his Baptism and at his first admission into the Christian-Church had made a solemn Profession of the true Christian Doctrine and did after degenerate into Corrupt and Heretical Opinions contrary and destructive to it passed sentence upon himself So He that declares to close with Christ as a Prince and a Saviour which supposeth a general submission to all the Laws of his Kingdom and shall after Indulge himself in a course of open disobedience and choose a continued practice of sin against that grand fundamental Law of Christ That he that names his name must depart from iniquity gives Judgment against himself in this case Disowns Christ and the Gospel Dissolves the Relation that seem'd to be between them and publickly retracts what he before obliged himself to So that a man is at the first actually and legally according to the tenor of the Gospel justified by a true and sincere Faith But a constant prosecution of such a faith in all its proper Ends and Tendencies by an universal submission to all the Laws of Christs Kingdom is of absolute necessity to our continuance in a Justified state Quest 3. Do not divers Scriptures in the New Testament seem to establish Justification solely upon believing and upon Faith only as an instrument receiving and no more in opposition to all sort of working Especially that Text Rom. 4.5 But to him that worketh not but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly his faith is counted for righteousness Answ We are said to be justified in the New Testament by faith alone upon these three accounts First as faith intends the Gospel and the Principles of Christianity in opposition to the Law and the principles of Judaisme Secondly As 't is a comprehensive word for all that the Gospel requires at our hands For by Believing in Christ the Scripture intends such a closure with him as receives him in all his offices and sujects us to all those obligations which 〈◊〉 Prince and Saviour he thinks fit by the Gospel to lay upon us And upon that account to Believe and to obey are often in Scripture put one for the other promiscuously and so are unbelief and disobedience All obedience and subjection to Christ is originated in and flows from our Belief of that Revelation God makes to us of him and is naturally implyed and compriz'd in it And so it has by Gods appointment the precedence and preferrence of all other Graces in point of Justification and we do not find any other grace so related to Justification as this And upon that account it is that we are not said in Scripture to be justified by repentance or by love or any other single grace but only by Faith as comprehensive of all the rest And thirdly because we are actually brought into a justified state at first solely by Faith without the actual exercise of any other grace The very act of sincere believing by Gods peculiar and gracious ordination intitles us to Christ and all his Benefits And the reason of that Ordination is evidently this That who ever believes in Christ receives him as he is by God proposed and whoever does so obliges himself therey to all the duties of Christianity But upon no one of these accounts can Faith be said to justifi◠〈◊〉 barely as an Instrument but as 't is comprehensive and productive of all other Gospel-duties and by the subsequent performance of them Faith as St. James tells us is perfected 'T was the fear many good men had of interesting any Works or any thing of our own Justification and Ecclipsing free grace thereby that made them that they would neither allow Faith to be a condition nor a work When they ought to have considered that Gospel works are never opposed to Grace nor can any thing done by Divine assistance be so and when the Apostle opposeth Works to Grace he means such Works as are inconsistent with Grace and so justifie by their merit as to put us out of need of Grace and render it useless but invented that unscriptural notion of its instrumentality of no other use but to make way for metaphysical subtilties and to obscure a plain point when indeed Faith is both a work and a condition First 'T is a work so our Saviour himself calls it Joh. 6.29 This is the work of God that you believe Indeed 't is the chiefest part
never circumcised may now also be justified that is have their sins forgiven if they believe the Gospel and Reform their lives And that by Justifying and Imputing Righteousness is meant the pardon of sin and that Abraham was justified as an ungodly person by being Pardoned and not as an Innocent person the next words declare ver 6. Even as David also describeth the blessedness of the man unto whom God imputeth Righteousness without works whcih was Abrahams case And how is that Why Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven and whose sins are covered Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin The scope of the Apostle in this Chapter is to prove that Abraham was not Justified by any original Innocency or such a sinless perfection of life as would make the reward to be of Debt And so not upon the terms of the first Covenant but he was justified by having Righteousness without Works upon the terms of another Covenant He was justified as an ungodly person as a Sinner That is was Pardoned upon his sincere Faith and suit able obedience and so arrived at the Blessedness David describes who takes it for granted that Blessedness comes not by unsinning perfect obedience which is inconsistent with Pardon For then he would have said Blessed are the sinless perfect persons that never offended But he sayes Blessed are they to whom God will not impute sin and blessed are they whose sins are pardoned The plain intention of this great Apostle of the Gentiles is by the instance of Abraham to establish Evangelical Justification of which the Gentiles were as capable as the Jews in opposition to Legal By works he intends all along the Law and the first Covenant and what was required to justifie a man therein And by Faith he intends the Gospel and all that is conditionally required of us thereby which is a sincere belief accompanied with suitable obedience And Abraham who was justified by performing the Gospel condition and not the condition of the Covenant of Works had such a sincere Faith accompanied with such obedience as the Story it self and the Holy Ghost by St. James positively tells us His Works wrought with his Faith that is to obtain the same End with it and by his Works his Faith was perfected T is absurd to imagine St. Paul ever intended to exclude Gospel-works such a sincere obedience as is naturally appurtenant to Faith and is included in it and supposed by it and which is accepted out of meer Grace and cannot pretend to the least merit But he speaks only against such works as might claim Justification as a reward of Debt in opposition to Grace such as the Jews insisted on which would utterly exclude the Gentiles from all possibility of Justification and establish it upon a Legal bottom and thereby subvert the whole design of the Gospel By justifying therefore the ungodly upon believing he means no more then the justifying a person that has not sinless legal perfection which the first Covenant made necessary to Justification by his performing the condition of the second Covenant which condition performed is through Grace accepted for Righteousness and procures actual Pardon Quest 4. Has Christ satisfied for our gospel-Gospel-sins For the breach of his own Laws as Mediator or not Answ This Question is resolved by one Text of St. John who tells us that The blood of Jesus Christ his son cleanseth from all sin Against whatever Law committed if we perform the Gospel Condition Ever since the Fall and sin of man Christ hath been extant in Promises and Types till his full Appearance And all Pardon and Forgiveness has some way or other come through Him He has been the great medium by and through which all Divine favour and Grace has been in all times dispensed Under the Gospel whoever perform the Condition and comes within the compass of that Latitude Christ by his New Law allows his sins of partial unbelief and all other sorts of Gospel-disobedience are Pardoned upon the terms thereof by the tenor of this New Covenant which Christ hath purchased by his blood whose blood is called the blood of the Covenant By this gracious Covenant a renewed pardon is still granted to all believers for every sin at any time committed upon sincere repentance and reformation And Christ proposeth himself to the world upon those gracious terms That if they cordially close with him and receive him as Lord and Christ as their King and Saviour all their past sins shall be forgiven And whenever they shall sin for the future and come short of that Duty they are to pay to him upon their Repentance they shall be renewed and God through and by Him and for His sake will exercise continual acts of Pardon towards them in all such cases And this day of Grace is for ought we know of the same duration with every mans life Every man while he lives has an Opportunity of embracing the Gospel And whoever falls by Temptation and the power of Corruption after he has so done has yet a continued possibility while God spares him in this world to be restored to a Pardoned Justified state by Repentance But whoever fails and comes short in performing the Gospel-condition Whoever closeth not with the Redeemer who hath all power put by the father into his hands upon his own Terms not one of that mans sins will he ever Remit or Account for to the Father But is he left to answer to that most dreadful Charge of the Law and besides by neglecting so great salvation falls under the utmost condemnation of the Gospel Is left to God as supream Judge of the World in the highest exercise of Justice having refused the terms of his mercy Is left to God without the interposition of a Mediator the terrour of which condition the Apostle thus expresseth 'T is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God Where he means without a Mediator For 't is spoken in terrorem to the Converted Jews who were in great danger of Apostatizing from the Gospel and the faith of the Mediator and returning back to the old Cancelled dispensation of the Law the end of which was Christ To conclude this whole matter The making and redeeming of a man is originally founded in an eternal transaction of the blessed Trinity God saw it fit to Create man at the first with a mutable Will with an inherent freedom of choice though he perfectly knew and foresaw all the consequents and what use man would make of it The Reason of this is not to be inquired into For although God is pleased in Scripture to permit us to Treat with him about his Justice and to Discourse with us about the equity of his proceedings whether his wayes be not equal towards us and ours unequal towards Him Yet he never admits us to any conference with him about his Wisdom never suffers any humane inquiry to be made Whether he does Wisely
or no in what he does but still puts us to silence in that point with his absolute Soveraignty over us and brands that man with a Wo that so strives with his Maker and shall dare to say Why hast thou made me thus Whatever God does we have these two prevailing Reasons to Acquiesce in it First That 't is done by him that has the supream Right of disposing All He that made all is sittest to dispose all and must needs be best intituled so to do Secondly That 't is the result of infinite Attributes such wherein is inherent the utmost possible Perfection we are able to conceive of in every kind Whatever opposeth or questioneth such Wisdom must needs be the highest Folly Whatever opposeth or thwarteth such Justice must needs be the greatest Injustice and so in all other instances God in this case saw it best to make man Free and leave him to the utmost exercise of that freedom that so Man might appear to be what he would be and God might appear to be what his is Evil had never been but that 't was infinitely better it should be then not to be For when the Creature has sinn'd to the utmost God over-rules that sin to excellent Ends and from the depths of Divine Wisdom we see it so brought about that glorious effects result from it Though the commission of sin is no way excused thereby and the guilt of it rests at every mans own door From created freedom all sin and all misery the adjunct of it had their first rise and from thence they were originally produced This created freedom of will was in it self and its own nature as first fram'd excellent and a bright beam of Divine perfection being of a Noble Faculty capable of a continual choice of what was best and 't is far more excellent freely to choose what is so then from any outward necessity to become obliged to it It was also suited in its nature to Gods giving a Law and mans Obedience Of the fitness of which we may easily conceive when we reflect upon that Relation there is between the Creator and a Creature from this Root of created freedom so adequate an adjunct to so noble a creature as Man and in its right exercise alwayes centering in God as the supream and chiefest good and most proper object of choice From hence sprang up the evil and apostacy of humane nature For no man can or from the beginning could say when he is tempted I am tempted of God for God cannot be tempted with evil neither tempteth he any man But every man is tempted when he is led aside of his own lust and enticed This freedom in man declining to disobedience puts a period to all his happiness Disorders and Disjoynt's all his Faculties and straight way renders him obnoxious to that supream and dreadful Attribute of his Maker his Justice God upon the first declension of this freedom upon mans first disobedience inflicts the utmost penalty of his Law Nor can we suppose it otherwise but that God in the first instance of that kind would give his Creatures to know what sin was That a Rebellion against Him the Highest most Absolute and most Perfect Being was of all things the most Intolerable contain'd in its bowels the utmost Evil being an opposition to the Greatest Good and must needs expose to the Worst of Conditions For nothing can oppose God and be happy or prosper Nor would it consist either with the Justice or Wisdom of such a Soveraign as God is to give Laws but upon the most perfect and unalterable Reason and upon that account to adhere to their punctual Execution And of this we are sufficiently informed when we see that nothing less then a satisfaction made by the Death of our Saviour that stupendious and Miraculous expedient of Divine Wisdom beyond the ken of Angels or Men whereby God receives a redundancy of compensation could relieve or release us from the severity and strict execution of the Law of Works and introduce that better Covenant the Law of Grace by which we are now justified and saved We must not imagine God dallyes when he gives Laws to the world or that he will connive at the breach of them or repeal them as men do 'T is otherwise with the supream Law-giver and Judge of all the earth to whom all things that are to come are fully and certainly known and before whom all future events are ever present Man by this chosen disobedience to the Law of his Maker stands before him thereby by as an object of his Justice who being also essentially good gracious and forgiving and acting nothing but in a perfect complyance with himself those two Attributes of Mercy and Justice So far as we are able to reach remain in such a juncture utterly irreconcilable till by a Miracle of Divine Wisdom which can never be sufficiently ador'd a way is found out to make those two Contending Attributes both triumphant Justice is fully satisfied and Mercy brought into its utmost exercise and all the Flood-gates of Divine Goodness let open upon the world This is all effected by the glorious and gracious undertaking of our blessed Redeemer by whom life and immortality is brought to light our Salvation proclaimed and stands for ever established upon these three fundamental points First That Christ perfectly performed all that was necessary for him to perform to constitute him a sufficient Mediator between God and Man exactly fulfilled all the Law of his publick Mediatorship and was approved of God so to have done A sufficient Instance whereof he gave to the world in raising him from the dead and exalting him at his own right hand Secondly That by reason of the Dignity of Christs person his obedience and sufferings were infinitely of more intrinsick value and weight then all the obedience and sufferings of Mankind ever were or possibly could be and so they are accounted of before God Thirdly That being perform'd in our Nature and wholly upon our Account God by an infinitely gracious Statute in Heaven accepts them for us though not as done by us and reckons all the effects and advantages of them by way of imputation to us The Lord Christ having made such a satisfaction to God for the sins of the world and thereby reversed that sentence of Condemnation that by the Law was Recorded against us has as Mediator the power of dispensing Pardon wholly committed to Him For the Father now judges no man but has committed all judgment unto the Son That is Christ as Mediator is established King And the world is now to be judged by a Law of Grace And two things in the exercise of this Mediatory Dominion are Eternally stipulated between the Father and the Son First that all pardon and Forgiveness shall be dispensed upon such Conditions that is upon the terms proclaimed by the Gospel whereby the glory of all the Divine Attributes as well as of Mercy and Forgiveness is highly display'd And Secondly That that power Christ as Mediator is vested withall to impower and inable whom he pleaseth by the sending forth of the Holy Ghost to perform the Gospel-Condition shall be exerted toward those alone to whom God in his Eternal Counsels who had all things in prospect and fore-knowledge and the whole of all mens circumstances before him from Everlasting designed present Grace and future Glory Those who through Divine Grace and Assistance receive Christ as he propounds himself to us in the Gospel are by the tenor thereof justified before God And he so propounds himself that whoever Receives him is thereby obliged to the performance of all Gospel-Righteousness And when the whole of Christs undertaking to bring many sons to glory shall be perfected and compleated we shall then see that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Apostle calls it that multiformâ—s sapientia Dei that manifold wisdom of God in curious variety a-about this matter and the glorious Excellency there is in a Sinners Justification in its contrivance in its procuring cause in its condition and in its final effect And thence will result Everlasting Adoration and Hymns of praise and thanksgiving to him that sits upon the Throne and to the Lamb for ever and ever FINIS
act accordingly that is to pursue the Ends of that Faith in all such acts of obedience as are subsequently required of us And this God sees virtually contained in the first Act of true Faith and the seeds of all future sincere persevering obedience therein And upon that account accepts thereof at first as the performance of the whole condition required by the Gospel legally to intitle us to the priviledge of a Justified state SECT V. ANd now the last thing proposed to be inquired after How and upon what terms we come to arrive at the benefits of a Justified state having been thus resolved that we arrive thereunto by coming up to the terms proposed by the Gospel and performing the condition therein required which is briefly comprized by our Saviour in Believing It will turn much to our account in this present Discussion to inquire with some farther particularity what is intended and comprehended therein And of that we may be much informed by the consideration of these three things First The way and method that God takes to justifie a sinner being originated in the depths of his infinite Counsels no way ever to be found out or discovered but by Revelation a great mystery hid from ages and a thing very incredible to a carnal mind and no way suited to the corrupt Reasonings of Flesh and Blood God expects in the first place that we should fully credit it and firmly give our assent to its veracity And this is in it self a very Righteous Act and so accounted of God firmly to believe him in what he reveals to us And herein the faith of the Gospel and that of Abraham in whose steps we are bid to tread do perfectly resemble each other For he believed God about diverse things in their own nature very hard to be credited He staggred not through unbelief but hoped against hope and still relyed upon Gods veracity and all-sufficiency Secondly God requires of us That he having revealed from Heaven such a glorious and extraordinary way of Justification and Salvation so far out of our own compass and span as is the sending of his Son to assume our nature and in that nature to perfect and compleat all that concern'd our present und future welfare He expects upon this that we should adore this Revelation bow before it with the greatest acknowledgments we are capable of making rely upon it acquiesce in it and be perfectly silenced to all attempts our own Wisdom can suggest to us about this matter And herein the faith of the Gospel answers punctually to that of Abraham For he wholly quitted all those methods carnal and corrupted reason would have directed him to He left his Country and his fathers house and went he knew not whither In a word he forsook the conduct of his own wisdom Believed whatever God told him Did all he bad him and Went whithersoever he called him whatever Difficulties appeared to himself and whatever Censures he lay exposed to from others in his so doing Thirdly God and the Mediator require of us that we should become Obedient to a New Recovering Law of Grace as the condition of our Pardon and Justification In a word That we should subject our selves to all the precepts of the Gospel For Christ as Mediator erects a Kingdom His exaltation is to be a Prince as well as a Saviour a Prince in being a Saviour and whosoever will be saved by him must become one of his Subjects must submit to the regiment of his Kingdom and subject himself to his Laws And herein the faith of Abraham and the faith of every Believer answer one to another as face answereth face in a glass For Abrahams Justification was upon performance of the terms and condition of the New Covenant The Apostle proves he was justified by faith which was to be justified upon the terms of another Covenant and not that of the Law For the law is not of faith nor faith of the Law there was no relation at all between faith and law the law made no promise to faith the promises of the law were to perfect obedience And as the Apostle with convincing evidence urgeth against the Jews Abraham was justified by a faith he had before he was circumcised or had any thing to do with the Law And that faith of Abraham was more then a bare fruitless assent to what God revealed to him 'T was such a faith as put him upon Action and approved its own truth by a suitable obedience And of this we are sufficiently informed by the Story it self in Genesis and by St. James his Comment upon it Some things there are to be remarked in this Disposal of God that highly exalt his Wisdom Holiness and Justice And some things that to a very stupendious degree do magnisie his Mercy First How is the Wisdom Holiness and Justice of God made very transparent by such a dispensing Pardon and Justification as this How suitable is this method to himself He forgives not as the Greatest of men often do and think it an effect of the most supream soveraignty so to do as if in forgiveness nothing were to be done but singly to exercise an act of soveraignty But he forgives like the Lord our Maker That eternal Jehovah who is wonderful in counsel and excellent in working with whom are inherent infinite Attributes none of which in the least can be Denyed or in the least Oppose or Contradict each other He proceeds in all he does in methods chalk'd out by his infinite Wisdom wherein they are all attempered together and do after an admirable manner harmonize each with other He annexeth such conditions to his forgiveness as no way lessen the grace and bounty of it and yet at the same time record his immutable holiness and justice Secondly The greatest righteousness that ever was extant the holyest state of man that he is capable of in his lapsed condition is introduced by the gospel and the precepts thereof and the greatest homage from Earth to Heaven that can be And yet all flesh put to silence in the performance of it We stand justified at Gods Bar in a way of Gods providing and contriving and we perform the Condition required of us solely by the power of his grace freely conferred upon us The glory of all redounds to God alone No Reward can be of Debt 〈◊〉 for all the Rewards of the Gospel are but Gods gracious remunerations of his own gifts and graces Free grace and Divine bounty is the Root that bears all nor can there be any boasting against that Root The holiest man that lives upon earth has the greatest occasion as having received most to abase himself and lie lowest in the dust before God in the Sense thereof in his best performances Thirdly By this method of forgiving these two great Ends are attained First Gods solemn hatred and dislike of sin is made very evident He save no man in his sin but from his sin Whom he