Selected quad for the lemma: scripture_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
scripture_n	abraham_n	faith_n	righteousness_n	4,321	5	8.3974	4	true

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A67397	The life of faith in two sermons to the university of Oxford, at St. Mary's Church there, on the 6th of January 1683/4 and June the 29th following / by John Wallis ...	Wallis, John, 1616-1703.	1684 (1684)	Wing W592; ESTC R18108	31,157	46

have recited these Words the more fully that you may clearly see what is the Doctrine and Language of the Church of England And this I hope we All take to be good Doctrine For my part I think it is I might add if it were necessary a great deal more As that where it tells us That Man cannot make himself righteous by his own Works neither in Part nor in Whole For that were the greatest Arrogancy and Presumption of Man that Antichrist could set up against God to affirm that a man might by his own Works take away and purge his own Sins and so justifie himself But Justification is the Office of God only and is not a thing which we Render unto him but which we Receive of him by his free Mercy and by the only Merits of his most dearly beloved Son and our only Redeemer Saviour and Justifier Jesus Christ. But I leave those who would see more of it to seek it in the first second and third Parts of the Sermon of Salvation the first second and third parts of the Sermon of Faith and the first second and third parts of the Sermon of Good Works And indeed the nature of the thing will not bear it that any Works of our own should even in part Justify us For Justification being an Act of God Remitting our Sins for the Ransome and Satisfaction made to his Justice It cannot be that any thing which we can now do can be any part of such Ransome or Satisfaction For all that we can do is but part of what is due for the present As our Saviour tells us When we have done all we are unprofitable Servants we have done but what was our Duty to do And there is nothing of Surplusage which might accrew toward Satisfaction for what is past Like as a Tenant who is run deep in Arrears of Rent cannot by paying part of the Growing Rent for the future make Satisfaction for the Arrears allready incurred For this growing Rent was due allso If it be said as perhaps it may That on this account we must renounce our Faith allso For neither doth Faith Satisfie Gods Justice or Deserve our Justification I say so too That Faith as a Grace or Faith as a Work doth not justifie us But onely as by it we embrace the Righteousness of Christ by which Righteousness alone so embraced we can be Justified And I say so the rather because our Church says so too in these words The true understanding of this Doctrine We be justified freely by Faith without Works or that we be justified by Faith in Christ onely Is not that this our own Act to Believe in Christ or this our Faith in Christ which is within us doth Justify us for that were to count our selves to be justified by some Act or Vertue that is within our selves but the true meaning thereof is That allthough we Hear Gods Word and Believe it allthough we have Faith Hope Charity Repentance Dread and Fear of God within us and do never so many Works thereunto yet we must renounce the merit of all our said Vertues of Faith Hope Charity and all other Vertues and good Deeds which we either have done shall do or can do as things that be far too weak and insufficient and unperfect to deserve Remission of our Sins and our Justification and therefore we must Trust onely in Gods Mercy and that Sacrifice which our High-Priest and Saviour Jesus Christ the Son of God once offered for us on the Cross to obtain thereby Gods Grace and Remission of Sins Original and Actual And as great and as godly a Vertue as the lively Faith is yet it putteth us from it self and remitteth or appointeth us unto Christ for to have onely by Him Remission of Sins and Justification So that our Faith in Christ as it were saith unto us thus It is not I that take away your sins but it is Christ onely and to him onely I send you for that purpose forsaking therein all your good Vertues Words Thoughts and Works and onely putting your Trust in Christ. Nevertheless because Faith doth directly send us to Christ for Remission of our Sins and that by Faith given us of God we Embrace the Promise of Gods Mercy and of the Remission of our sins which thing no other of our Vertues or Works properly doth therefore Scripture useth to say That Faith without Works doth Justify So that according to the Doctrine of our Church neither our other Works and Graces nor even Faith it self as a Work or as an Habit or Grace in us doth Justify us But onely as it Accepteth and Embraceth the Righteousness of Christ for which alone our Sins are Remitted and We Justified not for any thing done by us Which Accepting or Embracing the Promise of God and Salvation by Christ therein offered is not so much an Act of the Understanding Assenting to a Truth for thus the Devils believe and Wicked men as an Act of the Will Accepting of it and Consenting to it and Trusting in it which the Devils and Wicked men have not This being the language of Our Church I would not willingly depart from it or gratifie the Papists so far as to join with them in reproching our Church as Decrying good Works because we say We are not Justified by them If any shall yet say That when they affirm We are not Justified by Faith onely but by Works allso they mean not That either the one or the other doth Merit Gods Favour and the Remission of our Sins but onely That both Faith and Works are necessary to the Party Justified and That by Justification they mean all that is required to make one a Good Man and one qualified for Heaven and Salvation which cannot be without these I say The meaning is good But so to speak is not to speak Distinctly and like a Scholar but to speak confusedly and to Jumble together those things which in themselves are very Distinct. For in order to Salvation there are many other things necessary beside Justification There is Election Regeneration Justification Adoption Sanctification and as the fruits hereof a Holy Life with Perseverance therein to the end Of which Divines use to speak distinctly and consider separately what belongs to each Election is the Act of God which we are not curiously to pry into nor can we know it otherwise than as the Effect discovers it in time Justification is an Act of God allso and as to a person peccant it is the Remission of Sins upon which we are in Gods account reputed as Just or Innocent and this onely for the Satisfaction which Christ hath made not for any Work of ours And this Satisfaction of Christ is by us embraced by Faith accepting this Salvation offered by Christ not by any other Grace Adoption is an Act of God likewise whereby he reputes us his Children and Heirs of his Kingdom which is for the Merits of Christ Purchasing Heaven

by Faith And even by the same Faith to which he doth there exhort the Christian Hebrews It was the same Christ the same Gospel though not so clearly reveiled and the same Eternal Life which they expected though they were more in the dark as to the particulars and the distinct ways and methodes of bringing it to pass And as the first Threatening In the day that thou Eatest thereof thou shalt surely Dy extended to Spiritual and Eternal Death as well as the Natural For we are not to suppose that God Inflicts a greater Punishment than what he threatened So the Life there Promised by way of Insinuation and elsewhere Expressed He that doth them shall Live in them must be understood in a like sense not of Temporal Promises onely but of Spiritual and Eternal And the Apostle expounds it if the same Life or what is equivalent to be obtained by the first Covenant upon condition of Obedience and by the second Covenant by Faith in Christ. That no man is Justified by the Law in the sight of God is evident For the Just shall live by Faith And the Law is not of Faith but the Man that Doth them shall live in them The same Life or Blessedness though by different ways attainable And the Apostle here shews That it is the same Faith by which We beleeve to the saving of our Souls and by which the Elders obtained a good Report And by Faith Abraham with Isaac and Jacob Heirs with him of the same promise Sojourned in the Promised Land as in a strange Countrey of which though promised to them they had no other Enjoyment than mere Strangers For he looked for a City who 's Builder and Maker was God another kind of City than those on Earth All these Died in Faith not having Received the Promises which were therefore such as were to be enjoyed after Death but seeing them afar off and were perswaded of them and Embraced them and confessed that they were Strangers and Pilgrims upon Earth this being not the Countrey they sought for For they that say such things declare plainly that they seek a Countrey such a Countrey as yet they had not And truly if they had been mindful of such a Countrey as that from whence they came they might have had opportunity to have returned But now 't is manifest they desire a Better Countrey that is an Heavenly Wherefore God is not ashamed to be called Their God the God of Abraham Isaac and Jacob For he hath prepared a City for them By all which the Apostle doth not only Declare that they expected an Heavenly Happiness but Argues strongly That it must needs be so And by Faith Moses he tells us Esteemed the Reproches of Christ greater Riches than the Treasures of Egypt For he had respect to the Recompense of Reward as Seeing him that is Invisible Others were Tortured not accepting Deliverance that they might obtain a better Resurrection Others had Tryal of or did undergo 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 expertisunt Cruel Mockings of Bonds and Imprisonment Were Stoned were Sawn asunder were Slayn with the Sword c. And all these having obtained a good Report through Faith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 received not the Promise their Faith was exercised on better Promises than of what they here received God having provided for them Better things that they without us should not be perfect the Promises to them and those to us being the same Again As this Duty and Privilege of Living by Faith extended Backwards to the times before Christ So it extends Wider than the Nation of the Jews A Blessing which the Gentiles are particularly concerned in and which we this day celebrate The Epiphany or the Manifestation of Christ to the Gentiles For the Blessing of Abraham is come upon the Gentiles also through Jesus Christ that We might receive the promise of the Spirit through Faith And the Scripture foreseeing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that God would Justify the Heathen through Faith preached before 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 did before hand preach the Gospell to Abraham saying In thee that all Nations be blessed So then they which are of Faith the same are the Children of Abraham They which be of Faith are Blessed with faithfull Abraham And are therefore of the number of those as there it follows who shall Live by Faith Now if it be asked What it is thus to Live by Faith It is too large a Task for one Sermon to give a full account of it For allmost the whole Bible and the Practise of the Saints in all Ages are but a Comment on it I shall therefore content my self to give a short account of some of the chief Heads thereof To Live by Faith therefore is First to Beleeve the Word of God to give Credit to the Truthes of God or things by him declared how unlikely soever they may seem to be and however different from the common Sentiments of Natural men or what the Light of Nature alone could teach us For though there be nothing in Divine Truths Contrary to what the Light of Nature truly understood may teach us Yet there may be some things much above it which without Revelation cannot be known Thus By Faith we Beleeve That the Worlds were made by the Word of God that things that are now seen were made not of things that do appear That is that the now visible World was not made up of such things as we now see or that there was no praeexisting Matter such as we now see of which it was made but was indeed made of Nothing Which however contrary to the sentiments of Philosophers Ex nihilo nihil in nihilum nil posse reverti That nothing can be made out of Nothing Yet when God hath told us that it is so we are to give full credit to it There is indeed nothing from the Light of Nature Contrary hereunto why we should Disbeleeve it when it is Reveiled But yet we are sayd to know it by Faith because it is Above what Nature alone could have taught For when we see this glorious Fabrick of the World we might well admire it but could never know whence it was if God had not told us For though Naturalists have with a great deal of Reason talked of a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Causa prima a Common Maker or First Cause which should give Original to all things else Yet this was but either from some faint Remains of an ancient Tradition from Adam and Noah downward to after Ages Or atmost be Conjectural and Groping in the dark and Guessing at this as a more likely Supposition than That it had Allways been or should take its beginning from a Fortuitous Concurse of Atomes Which yet the Wits of this Age as they would be thought or the Fools rather would now cry-up as