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A23656 Animadversions on that part of Mr. Robert Ferguson's book entituled The interest of reason in religion which treats of justification in a letter to a friend. Allen, William, d. 1686. 1676 (1676) Wing A1054; ESTC R5034 44,339 112

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being justified by believing and obeying the Gospel with any such absurdity or inconvenience as that it is not maintainable without perverting innumerable texts from their plain and natural sense to a Metaphorick Only let me premise this that it would alwayes be remembred that whatever benefits do accrue to us by vertue of the new Covenant are owing unto Christ and truly attributable unto him in whom for whose sake and upon account of whose undertaking the Covenant it self and all the benefits of it are vouchsafed unto men And accordingly this Covenant in Scripture is said to be confirmed of God in Christ Gal. 3.17 to be the new-Testament in his blood Mat. 26.28 and his blood to be the blood of the everlasting Covenant Heb. 13.20 And he himself given for a Covenant of the People Is 42.6 and all the promises of God are in him yea and in him amen 2. Cor. 1.22 What ever then depends upon this Covenant depends upon Christ and accordingly the benefits promised in it Remission of sin and eternal life are in Scripture ascribed unto him And although Faith as comprehending repentance and sincere obedience be imputed for righteousness yet it is not for its own sake that it is so but for Christ's sake and all by vertue of the divine will which hath of mere Grace and favour appointed that so it shall be This being premised I proceed now to shew that we are justified by God upon our believing and obeying the Gospel and that in a proper sense and that our believing and obeying the Gospel is our Evangelical righteousness upon the taking place whereof in men God accounts and by the doctrine in the Scriptures declares them just and deals with them accordingly which is his justifying of them To this end let it be considered that this Covenant as founded by God in the righteousness of Christ's life and Sacrifice of his death doth consist of two parts of Conditions required by God and to be performed by men and of promise of benefits made by God and to be performed by him but to be received and enjoyed by men The Condition upon which promise of benefits is made by God is that which Mr. S. rightly calls a believing and obeying the Gospel And the benefits promised upon the aforesaid condition Mr. S. truly saith are pardon of Sin and eternal life That such promises are made and upon such conditions appears every where in Scripture where things of this nature are spoken of as every one knows that knows the Scripture and Mr. F. himself stands declared no enemy to the Doctrine of the conditionality of the promises Things then being thus setled between God and all men in this Covenant the enquiry upon every man's tryall will be whether he hath performed the condition required on his part in believing repenting and sincerely obeying If it be found that he hath he is thereupon as truly and in a proper Sense justified that is accounted and by the Gospel declared and pronounced Evangelically just and righteous i. e. in the sense of this Evangelicall Law as he would have been in the sense of the Original Law in case he had observed the terms of that And had I been to have written to Mr F. I would have enquired of him which of these things now mentioned he would or could deny being all so perfectly agreeable as they are to the tenour and very letter of the Scripture Will he or can he deny belief in the Gospel and obedience to it to be the Condition upon which God in the Gospel or new Covenant hath promised pardon of Sin and eternal life or which is the same that he hath promised these benefits to such and to no other This I take for granted he will not deny Next I would demand whether Faith Repentance and sincere obdience be not all that is required of men themselves by God in the Gospel to make them Evangelically righteous and capable of the saving benefits promised in the Gospel If they be and I believe Mr. F. will not deny them to be so from one of his own assertions p. 414. then I further query whether these do not denominate a man Evangelically righteous or righteous in the gospel sense as well as the doing all that the Law required would have denominated a man legally righteous or righteous in the sense of the Law And further whether men from those qualifications aforesaid are not in Scripture so denominated As for instance Faith which is as I have said comprehensive of repentance and sincere obedience when saveing this as the Scripture tells us expresly was counted to Abraham for righteousness Rom. 4.3 Gal. 3.6 And we are told also that the Scripture speaking of this in reference to Abraham was not written for his sake only but for us also to whom it shall be imputed if we believe on him who raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead vers 23.24 And then for Evangelical or sincere obedience that comes in also for a share in denominating a man righteous in a gospel sense He that doth righteousness is righteous saith St. John 1 Ep. 3.7 and he speaks it of that righteousness which men themselves do in a course of sincere obedience and not of the righteousness of another imputed to them In the righteousness which he hath done shall he live saith the Phophet speaking of a man that shall turn from all the sins which he hath committed and shall observe all God's Statutes and do all that which is lawfull and right Ezek. 18.22 If then Faith Repentance and sincere obedience be all that the gospel requires to denominate a man righteous in a gospel sense and to make him capable of the promised benefits Then all those in whom these are found are by God in the Gospel declared and pronounced righteous men which Declaration is their Justification For what is done in this kind by the gospel on Earth is done also by God in Heaven No man sure that understands and considers what he saith will deny this to be Justification in a proper sense nor assert it not maintainable without perverting the scriptures from their plain and natural meaning to a Metaphorick sense whereas its most evident it stands back't with the Scriptures understood in their plain proper and genuine sense But because Mr. Ferguson was somwhat sensible that he could not duly infer any thing from Mr. S's own words touching his apprehensions about Justification but what was agreeable to the Notion of justification in a proper sense in reference to the demands of the gospel as you may perceive by what he saith towards the beginning of the page 416. And because he had a great mind to fasten somthing by way of retortion upon Mr. S's Notion of Justification as if it had not been maintainable to be Justification properly so called without wresting the Scriptures from their plain and proper sense which was the the thing Mr. S. charged on them whose opinion Mr.
Principle of Sincerity and of the Divine Nature and Life is made the Condition of Pardon And now if what hath been said amounts to any fair account of the Apostle's scope and design in those forementioned verses and of the sense of the several Phrases by which it is exprest and I leave you to judg whether it doth or no then I can see no reason why by Righteousness imputed without Works we should understand the Righteousness of Christ but rather the Righteousness of Faith properly understood which Faith the Apostle there expresly affirms to be imputed for Righteousness but doth not so much as mention Christ in those verses much less the imputation of his Righteousness unto Justification as exclusive of all manner of Works It is not the Righteousness of Christ but Grace and Faith that are in this contexture of Scripture opposed to Works Nor are Works opposed to Faith neither but under the notion of Merit as they make the reward to be of Debt and not of Grace And when I say this I do for all that with all thankfulness acknowledge and profess That the Righteousness or Obedience of Christ's Life and Death doth with a high hand operate to our Justification and so as neither our Faith nor any thing in us or done by us can do but in a way altogether transcending it though not in Mr. F's way of Imputation nor is it in this Scripture set forth as it is in others It 's true indeed the Righteousness the Apostle treats of in this place is stiled Righteousness imputed But the reason is not because it is not inherent in the persons themselves to whom it is imputed but in Christ and made theirs only by imputation for it is the Faith of the Person himself that is here said to be counted or imputed to him for Righteousness And the reason why it is called a Righteousness imputed may be because it is not naturally and of it self or in its own nature a Righteousness that would justifie a man as Adam's was before his fall but it is only by Divine Institution Grace and Favour that it is so God justifies us freely by his Grace Rom. 3.24 It is of Faith that it might be by Grace as it follows Rom. 4.16 As it is by the Justification or Ordinance of a King that such a piece of Coin passeth currant for so much whether it be of the intrinsick value or no even so by vertue of God's institution and for Christ's sake Faith is made to pass for and to be reckoned and accounted to us for Righteousness and to entitle us to those benefits which in its own Nature it doth not merit If it were a perfect Righteousness in its own Nature as Adam's was it would need no Pardon to accompany it as it does and would secure us as well from temporal as eternal death which yet it doth not But it being a Righteousness by Institution and Grace how far it shall be beneficial to us and to what ends and purposes it shall serve depend wholly upon the good will and pleasure of God and are knowable only so far to us as he hath been pleased to put them into promise by vertue of which promise made upon condition of such Righteousness and not by merit of the Righteousness it self we come to have a title to the promised benefits such as are remission of Sin and eternal Life But Mr. F. cannot understand but that it is repugnant to the immutability and essential Holiness of God to justifie us upon an imperfect obedience the Law commanding that which is perfect and thinks for him to do so would be to pronounce an unjust person just But he should consider That God in justifying us doth not pronounce us just as not having sinned for that 's impossible for him indeed to do but as having performed the Condition on which he in his Gospel-Covenant hath promised to pardon our Sin And in doing this he doth not prouounce unjust persons just for they are just with an Evangelical Righteousness just in the Gospel sense and so stiled from place to place in the Scripture as I have shew'd And although the Evangelical Righteousness and Obedience upon which God is pleased to justifie us be imperfect if measured by the Law yet it is perfect as to its end appointed by God when measured by the Gospel by which we are to be tryed whether we be righteous or unrighteous And whosoever being adult is not righteous in this sense shall not inherit the Kingdom of God 1 Cor. 69. but those that are thus righteous shall go into life eternal Matth. 25.46 But supposing Evangelical Righteousness or Obedience to be Comparatively imperfect whether compared with what man in innocency had and was capable to perform or whether compared with a gradual perfection of Righteousness and Obedience of the same kind and supposing it to be only sincere obedience according to the present circumstances a man is in Let us weigh and consider whether or no it be not consistent with the Holiness of God to justifie men upon such Righteousness and Obedience when found in them when withal we take in what hath been done by Christ the Mediatour to make way for it I conceive Mr. F. doth not suppose that God by the Holiness of his Nature is naturally and necessarily restrained from shewing favour to men after once they have been guilty of Sin and have made themselves obnoxious to the effects of his high displeasure for if he were we were all still in an ill case and there would be then no such thing as Grace extant in the World which yet is so illustrious and glorious as that it is the very subject matter of the Gospel Grace and mercy are as essentially in God as Holiness And therefore we must take heed of framing such notions of his Holiness as to leave no place for the exercise of his Grace and Mercy God no doubt is at liberty to recede from his own right as well as men are in remitting debts and pardoning offences to what degree and upon what terms he pleaseth only he as Rector of the World hath respect therein unto good order and government Supposing all this we must suppose again that such acts of Grace and Favour towards offending Sinners as do not in the least encourage them to continue in Sin nor any other Creature in the whole Creation that is innocent to fall into a state of like Rebellion as man hath done but are of a quite contrary tendency will very well consist with the end of his Government as he is Rector of the World and with the Righteousness and Justice of the Governour himself Now the reason and end of executing Justice upon Delinquents is either to recover them themselves to good order and behaviour or to deterr others from falling into like Rebellion against God For otherwise God delighteth not in the death as such of him that dies Ezek. 18. Provided then that