Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	covenant_n	heart_n	new_a	6,959	5	6.8797	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
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

Jewish Rites Acts 21. and in circumcising Timothy nor have said as he did that God had received such Christian Jews who yet made Conscience of Jewish difference and distinction of meats and dayes Rom. 14. if a mere perswasion of being under the obligation of the Law of Moses had been so dangerous and damnable as he affirms the errour of the Judaising Christians to be The very nature of the opposition which the Apostles made against the errour of the Judaising Christians in their Epistles to the Churches among whom they were sufficiently discovers to us the nature of their errour to be the placing Justification in an external Righteousness and not in an internal When St. Paul had said if they were Circumcised Christ should profit them nothing and that they were fallen from Grace that would be justified by the Law and that the true Christians waited for the hope of the Righteousness which is by Faith or which Faith produceth he gives this reason of all saying For in Christ Jesus neither Circumcision availeth any thing nor Uncircumcision but Faith which worketh by Love i. e. by causing Love to God and Men Gal. 5. And again for in Christ Jesus neither Circumcision availeth any thing nor Uncircumcision but a new Creature Gal. 6.15 And if any man be in Christ he 's a new Creature 2 Cor. 5.17 And the Gospel is declared by St Paul to be the ministration of Righteousness not in the Letter of the Law but in the Spirit or internal Righteousness which was required in the Law and more plainly and expresly in the Gospel 2 Cor. 3. and that Christians must serve in newness of Spirit and not in the oldness of the Letter And the benefits of the new Covenant of having God to be our God and our Sins pardoned belong only to them who have his Laws put in their mind and written in their heart Heb. 8. And that those who are born after the Spirit by regeneration are Children according to promise or tenour of the New Covenant when as those who were born after the flesh and adhering only to the Letter of the Law for an external Righteousness were Children of the flesh or Legal Political Covenant And this is set forth in an Allegory touching the two Covenants Gal. 4. All this serves not only to let us see the nature of that Righteousness by which the Judaising Christians could not be justified as they expected but also by way of opposition to that truly and plainly to represent to us the nature of that Evangelical Righteousness by which in subordination to Christ's Righteousness we must be justified if ever justified both which doubtless were the true design of the Scriptures I have brought together that you uright see the harmony and concurrent testimony of the Scriptures in this matter By this time I presume you perceive that the difference between the two sorts of Judaising Christians the better and the worse lay much in this one point to wit that the one did and the other did not hold internal Righteousness necessary to Justification For excepting in this they seem both to have been of one mind both in professing Faith in Christ and in holding themselves under the obligation of the Law of Moses for Circumcision and other Legal Rites Now then if that very thing made so great a difference between them as I have shew'd what shall we then think of that opinion by which some better men among us than the corrupt Judaising Christians were do thus far agree and fall in with them as they do in denying internal Righteousness of inherent Grace to be necessary to our Justification or that it doth enter it or is any ingredient in it but think it perfectly subsequent to it not so much as admitting it to take place or to come into being until we are first justified nor so much as admitting that Faith in it self is imputed for Righteousness but only the Righteousness of Christ as apprehended by Faith I say what shall we think of this Can we possibly think the same opinion to be a grievous errour in the Judaising Christians and yet to be Orthodox and Innocent in others Doubtless where this opinion is as practically held as it was by the corrupter sort of the Judaising Christians it is as criminal and dangerous as it was in them but so it is not I confess where it is held only speculatively as I suppose it to be by all those of that perswasion that are Regenerate and truly good For they hold Regeneration and the inherent Grace of Sanctification necessary to Salvation though not to Justification and in holding this they practically hold it necessary to Justification even then while in speculation and opinion they hold no absolute necessity of it in order thereto For the practising upon this better principle as believing Regeneration and Sanctification necessary to Salvation and becoming Regenerate Sanctified and internally Righteous thereupon they come thereby to have this Evangelical Righteousness imputed to them for such as it is that is for Righteousness for so it is in the eye and according to the tenour of the Evangelical Law which Imputation is their Justification This God does although they do not know and believe all this but think they were justified before they were sanctified which by interpretation is to think they were accounted righteous before they were so that they were accounted righteous in the Righteousness of another before they were at all righteous in themselves But God proceeds in justifying men not according to by-opinions in men while consistent with real Holiness but according to what they are indeed and in truth in the temper of their hearts and tenour of their lives I have said thus much to ease those of the opinion I oppose as much as I can For by reason that it is counter-ballanced by better principles in many it is not so dangerous in them as it was in the corrupt Judaising Christians It was in them indeed mortiserous and damnable if practised upon and persisted in because there was in them no such thing to counter-ballance it in its operation as a perswasion of the necessity of internal Righteousness unto Salvation no more than unto Justification as there is in these And in this very respect and their opinion of merit doubtless it was that the promoters of this grand errour were charged with perverting the Gospel of Christ and those that practically adhered to them therein with falling from Grace and depriving themselves of the benefit of Christ's death And the reason of this is plain because the Grace of God in the Gospel is limited and restrained in the last issue and event unto mens becoming Regenerate and internally righteous as the condition without which they shall neither be justified pardoned nor saved by the death of Christ or any thing he hath done for the Salvation of Sinners And therefore those false Teachers that taught Justification and Salvation attainable by Christ

being justified by Faith alone as abstracted from it's effect of renewing us And if either of these Doctrines were true we might have an immediate title to Pardon and Salvation without Repentance and without being born again unless we will suppose that Justification does not immediately entitle us to these which to suppose is as absurd as any of the rest For what I pray you would such a Justification signisie And then as concerning the other thing viz. That if we have not by the Imputation of Christ's perfect Righteousness a Rightteousness to answer the demands of the Law that then as Mr. F. infers we can have no Justification but what consists in the remission of Sins I answer That for the same reason that we are accounted Righteous upon our performing the Condition of the promise pardon cannot be our Justification but a benefit consequent upon it For if God's owning or avouching the Condition to be performed on our part as he does when it is performed on which he hath promised Pardon and Salvation be his justifying of us or his accounting us righteous according to the tenour of the Covenant of Grace as indeed it is then Pardon is not our Justification it self but one of the benefits unto which our Justification by vertue of the New Covenant doth entitle us for the one is promised but on condition of the other And as the thing promised and the Condition on which it is promised are not the same so neither is the reckoning or accounting us righteous as having performed the Condition of the Promise of Pardon and the actual Pardon it self the same but so much as these differ so much does Justification and Pardon differ But yet for all that I do not deny but that in a large sense as Justification is opposed to Condemnation it may comprehend remission of Sins That is if by Condemnation you understand both conviction of impenitency which is the opposite to Justification properly and the obligation or obnoxiousness thereby to suffer the pains of the second Death And by Justification both a vindication from impenitency and unbelief which is Justification properly and also a discharge thereby from obnoxiousness to eternal punishment then as I said Justification thus opposed to condemnation does indeed include in it remission of Sin though when strictly and most properly considered Justification seems to be one thing and Pardon of Sin another It is wont to be alledged That when St. Paul saith in Rom. 4.6 that God imputeth Righteousness without Works the meaning is That he imputeth the Righteousness of Christ to us without any Works of ours at all Legal or Evangelical External or Internal And because great stress is laid on it by some I will briefly shew how the Context directs us to another sense of those words The Scope of the Apostle in this and the former Chapter is to prove that Justification proceeds from God of Grace and favour and not of Debt To make this good he shews here that it must needs be so because it is vouchsafed not unto such who have been alwayes righteous for he had proved before Chap. 3. that there are none such but that all both Jews and Gentiles have sinned but to such as have been ungodly when once they believe and therefore cease to be so and become sincerely righteous And the Apostle's reason depends upon this manifest truth That such as have once sinned can never by any after-works which they can do merit the Divine favour as a Debt due to them by desert of their Works nor are capable of that favour upon any other terms than what God of his mere Grace is pleased to appoint as the Condition of it as he hath done that of Faith For to him that worketh not saith he but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly his faith is counted to him for righteousness ver 5. And to prove as well as to assert that God justifieth none upon account of their having been alwayes righteous and in his favour as some Jews fancied themselves to have been upon account of their observing the Law of Moses as he in the Gospel who said All these have I kept from my youth up he shew's out of the Psalms of David how that the ancient godly Jews did alwayes esteem their happiness of being in God's favour not to proceed from the merit of their Works in observing the Law of Moses but from the Grace and Mercy of God in forgiving their Sins and accepting their sincere endeavours to please him Even as David saith he describes the blessedness of the man to whom God imputeth righteousnes without works saying Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven and whose sins are covered ver 6 7. And you may easily discern if you observe it that what is said in this sixth and seventh verses is to back and make good what he had said in vers 5. touching God's justifying men upon their believing notwithstanding they had been in a state of ungodliness before And to shew that if he justifie such men upon such terms Justification must needs proceed of Grace and not of Debt or merit of Works of which he had spoken vers 4. saying Now to him that worketh the reward is not reckoned of Grace but of Debt So that in making a Judgment of what Works St. Paul speaks when he saith Righteousness is imputed without Works vers 6. if you do but take your rise from what 's said in vers 4. touching such Works the reward of which is reckoned not of Grace but of Debt and so follow the discourse and the design of it to vers 6. you will find that you cannot fairly turn aside to another but must needs understand him to this sense to wit That the Righteousness which is by Faith of which he had spoken in vers 5. is imputed without such Works as make the reward to be not of Grace but of Debt mentioned v. 4. His Argument runs thus in other words They to whom God imputed Righteousness heretofore were such as stood in need of forgiveness from God therefore they could not possibly merit his favour And although St. Paul doth not improve the words of the Psalmist further than to prove that no man is restored to the Divine favour and the blessedness consequent upon it without forgiveness of Sins and that therefore it must needs be of Grace and not of Debt and Merit that any man attains it by being justified this being his end in alledging them Yet it 's also evident by the words immediately following those the Apostle here recites That Godly sincerity is the conditional qualification required of such to whom the favour of forgiveness is vouchsafed For it 's there said Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity and in whose Spirit there is no guile No guile notes the Sincerity I speak of Psal 32.2 And it 's to the same sense when in the writings of the New Testament Faith as the