goodness of Gods Laws Whether the Promise and â—â—eward be the end of Obedience or Obedience the end of the 〈…〉 Reward Of Scripture examples 232 Chap. 5. How to live by faith on Gods Promises What will of God it is according to which they must ask who will receive Of a particular faith in prayer Is the same degree of grace conditionally promised to all Directions for understanding the Promises The true nature of faith or trust in Gods Promises opened at large Affiance is in the understanding will and vital power Whether Faith be Obedience or how related to it Ten acts of the understanding essential to the Christian Faith in the Promises Several acts of the will essential to Faith And in the vital power whether all true Faith have a subjective certainty of the truth of the Word Choice and venturing or forsaking all is the sign of real trust Promises collected for the help of Faith 1. Of Pardon 2. Of Salvation 3. Of Reconciliation and Adoption 4. Of pardon of new sins after conversion 5. Of Sanctification 6. Promises to them that desire and seek 7. To Prayer 8. To groans that want expression 9. Promises of all that we want and that is good for us 10. To the use of Gods Word and Sacraments 11. To the humble meek and lowly 12. To the peaceable 13. To the diligent 14. To the patient 15. To Obedience 16. To the Love of God 17. To them that love the godly and are merciful in good works 18. To the poor 19. To the oppressed 20. To the persecuted 21. In dangers 22. Against temptations 23. To them that overcome and persevere 24. In sickness and at death 25. Of Resurrection final Justification and Glory 26. For children of the godly 27. To the Church 241 Chap. 6. How to exercise faith on Godâ— Threatnings and Judgements How far belief of the threatnings in good necessary and a saving faith How saving faith is a personal application How to perceive true faith 297 Chap. 7. How to live by faith for Pardon and Justification In how many respects and waies Christ justifieth us Of the imputation of Christs Righteousness Twelve reasons to help our belief of pardon How far sin should make us doubt of our Justification 308 Chap. 8. 58 Dangerous Errours detected which hinder the 〈…〉 faith about 〈…〉 and the contrary truthâ—â—ssertedâ— 321 Chap. 9. How to live by faith in the exercise of other graces and duties And 1. Of the doctrinal Directions What Sanctification is How God loveth the unsanctified How 〈◊〉 loveth 〈◊〉 in Christ Of Preaching meer Morality â—61 Chap. 10. The practical Directions to promote Love to God and Holiness 367 Chap. 11. Of the order and harmony of graces and duties which must be taken all together Of the parts that make up the new Creature 1. The intellectual order or a method or scheme of the heads of Divinity 2. The order of Intention and Affection 3. The order of practice Of the various degrees of means to mans ultimate end Of the grace necessary to concur with these various means The circular motion by divine communication to our Receiving Graces and so by our Returning Graces unto God again The frame of the present means of grace and of our returning duties Rules about the order of Christian practice which shew that and how the best is to be preferred and which is best in fifty three Propositions How mans Laws bind conscience and many other cases resolved A lamentation for the great want of order and method and harmony in the understandings wills and lives of Christians Many instances of mens partiality as to truths graces duties sins c. Twenty Reasons why few Christians are compleat and entire but â—ame and partial in their Religion Ten Consectaries Whether all graces be equal in habit Religion not so perfect in us as in the Scriptures which therefore are the Rule to us c. 373 Chap. 12. How to use faith against particular sins 417 Chap. 13. What sins the best are most in danger of and should most carefully avoid And wherein the infirmities of the upright differ from mortal sins 421 Chap. 14. How to live by faith in prosperity The way by which faith doth save us from the world General Directions against the danger of prosperity Twenty marks of worldliness The pretences of worldly minds The greatness of the sin The ill effects 428 Chap. 15. How to be poor in spirit And 1. How to escape the Pride of prosperous men The cleaks of Pride The signs of Pride and 〈…〉 446 Chap. 16. How to escape the 〈…〉 by faith The mischiefe of serving the appetite 〈…〉 465 Chap. 17. How faith must conquer sloth and idleness Who are guilty of this sin Cases resolved The evil of idleness The remedies 474 Chap. 18. Vnmercifulness to the poor to be conquered by faith The remedies 491 Chap. 19. How to live by faith in adversity 493 Chap. 20. How to live by faith in trouble of conscience and doubts of our salvation The difference between true and false repentance How to apply the universal grace to our comfort The danger of casting our part on Christ and of ascribing all melancholy disturbances and thoughts to the spirit Of the trying the spiriâ— and of the witness of the Spirit 503 Chap. 21. How to live by faith in the publick Woshipping of God Overvalue not your own manner of Worship and overvilifie not other mens Of communion with others 519 Chap. 22. How to pray in faith 527 Chap. 23. How to live by faith towards children and other Relations 530 Chap. 24. How by faith to order our affections to publick Societies and to the unconverted world 535 Chap. 25. How to live by faith in the love of one another and to mortifie self-love It is our own interest and gain to love our neighbours as our selves Objections wherein it consisteth What is the sincerity of it Consectaries Loving others as your selves is a duty even as to the degree 539 Chap. 26. How by faith to be followers of the Saints and to look with profit to their examples and their end and to hold communion with the heavenly Society Reasons of the duty The nature of it Negatively what it is not and Affirmatively what it is Wherein they must be imitated 556 Chap. 27. How to receive the sentence of death and how to die by Faith 589 Chap. 28. How by faith to look aright to the coming of Jesus Christ in Glory 594 Reader The first and great Errour of the Printer iâ— that he hath not distinguished the three distinct Parts of the Treatise Therefore you must write Page 1. PART 1. and Pag. 81. PART 2. Chap. 1. and Pag. 168. PART 3. Chap. 1. IN the Preface Page 3. l. 16. put If you would have p. 8. l. 8. put out have p. 31. l. 31. put out out p. 40. l. 22. for that r. the p. 51. l. 37. for yoâ—r r. their p. 54. l. 13. for believe r.
those things that are not seen Or you may take the sense in this Proposition which I am next to open further and apply viz. That the nature and use of faith is to be as it were instead of presence possession and sight or to make the things that will be as if they were already in existence and the things unseen which God revealeth as if our bodily eyes beheld them 1. Not that faith doth really change its object 2. Nor doth it give the same degree of apprehensions and affections as the sight of present things would do But 1. Things invisible are the objects of our faith 2. And Faith is effectual instead of sight to all these uses 1. The apprehension is as infallible because of the objective certainty though not so satisfactory to our imperfect souls as if the things themselves were seen 2. The will is determined by it in its necessary consent and choice 3. The affections are moved in the necessary dâ—gree 4. It ruleth in our lives and bringeth us through duty and suffering for the sake of the happiness which we believe 3. This Faith is a grounded wise and justifiable act an infallible knowlâ—dge and often called so in Scripture John 6.69 1 Cor. 15.58 Rom. 8.28 c. And the constitutive and efficient causes will justifie the Name We know and are infallibly sure of the truth of God which we believe As it 's said John 6.69 We believe and are sure that thou art that Christ the Son of the living God 2 Cor. 5.1 We know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved we have a building of God an house not made with hands eternal in the Hâ—avens Rom. 8.28 We know that all things work together for good to them that love God 1 Cor. 15.58 You know that your labour is nâ—t in vain in the Lord Joh. 9.29 We knâ—w God spake to Moses c. 31. We know God heareth not sinners John 3.2 We know thou art a Teacher come from God So 1 John 3.5 15. 1 Pet. 3.17 and many other Scriptures tell you that Believing God is a certain infallible sort of knowledge I shall in justification of the work of Faith acquaint you briefly with 1. That in the Nature of it 2. And that in the causing of it which advanceth it to be an infallible knowledge 1. The Believer knows as sure as he knows there is a God that God is true and his Word is true it being impossible for God to lie Hâ—b 6.18 God that cannot lie hath promised Titus 1.2 2. He knows that the holy Scripture is the Word of God by his Image which it beareth and the many evidences of Divinity which it containeth and the many Miracles certainly proved which Christ and his Spirit in his servants wrought to confirm the truth 3. And therefore he knoweth assuredly the conclusion that all this Word of God is true And for the surer effecting of this knowledge God doth not only set before us the ascertaining Evidence of his own veracity and the Scriptures Divinity but moreover 1. He giveth us to believe Phil. 1.29 2 Pet. 1.3 For it is not of our selves but is the gift of God Ephes 2.8 Faith is one of the fruits of the Spirit Gal. 5.22 By the drawing of the Father we come to the Son And he that hath knowledge given from Heaven will certainly know and he that hath Faith given him from Heaven will certainly believe The heavenly Light will dissipate our darkness and infallibly illuminate Whilest God sets before us the glass of the Gospel in which the things invisible are revealed and also gives us eye sight to behold them Believers must needs be a heavenly people as walking in that light which proceedeth from and leadeth to the celestial everlasting Light 2. And that Faith may be so powerful as to serve instead of sight and presence Believers have the Spirit of Christ within them to excite and actuate it and help them against all temptations to unbelief and to work in them all other graces that concur to promote the works of Faith and to mortifie those sins that hinder our believing and are contrary to a heavenly life So that as the exercise of our sight and taste and hearing and feeling is caused by our natural life so the exercise of Faith and Hope and Love upon things unseen is caused by the holy Spirit which is the principle of our new life 1 Cor. 2.12 We have received the Spirit that we might know the things that are given us of God This Spirit of God acquainteth us with God with his veracity and his Word Heb. 10.30 We know him that hath said I will never fail thee nor forsake thee This Spirit of Christ acquainteth us with Christ and with his grace and will 1 Cor. 2.10 11 12. This heavenly Spirit acquainteth us with Heaven so that We know that when Christ appeareth we shall be like him for we shall see him as he is 1 Joh. 3.2 And we know that he was manifested to take away sin 1 Joh. 3.5 And will perfect his work and present us spotless to his Father Eph. 5.26 27. This heavenly Spirit possesseth the Saints with such heavenly dispositions and desires as much facilitate the work of Faith It bringeth us to a heavenly conversation and maketh us live as fellow-citizens of the Saints and in the houshold of God Phil. 3.20 Eph. 2.19 It is within us a Spirit of supplication breathing heaven-ward with sighs and groans which cannot be expressed and as God knoweth the meaning of the Spirit so the Spirit knows the mind of God Rom. 8.37 1 Cor. 2.11 3. And the work of Faith is much promoted by the spiritual experiences of Believers When they find a considerable part of the holy Scriptures verified on themselves it much confirmeth their Faith as to the whole They are really possessed of that heavenly disposition called The Divine Nature and have felt the power of the Word upon their hearts renewing them to the Image of God mortifying their most dear and strong corruptions shewing them a greater beauty and desirableness in the Objects of Faith than is to be found in sensible things They have found many of the Promises made good upon themselves in the answers of prayers and in great deliverances which strongly perswadeth them to believe the rest that are yet to be accomplished And experience is a very powerful and satisfying way of conviction He that feeleth as it were the first fruits the earnest and the beginnings of Heaven already in his soul will more easily and assuredly believe that there is a Heaven hereafter We know that the Son of God iâ— come and hath given us an understanding that we may know him that is true and we are in him that is true even in his Son Jesus Christ This is the true God and eternal life 1 Joh. 5.20 He that believeth on the Son hath the witness in himself Vers 10. There is so
agreed whether its acts should be called physical properly or not Nay they cannot tell what doth individuate an act of sense whether when my eye doth at once see many words and letters of my Book every word or letter doth make as many individual acts by being so many objects And if so whether the parts of every letter also do not constitute an individual act and where we shall here stop And must all these trifles be considered in our Faith Assenting to the truths is not one Faith unless when separated from the rest and consenting to the good another act Nor is it one Faith to believe the promise and another to believe the pardon of sin and another to believe salvation and another to believe in God and another to believe in Jesus Christ nor one to believe in Christ as our Ransom and another as our Intercessor and another as our Teacher and another as our King and another to believe in the Holy Ghost c. I deny not but some one of these may be separated from the rest and being so separated may be called Faith but not the Christian Faith but only a material parcel of it which is like the limb of a man or of a tree which cut off from the rest is dead and ceaseth when separated to be a part any otherwise than Logical a part of the description The Faith which hath the promise of salvation and which you must live by hath 1. God for the Principal Revealer and his Veracity for its formal object 2. It hath Christ and Angels and Prophets and Apostles for the sub-revealers 3. It hath the Holy Ghost by the divine attesting operations before described to be the seal and the confirmer 4. It hath the same Holy Ghost for the internal exciter of it 5. It hath all truths of known divine revelation and all good of known divine donation by his Covenant to be the material general object 6. It hath the Covenant of Grace and the holy Scriptures and formerly the voice of Christ and his Apostles or any such sign of the mind of God for the instrumental efficient cause of the object in esse cognito And also the instrumental efficient of the act 7. It hath the pure Deity God himself as he is to be known and loved inceptively here and perfectly in Heaven for the final and most necessary material object 8. It hath the Lord Jesus Christ entirely in all essential to him as God and Man and as our Redeemer or Saviour as our Ransome Intercessor Teacher and Ruler for the most necessary mediate material object 9. It hath the gifts of Pardon Justification the Spirit of Sanctification or Love and all the necessary gifts of the Covenant for the material never-final objects And all this is essential to the Christian Faith even to that Fath which hath the promise of pardon and salvation And no one of these must be totally left out in the definition of it if you would not be deceived It is Heresie and not the Christian Faith if it exclude any one essential part And if it include it not it is Infidelity And indeed there is such a connexion of the objects that there is no part in truth where there is not the whole And it is impiety if any one part of the offered good that is necessary be refused It is no true Faith if it be not a true composition of all these Direct 8. There is no nearer way to know what true Faith is than truly to understand what your Baptismal Covenanting did contain In Scripture phrase to be a Disciple a Believer and a Christian is all one Acts 11.26 Acts 5.14 1 Tim. 4.12 Matth. 10.42 27.57 Luke 14.26 27 33. Acts 21.16 Joh. 9.28 And to be a Believer and to have Belief or Faith is all one and therefore to be a Christian and to have Faith is all one Christianity signifieth either our first entrance into the Christian State or our progress in it As Marriage signifieth either Matrimony or the Conjugal State continued in In the latter sense Christianity signifieth more than Faith for more than Faith is necessary to a Christian But in the former sense as Christianity signifieth but our becoming Christians by our covenanting with God so to have Faith or to be a Believer and internally to become a Christian in Scripture sense is all one and the outward covenanting is but the profession of Faith or Christianity Not that the word Faith is never taken in a narrower sense or that Christianity as it is our heart-covenant or consent containeth nothing but Faith as Faith is so taken in the narrowest sense But when Faith is taken as ordinarily in Scripture for that which is made the condition of Justification and Salvation and opposed to Heathenism Infidelity Judaism or the works of the Law it is commonly taken in this larger sense Faith is well enough described to them that understand what is implyed by the usual shorter description as that it is a believing acceptance of Christ and relying on him as our Saviour or for salvation Or a belief of pardon and the heavenly Glory as procured by the Redemption wrought by Christ and given by God in the Covenant of Grace But the reason is because all the rest is connoted and so to be understood by us as if it were exprest in words But the true and full definition of it is this The Christian Faith which is required at Baptism and then professed and hath the promise of Justification and Glorification is a true Belief of the Gospel and an acceptance of and consent unto the Covenant of Grace Particularly a believing that God is our Creatour our Owner our Ruler and our Chief Good and that Jesus Christ is God and man our Saviour our Ransoms our Teacher and our King and that the Holy Ghost is the Sanctifier of the Church of Christ And it is an understanding serious consent that this God the Father Son and Holy Ghost be my God and reconciled Father in Christ my Saviour and my Sanctifier to justifie me sanctifie me and glorifie me in the perfect knowledge of God and mutual complacence in Heaven which belief and consent wrought in me by the Word and Spirit of Christ is grounded upon the Veracity of God as the chief Revealer and upon his Love and Mercy as the Donor and upon Christ and his Apostles as the Messengers of God and upon the Gospel and specially the Covenant of Grace as the instrumental Revelation and Donation it self And upon the many signal operations of the Holy Ghost as the divine infallible attestation of their truth Learn this definition and understand it throughly and it may prove a more solid useful knowledge to have the true nature of Faith or Christianity thus methodically printed on your minds than to read over a thousand volumes in a rambling and confused way of knowledge If any quarrel at this definition because the foundation is not first
means is a condition of our further reception of more grace And perseverance in true holiness with faith is the condition of our final Justification and Glorification of which more anon Direct 24. You can no further believe the fulfilling of any of these conditional Promises than you know that you perform the condition It is presumption and not faith for an impenitent person to expect the benefit of those Promises which belong to the penitent only And so it is for him that forgiveth not others to expect to be forgiven his particular sins And so in all the rest of the Promises Direct 25. But be sure that you ascribe no more to your selves for performing any condition of a Promise than God doth A condition as such is no cause at all of the performance of the Promise either natural or moral only the non-performance of the condition is a cause of the non-performance of the Promise For the true nature of a condition as such is only to suspend the benâ—fit Though naturally a condition may be meritorious among men and for their own commodity which God is not capable of they ordinarily make only meritorious acts to be conditions As God also doth only such acts as are pleasing to him and suited to their proper ends But this is nothing to a condition formally which is but to suspend the benefit till it be done Direct 26. When you find a Promise to be common or universal apply it as boldly as if your name were written in it and also when you find that any particular Promise to a Saint is but a branch of that universal Promise to all Saints or to all that are in the same case and find that the case and reason of the Promise proveth the sense of it to belong to you as well as them If it be said that whosoever believeth shall not perish but have everlasting life John 3.16 You may apply it as boldly as if it were said If thou John or Thomas be a Believer thou shalt not perish but have everlasting life As I may apply the absolute Promise of the Resurrection to my self as boldly as if my name were in it because it is all that shall be raised John 5.22 24 25. 1 Cor. 15. So may I all the conditional promises of pardon and glory conditionally if I repent and believe And you may absolutely thence conclude your certain interest in the benefit so far as you are certain that you repent and believe And when you read that Christ promiseth his twelve Apostles to be with them and to reward their labours and to see that they shall be no losers by him if they lose their lives c. You may believe that he will do so by you also For though your work be not altogether the same with theirs yet this is but a branch of the common Promise to all the faithful who must all follow him on the same terms of self-denial Luke 14.26 27 33. Mat. 10. Rom. 8.17 18. And on this ground the promise to Joshua is applied Heb. 15. I will never fail thee nor forsake thee because it is but a branch of the Câ—venant common to all the faithful Direct 27. Be sure that you lay the stress of all your hopes on the Promises of God and venture all your happiness on them and when God calleth to it express this by forsaking all else for these hopes that it may appear you really trust Gods word without any secret hypocritical reserves This is the true life and work and tryal of faith whether we build so much on the Promise of God that we can take the thing promised for all our treasure and the Word of God for our whole security As Faith is called a Trusting in God so it is a practical kind of Trust and the principal tryal of it lyeth in forsaking all other happiness and hopes in confidence of Gods promise through Jesus Christ To open the matter by a similitude Suppose that Christ came again on earth as he did at his Incarnation and should confirm his truth by the same miracles and other means and suppose he should then tell all the Country I have a Kingdom at the Antipodes where men never die but live in perpetual prosperity and those of you shall freely possess it who will part with your own estates and Country and go in a ship of my providing and trust me for your Pilot to bring you thither and trust me to give it you when you come there My power to do all this I have proved by my miracles and my love and will my offer proveth How now will you know whether a man believe Christ and trust this promise or not why if he believe and trust him he will go with him and will leave all and venture over the Seas whithersoever he conducteth him and in that ship which he prepareth for him But if he dare not venture or will not leave his present Country and possessions it is a sign that he doth not trust him If you were going to Sea and had several Ships and Pilots offered you and you were afraid left one were unsafe and the Pilot unskilful and it were doubtful which were to be trufled when after all deliberation you chuse one and refuse the rest and resolve to venture your life and goods in it this is properly called trusting it So trusting in God and in Jesus Christ is not a bare opinion of his fidelity but a PRACTICAL TRVST and that you may be sure to understand it clearly I will once open the parts of it distinctly Divines commonly tell us that Faith is an Affiance or Trust in God and some of them say that this is an act of the understanding and some that it is an act of the will and others say that Faith consisteth in Assent alone and that Trust or Affiance is as Hope a fruit of Faith and not Faith it self And what Affiance it self is is no small controversie And so it is what Faith and Christianity is even among the Teachers of Christians The plain truth is this as to the name of Faith it sometime signifieth a meer Intellectual Assent when the object requireth no more And sometime it signifieth a practical Trust or Affiance in the Truth or Trustiness of the undertaker or promiser that is in his Power Wisdom and Goodness or honesty conjunct as expressed in his word and that is when the matter is practical requiring such a trust The former is oft called The Christian Faith because it is the belief of the truth of the Christian Principles and is the leading part of Faith in the full sense But it is the latter which is the Christian Faith as it is taken not secundum quid but simply not for a part but the whole not for the opinion of men about Christ but for Christianity it self or that Faith which must be profest in Baptism and which hath the promise of Justification and Salvation And
be doth the Scripture say that all men believe or only some If some doth it name them or notifie them by any thing but the marks by which they must find it in themselves Object But he that believeth may be as sure that he believeth as that the Scripture is true Answ But not that he is sincere and exceedeth all hypocrites and common believers At least there are but few that get so full an assurance hereof Object The Spirit witnesseth that we are Gods children And to believe the Spirit is to believe God Answ The Spirit is oft called in Scripture the witness and pledge and earnest in the same sense that is it is the evidâ—nce of our right to Christ and life If any man have not his Spirit he is none of his Rom. 8.9 And hereby we know that he dweleth in us by the Spirit which he hath given us As the Spirits Miracles were the witness of Christ Heb. 2.3 c. objectively as evidence is called witness 2. And withall the Spirit by illumination and excitation helpeth us to see it self as our evidence 3. And to rejoyce in this discovery And thus the Spirit witnesseth our adoption But none of these are the proper objects of a Divine Belief 1. The objective evidence of holiness in us is the object of our rational self-acquaintance or conscience only 2. The illuminating grace by which we see this is not a new Divine Testimony or proper Revelation or Word of God but the same help of grace by which all other divine things are known And all the Spirits grace for our understanding of divine Revelations are not new objective Revelations themselves requiring a new act of Faith for them A word or proper Revelation from God is the object of divine belief otherwise every illuminating act of the Spirit for our understanding Gods Word would be it self a new word to be believed and so in infinitum Errour 33. Doubting of the life to come or of the truth of the Gospel will not stand with saving Faith Contr. It will not stand with a confirmed Faith but it will with a sincere Faith He that doubteth of the truth of the promise so far as that he will not venture life and soul and all his hopes and happiness temporal and eternal upon it hath no true Faith But he that doubteth but yet so far belâ—eveth the Gospel as to take God for his only God and portion and Christ for his only Saviour and the Spirit for his Sanctifier and will cast away life or all that stand in competition hath a true and saving Faith as is before proved Errour 34. That Repentance is no condition of Pardon or Justification for then it would be equal therein with Faith Contr. I have elsewhere at large proved the contrary from Scripture Repentance hath many acts as Faith hath To repent as it is the change of the mind of our Atheism Idolatry and not loving God and obeying him is the same motion of the soul denominated from the terminus à quo as Faith in God and Love to God is denominated from the terminus ad quem This is Repentance towards God Repenting of our Infidelity against Christ is the same motion of the soul as believing in Christ only one is denominated from the object-turned from and the other from the object-turned to By which you may see that some Repentance is the same with Faith in Christ and some is the same with Faith in God and some is the same with Love to God and some is but the same with the leaving of some particular sin or turning to some particular fore-neglected duty And so you may easily resolve the case how far it is the condition of Pardon Repentance aâ— it is a return to the Love of God as he is our God and End and All is made the final condition of further blessings as necessary in and of it self as the end of Faith in Christ And Repentance of Infidelity and Faith in Christ is made the Mediate or Medicinal Condition As consenting to be friends with your Father or King after a rebellion and consenting to the Mediation of a friend to reconcile you are both conditions one the more noble de fine and the other de mediis or as consenting to be cured and consenting to take Physick They that will or must live in the darkness of confusion were best at least hold their tongues there till they come into distinguishing light Errour 35. That all other acts of Faith in Christ as our Lord or Teacher or Judge or of Faith in God or the Holy Ghost all confessing sin and praying for pardon and repenting and forgiving others and receiving Baptism c. are the works which Paul excludeth from Justification And one act of faith only being the Justifying Instrument he that looketh to be justified by any of all these besides that one act doth look for Justification by Works and consequently is fallen from grace Contr. This is not only an addition to Gods Word and Covenant not to be used by them that judge it unlawful to add a form or ceremony in his worship but it is a most dangerous invention to wrack mens consciences and keep all men under certain desperation For whilest the world standeth the subtilest of these Inventers of new doctrines will never be able to tell the world which is that one sole act of Faith by which they are justified that they may escape looking for a legal Justification by the rest whether it be believing in Christs Divinity or Humanity or both or in his Divine or Humane or Habitual Righteousness or his Obedience as a subjâ—ct or his Sacrifice or his Priest-hood offering that Sacrifice or his Covenant and Promise of Pardon and Justification or in God that giveth him and them or in his Resurrections or in Gods present sentential or executive Justification or in his final sentential Justification c. No man to the end of the world shall know which of these or any other is the sole justifying act and so no man can scape being a legal adversary to grace Unhappy Papists who by the contrary extream have frightened or disputed us into such wild and scandalous inventions Of this see fully my Disput of Justification against the worthy and excellent Mr. Anthony Burgess Errour 36. That our own Faith is not at all imputed to us for Righteousness but only Christs Righteousness received by it Contr. The Scripture no where saith that Christ or his Righteousness or his Obedience or his Satisfaction is imputed to us And yet we justly defend it as is before explained and as Mr. Bradshaw and Grotius de satisfact have explained it And on the other side the Scripture often saith that Faith is imputed for Righteousness and shall be so to all that believe in God that raised Christ Rom. 4. And this these objectors peremptorily deny But expounding Scripture amiss is a much cleanlier pretence for errour than a flat
by any further suit on their behalf But for your selves O use your seeing and fore-seeing faculties Be often looking through the prospective of the promise and live not by sense on present things but live as if you saw the glorious things which you say you do believe That when worldly titles are insignificant words and fleshly pleasures have an end and Faith and Holiness will be the marks of honour and unbelief and ungodliness the badgeâ— of perpetual shame and when you must give account of your Stewardship and shall be no longer Stewards you may then by brought by Faith unto Fruition and see with joy the glorious things that you now believe Write upon your Palaces and goods that sentence 2 Pet. 3.11 Seeing all these things shall be dissolved What manner of persons ought ye â—o be in all holy conversation and godliness looking for and hasting to the coming of the day of God! HEBREWS 11.1 Now Faith is the substance of things hoped for the evidence of things not seen CHAP. I. For Conviction IN the opening of this Text I have already shewed that it is the nature and use of Faith to be instead of presence and sight or to make things absent future and unseen to be to us as to our Estimation Resolution and Conversation as if they were present and before our eyes Though not as to the degree yet as to the sincerity of our acts In the handling of this Doctrine I have already shewed that this Faith is a grounded justifiable knowledge and not a fancy or uneffectual opinion having for its object the infallible Revelation and certain Truth of God and not a falshood nor a meer probability or verisimile I have shewed how such a Faith will work how far it should carry us if its evidence were fully entertained and improved and how far it doth carry all that have it sincerely in the least degree and I have shewed some of the moving considerations that should prevail with us to live upon the things unseen as if they were open to our sight I think I may suddenly proceed here to the remaining part of the Application without any recital of the explication or confirmation the truth lying so naked in the Text it self The Life of Faith and the Life of Sense are the two waies that all the world do walk in to the two extreamly different ends which appear when death withdraws the veil It is the ordination of God that mens own estimation choice and endeavours shall be the necessary preparative to their Fruition Nemo nolens bonus aut beatus est Men shall have no better than they value and chuse and seek Where earthly things are highest in the esteem and dearest to the mind of man such persons have no higher nor more durable a portion Where the heavenly things are highest and dearest to the soul and are practically preferred they are the portion of that soul Where the Treasure is the heart will be Matth. 6.21 The sanctifying spirit doth lead the spiritual man by a spiritual Rule in a spiritual way to a spiritual glorious durable felicity The sensual part with the sensual inclination communicated to the corrupted mind and will doth by carnal reasonings and by carnal means pursue and embâ—ace a present fading carnal interest and therefore it findeth and attaineth no more The flâ—sh lusteth against the Spirit and the spirit against the flesh and these are contrary the one to the other Gal. 5.17 They that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh but they that are after the spirit the things of the spirit To be carnally minded is death but to be spiritually minded is life and peace Because the carnal mind is enmity against God for it is not subject to the Law of God neither indeed can be So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God If any man have not the Spirit of Christ the same is none of his If we live after the flesh we shall die but if by the spirit we mortifie the deeds of the body we shall live Rom. 8. to v. 14. Whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap He that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption but he that soweth to the spirit shall of the spirit reap everlasting life Gal. 6.7 8. As a man is so he loveth and desireth as he desireth he seeketh and as he seeketh he findeth and possesseth If you know which world what riches a man prefers intends and liveth for you may know which world is his inheritance and whither he is going as to his perpetual abode Reason enableth a man to know and seek more than he seeth And Faith informeth and advanceth Reason to know that by the means of supernatural Revelation that by no other means is fully known To seek and hope for no better than we know and to know no more than is objectively revealed while we hinder not the revelation is the blameless imperfection of a creature that hath limited faculties and capacities To know what 's Best and yet to chuse and seek an inferiour inconsistent Good and to refuse and neglect the Best when it is discerned is the course of such as have but a superficial opinion of the good refused or a knowledge not wakened to speak so loudly as may be effectual for choice and whose sensuality mastereth their wills and reason and leads them backward And those that know not because they would not know or hear not because they would not hear are under that same dominion of the flâ—sh which is an enemy to all knowledge that is an enemy to its delights and interest To profess to know good and yet refuse it and to profess to know evil and yet to chuse it and this predominantly and in the main is the description of a self-condemning Hypocrite And if malignity and opposition of the Truth professed be added to the Hypocrisie it comes up to that Pharisaical blindness and obdurateness which prepareth men for the remediless sin Consider then but of the profession of many of the people of this Land and compare their practice with it and judge what compassion the condition of many doth bespeak If you will believe them they profess that they verily believe in the invisible God in a Christ unseen to them in the Holy Spirit gathering a holy Church to Christ and imploying them in a communion of Saints that they believe a judgement to come upon the glorious coming of the Lord and an everlasting life of joy or torment thereupon All this is in their Creed they would take him for a damnable Heretick that denyeth it and perhaps would consent that he be burnt at a stake So that you would think these men should live as if Heaven and Hell were open to their sight But O what an Hypocritical Generation are the ungodly how their lives do give their tongues the lye Remember that I apply this to no better men It is a
sinful world and flesh linger not now as unwilling to depart repent not of thy choice when all that the world can do for thee is past repent not of thy warfare when thou hast got the victory nor of thy voyage when thou art past the storms and waves and ready to land at the haven of felicity Thus Faith may sing our Nunc dimittis when the flesh is lothest to be dissolved But we must live by faith if we would thus die by faith Such a death doth not use to be the period of a fleshly worldly life nor of a careless dull and negligent life Nature which brought us into the world without our forecast or care will turn us out of the world without it But it will not give us a joyful passage nor bring us to a better world without it It costeth worldlings no small care to die in an honourable or plentiful estate that they may fall from an higher place than others and may have something to make death more grievous and unwelcome to them and may have a greater account to make at Judgement and that their passage to Heaven may be as a Camels through a Needle And may a believing joyful death be expected without the preparations of exercise and experience in a believing life Nature is so much afraid of dying and an incorporated soul is so incarcerated in sense and so hardly riseth to serious and satisfying apprehensions of the unseen world that even true Believers do find it a work of no small difficulty to desire to depart and be with Christ and to die in the joyful hopes of faith A little abatement of the terrours of death a little supporting hope and peace is all that the greater part of them attain instead of the fervent desires and triumphant joyes which the lively belief of endless glory should produce O therefore make it the work of your lives of all your lives your greatest work your constant work to live by faith that the faith which hath first conquered all the rest of your enemies may be able also to overcome the last and may do your last work well when it hath done the rest CHAP. I. Directions how to live by Faith And first how to strengthen Faith And secondly the natural Truths presupposed to be considered THe Directions which I shall give you as helps to live by Faith are of two ranks 1. Such as tend to the strengthening of your Faith 2. Such as tell you how to use it The first is the greatest part of our task for no man can use that faith which he hath not nor can use more of it than he hath And the commonest reason why we use but little is because we have but little to use But on this subject supposing it most weighty I have written many Treatises already The second part of the Saints Rest The Unreasonableness of Infidelity And last of all The Reasons of the Christian Religion Besides others which handle it on the by And somewhat is said in the beginning of this discourse But yet because in so great a matter I am more afraid of doing too little than too much I will here give you an Index of some of the chief Helps to be close together before you for your memories to be the constant fuel of your Faith In the work of Faith it is first needful that you get all the prerequisite Helps of Natural Light and be well acquainted with their Order and Evidence and their Vsefulness to befriend the supernatural revelations For it is supposed that we are men before we are Christians We were created before we were redeemed And we must know that there is a God before we can know that we have offended him or that we need a Saviour to reconcile us to him And we must know that we have reasonable souls before we can know that sin hath corrupted them or that grace must sanctifie them And we must know that whatsoâ—ver God saith is true before we can believe that the Scripture is true as being his revelation Faith is an act of Reason and Believing is a kind of knowing even a knowing by the testimâ—ny of him whom we believe because we have sufficient reason to believe him 2. And next we must be well acquainted with the evidence of supernatural Truth which presupposeth the foresaid Natural Verities I shall set both bâ—fore you briefly in their order 1. Think well â—f the nature of your souls of their faculties or pâ—wers their excellency and their proper use And then you will find that you are not meer brutes who know not their Creatâ—ur nor live noâ— by a Law nor think not of another world nor â—â—ar any â—â—fferings after death But that you have reasâ—n free-will and executive power to knâ—w your Maker and to live by â—ule aâ—d to hope for a Reward in another life and to fear a pâ—nâ—shmeâ—t hereafter And that as no wise Artificer maketh any thing in vain so God is mâ—ch less to be thought to havâ— given you such souls and faculties in vain 2. Coâ—sidâ—r next how all the world declareth to you that there is a Gâ—d whâ— is infiniteâ—y pâ—werful wise and good And thaâ— it is not possible that all things which we see should have no cause or that the derived Power and Wisdom and Goodnesâ— of the creature should not proceed from that which is more excellent in the first and total cause Or that God should give more than he had to give 3. Consider nexâ— in whâ—t Relation such a creature must needs stand to such a Creatour If he made us of Nâ—â—hing 〈◊〉 is not pâ—ssible but that he must be 〈◊〉 Owner and wâ— aâ—d all things absolutely his Own And if he be our Maker and Owner and be infinitely powerful wise and good and we be Reasonable-free-agents made to be guided by Laws or Moral Means unto our end it is not possible but that we should stand related to him as subjects to their rightful Governour And if he be our Creatour Owner and Ruler and also infinitely Good and the grand Benefactor of the world and if the nature of our souls be to Love Good as Good it cannot be possible that he should not be our End who is our Creatour and that we should not be related to him as to the Chiefest Good both originally as our Benefactor and finally as our End 4. And then it is easie for you next to see what duty you owe to that God to whom you are thus related That if you are absolutely his Own you should willingly be at his absolute dispose And iâ— he bâ— your Soveraign Ruler you should labour most diligently to know his Laws and absolutely to obey them And if he be infinitely Good and your Benefactor and your End you are absolutely bound to Love him most devotedly and to place your own felicity in his Love All this is so evidently the duty of man to God by nature that nothing but madness can deny
in or by Christ so that his very Attributes of Wisdom and Love and Holiness and Justice and Mercy c. which Christ came purposely to declare are by some denyed blasphemed or abused on pretence of extolling Christ and our Redemption as if we might sin that grace may abound Rom. 6.1 2. But if while we seek to be justified by Christ we our selves also are found sinners is therefore Christ the Minister of sin God forbid Gal. 2.17 Direct 3. Distinguish between the common and the special benefits of mans Redemption by Christ and see how the latter do suppose the former and set not these parts against each other which God in wisdom hath joyned together To pass by all other the great and notable common benefit is the conditional Covenant of grace or the conditional pardon of sin and gift of eternal life to all without exception John 3.16 Mark 16.15 16. Rom. 10.9 Mat. 6.14 15. Mat. 22.7 8 9. And this general conditional promise must be first preached and the preaching of this is the universal oâ— common call and offer of grace And it must be first believed as is before said But the actual belief of it according to its true intent and meaning doth prove our actual personal title to all the benefits which were before given but conditionally John 3.16 1 John 5.10 11 12. 2 Cor. 5.19 20 21. Direct 4. Accordingly judge how far Redemption is common or special by the common and special benefits procured For no man can deny but it is so far common as the benefits are common that is so far as to procure and give to sinners a common conditional pardon as aforesaid as Dr. Twisse very often taketh notice And no man can affirm that it is common to all so far as absolutely or eventually to give them actual pardon and salvation unless they dream that all are saved But that some eventually and infallibly are saved all confess And we had rather think that Christ and the good pleasure of God is the chief differencing cause than we our selves Direct 5. Set not the several parts of the Office of Christ against each other nor either depress or forget any one part while you magnifie and meditate only on the other It is most ordinary to reduce all the Office of Christ to the Prophetical Priestly and Kingly part For it is more proper to call them three parts of one Office than three Offices But it is hard to reduce his Incarnation or his infant-humiliation and his whole course of obedience and fulfilling the Law to any one or all of these totally Though in some respect as it is his example it is teaching and as it is part of his humiliation it may be called a part of his sacrifice yet as it is meritorious obedience and perfection it belongeth indeed to our High-Priest but not formally to his Priesthood No nor yet as he himself is the sacrifice for sin For it is not an act of Priesthood to be himself a sacrifice But yet I think the common destribution intimateth to us that sense which containeth the truth which we enquire after For the word Priesthood is applyed to Christ in a peculiar notion so as it is never applyed to any other and therefore is taken more comprehensively as including all that good which he doth for us as good by the way of Mediation with the Father and all his acts of Mediation with God as the Prophetical and Kingly parts contain his other acts toward men But yet a more plain and accurate destribution should be made in which it should be manifested also to what heads his many other assumed titles of Relation are to be reduced But this is not a work for this place But that which now I advise you to avoid iâ— the errour of them who look so much at Christs Mediation with God that they scarce observe his work with man And the errour of them who look so much at his work on man that they overlook his Mediation with God And theirs that so observe hâ—s sacrifice as to make light of his continual intercession or that observing both make light of his doctrine and example Or that observe these so much as to make light of his sacrifice and intercession Or that extol his doctrine and example and overlook his giving of the Spirit to all his living members Or that cannot magnifie any one of these without depressing or extenuating some other If Christs Kingdom be not divided Mat. 12.25 sure Christ himself is not divided nor his works 1 Cor. 1.13 Direct 6. Still distinguish between Christs work of Redemption which he hath already wrought on earth to constitute him our Mediatory Head and that which he was further to do for us in that Relation that you may ground your faith on the first as a foundation laid by him and may seek after the second as that which requireth somewhat from your selves to your own participation The first part is commonly called the Impetration the second the Application or rather the Communication As God did first do himself the work of Creation and thence result his Relations of our Owner our Ruler and our Chief Good or our Love or End or Benefactor so Christ first doth the works which make him our Redeemer towards God and then he is also our Owner our Ruler and our communicative Benefactor hereupon And this seemeth intimated by those phrases Heb. 5.8 2.9 10. where he is said to learn obedience by the things which he suffered that is as a subjâ—ct exercised obedience and so learnt to know by experience what obeying is And that the Captain of our salvation was made perfect by sufferings and for suffering death was crowned with glory because his sufferings did constitute him a perfect Captain or Redeemer in performance though before he was perfect in ability As he that undertaketh to redeem some Turkish gally-slaves by conquering their Navy is made a perfect Redeemer or Conquerour when he hath taken the fleet though yet the prisoners are in his power to release them on such terms at seem best to him And as a man is a perfect Chirurgeon when besides his skill he is furnished with all his instruments or salves how costly soever though yet the cure is not done Or as he that hath ransomed prisoners is a perfect Ransomer when he hath paid the price though yet they are not delivered nor have any actual right themselves to claim deliverance by I here mention this because the building upon that foundation which is supposed to be already laid and finished and the seeking of the further salvation which yet we have no possession of nor perhaps any title to are works so very different that he that doth not discern the difference cannot exercise the Christian faith Because it is to be necessarily exercised by two such different acts or different waies of acting and applying our selves to our Redeemer Direct 7. Still think of Christs nearness
what our case is and then hath taught him what he himself is as to his person and his office and what he hath done to reconcile us to God and how far God is reconciled hereupon and what a common conditional pardoning Covenant he hath made and offereth to all and what he will be and do to those that do come in the belief of all this serioâ—sly by the assenting act of the understanding is the first part of saving Faith going in nature before both the Love of God and the consenting act of the Will to the Redeemer And yet perhaps the same acts of faith in an uneffectual superficial measure may go long before this in many 6. In this assent our belief in God and in the Mediatour are conjunct in time and nature they being Relatives here as the objects of our faith It is not possible to believe in Christ as the Mediatour who hath propitiated God to us before we believe that God is propitiated by the Mediatour nor vice versâ Indeed there is a difference in order of dignity and desirableness God as propitiated being represented to us as the End and the Propitiator but as the Means But as to the order of our apprehension or believing there can be no difference at all no more than in the order of knowing the Father and the Son the Husband and Wife the King and subjects These Relatives are simul naturá tempore 7. This assenting act of Faith by which at once we believe Christ to be the Propitiator and God to be propitiated by him is not the belief that my sins are actually pardoned and my soul actually reconciled and justified but it includeth the belief of the history of Christs satisfaction and of the common conditional Covenant of Promise and Offer from God viz. that God is so far reconciled by the Mediatour as that he will forgive and justifie and glorifie all that Repent and Believe that is that return to God by faith in Christ and offereth this mercy to all and intreateth them to accept it and will condemn none of them but those that finally reject i◠〈◊〉 things are of God who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ and hath given to us the Ministry of reconciliation to wit that God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himsâ—lf not imputing their trespasses to them and hath committed to us the word of reconciliation Now then we are Embassadors for Christ as though God did beseech you by us we pray you in Christs stead be ye reconciled unto God 2 Cor. 5.18 19 20. So that it is at once the belief of the Father as reconciled and the Son as the Reconcilâ—r and that according to the tenour of the common conditional Covenant which is the first assenting part of saving Faith 8. This same Covenant which revealeth God as thus far reconciled by Christ doth offer him to be further actualy and fully reconciled and to justifie and glorifie us that is to forgive accept and love us perfectly for ever And it offereth us Christ to be our actual Head and Mediatour to procure and give us all this mercy by communicating the benefits which he hath purchased according to his Covenant-terms so that as before the Father and the Son were revealed to our assent together so here they are offered to the Will together 9. In this offer God is offered as the End and Christ as Mediatour is offered as the Means therefore the act of the Will to God which is here required is simple Love of complacency with subjection which is a consent to obey but the act of the Will to Christ is called choice or consent though there be in it Amor Medii the Love of that Means for its aptitude as to the end 10. This Love of God as the End and Consent to Christ as the Means being not acts of the Intellect but of the Will cannot be the first acts of Faith but do presuppose the first assenting acts 11. But the assenting act of Faith doth cause these acts of the Will to God and the Mediatour Because we believe the Truth and Goodness we Consent and Love 12. Both these acts of the Will are caused by assent at one time without the least distance 13. But here is a difference in order of Nature because we will God as the End and for himself and therefore first in the natural order of intention and we will Christ as the Means for that End and therefore but secondarily Though in the Intellects apprehension and assent there be no such difference because in the Truth which is the Vnderstandings object there is no dâ—fference but only in the Goodness which is the Wills object And as Goodness it self is apprehended by the Vnderstanding ut verè bonum there is only an objective dâ—fference of dignity 14. Therefore as the Gospel revelation cometh to us in a way of offer promise and covenant so our Faith must act in a way of Acceptance Covenanting with God and the Redeemer and Sanctifier And the Sacrament of Baptism is the solemnizing of this Covenant on both parts And till our hearts do consent to the Baptismal Covenant of Grace we are not Believers in a saving sense 15. There is no distance of time between the Assent of Faith and the first true degree of Love and Consent Though an unsound Assent may go long before yet sound Assent doth immediately produce Love and Consent and though a clear and full resolved degree of consent may be some time afterward And therefore the soul may not at the first degree so well understand it self as to be ready for an open covenanting 16. This being the true order of the work of Faith and Love the case now lyeth plain before those that can observe things distinctly and take not up with confused knowledge And no other are fit to meddle with such cases viz that the knowing or assenting acts of faith in God as reconciled so far and in Christ as the reconciler so far as to give out the offer or Covenant of Grace are both at once and both go before the acts of the will as the cause before the immediate effect and that this assent first in order of nature but at once in time causeth the will to love God as our End and to consent to and chuse Christ in heart-covenant as the means and so in our covenant we give up our selves to both And that this Repentance and Love to God which are both one work called conversion of turning from the creature to God the one as denominated from the terminus à quo viz. Repentance the other from the terminus ad quem viz. Love are twisted at once with true saving Faith And that Christ as the means used by God is our first Teacher and bringeth us to assent And then that assent bringeth us to take God for our End and Christ for the Means of our actual Justification and Glory so that Christ is
also suffer seeing it is a righteous thing with God to recompence tribulation to them that trouble you and to you who are troubled rest with us when Christ shall come to be glorified in his Saints and admired in all them that believe Acts 9.4 Saul Saul why persecutest thou me Read Rom. 8.28 to the end Rev. 2. 3d. Heb. 11. 12. 1 Cor. 10.13 There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man but God is faithful who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able but will with the temptation also make a way to escape that ye may be able to bear it 2 Tim. 2.9 10 11 12. I suffer trouble as an evil doer unto bonds but the Word of God is not bound I endure all things for the Elects sake It is a faithful saying For if we be dead with him we shall also live with him If we suffer we shall also reign with him Rom. 8.17 18. If so be that we suffer with him that we may be also glorified together For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory ready to be revealed on us 2 Cor. 4.17 For our light affliction which is but for a moment worketh for us a far more exceeding eternal weight of glory 1 Pet. 3.14 15. But if ye suffer for righteousness sake happy are ye and be not afraid of their terrour neither be troubled Read 1 Pet. 4.12 13 14 15 16 18 19. Rom. 5.1 2 3 4. 1 Pet. 5.10 The God of all grace who hath called us to his eternal glory by Christ Jesus after ye have suffered a while make you perfect stablish strengthen settle you 21. Promises to the faithful in dangers daily and ordinary or extraordinary Psal 34.7 The Angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear him and delivereth them v. 17. The righteous cry and the Lord heareth and delivereth them out of all their troubles v. 19 20 22. Many are the afflictions of the righteous but the Lord delivereth him out of them all He keepeth all his bones nor one of them is broken The Lord redeemeth the soul of his servants and none of them that trust in him shall be desolate Psal 91.1 He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most high shall abide under the tabernacle of the Almighty v. 2 3. I will say to the Lord He is my refuge and my fortress my God in him will I trust Surely he will deliver thee from the snare of the fowler and from the noisome Pestilence v. 5. Thou shalt not be afraid for the terrour by night v. 11 12 For he shall give his Angels charge over thee to keep thee in all thy waies They shall bear thee up in their hands lest thou dash thy foot against a stone Read the whole Psal 121.2 3 4 5 6 7 8. My help cometh from the Lord which made Heaven and Earth He will not suffer thy foot to be moved he that keepeth thee will not slumber The Lord is thy keeper the Lord is thy shade upon thy right hand The Lord shall preserve thee from all evil he shall preserve thy soul The Loâ—d shall preserve thy going out and coming in from this time forth and even for ever more Psal 145.20 The Lord preserveth all them that love him Psal 31.23 97.10 116.6 Prov. 2.8 Isa 43.2 When thou passest thorow the waters I will be with thee 1 Pet. 5.7 Casting all your care on him for he careth for you 22. Promises fâ—r help against Temptations to believers 1 Cor. 10.13 before cited 2 Pet. 2.9 The Lord knoweth how to deliver the godly out of temptations Compare Matth. 4. where Christ was tempted even to worship the Devil c. with Heb. 4.15 2.18 For we have not an High Priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities but was in all points tempted like as we are without sin Wherefore in all things it behoved him to be made like unto his brethren that he might be a merciful and faithful High Priest in things God-ward for us For in that he himself hath suffered bâ—ing tempted he is able to succour them that are tempted James 1.2 My Brethren count it all ioy when ye fall into divers temptations that is by sufferings for Christ v. 12. Blessed is the man that endureth temptation for when he is tryed he shall receive the Crown of life 2 Cor. 12.9 My grace is sufficient for thee My strength is made perfect in weakness Phil. 4.13 I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me 1 Pet. 5.9 Whom resist stedfast in the faith with v. 10. James 4.7 Resist the Devil and he will flee from you Eph. 6.10 11 c. Rom. 6.14 For sin shall not have dominion over you for ye are not under the Law but under Grace John 16.33 Be of good cheer I have overcome the world 1 John 5.4 This is the victory that overcometh the world even our faith 23. Promises to them that overcome and persevere Rev. 2.7 To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life which is in the midst of the Paradise of God V. 11. He that overcometh shall not be hurt of the second death V. 17. To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the hidden Manna and will give him a white stone c. V. 10. Be faithful unto death and I will give thee a Crown of life V. 26 28 He that overcometh and keepeth my words unto the end to him will I give power over the Nations and he shall rule them with a Rod of Iron Even as I received of my Father and I will give him the morning star Rev. 3 5. He that overcometh the same shall be clothed in white rayment and I will not blot out his name out of the book of life but I will confess his name before my Father and before his Angels V. 12. Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in the Temple of my God and he shall go no more out And I will write upon him the name of my God and the name of the City of my God New Jerusalem which cometh down out of Heaven from my God and my new name V. 21. To him that overcometh will I grant to sit down with me on my Throne even as I overcame and am set down with my Father on his Throne John 8.31 If ye continue in my word then are ye my Disciples indeed and ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free Col. 1.22 23. To present you holy and unblameable and unreproveable in his sight If ye continue in the faith grounded and settled and be not moved away from the hope of the Gospel John 15.7 If ye abide in me and my words abide in you ye shall ask what ye will and it shall be done unto you Matth. 10.22 He that endureth to the end shall be
is as Davenant well noteth the act of the whole man I was wont to say of both faculties I now say of the three faculties which constitute the soul of man the Potestative the Intellective and the Volitive And the Assent it self is many acts as acts are physically specified by their objects as is shewed It is one moral act or work of the soul Like trusting a man as my Physician which is a fiducial consent that he be my Physician in order to the use of his remedies Oâ— as taking a man to be your Prince Husband Tutor Master c. where he that will tell people that taking signifieth but one physical act would be ridiculous And he that will tell people that only one physical act of one faculty is it that they must look to be justified by will be much worse than ridiculous Errour 24. That we are justified by Faith not as it receiveth Christs person but his benefits or righteousness Contr. The contrary is before and after proved and insisted on by Dr. Preston at large Indeed we receive not Christs person it self physically but his person in the office and relation of our Saviour as we must chuse what person shall be our Physician before we take his medicines or receive our health but it is only a consent that he and no other be our Physician which we call the taking of his person And so it is here Errour 25. That it is one act of Faith which giveth us right to Christ and another to his righteousness and another to his teaching and another to his Spirit and another to Adoption and to Heaven c. and not the same Contr. This is 1. Adding to the Word of God and that in a matter near our chiefest comfort and safety Prove it or affirm it not 2. It is corrupting and perverting and contradicting the Word and Covenant of God which unitedly makeeth the same Faith without any such distinction the condition of all the Covenant-gifts Mark 16.16 John 3.16 c. Errour 26. That though the same Faith which justifieth doth believe in him as a Teacher as a King and Judge c. yet it justifieth us only quatenus receptio justitiae as it is the receiving of Christs Righteousness Contr. See in my Dispute of Justification my Confutation of this Assertion in Mr. Warner Properly Faith justifieth not at all but we are justified of or by it as a condition by the tenour of Gods deed of gift And so far as it is the condition in that gift so far we are justified by it But it is one entire Faith in Christ which is the condition without such distinction therefore we are so justified by it 2. According to that Rule there must be as many acts of Faith as there are benefits to be received and the title to be ascribed to each one accordingly 3. The natural relation of the act to the object sheweth no more but what the nature or essence of that Faith is and not how we come to be justified by it 4. The sense containeth this false Proposition Haec fides qua talis or quae fides justificat Faith as Faith or as this Faith in specie justifieth which some call the To credere For it is the essence of Faith which they call its Reception of Christs Righteousness 5. The true passive Reception of Righteousness and Pardon is that of the person as he is the terminus of the donative or justifying act of the Covenant To receive Pardon properly is to be pardoned But our Active Receiving or Consent is but the condition of it and there is no proof or reason that the condition should be so parcelled 6. Yet if by your quatenus you intend no more than the description of the act of Faith as essentially related to its subsequent benefit and not at all to speak of its conditional nearest interest in our Justification the matter were less 7. But the truth is that if we might distinguish where God doth not distinguish it were much more rational to say that taking Christ for a true Messenger of God and a Teacher and Sanctifier and King hath a greater hand in our Justification than taking him to justifie us supposing that all be present Because the common way and reason of conditions in Covenants is that somewhat which the party is willing of is promised upon condition of something which he is unwilling of that for the one he may be drawn to consent unto the other As if the Physician should say If you will take me for your Physician and refuse none of my medicines I will undertake to cure you Here it is supposed that the Patient is willing of health and not willing of the Medicines but for healths sake and therefore consenting to the Medicines or receiving this man to be his Physician as a pâ—escriber of the Medicines is more the condition of his cure than his consenting to the cure it self or receiving the Physician as the cause of his health So here it is supposed that condemned sinners are already willing to be justified pardoned and saved from punishment but not willing to repent and follow the teaching and counsel of a Saviour and therefore that Pardon and Justification is given and offered them on condition that they accept of and submit to the teaching and government of Christ and of salvation from their sins But the truth is we must not presume beyond his revelation to give the reasons of Gods institutions We are sure that the entire Belief in Christ and accepting of himself as our perfect Saviour in order to all the ends of his Relation is made by God in his Covenant the condition of our title to the benefits of his Covenant conjunctly And it is not only the believing in Christ for pardon that as such is the condition of pardon nor is any one act the condition of any benefit but as it is a part of that whole Faith which is indeed the condition The occasion of their errour is that they consider only what it is in Christ the object of Faith which justifieth sanctifieth c. and they think that the act only which is exercised on that object must do it which is a gross mistake Because Faith is not like taking of mony jewels books c. into ones hand which is a physical act which taketh possession of them But it is a Jus or Debitum a Right and Relation which we are morally and passively to receive as constituting our first Justification and Pardon and as the condition of this we are to take Christ for our Saviour which is but a physicial active metaphorical receiving in order to the attainment of the said passive proper receiving For recipere proprie est pati If an Act be passed that all Traitors and Rebels who will give up themselves to the Kings Son as one that hath ransomed them to be taught and ruled by him and reduced to their obedience to be their
grace and therefore he is an heir of Hâ—ll and belongs to me I ruled him and I must have him What would you think of a life of sin if once you had heard such accusations as these How would you deal by the next temptation if you had heard what use the tempter will hereafter make of all your sins 7. What if you had seen the damned in their misery and heard them cry out of the folly of their â—mpenitent careless lives and wishing as Dives Luke 16. that their friends on earth might have one sent from the dead to warn them that they come not to that place of torment I speak to men that say they are believers what would you do upon such a fight If you had heard them there torment themselves in the remembrance of the time they lost the mercy they neglected the grace resisted and wish it were all to do again and that they might once more be tried with another life If you saw how the world is altered with those that once were as proud and confident as others what do you think such a sight would do with you And why then doth the believing of it do no more when the â—hâ—ng is certain 8. Once more suppose that in your temptations you saw the tempter appearing to you and pleading with you as he doth by his inward suggestions or by the mouths of his instruments If you saw him and heard him hâ—ssing you on to sin perswading you to gluttony drunkenness or uncleanâ—ess If the Devil appeared to you and led you to the place of lust and offered you the harlot or the cup of excess and urged you to swear or curse or raâ—l or scorn at a holy life would not the sight of the Angler maâ— his gâ—me and 〈◊〉 your courage and spoil your sport and turn your stomâ—chs would you be drunk or filthy if you saw him stand by you Think on it the next tâ—me you are tempted Stout men have been apaled by such a sight And do you not believe that it 's he indeed that tempteth you As sure as if your eyes behâ—ld hâ—m â—t's he that prompteth men to â—â—er at godâ—iness and puts your wanton ribbald speeches and oaths and curses into yoâ—r mouths He is the Tutor of the enemies of grace that teacheth them docâ—è delâ—rare ingeniosè insanire ingeniously to quarrel with the way of life and learnedly to confute the arguments that would have saved them and subtilly to dispute themselves out of the hands of mercy and gallantly to scorn to stoop to Christ till there be no remedy and with plausible eloquence to commend the plague and sickness of their souls and irrefragâ—bly maintain it that the way to Hell will lead to Heaven and to justifie the sins that will condemn them and honourably and triumphantly to overcome their friends and to serve the Devil in mood and figâ—â—re and valiantly to cast themselves into Hell in despite of all the laws and reproofs of God or man that would have hindered them It being most certain that this is the Dâ—vils work and you durst not do it if he moved you to it with open face how dare you do it when faith would assure you that it 's as veriâ—y he as if you saw him More distinctly answâ—r these following Questions upon the foregoing suppositions Qâ—est 1. If you saw but what you say you do believe would you not be convinced that the most pleasant gainful sin is worse than madness and would you not spit at the very name of it and openly cry out of your open folly and beg for prayers and love reprovers and resolve to turn without delay Quest 2. What would you think of the most serious holy life if you had seen the things that you say you do believe would you ever again reproach it as preciseness or count it more ado than needs and think your time were better spent in playing than in praying in drinking and sports and filthy lusts than in the holy services of the Lord would you think then that one day in seven were too much for the work for which you live and that an hour on this holy day were enough to be spent in instructing you for eternity Or would you not believe that he is the blessed man whose delight is in the Law of God and meditateth in it day and night Could you plead for sensuality or ungodly negligence or open your mouths against the most serious holiness of life if Heaven and Hell stood open to your view Quest 3. If you saw but what you say you do believe would you ever again be offended with the Ministers of Christ for the plainest reproofs and closest exhortations and strictest precepts and discipline that now are disrelished so much Or rather would you not desire them to help you presently to try your states and to search you to the quick and to be more solicitous to save you than to please you The patient that will take no bitter medicine in time when he sees he must die would then take any thing When you see the things that now you hear of then you would do any thing O then might you have these daies again Sermons would not be too plain or long In season and out of season would then be allowed of Then you would understand what moved Ministers to be so importunate with you for conversion and whether trifling or serious preaching was the best Quest 4. Had you seen the things that you say you do believe what effect would Sermons have upon you after such a sight â—s this O what a change it would make upon our preaching and your hearing if we saw the things that we speak and hear of How fervently should we importune you in the name of Christ How attentively would you hear and carefully consider and obey we should then have no such sleepy preaching and hearing as now we have Could I but shew to all this Congregation while I am preaching the invisible world of which we preach and did you hear with Heaven and Hell in your eye sight how confident should I be though not of the saving change of all that I should this hour teach you to plead for sin and against a holy life no more and send you home another people than you came hither I durst then ask the worst that heareth me Dare you now be drunk or gluttonous or worldly dare you be voluptuous proud or fornicators any more Dare you go home and make a jest at piety and neglect your souls as you have done And why then should not the believed truth prevail if indeed you did believe it when the thing is as sure as if you saw it Quest 5. If you had seen what you say you do believe would you hunt as eagerly for wealth or honour and regard the thoughts or words of men as you did before Though it 's only the Believer that truly honoureth his Rulers for none else honour
that they used the method which I now direct you to And if you consider it well you will find that the miracles of Christ himself and all those of his Apostles after him were wrought for the confirmation of Christianity it self immediately and mostly before the particular Epistles or Books were written and therefore were only remotely and consequentially for the confirmation of those Books as such as they proved that the Writers of them were guided by the infallible Spirit in all the proper work of their office of which the writing of the Scriptures was a part 1. Therefore settle your belief of Christianity it self that is of so much as Baptism containeth or importeth This is more easily proved than the truth of every word in the Scriptures because there are controversies about the Canon and the various readings and such like And this is the natural method which Christ and his Spirit have directed us to and the Apostles and the ancient Churches used And when this is first soundly proved to you then you cannot justly take any textual difficulties to be sufficient cause of raising difficulties to your faith in the essentials But you may quietly go on in the strength of faith to clear up all those difficulties by degrees I know you will meet with some who think very highly of their own mistakes and whose unskilfulness in these things is joyned with an equal measure of self conceitedness who will tell you that this method smells of an undervaluing of the Scripture But I would advise you not to depart from the way of Christ and his Apostles and Churches nor to cast your selves upon causeless hinderances in so high a matter as Saving Faith is upon the reverence of the words of any perverted factious wrangler nor to escape the fangs of censorious ignorance We cannot better justifie the holy Scriptures in the true Method than they can in their false one And can better build up when we have laid the right foundation than they can who begin in the middle and omit the foundation and call the superstructure by that name 2. Suspect not all Church-history or Tradition in an extreme opposition to the Papists who cry up a private unproved Tradition of their own They tell us of Apostolical Traditions which their own faction only are the keepâ—rs of and of which no true historical evidence is produced And this they call the Tradition of the Church But we have another sort of Tradition which must not be neglected or rejected unless we will deny humanity and reject Christianity Our Traditio tradens or active Tradition is primarily nothing but the certain history or usage of the universal Christian Church as Baptism the Lords day the Ministry the Church Assemblies and the daily Church exercises which are certain proofs what Religion was then received by them And 2. The Scriptures themselves Our Traditio tradita is nothing else but these two conjunctly 1. The Christian Religion even the Faith then professed and the Worship and Obedience then exercised 2. The Books themselves of the holy Scriptures which contain all this with much more But we are so far from thinking that Apostolical Oral Tradition is a supplement to the Scriptures as being larger than them that we believe the Scriptures to be much larger than such Tradition and that we have no certainty by any other than Scriptural Tradition of any more than the common matters of Christianity which all the Churches are agreed in But he that will not believe the most universal practice and history of the Church or world in a matter of fact must in reason much less believe his eye-sight 13. When you have soundly proved your foundation take not every difficult objection which you cannot answer to be a sufficient cause of doubting For if the fundamentals be proved truths you may trust to that proof and be sure that there are waies of solving the seeming inconsistent points though you are not yet acquainted with them There are few Truths so clear which a sophister may not clog with difficulties And there is scarce any man that hath so comprehensive a knowledge of the most certain Truths as to be able to answer all that can be said against it 14. Come not to this study in a melancholy or distracted frame of mind For in such a case you are ordinarily incapable of so great a work as the tryal of the grounds of Faith And therefore must live upon the ground-work before laid and wait for a fitter time to clear it 15. When new doubts arise mark whether they proceed not from the advantage which the tempter findeth in your minds rather than from the difficulty of the thing it self And whether you have not formerly had good satisfaction against the same doubts which now perplex you If so suffer not every discomposure of your minds to become a means of unbelief And suffer not Satan to command you to dispute your faith at his pleasure For if he may chuse the time he may chuse the success Many a man hath cast up a large account well or written a learned Treatise or Position well who cannot clear up all objected difficulties on a sudden nor without Books tell you all that he before wrote especially if he be half drunk or sleepy or in the midst of other thoughts oâ— business 15. When you are once perswaded of the truth of Christianity and the holy Scriptures think not that you need not study it any more because you do already confidently believe it For if your faith be not built on such cogent evidence as will warrant the conclusion whether it be at the present sound or not you know not what change assaults may make upon you as we have known them do on some ancient eminent Professors of the strictest Godliness who have turned from Christ and the belief of immortality Take heed how you understand the common saying of the Schools that Faith differeth from Knowledge in that it hath not Evidence It hath not evidence of sense indeed nor the immediate evidence of things invisible as in themselves but as they are the conclusions which follow the principles which are in themselves more evident It is evident that God is true and we can prove by good evidence that the Christian Verity is his Revelation And therefore it is evident though not immediately in it self that the matter of that word or revelation is true And as Mr. Rich. Hooker truly saith No man indeed believeth beyond the degree of evidence of truth which appeareth to him how confidently soever they may talk I remember that our excellent Vsher answered me to this case as out of Ariminensis that faith hath evidence of Credibility and science hath evidence of Certainty But undoubtedly an evidence of Divine Revelation is evidence of Certainty And all evidence of Divine Credibility is evidence of Certainty though of humane faith and credibility the case be otherwise 16. Yea think not that you have
or hearing or thinking on such a great and difficult matter that will make it your own for the stablishing of your faith He that will understand the art of a Sea-man a Souldier a Musician a Physician c. so as to practise it must study it hard and understand it clearly and comprehensively and have all the whole frame of it printed on his mind and not only here and there a scrap Faith is a practical knowledge We must have the heart and life directed and commanded by it We must live by it both in the intention of our end and in the choice and use of all the means Whilest the Gospel and the Reasons of our Religion are strange to people like a lesson but half learned who can expect that they should be settled against all temptations which assault their faith and able to confute the tempter We lay together the proofs of our Religion and you read them twice or thrice and then think that if after that you have any doubting the fault is in the want of evidence and not in your want of understanding But the life of faith must cost you more labour than so study it till you clearly understand it and remember the whole method of the evidence together and have it all as at your fingers ends and then you may have a confirmed faith to live by Direct 5. When you know what are the sorest temptations to unbelief get all those special arguments and provisions into your minds which are necessary against those particular temptations And do not strengthen your own temptations by your imprudent entertaining them Here are thâ—ee things which I would especially advise you to â—gainst temptations to unbelief 1. Enter not into the debate of so great a business when you are uncapable of it Especially 1. When your minds are taken up with worldly business or other thoughts have carryed them away let not Satan then surprize you and say Come now and question thy Religion You could not resolve a question in Philosophy nor cast up any long account on such a sudden with an unprepared mind When the Evidences of your faith are out of mind stay till you can have leisure to set your selves to the business with that studiousness and those helps which so great a matter doth require 2. When sickness or melancholy doth weaken your understandings you are then unfit for such a work You would not in such a case dispute for your lives with a cunning sophister upon any difficult question whatsoever And will you in such a case dispute with the Devil when your salvation may lye upon it 2. When your faith is once settled suffer not the Devil to call you to dispute it over again at his command Do it not when his suggestions urge you at his pleasure but when God maketh it your duty and at his pleasure Else your very disputing with Satan will be some degree of yielding to him and gratifying him And he will one time or other take you at the advantage and assault you when you are without your arms 3 Mark what it is that Atheists and Infidels most object against Christianity but especially mark what it is which Satan maketh most use of against your selves to shake your faith And there let your studies be principally bent that you may have particular armour to defend you against particular assaults And get such light by communication with wiser and more experienced men as may furnish you for that use that no objection may be-made against your faith which you are not alwaies ready to answer This is the true sense of 1 Pet. 3.15 Sanctifie the Lord God in your hearts and be ready alwaies to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear Direct 6. Mark well those works of God in the world which are the plain fulfilling of his Word God doth not make such notable difference by his Judgements as shall prevent the great discoveries at the last and make his Assize and final Judgement to be unnecessary by doing the same work before the time But yet his Providences do own and bear witness to his Word and he leaveth not the world without some present sensible testimonies of his soveraign government to convince them and restrain them 1. Mark how the state of the sinful world agreeth to Gods description of it and how maliciously Godliness is every where opposed by them and how notably God still casteth shame upon sinners so that even in their prosperity and rage they are pittied and contemned in the eyes of all that are wise and sober and in the next generation their names do rot Psal 15.3 4. Prov. 10.7 And it is wonderful to observe that sin in the general and abstract is still spoken of by all as an odious thing even by them that will be damned rather than they will leave it And that Vertue and Godliness Charity and Justice are still praised in the world even by them that abhor and persecute it 2. And it is very observable how most of the great changes of the world are made By how small contemptible and unthought of meanâ— Especially where the interest of the Gospel is most concerned The instance of the Reformation in Luther's time and many others nearer to our daies would shew us much of the conjunction of Gods works with his Word if they were particularly and wisely opened 3. The many prodigies or extraordinary events which have fallen out at several times would be found to be of use this way if wisely considered A great number have fallen out among us of late years of real certainty and of a considerable usefulness But the crafty enemy who useth most to wrong Christ and his Cause by his most passionate injudicious followers prevailed with some over-forward Minister of this strein to publish them in many volumes with the mixture of so many falshoods and mistaken circumstances as turned them to the advantage of the Devil and ungodliness and made the very mention of Prodigies to become a scorn 4. The strange deliverances of many of Gods servants in the greatest dangers by the most unlikely means is a great encouragement to faith And there are a great number of Christians that have experience of such The very manner of our preservations is often such as forceth us to say It is the hand of God 5. The notable answer and grant of prayers of which many Christians have convincing experience is also a great confirmation to our faith of which I have before spoken 6. The three sensible evidences formerly mentioned compared with the Scriptures may much perswade us of its truth I mean 1. Apparitions 2. Witches 3. Satanical possessions or diseases which plainly declare the operation of Satan in them of all which I could give you manifold and proved instances These and many other instances of Gods providence are great means to help us to believe his Word
all the same thing equally to duty and sin without it Direct 15. Consider well how much all humane converse is maintained by the necessary belief of one another and what the world would be without it and how much you expect your selves to be believed And then think how much more belief is due to God Though sin hath made the world so bad that we may say that all men are lyars that is deceitful vanity and little to be trusted yet the honesty of those that are more vertuous doth help so far to keep up the honour of veracity and the shamefulness of lying that throughout the world a lye is in disgrace and truth in speech and dealing is well spoken of And the remnants of natural honesty in the worst do so far second the true honesty of the best that no man is so well spoken of commonly in the world as a man of truth and trustiness whose Word is his Law and Master and never speaketh deceitfully to any Nor no man is so commonly ill spoken of as a knave as he that will lye and is not to be trusted In so much that even those debauched Ruffians who live as if they said in their hearts There is no God will yet venture their lives in revenge against him that shall give them the lye Perhaps you will say that this is not from any vertue or natural Law or honesty but from common interest there being nothing more the interest of mankind than that men be trusty to each other To which I answer that you oppose things which are conjunct It is both For all Gods natural Laws are for the interest of mankind and that which is truly most for our good is made most our duty and that which is most our duty is most for our good And that which is so much for the interest of mankind must needs be good If it were not for credibility and trustiness in men there were no living in families but Masters and Servants Parents and Children Husbands and Wives would live together as enemies And neigbours would be as so many thieves to one another There could be no Society or Common-wealth when Prince and people could put no trust in one another Nay thieves themselves that are not to be trusted by any others do yet strengthen themselves by confederacies and oaths of secrecy and gather into troops and armies and there put trust in one another And can we think that GOD is not much more to be trusted and is not a greater hater of a lye and is not the fountain of all fidelity and hath not a greater care of the interest of his creatures Surely he that thinketh that God is a lyar and not to be trusted will think no better of any mortal man or Angel and therefore trusteth no one and is very censorious and would be thought no better of himself and therefore would have none believe or trust him For who would be better than his God Direct 16. Consider also that Veracity in God is his nature or essence and cannot be denyed without denying him to be God For it is nothing but his three Essentialities or Principles Power Wisdom and Goodness as they are expressed in his Word or Revelations as congruous to his mind and to the matter expressed He that neither wanteth knowledge to know what to say and do nor Goodness to love truth and hate all evil nor Power to do what he please and to make good his word cannot possibly lye because every lye is for want of one or more of these Heb. 6.18 Titus 1.12 And there as it is said that he cannot lye and that it is impossible so it is called a denying of himself if he could be unfaithfull 2 Tim. 2.13 If we believe not yet be abideth faithful and cannot deny himself Direct 17. Exercise Faith much in those proper works in which self and sense are most denyed and overcome Bodily motions and labours which we are not used to are done both unskilfully and with pain If Faith be not much exercised in its warfare and victorious acts you will neither know its strength nor find it to be strong when you come to use it It is not the easie and common acts of Faith which will serve turn to try and strengthen it As the life of sense is the adversary which Faith must conquer so use it much in such conflicts and conquests if you would find it strong and usefull Use it in such acts of mortification and self-denyal as will plainly shew that it over ruleth sense Use it in patience and rejoycing in such sufferings and in contentment in so low and cross a state where you are sure that sight and sense do not contribute to your peace and joy Use it not only in giving some little of your superfluities but in giving your whole two mites even all your substance and selling all and giving to the poor when indeed God maketh it your duty At least in forsaking all for his sake in a day of tryal Faith never doth work so like it self so clearly so powerfully and so comfortably as in these self-denying and overcoming acts when it doth not work alone without the help of sense to comfort us but also against sense which would discourage us Luke 18.22 23. 14.26 33. 2 Cor. 5.7 Direct 18. Keep a constant observation of Gods converse with your hearts and workings on them For as I said before there are within us such demonstrations of a Kingdom of God in precepts mercies rewards and punishments that he which well worketh them will have much help in the maintaining and exercising his belief of the everlasting Kingdom Especially the godly who have that Spirit there working which is indeed the very seal and pledge and earnest of life eternal 2 Cor. 1.22 5.5 Ephes 1.13 14. Gal. 4.5 6. Rom. 8.16 17. There is so much of God and Heaven in a true Believers heart that as we see the Moon and Stars when we look down into the water so we may see much of God and Heaven within us if the heart it self be throughly studied And I must add that Experiences here must be carefully recorded and when God fulfilleth promises to us it must not be forgotten Direct 19. Converse much with them that live by Faith and fetch their motives and comforts from the things unseen Converse hath a transforming power To converse with them that live all by sense and shew no other desires or joyes or sorrows but what are fetched from fleshly sensible things is a great means to draw us downwards with them And to converse with them who converse in Heaven and speak of nothing else so comfortably or so seriously who shew us that Heaven is the place they travel to and the state that all their life doth aim and who make little of all the wants or plenty pains or pleasures of the flesh this much conduceth to make us heavenly As men are apt to learn
both to the Father and to us and so of our NEARNESS to God in and by him Our distance is the lamentable fruit of our Apostacy which inferreth our fears and estrangedness and backwardness to draw near to God It causeth our ignorance of him and our false conceits of his will and works it greatly hindereth both love and confidence whereas the apprehension of our nearness to God will do much to cure all these evils As it is the misery of the proud that God looketh on them as afar off that is with strangeness and abhorrence and disdain Psal 138.6 And accordingly they shall be far off from the blessed ones hereafter Luke 16.23 So it is the happiness of Believers to be nigh to God in Jesus Christ who condescended to be nigh to us which is our preparation to be yet nearer to him for ever Psal 148.14 34.18 145.18 Ephes 2.13 It giveth the soul more familiar thoughts of God who seemed before to be at an inaccessible distance which is part of the boldness of access and confidence mentioned Ephes 3.12 2.18 Rom. 5.2 Heb. 10.19 We may come boldly to the Throne of grace Heb. 4.16 And it greatly helpeth us in the work of Love to think how near God is come to us in Christ and how near he hath taken the humane nature unto him When a sinner looketh at God only as in himself and as he is estranged from the guilty he is amazed and confounded as if God were quite out of the reach of our love but when he thinketh how he hath voluntarily come down into our flesh that he might be man and be familiar with man and what a wonderful marriage the Divine Nature hath made with the humane this wonderfully reconcileth the heart to God and maketh the thoughts of him more sweet and acceptable If the life of faith be a dwelling in God and God in us and a walking with God 1 Joh. 3.24 4.12 15 16. Ephes 3.17 Gen. 17.1 24.40 5.22 6.9 Heb. 11.5 Then must we perceive our nearness to God The just apprehension of this nearness in Christs Incarnation and Relation to us is the chief means to bring us to the nearness of love and heavenly conversation Col. 3.1 3 4. Direct 8. Make Christ therefore the Mediation for all your practical thoughts of God The thoughts of God will be strange to us through our distance and terrible through our guilt if we look not upon him through the prospective of Christs humanity and cross God out of Christ is a consuming fire to guilty souls As our acceptance must be through the Beloved in whom he is well pleased so our thoughts must be encouraged with the sense of that acceptance and every thought must be led up to God and emboldened by the Mediatour Mat. 3.17 17.5 12.18 Ephes 1.6 Heb. 2.9 10 12 13 17. Direct 9. Never come to God in prayer or any other act of worship but by the Mediation of the Son and put all your prayers as into his hand that he may present them to the Father There is no hoping for any thing from God to sinners but by Christ and therefore there is no speaking to God but by him not only in his Name but also by his Mediation And this is the exercise of his Priesthood for us by his heavenly intercession so much spoken of by the Holy Ghost in the Epistle to the Hebrews Seeing we have a great High Priest that is passed into the Heavens Jesus the Son of God let us hold fast our profession Let us therefore come boldly to the Throne of grace that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need Heb. 4.14 16. Direct 10. Hear every word of Scripture Precept and Ministerial Exhortation consonant to the Scripture as sent to us by Christ and from the Father by him as the appointed Teacher of the Church Hear Christ in his Gospel and his Ministers and hear God the Father in the Son Take heed of giving only a slight and verbal acknowledgement of the voice of Christ whilest you really are more taken with the Preachers voice as if he had a greater share in the Sermon than Christ hath The voice in the holy Mount which Peter witnesseth that he heard 2 Pet. 1.17 was This is my Beloved Son in whom I am well pleased hear ye him Mat. 17.5 And it shall come to pass that every soul which will not hear that Prophet shall be destroyed from among the people Acts 3.23 When ye received the Word of God which ye heard of us ye received it not as the Word of men but as it is in truth the Word of God which worketh effectually in you that believe 1 Thes 2.13 The Sheep will follow him for they know his voice a stranger they will not follow John 10.4 5. Direct 11. Take every mercy from God as from the hand of Christ both as procured by his Cross and as delivered by his Mediatory Administration It is still supposed that the giving of the Son himself by the Father to this office is excepted as presupposed But all subsequent particular mercies are both procured for us and given to us by the Mediator Yet is it nevertheless from God the Father nor doth it evertheless but the more fully signifie his love But the state of sinners alloweth them no other way of communication from God for their benefit and happiness but by one who is more near and capable to God who from him may convey all blessings unto them Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in things heavenly in Christ Ephes 1.3 He that spared not his own Son but gave him up for us all how shall he not with him also freely give us all things Rom. 8.32 Through the knowledge of him the Divine Power giveth us all things that pertain to life and godliness 2 Pet. 1.3 God hath given us eternal life and this life is in his Son 1 John 5.10 11. All things are delivered into his hand Joh. 13.3 17.2 Therefore receive every particular mercy for soul and body as from the blood and from the present mediation of Christ that you may rightly understand it and have it as sanctified and sweetned by Christ Direct 12. Let Faith take occasion by every sin to renew your sense of the want of Christ and to bring you to him to meditate and grant you a renewed pardon Therefore entertain not their mistake who tell men that all sin past present and to come is fully pardoned at once whether it be before you were born in Gods decree or Christs satisfaction or at the time of your conversion nor theirs who teach that Christ pardoneth only sins before conversion but as for all that are committed afterward he doth prevent the need of pardon by preventing all guilt and obligation to punishment except meer temporal chastisement The preparation
his blood and resurrection is unto them When it hath cost Christ so dear to procure them certainly God will not break them A Promise ratified in the blood of the Son of God called the blood of the everlasting Covenant Heb. 13.20 and by his rising from the dead can never be broken If the Law given by Moses was firm and a jot or tittle should not pass away till all were fulfilled much more the word and testament of the Mediatour of a better Covenant 2 Cor. 1.20 All the Promises in him are Yea and Amen that is they are asserted or made in him and they are ratified and shall be fulfilled in him Heb. 8.6 He hath obtained a more excellent Ministry by how much also he is the Mediatour of a better Covenant which was established on better Promises And those that are better cannot be less sure It is the sure mercies of David that are given us by a Promise which is sure to all the sâ—ed Acts 13.34 Isa 55.3 Rom. 4.16 Direct 4. Consider well that it is Gods own interest to fulfil his Promises for he attaineth not that glory of his Love and Grace in the perfection of his people till it be done which he designed in the making of them And certainly God will not fail himself and his own interest The happiness will be ours but it will be his everlasting pleasure to see his creatures in their perfection If he was so pleased after the Creation to see them all good that he appointed a Sabbath of Rest to celebrate the commemoration of it how much more will it please him to see all restored by Jesus Christ and brought up to that perfection which Adam was but in the way to when he sinned and fell short of the Glory of God He will not miss of his own design nor lose the everlasting complacency of his love Direct 5. Consider how great stress God hath laid upon the belief of his Promises and of how great use he hath made them in the world If the intimation of another world and reward which we find in Nature and the Promise of it in Scriptures were out of the world or were not believed and so men had nothing but temporal motives to rule their hearts and lives by O what an odious thing would man be and what a Hell would the world be I have elsewhere shewed that the Government of the world is mainly steered by the hopes and fears of another life and could not be otherwise unless man be turned into far worse than a beast And certainly those Promises cannot be false which God hath laid so great a stress on and the belief of which is of so great moment For the wise and holy and powerful God neither needeth a lye nor can use it to so great a work Direct 6. Take notice how agreeable Gods Promises are to the Nature both of God and man It is not only Gods Precepts that have a congruence to natural Reason but his Promises also It is agreeable to the Nature of Infinite Goodness to do good And yet we see that he doth not do to all alike He maketh not every creature an Angel nor a man How then shall we discern what he intendeth to do by his creatures but by their several natures The nature of every thing is fitted to its use Seeing therefore God hath given man a nature capable of knowing loving and enjoying him we have reason to think he gave it not in vain And we have reason to think that nature may be brought up to its own perfection and that he never intended to imploy man all his daies on earth in seeking an end which cannot be attained And yet we see that some do unfit themselves for this end by turning from it and following vanity and that God requireth every man as a free Agent to use his guidance and help aright for his own preparation to felicity Therefore reason may tell us that those who are so prepared by the nearest capacity and have a love to God and a heavenly mind shall enjoy the Glory which they are fitted for And it helpeth much our belief of Gods Promise to find that Reason thus discerneth the equity of it Yea to find that a Cicero a Seneca a Socrates a Plato c. expected much the like felicity to the just which the Scripture promiseth Direct 7. Be sure to understand Gods Promises aright that you expect not that which he never promised and take not presumption to be Faith Many do make promises to themselves by misunderstanding and look that God should fulfil them and if any of them be not fulfilled they are ready to suspect the truth of God And thus men become false Prophets to themselves and others and speak words in the Name of the Lord which he hath never spoken and incur much of the guilt which God oft chargeth on false Prophets and such as add to the Word of God It is no small fault to father an untruth on God and to call that his Promise which he never made Direct 8. Think not that God promiseth you all that you desire or think you want in bodily things It is not our own desires which he hath made the measure of his outward gifts no nor of our own Opinion of our Necessity neither else most men would have nothing but riches and health and love and respect from men and few would have any want or pain or suffering But it is so much as is good 1. To the common ends of Government and the Societies with which we live 2. And to our souls which God doth promise to his own And his Wisdom and not their partial conceits shall be the Judge Our Father knoweth what we need and therefore we must cast our care on him and take not too particular nor anxious thoughts for our selves Mat. 6.24 to the end 1 Pet. 5 7. Direct 9. Think not that God promiseth you all that you will ask no not that which he commandeth you to ask unless it agree with his promising will as well as with his commanding will That promise of Christ Ask and ye shall receive c. And whatsoever you ask the Father in my Name according to his will he will give it you are often misunderstood and there is some dâ—fficulty in understanding what Will of God is here meant If it be his Decreeing Will that is secret and the promise giveth us no sure consolation If it be meant of his Promising Will what use is this general promise for if we must have a particular promise also for all that we can expect If it be meant of his Commanding Will the event notoriously gainsayeth it For it is most certain that since the Church hath long prayed for the conversion of the Infidel world and the reforming of the corrupted Churches c. it is not yet done And it is all Christians duty to pray for Kings and all in Authority and to ask that wisdom
28.19 20. Go and Disciple all Nations baptizing them c. Rom. 4.16 That the promise might be sure to all the seed And 9.8 The children of the Promise are counted for the seed Matth. 19.13 14. Jesus said suffer little children and forbid them not to come unto me for of such is the Kingdom of Heaven 27. Promises to the Church of its increase and preservation and perfection Rev. 11.15 The Kingdoms of the world are become the Kingdoms of the Lord and of his Christ Luke 1.33 He shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever and of his Kingdom there shall be no end Matth. 13.31 33. The Kingdom of Heaven is like to a grain of Mustard-seed which a man took and sowed in his field which is indeed the least of all seeds but when it is grown it is the greatest among herbs and becometh a tree so that the birds of the air lodge in the branches of it The Kingdom of Heaven is like unto leven which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal till the whole was levened John 12.32 And I if I be lifted up will draw all men unto me Dan. 2.44 In the daies of these Kings shall the God of Heaven set up a Kingdom which shall never be destroyed and the Kingdom shall not be left to other people but it shall break in pieces and consume all these Kingdoms and it shall stand for ever Matth. 16.18 Upon this Rock will I build my Church and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it Ephes 4.12 16. For the perfecting of the Saints for the work of the Ministry for the edifying of the body of Christ till we all come in the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God unto a perfect man unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ that henceforth we may be no more children tossed to and fro and carryed about with every wind of Doctrine by the sleight of men and cunning craftiness whereby they lye in wait to deceive but speaking the truth in love may grow up into him in all things who is the head Christ from whom the whole body fitly joyned together and compacted by that which every joynt supplieth according to the effectual working in the measure of every part maketh increase of the body to the edifying of it self in Love Ephes 5.25 26 27. Christ loved the Church and gave himself for it that he might sanctifie and cleanse it with the washing of water by the Word that he might present it to himself a glorious Church not having spot or wrinckle or any such thing but that it should be holy and without blemish Read Rev. 21 22. Matth. 28.20 Lo I am with you to the end of the world Matth. 24.14 And this Gospel of the Kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness to all Nations and then shall the end come Matth. 21.44 Whosoever shall fall on this stone shall be broken but on whomsoever it shall fall it will grind him to powder The obscure Prophetick passages I pass by So much for living by Faith on the Promises of God CHAP. VI. How Faith must be exercised on Gods Threatnings and Judgments THE exercise of Faith upon Gods Threatnings and Judgments must be guided by such rules and helps as these Direct 1. Think not either that Christ hath no Threatning penal Laws or that there are none which are made for the use of Believers If there were no penalties or penal Laws there were no distinguishing Government of the world This Antinomian fancy destroyeth Religion And if there be threats or penal Laws none can be expected to make so much use of them as true Believers 1. Because he that most believeth them must needs be most affected with them 2. Because all things are for them and for their benefit and it is they that must be moved by them to the fear of God and an escaping of the punishment And therefore they that object that Believers are passed already from death to life and there is no condemnation to them and they are already justified and therefore have no use of threats or fears do contradâ—ct themselves For it wâ—ll rather follow Therefore they and they only do and will faithfully use the threatnings in godly fears For 1. Though they are justified and passed from death to life they have ever faith in order of nature before their Justification and he that believeth not Gods threatnings with fear hath no true Faith And 2. They have ever inherent Righteousness or Sanctification with their Justification And this Faith is part of that holiness and of the life of grace which they are passed into For this is life eternal to know the only true God and Jesus Christ John 17.3 And he knoweth not God who knoweth him not to be true And this is part of our knowledge of Christ also to know him as the infallible Author of our Faith that is of the Gospel which saith not only He that believeth and is baptiz'd shall be saved but also He that believeth not shall be damned Mark 16.16 And this is the record which God gave of his Son which he that believeth not maketh him a lyar that God hath given us eternal life and this life is in his Son He that hath the Son hath life and he that hath not the Son hath not life 1 John 5.12 Yea as he that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life so he that believeth not the Son shall not see life but the wrath of God abideth on him John 3.36 And therefore 3. The reason why there is no condemnation to us is because believing not part only but all this Word of Christ we fly from sin and wrath and are in Christ Jesus as giving up our selves to him and walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit being moved so to do both by the promises and threats of God This is plain English and plain and necessary truth the greater is the pitty that many honest well-meaning Antinomians should fight against it on an ignorant conceit of vindicating Free Grace If the plain Word of God were not through partiality over-lookt by them they might see enough to end the controversie in many and full expressions of Scripture I will cite but three more Matth. 10.28 and Luke 12.5 But fear him who is able to destroy both soul and body in Hell or when he hath killed hath power to cast into Hell yea I say unto you fear him Doth Christ thus iterate that it is he that saith it and saith it to his Disciples and yet shall a Christian say it must not be preached to Disciples as the Word of Christ to them Hâ—b 4.1 Let us therefore fear lest a promise being left us of entering into his rest any of you should seem to come short of it Heb. 11.7 By Faith Noah being warned of God of things not seen as yet that is of the deluge
true Suppose that the Law do pardon a fellon if he can read as a Clerk and one that is a fellon be in doubt whether his reading will serve or not this is not to deny belief to the pardoning act of the Law Suppose one promise a yearly stipend to all that are of full one and twenty years of age in the Town or Country To doubt of my age is not to doubt of the truth of the promise Object But do not Protestant Divines conclude against the Papists that saving Faith must be a particular application of Christ and the Promise to ourselves and not only a general assent Answ It is very true and the closer that application is the better But the application which all sound Divines in this point require as necessary in saving Faith is neither an assurance nor perswasion that your own sins are already pardoned or that they ever will be But it is 1. A belief that the Promise of pardon to all believers is so universal as that it includeth you as well as others and promiseth and offereth you pardon and life if you will believe in Christ 2. And it is a consent or willingness of heart that Christ be yours and you be his to the ends proposed in the Gospel 3. And it is a practical Trust in his sufficiency as chusing him for the only Mediatour resolving to venture your souls and all your hopes upon him Though yet through your ignorance of your selves you may think that you do not this thing in sincerity which indeed you do yea and much fear through melancholy or temptation that you never shall do it and consequently never shall be saved He that doubteth of his own salvation not because he doubteth of the truth of the Gospel but because he doubteth of the sincerity of his own heart may be mistaken in himself but is not therefore an unbeliever as is said before If you would know whether you believe the Promises truly answer me these particular questions 1. Do you believe that God hath promised that all true Believers shall be saved 2. Do you believe that if you are or shall be a true Believer you shall be saved 3. Do you chuse or desire God as your only happiness and end to be enjoyed in Heaven and Christ as the only Mediatour to procure it and his holy Spirit as his Agent in your souls to sanctifie you fully to the Image of God Are you truly willing that thus it should be And if God be willing will not you refuse it 4. Do you turn away from all other waies of felicity and chuse this alone to venture all your hopes upon and resolve to seek for none but this and to venture all on God and Christ though yet you are uncertain of your sincerity and salvation why this makes up true saving faith 5. And I would further ask you Do you fear damnation and Gods wrath or not If not what troubleth you and why complain you If you do tell me then whether you do believe Gods threatning that he that believeth not shall be damned or not If you do not what maketh you fear damnation Do you fear it and not believe that there is any such thing If you do believe it how can you chuse but believe also that every true Believer shall be saved Is God true in his Threatnings and not in his Promises This must force you plainly to confess that you do believe Gods Promises but only doubt of your own sincerity and consequently of your salvation which is more a weakness in your hope than in your faith or rather chiefly in your acquaintance with your self Direct 8. Yet still dwell most upon Gods Promises in the exercise of love desire and thankfulness and use all your fear about the threatnings but in a second place to further and not to hinder the work of love Direct 9. Let faith interpret all Gods Judgements meerly by the light of the threatnings of his Word and do not gather any conclusions from them which the Word affordeth not or alloweth not Gods Judgements may be dangerously misunderstood CHAP. VII How to exercise Faith about Pardon of sin and Justification THE practice of Faith about our Justification is hindered by so many unhappy controversies and heresies that what to do with them here in our way is not very easie to determine Should I omit the mention of them I leave most that I write for either under that disease it self or the danger of it which may frustrate all the rest which I must say For the errours hereabout are swarming in most quarters of the Land and are like to come to the caâ—s of most that are studious of these matters so that an antidote to most and a vomit to the rest is become a matter of necessity to the success of all our practical Directions And yet many cannot endure to be troubled with difficulties who are slothful and must have nothing set before them that will cost them much study and many peaceable Christians love not any thing that soundeth like controversie or strife As others that are Sons of contention relish nothing else But averseness must give place to necessity If the Leprosie arise the Priest must search it and the Physician must do his best to cure it notwithstanding their natural averseness to it Though I may be as averse to write against errours as the Reader is to read what I write we must both blame that which causeth the necessity but not therefore deny our necessary duty But yet I will so far gratifie them that need no more as to put the more practical Directions first that they may pass by the heap of errours â—â—ter if their own judgements prevail not against their unwillingness Direct 1. Vnderstand well what need you have of pardon of sin and Justification by reason of your guilt and of Gods Law and Justice and the everlasting punishment which is legally your due 1. It must be a sensible awakening practical knowledge of our own great necessity which must teach us to value Christ as a Saviour and to come to him in that empty sick and weary plight as is necessary in those who will make use of him for their supply and cure Matth. 9.12 11.28 29. A superficial speculative knowledge of our sin and misery will prepare us but for a superficial opinionative faith in Christ as the remedy But a true sense of both will teach us to think of him as a Saviour indeed 2. Original sin and actual the wickedness both of the heart and life even all our particular sins of omission and commission and all their circumstances and aggravations are the first reason of our great necessity of pardon And therefore it cannot but be a duty to lay them to heart as particularly as we can to make that necessity and Christs redemption the better understood Acts 2.37 Acts 2â— 8 9 c. 3. The wrath of God and the miseries of this life
and some among men are meritorious And with God every act that is chosen by him to be a condition of his gift is pleasing to him for some special aptitude which it hath to that office This is the full truth and the plain truth about conditions Errour 18. There is no degree of pardon given to any that are not perfectly justified and that shall not be saved But the giving of the Spirit so far as to cause us to believe and repent is sâ—me degree of executive pardon Therefore we are justified before we believe Contr. There is a great degree of pardon given to the world before conversion which shall yet justifie and save none but Believers Gods giving a Saviour to the world and a New Covenant and in that an universal conditional pardon yea his giving them teaching exhortations and offers of free grace and his giving them life and time and many mercies which the full execution of the Law would have deprived them of is a very great degree of pardon God pardoned to mankind much of the penalty which sin deserved even presently after the first transgression in the promâ—se made to Adam Gen. 3.15 Many texts of Scripture which partial men for their opinions sake do pervert do speak magnificently of a common pardon which must be sued out and made particular upon our believing The world was before under so much impossibility of being saved by any thing that they could do that they must have procured all to be done first which Christ hath done and suffered for them which was utterly above their power They that were actually obliged to bear the pains of death both temporal spiritual and eternal are now so far redeemed pardoned and delivered that all the merit and satisfaction necessary to actual forgiveness is made for them by another and no one of them all shall perish for want of a Sacrifice made and accepted for them and an universal conditional pardon is enacted sealed and recorded and offered and urged on all to whom the Gospel cometh and nothing but their obstinate wilful refusal or neglect can deprive them of it And this is so great a degree of pardon that it is called often by such absolute names as if all were done because all is done which concerneth God as Legislator or Covenant maker to do before our own Acceptance of it Suppose a Prince redeem all his captive subjects from the Turkish slavery and one half of them so love their state of bondage or some harlot or ill company there yea if all of them do so till half of them are perswaded from it that they will not come away It is no improper nor unusual language to say that he hath redeemed them and given them a release though they would not have it That may be given to a man which he never hath because he refuseth to accept it when the Donor hath done all that belongeth to him in that relation of a Donor though perhaps as a Perswader he might do more This is the sense of Heb. 1.3 When he had by himself purged our sins or made purgation of our sins he sate down on the right hand of the Majesty on high that is when he had become a sacrifice for sin and sealed the Covenant by his blood For actual personal pardon was not given by him before our acceptance This is the plain sense of 2 Cor. 5.18 19 20. God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself not imputing to them their trespasses that is purchasing and giving them a pardoning Covenant and hath committed to us the word and ministry of reconciliation Now then we are Embassadours for Christ as though God did beseech you by us we pray you in Christs stead to be reconciled to God John 1.29 36. Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sins of the world that is as a sacrifice for sin As Heb. 9.26 Once in the end of the world he hath appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself Though the sacrifice as offered only doth not actually and fully pardon it The same as Heb. 10.12 After he had offered one Sacrifice for sins for ever sate down on the right hand of God So Matth. 18.27 32. He forgave him the debt I forgave thee all that debt viz. conditionally and as David forgave Shimei Psal 78.38 He forgave their iniquity and destroyed them not that is he forgave the temporal punishment and suspended the execution of eternal punishment giving them yet more time and offers of repentance and of further mercy And so he forgave Ahab and Nineve upon their humiliation Numb 14.19 Pardon I beseech thee the iniquity of this people according to the greatness of thy mercy and as thou hast forgiven this people from Egypt until now So Psal 85.2 3. Thou hast forgiven the iniquity of thy people thou hast covered all their sins thou hast taken away all thy wrath Turn us O God of our salvation and cause thine anger to cease wilt thou be angry with us for ever So that they are two palpable errors here asserted by the objecters viz. that there is no degree of pardon to such as are not saved and that we are justified when ever we have any degree of pardon We may be so far pardoned as to have grace given us effectually to believe and yet our Justification or the Covenant-forgiveness of eternal punishment is in order of nature after our believing and not before it Errour 19. That our natures are as far from being able to believe in Christ as from being able to fulfil the Law of works and to be justified by it they being equally impossible to us and as much help is necessary to one as to the other Contr. To be justified by the Law of works when we have once broken it is a contradiction and a natural impossibility as it is to be at once a sinner and no sinner But so it is not for a sinner to believe in Christ The impossibility is but moral at most which consisteth not in a want of natural faculties or power but in the want of a right dâ—spâ—sition or willingness of mind And to fulfil the Law of God and to be perfect for the future is surely a far higher degree of spiritual grace and excellency than to be a poor weak sinful believer dâ—siring to fulfil it Therefore our sinful natures are much farther off from perfection than from faith 3. And though the same Omnipotency do all Gods works for all Gods Power is Omnipotency yet it is not equally put forth and manifested in all his works The moving of a feather and the making of the world are both works of Omnipotency but not equal works or exertions of it 4. And it is certain that in verum natura there is such a thing as a proper Power given by God to do many things that nâ—ver are done and that necessary grace which some call sufficient which is not eventually effectual for
general in the wars against his enemies shall have pardon and lands and honours and further rewards after this service here the Prince himself doth deliver them by his ransom and enrich them by his lands and honour them by his honour or power c. But their act of giving up themselves to him under the notion of a Ransomer doth no more to their deliverance than their giving up themselves to him under the notion of a General or Ruler c. Because it doth not free them as it is such an act but as it is an act made the condition of his gift And note that I have before proved that even as to the object Christ justifieth us in all the parts of his office Errour 27. That believing in God as God and our Father in Christ is not an act of Justifying Faith but only a consequent or concomitant of it Contr. 1. No doubt but God must some way be believed in in order of nature before Christ can be believed in as is proved who can believe that Christ is the Son and Messenger of God who believeth not that there is a God Or that Christ reconcileth us to God before he believe that he is our offended God and Governour 2. But to believe in God as the end of our Redemption to whose love and savour we must be restored by Faith in Christ and who pardoneth by the Son is as essential an act of Justifying Faith as our belief in Christ Object But not quatenus justificantis not of Faith as justifying Answ If by as justifying you mean not as effecting Justification it is a false supposition There is no such Faith If you mean not as the condition of Justification it is false It is as essential a part of it as the condition If you mean not as Faith is denominated Justifying from the consequent benefit it s true but impertinent For the same may be said of Faith in Christ it is not called Faith in Christ as it is called by you Justifying And yet I may add that in the very physical nature of it Belief in God as our God and End is essential to it As consenting to be healed is essential to consenting to the Physician and consenting to be reconciled is essential to our consenting to a Mediation for that end Because the respect to the end is essential to the Relation consented to All the Faith described Heb. 11. in all those instances hath special essential respect to God So hath Abrahams faith Rom. 4.3 Abraham believed God and it was imputed to him for righteousness v. 5. To him that worketh not but believeth on him on God that justifieth the ungodly his Faith is counted for righteousness v. 8. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin v. 17. Before him whom he believed even God who quickeneth the dead v. 20. He staggered not at the Promise of God Being fuly perswaded that what he had promised he was also able to perform v. 21 22. And therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness Now it was not written for his sake alone that it was imputed to him but for us also to whom it shall be imputed if we believe on him who raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead Abundance such testimonies are obvious in Scripture but this being as plain as can be spoken he maketh his own Faith who refuseth to believe it Our Faith in God as God hath as much hand in our Justification as our Faith in Christ as Mediatour But the form of the Baptismal Covenant which the Church ever used fully proveth it as is aforesaid though to answer all ignorant cavils against it as an unnecessary tediousness I pass by Errour 28. The belief of Heaven or the life to come is no essential part of Justifying Faith as such Contr. The last answer to this Errour is sufficient Heaven is the everlasting vision and love of God and therefore we are justified by believing it though not it alone It is essential to our Saviour to save and bring us to the fruition of God Errour 29. That Justifying Faith is a believing that I am justified or elect and shall be saved by Christ Errour 30. That this Faith is a full assurance or perswasion at least excluding doubting Contr. 1. We are justified by believing and accepting God for our God and Christ for our Saviour that we may be justified and not by believing that we are justified 2. It is false and ever will be that any of the praesciti as Austin and Prosper call them or the Non-Elect are elect or justified or will be saved But the Non-Elect are commanded and bound to believe with that same kind of Faith by which we are justified Therefore to believe that they themselves are elect justified and shall be saved is not that kind of Faith by which we are justified No men are bound by God on pain of damnation to believe a lye nor damned for not believing it 3. Assurance of personal pardon is the happiness but of few true Christians in this life And where it is it is only an effect or consequent participating of Faith See Mr. Hickman on this subject Errour 31. The meaning of that Article of our Creed I believe the remission of sins is I believe that my own sins are forgiven to me personally Contr. Though worthy Mr. Perkins and other ancient Divines have too much countenanced this exposition it is false The meaning of that Article is but this I believe that a sufficient provision for pardon is made by Christ both for sins before regeneration and after-fault which shall be repented of and that a pardoning Covenant is made to all if they will repent and believe and to me as well as others and I accept of that gracious offer and trust in that Covenant in Christ It s dangerous misexpounding Articles of the Creed Errour 32. At least it is an act of Divine Belief to believe that I am elect and justified and shall be saved Contr. Many have been a great scandal or snare to harden the Papists by asserting this But the truth is it is but a rational conclusion from two premises the one of which is of Divine Revelation and the other of inward experience and all that is capable of being a controversie to the judicious is only de nomine whether logically the conclusion be to be denominated from the more debile of the premises or from both by participation as being both an act of Faith and of Reason secundum quid and of neither simpliciter But it is commonly concluded that the more debile of the premises must denominate the conclusion And it is certain de re that the conclusion can be no more certain than it Object But when the Scripture saith He that believeth shall be saved it is equipollent to this I John believe and therefore I shall be saved Answ A gross deceit That I believe is no where in the Scripture If it
Stand in awe and sin not Offer the sacrifices of righteousness Psal 51.17 The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit Matth. 9.13 12.7 Learn what this meaneth I will have mercy and not sacrifice Eccles 5.1 Keep thy foot when thou goest to the house of God and be more ready to hear than to offer the sacrifice of fools for they know not that they do evil All this telleth us that fools and hypocrites while they disobey Gods Law do think to make up all with sacrifice or to appease God with offering him something that is excellent But the acceptable Worshipper cometh to God as a penitent a learner resolving to obey as a Receiver of mercy and not a meriter Direct 2. Over-value not therefore the manner of your own Worship and over-vilifie not other mens of a different mode And make not men believe that God is of your childish humour and valueth or vilifieth words and orders and forms and ceremonies as much as self-conceited people do If one man hear another pray only from the habits of his mind and present desires he reproacheth him as a rash presumptuous speaker that talketh that to God which he never fore-considered As if a beggar did rashly ask an alms or a corrected child or a malefactor did inconsiderately beg for pardon unless they learn first the words by rote or as if all mens converse and the words of Judges on the Bench were all rash or the counsel of a Physician to his Patient because they use not books and forms or set not down their words long before And if another man hear a form of prayer especially if it be read out of a Book and especially if it have any disorder or defect he sticketh not to revise it and call it false Worship and mans Inventions and perhaps Idolatry and to fly from it and make the world believe that it is an odious thing which God abhorreth And why so Are your words so much more excellent than the words of others Or doth the Book or Press or Pen make them odious to God Or are all words baâ— which are resolved on before-hand Is the Lords Prayer and the Psalms all odious because they are book-forms Or doth the command of other men make God hate them Let Parents take heed then of commanding their children prescribed words Nay rather let them take heed lest they omit such prescripts Or is it the disorder or defects that makes them odious Such are not to be justified indeed where-ever we find them But woe to us all if God will not pardon disorders and defects and accept the prayers that are guilty of them Many a time I have heard such forms of prayers whose disorders and defects I have much lamented and done my part to have cured and yet I durst not so reproach them as to say God will not accept and hear them Or that it is unlawful to joyn in communion with them And many a time I have heard as sad disorder in extemporate prayers sometimes by wrong methods or no method at all sometimes by vain repetitions sometimes by omitting the chiefest parts of prayer and sometimes in the whole strein by turning a prayer into a Sermon to the hearers or a meer talk or narrative to God that had little of a prayer in it save very good matter and honest zeal And though this prayer was more disorderly than the forms which perhaps in that prayer were accused of disorder yet durst I not run away from this neither nor say it is so bad that God will not hear it nor good men should have no comunion in it It is easie but abominable to fall in love with our own and to vilifie that which is against our opinion and to think that God is of our mind and is as fond of our mode and way as we are and as exceptious against the way or words of other men as childish pievish Christians are Look on your Book and read or learn your prayer in words saith one or else God will not hear you Look off your Book and read not or learn not the words saith another or God will not hear you But oh lamentable that both of them tremble not thus to abuse God and add unto his Word and to prophesie or speak falsly against their brethren in his Name nor to reproach the prayers which Christ presenteth from his servants to the Father and which notwithstanding their defects are his delight Direct 3. Offer God nothing as worship which is contrary to the perfection of his Nature as far as you can avoid it And yet feign not that to be contrary to his nature which he commandeth For then it is certain that you misunderstand either his nature or command Direct 4. Never come to the Father but by the Son and dream not of any immediate access of a sinner unto God but wholly trust in Christs mediation Receive the Fathers will from Christ your Teacher and his commands from Christ your King and all his mercies from Christ your Head and the Treasury of the Church and your continual Intercessor with God in Heaven And put all your prayers praises duties alms into his hand that through him alone they may be accepted of God Direct 5. Understand well how far the Scripture is a particular Rule as to the substance of Gods Worship and how far it is only a general Rule as to the circumstances that so you may neither offer God a Worship which he will not accept nor yet reject or oppose all those circumstances as unlawful which are warranted by his general commands Of which I have said enough elsewhere Direct 6. Look first and most to the exercise of inward grace and to the spiritual part of Worship for God will be worshiped in spirit and in truth and hateth the Hypocrite who offereth him a carkass or empty shell and ceremony and pomp or length of words instead of substance and draweth neer him with the lips without the heart And yet in the second place look carefully also to your words and order and outward behaviour of the body For God must be honoured with soul and body And order and reverend solemnity is both a help to the affections of the soul and a fit expression of them Never forget that hypocritical dead formality and ignorant self-conceited fanatical extravagancies are the two extreams by which the Devil hath laboured in all ages to turn Christs Worship against him and to destroy the Church and Religion by such false Religiousness The poor Popish Formalists on one side mortifie Religion and turn it into a carkass and a comely Image that hath any thing save life And the Fanaticks on the other side do call all the enormities of their proud and blustering fancies by the name of spiritual devotion and do their worst to make Christianity to seem a ridiculous fancy to the world Escape both these extreams as ever you will escape the dishonouring of God the dividing and
disturbing and corrupting of the Church the deluding of others and the disappointing and deceiving of your selves Direct 7. Neglect not any helps which you can have by the excellent gifts of any of Christs Ministers or flocks and yet take heed that through prejudice or for the faults of either you vilifie or reject nothing which is of God But carefully distinguish between Christs and theirs Communion with the holiest and purest Assemblies is more desirable than with the less pure But yet all that is less desirable comparatively is not simply unlawful nor to be rejected The labours of an abler and more faithful Minister are much to be preferred before theirs that are less able and faithful For God worketh usually according to the aptitude of the means and of the receiver To the recovery and salvation of a soul it is necessary 1. That the Vnderstanding be made wise 2. That the Heart or Will be sanctified by Love 3. That the Life be holy and obedient To the first of these there are three things needful 1. That the Vnderstanding be awakened 2. That it be illuminated 3. That it be preserved from the seduction of temptations to deceit Now an able and faithful Pastor is suited to all these effects 1. He is a lively Preacher to awaken the understanding He is a clear intelligent methodical and convincing Teacher to illuminate it 3. He can confute gainsayers and refute objections and shame the cavils of tempters and deceivers to preserve it And 2 He speaketh all from the unfeigned Love of God and men and as all his words do breathe forth Love so they art apt to kindle such love in the hearers For every active nature tendeth to propagation 3. And the holiness of his life as well as doctrine tendeth to win the people to a holy life So that he that loveth his own soul must not be indifferent what Pastor he chuseth for the help and conduct of his soul but should most carefully seek to get the best or fittest for such necessary ends But yet it followeth not that a weaker or worse may not be heard or may not be accepted or submitted to in a case of necessity when a better cannot be had without more disturbance and hurt than the benefits are like to recompence And when we live under such a weak or cold or faulty Pastor our care must be so much the greater that we may make up that in the diligence of our attention which is wanting in his manner of expression and that we make up that in a care of our own souls which is wanting in his care And that our knowledge of his failings tempt us not to slight the truth which he delivereth and that we reject not the matter for the manner The Sheep of Christ do know his voice and they know his words and reverence and love them from what mouâ—h soever they proceed A Religious zâ—alous man that preacheth false doctrine is more to be avoided than a cold or scandalous man who preacheth the truth If you doubt of this observe these texts Matth. 23.2 3. The Scribes and Pharisees sit in Moses seat All therefore whatsoever they bid you observe that observe and do but do not ye after their works for they say and do not Acts 1.17 For he Judas was numbred with us and had obtained part of this Ministry Judas the thief and traitor was an Apostle called and sent out by Jesus Christ Phil. 1.15 c. Some indeed preach Christ even of envy and strife and some also of good will The one preach Christ of contention not sincerely supposing to add afflâ—ction to my bonds what then Notwithstanding every way whether in pretence or in truth Christ is preached and I do therein rejoyce yea and will rejoyce Rom. 16.17 Now I beseech you brethren Mark them which cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned and avoid them Acts 20.30 Of your own selves shall men arise speaking perverse things to draw away Disciples after them Gal. 1.7 8. If we or an Angel from Heaven bring another Gospel let him be accursed Is not all this a plain decision of the case Direct 8. While you prefer local communion with the purest Churches and â—est taught and ordered for your own edification take heed that you disown not a distant and mental communion with any part of the Church of Christ on earth which Christ himself disowneth not But first remember that you are members of the Vniversal Church and as such in mental communion with the whole present your selves and services to Christ and next as members of your Particular Church It is true that you must not own the corruptions of any Church or of any of their Worship but you must own the Church it self and own all the substance of the Worship which is good and which God owneth God doth not reject the matter for the manner nor the whole for a faulty part where the heart is sincere that offereth it nor no more must you And if they force you not to any actual sin as by false speaking subscribing or the like you must sometimes also locally joyn with such Churches when occasion requireth it As when you have no better to go to or when it is necessary to shew your mental communion or to avoid schism scandal or offence As you must not approve of your own failings in Gods Worship as in the manner of praying preaching c. and yet must not give over worshipping God though you are alwaies sure to fail even so must you do by your communion with others And here I would earnestly intreat all those that are inclinable to sinful separation to think but of these few things 1. What is more contrary to Christianity than Pride and what is a plainer sign of Pride than to separate from whole Churches and perhaps from most part of the Christian world for such faults as are no greater than others of our own and to say They are too bad for such as you to communicate with 2. Whether it be not much contrary to that clemency of Jesus Christ by which he pardoneth the failings of Believers and which we have need of our selves as well as others And whether it be not an horrid injury to our Lord to ascribe his inheritance to the Devil and to cast those out of his Church whom he himself receiveth and to deny so many of his servants to be his 3. How great a loss is it to lose your part in all those prayers of the Churches how weak soever which you disown And how can you justly expect the benefit of such prayers I would not take all their riches for my part of the benefit of those prayers of the Churches of Church which some reject because they are extemporate and others because they are forms or book-prayers or imposed nor would I take all their wealth and honour for my part in all the prayers of the Vniversal Church which
man to God to love him and be beloved by him so the true use of Faith in Jesus Christ is to be as it were the bellows to kindle love or the burning-glass as it were of the soul to receive the beams of the Love of God as they shine upon us in Jesus Christ and thereby to enflame our hearts in love to God again Therefore if you would live by Faith indeed begin here and first receive the deepest apprehensions of that Love of the Father Who so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life And by these apprehensiâ—ns stir up your hearts to the Love of God and make this very endeavour the work and business of your lives Oh that mistaken Christians would be rectified in this point how much would it tend to their holiness and their peace You think of almost nothing of the life of Faith but how to believe that you have a special interest in Christ and shall be saved by him But you have first another work to do You must first believe that common Love and Grace before mentioned John 3.16 2 Cor. 5.19 20.14 15. 1 Tim. 2.6 Heb. 2.9 And you must believe your own interest in this that is that God hath by Christ made to all and therefore unto you an act of oblivion and free deed of gift that you shall have Christ and pardon and eternal life if you will believingly accept the gift and will not finally reject it And the belief of this even of this common Love and Grace must first perswade your hearts accordingly to accept the offer and then you have a special interest and withall at the same time must kindle in your souls a thankful love to the Lord and fountain of this grace and if you were so ingenuous as to begin here and first use your Faith upon the foresaid common gift of Christ for the kindling of love to God within you and would account this the work which Faith hath every day to do you would then find that in the very exciting and exercise of this holy Love your assurance of your own special interest in Christ would be sooner and more comfortably brought about than by searching to find either evidence of pardon before you find your love to God or to find your love to God before you have laboured to get and exercise it I tell you they are dangerous deceivers of your souls that shall contradict this obvious truth that the true method and motive of mans first special love to God must not be by believing first God 's special love to us but by believing his more common love and mercy in the general act and offer of grace before mentioned For he that believeth Gods special love to him and his special interest in Christ before he hath any special love to God doth sinfully presume and not believe For if by Gods special love you mean his love of complacency to you as a living member of Christ to believe this before you love God truly is to believe a dangerous lie and if you mean only Gods love of benevolence by which he decreeth to make you the objects of his foresaid complacency and to sanctifie and save you to believe this before you truly love God is to believe that which is utterly unknown to you and may be false for ought you know but is not at all revealed by God and therefore is not the object of Faith Therefore if you cannot have true assurance or perswasion of your special interest in Christ and of your justification before you have a special love to God then this special love must be kindled I say not by a common Faith but by a true Faith in the General Love and Promise mentioned before Nay you must not only have first this special love but also must have so much knowledge that indeed you have it as you will have knowledge of your special interest in Christ and the love of God for no act of Faith will truly evidence special grace which is not immediately and intimately accompanied with true love to God our Father and Redeemer and the ultimate object of our Faith Nor can you any further perceive or prove the sincerity of your Faith it self than you discern in or with it the Love here mentioned For Faith is not only an act of the Intellect but of the Will also And there is no volition or consent to this or any offered good which hath not in it the true nature of Love and the intention of the end being in order of nature before our choice or use of means the intending of God as our end cannot come behind that act of Faith which is about Christ as the chosen means or way to God Therefore make this your great and principal use of your Faith to receive all the expressions of Gods Love in Christ and thereby to kindle in you a love to God that first the special true belief of Gods more common love and grace may kindle in you a special love and then the sense of this may assure you of your special interest in Christ and then the assurance of that special interest may increase your love to a much higher degree And thus live by Faith in the work of Love Direct 7. That you may understand what that Faith is which you must live by take in all the parts at least that are essential to it in your description and take not some parcels of it for the Christian Faith nor think noâ— that it must needs be several sorts of Faith if it have several objects and hearken not to that dull Philosophical subtilty which would perswade you that Faith is but some single physical act of the soul 1. If you know not what Faith is it must needs be a great hinderance to you in the seeking of it the trying it and the using it For though one may use his natural faculties which work by natural inclination and necessity without knowing what they are yet it is not so where the choice of the rational appetite is necessary for it must be guided by the reasoning faculty And though unlearned persons may have and use Repentance Faith and other graces who cannot define them yet they do truly though not perfectly know the thing it self though they know not the terms of a just definition and all defect of knowing the true nature of Faith will be some hinderance to us in using it 2. It is a moral subject which we are speaking of and terms are to be understood according to the nature of the subject therefore Faith is to be taken for a moral act which comprehendeth many physical acts Such as is the act of believing in or taking such a man for my Physician or my Master or my Tutor or my King Even our Philosophers themselves know not what doth individuate a physical act of the soul Nay they are not