Selected quad for the lemma: woman_n
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A34849
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A discourse of the covenants that God made with men before the law wherein the covenant of circumcision is more largely handled, and the invalidity of the plea for pædobaptism taken from thence discovered / by Nehemiah Coxe.
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Coxe, Nehemiah.
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1681
(1681)
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Wing C6717; ESTC R7196
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96,812
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205
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and Gracious God who from Eternity foresaw the Fall of Man had also from Eternity a gracious Purpose in himself according to the Counsel of his own Will to redeem 2 Tim. 1. 9 10. Tit. 1. 1 2. and save a Remnant of lost Mankind from their lapsed and fallen State and by his All-powerful Grace thro' the Merits of Christ to recover them from Misery to the Inheritance of a Kingdom and Glory far greater than that set before Adam in his Integrity And these eternal Counsels that were hid with himself were transacted in a way of Covenant between the Father and the Son even in a Covenant of Redemption now revealed in the Scriptures of Truth And to this Covenant belong all the Promises of the Father to the Mediator and the restipulatory Engagements of the Redeemer about the Salvation of Sinners and the way and method of its Accomplishment And with respect to these Counsels the Son of God is said to be the Father's Delights and himself also to have his Delights in the habitable World when the Head of the Dust thereof was formed Prov. 8. 22 31. In which Context the mutual Acquiescence both of the Father and the Son in this admirable Contrivance of infinite Grace and Wisdom is not obscurely set forth 2. In pursuance of this Covenant of Redemption and the Suretiship of Christ taken therein upon the Fall of Man the Government of the World was actually put into the hands of the Son of God the designed Mediator who interposed himself for the Prevention of its present and utter Ruin And by him were all future Transactions managed for the Good of Man and all Discoveries of Grace and Mercy were made to the Children of Men in him and by him And all things in Heaven and Earth were brought into an order subservient to the Ends of the new Creation and the Redemption of lost Man to be accomplished in the fulness of time by the Son of God incarnate Fallen Man could have no more to do with God nor God with him in a way of Kindness but in a Mediator § 11. And from this Design of Love and Mercy it was that when the Lord God came unto fallen Man in the Garden in the cool of the Day and found him filled with Horror and Shame in the Conscience of his own Guilt he did not execute the Rigor of the Law upon him but held a Treaty with him which issued in a Discovery of Grace whereby a Door of Hope was opened to him in the laying of a new Foundation for his acceptance with God and walking unto well pleasing before him For 1. In the Sentence passed upon the Serpent which principally concerned the Devil whose Instrument he had been in tempting Man and who probably was made to abide in his Possession of the Serpent till he had received this Doom Gen. 3. 5. there was couched a blessed Promise of Redemption and Salvation unto Man which was to be wrought out by the Son of God made of a Woman and so her Seed which Salvation thus promised Man was to receive by Faith and to hope in it for in this implyed Promise was laid the first Foundation of the Church after the Fall of Man which was to be raised up out of the Ruines of the Devil's Kingdom by the Destruction of his Work by Jesus Christ 1 Joh. 3. 8. 2. In this Commination of the Serpent there is not only implyed a Promise of raising up a Saviour of the Seed of the Woman and sending him into the World for the breaking of the Serpents Head that is the perfect Conquest of Satan and the utter ruining of his Kingdom but also of propagating and preserving a Church in the World that should be Heirs of that Salvation and should maintain a spiritual War with Satan and his Kingdom which on their part should end in perfect Conquest and Victory The God of Peace bruising Satan under their Feet while he is nibling at their Heel and making them to be more than Conquerors thro' him that loved them for the Seed of the Woman is to be understood collectively of Christ and his members as the Seed of the Serpent includes all wicked Men tho' it hath a principal respect to Christ personal who alone hath obtained the Victory over the infernal Power and destroyed the Works of the Devil But altho' this was done by himself alone yet was it not for himself only but for his Body the Church of which every true Believer is a Member and shall certainly obtain Victory thro' the Faith of his Name And against this Church the Gates of Hell can never prevail but a Church there ever shall be in the World so long as the World continues and ever was since the first Promise tho' maligned and persecuted by the Devil and wicked Men as early appears in that Instance of Cain and Abel Gen. 4. compared with 1 Joh. 3. 12. And something of this nature is intimated in the Name of Seth and the Reason given by Eve of her imposing that Name Gen. 4. 25. 3. Hereupon there was a present Restraint and Modification of the Curse in the Sentence pronounced upon Adam and Eve Gen. 3. 16 19. whereby altho' they and their Offspring were necessarily subjected to many Evils and Miseries while they lived and Dissolution by a temporal Death at last yet they were not immediately laid under a Sentence of eternal Death which was the Punishment they had deserved And concerning this Sentence we may farther observe 1. That the Promise of breaking the Serpents Head which was revealed to our first Parents did not give them a Deliverance from all Misery but only an Exemption from eternal Death But notwithstanding this Promise and all that Christ hath now done for the full Accomplishment thereof it is the Will of God that all Men even Believers as well as others shall in this World be exercised with Miseries and remain subject to temporal Death or Dissolution of the Body into Dust 2. The Corruptibility of Man all the Miseries he is subject to while he lives and temporal Death at last are the Fruits of Sin and of the Curse due to it as they are natural Evils or Punishments but yet they are not the Fruit or Result of the Curse only nor the full Wages of Sin As they are evil they flow from the Curse but as temporal only the Evil of them is limited and thus modified by Mercy or compassionate Goodness at least The Position of temporal Death concludes indeed that Sin is in the World but this Limitation of Death doth also prove that there is Mercy reserved for some and that such as obtain not Mercy must be brought to an after reckoning inasmuch as the Fruit of their Doings hath not fully been repaid to them in this World And hence 3. There are none of these Evils but are capable of a Change as to their penal Nature together with the Change of that Man's State upon
for the most part as shadowed and figured by outward things And hence That which concerns the State of Israel under the Mosaical Oeconomy is more expresly and fully declared unto Abraham than what concerns his spiritual Seed under the Gospel And therefore tho' this latter be the chief thing intended and aimed at because the perfection of all the rest in all divine Transactions with Abraham yet is it for the most part mystically infolded in and to be inferred from the typical Respect of the other thereunto which leaves the Glory of Gospel-grace still under that Vail which accompanied the Old Testament-state of the Church the full opening of those Promises that did immediately belong to the Covenant of Grace being reserved for another State of things in the Church God having provided some better thing for us that they without us should not be made perfect Heb. 11. 40. A dim Light was suited to those Times and it could be but dim so long as the Promises lay so much intangled one within another The like is to be observed in After-times in the Revelation of the Mind of God to Israel by the Prophets For in the prophetick Writings as it appears that the temporal Deliverances of Israel are considered as typical of the spiritual Redemption of the Church so we often meet with sudden and seemingly abrupt Transitions from the Promises of things relating to the present State of Israel after the Flesh unto Promises and Prophecies of those things which are accomplished in the New-Testament by the Ministration of the Spirit which being generally delivered in Terms suitable to the present Dispensation of things and their typical Respect are by the Jews wofully perverted unto this day while they contend that themselves are the only People concerned in them to whom the Blessings promised and prophesied of do belong and that they are to be fulfilled unto them in a way agrecable to their former State and suited to their own carnal Lusts and Imaginations whereby they harden themselves in their Contempt of the Grace of God in Christ and the spiritual Blessings of the Gospel wherein the Accomplishment of those Prophecies according to the true Sence of them is only to be sought And thus Jesus Christ himself became a Stone of stumbling and Rock of Offence to them because the State of his Kingdom suited not their carnal Minds nor answered their groundless Expectation § 3. It is also to be observed That there is not only a singular Congruity and Fitness in this Method of giving forth the Promises in regard of the Time wherein they were made to Abraham and that State of the Church which was next to follow upon these Transactions but there is also in some respect a Necessity of it arising from the Nature of the things promised and their mutual Dependence one upon the other For All the Promises of a spiritual Seed and spiritual Blessings to be bestowed on that Seed which belong to the Covenant of Grace as revealed to Abraham are Yea and Amen in Christ Jesus And this Messiah in whom the Covenant was confirmed was to be made of the Seed of Abraham according to the Flesh and for the bringing of him forth according to the Promise was the Seed of Abraham by Isaac and Jacob separated unto God for a peculiar People and kept distinct from all other Families in the World and in this respect the Blessing of Grace and eternal Life given unto Abraham and his believing Seed was suspended upon the Effect and Accomplishment of the Promises concerning his natural Offspring and particularly upon the Promise of Isaac's Birth who was to be begotten by Abraham and brought forth by Sarah at such a time when Nature in them both was so weakned by Age that they were as unapt he to beget and she to conceive a Son as if they had been already dead Rom. 4. 19. And hence it is that the Apostle doth lay so great Weight upon Abraham's Faith in this Particular even in the Business of his Justification before God The Object of justifying Faith the Messiah to come being thus included in the Promise of Isaac's Birth On this account his Parents had the greatest Cause of rejoycing at the Birth of this Son who hath his Name from Laughter and Rejoycing Gen. 17. 17. and Chap. 21. And to this in part may be referred the saying of our Saviour Abraham rejoyced to see my Day and he saw it and was glad Joh. 8. 56. He saw it in the Birth of Isaac and afterwards in the offering of him up who was a Type of Christ and from whom he was to come whose miraculous Birth in the virtue of a Promise when Nature could not have effected it afforded also some Adumbration of and was a Praeludium to the more miraculous Birth of Christ who was conceived and brought forth by a pure Virgin the Power of the most High overshadowing her for the fufilling of that Promise The Seed of the Woman shall break the Head of the Serpent As Isaac in the Type so Christ more eminently sprang up as a Root out of a dry Ground Isa 53. § 4. Now from these things we may collect with Ease and great Clearness wherein the Greatness of Abraham's Tryal and the Eminency of his Faith in offering up Isaac did specially consist To part with a Son an obedient Son a Son grown up as Isaac now was yea an only Son was indeed a great Tryal howbeit Abraham was not only required to part with him but to sacrifice him and for a Father to become the Executioner of his Son the Son of his old Age and the Object of his most endeared Affections for him I say to be appointed the Priest that must slay this Victime adds yet much more to the Tryal And in Abraham's addressing himself to such a Service had there been no more in it without Debate murmuring or delay we have an unparallell'd Instance and Example of Piety and Obedience But alas There is a Concern infinitely greater in this Case than all that hath been yet mentioned Isaac was the Son of the Promise And upon this account the Holy Ghost places it he that had received the Promises offered up his only begotten Son Of whom it was said in Isaac shall thy Seed be called Heb. 11. 17 18. Abraham had no other Son in whom he might expect the fulfilling of the Promise when Isaac was lost and yet upon the Accomplishment of this Promise in the bringing forth of the Messiah in Isaac's Line the eternal Salvation of Abraham and of the whole Church depended and therefore he is called his only begotten not because Abraham had no other Son but because he was the only Hâ—ir of the Promise This might have caused the greatest Anxiety of Mind imaginable in Abraham had he at all consulted with Flesh and Blood in the case but his Faith overcame this Difficulty and silenced all carnal Reasonings about the Impossibility of the Accomplishment of the