Selected quad for the lemma: work_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
work_n	covenant_n	law_n	moral_a	4,802	5	10.4234	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A52574	New-Englands duty and interest to be an habitation of justice and mountain of holiness containing doctrine, caution, & comfort : with something relating to the restaurations, reformations, and benedictions promised to the church and world in the latter dayes : with grounds of hope, that America in general & New-England in particular may may have a part therein : preached to the General Assembly of the Province of the Massachusetts-Bay, at the anniversary election, May 25, 1698 / by Nicholas Noyes ...	Noyes, Nicholas, 1647-1717.	1698 (1698)	Wing N1461; ESTC R16814	53,865	112

of the heavenly Courtiers that wait round the throne of God is their holiness and yet that is dim in comparison of the HOLY JESUS who is the Fountain of all the holiness righteousness the Saints on earth have There are some few Saints whose bodies as well as Souls are already glorifyed and the Spirits of just men made perfect who have received perfection of holiness Oh! what a holy place is heaven that is full of holiness yea so full that it doth as it were run over The skyes pour down holiness and righteousness there is none upon earth but what comes down from Heaven even from the God of all Grace and the God of Glory who is glorious in Holiness 2. To teach us what a wicked and woful estate man fell into in the primitive Apostasy He fell from a state of holiness and righteousness into a state of unholiness and unrighteousness If man had continued in the state wherein he was created every Man and Woman and Child had been a habitation of righteousness and mountain of holiness Every Family every Society had been a habitation of righteousness and mountain of holiness for God made man upright or right that is holy and righteous Eccles 7.29 Man was then a Vessel of honour sanctified and meet for the masters use Holiness and Righteousness were Concreated with and Connatural to him but alas it is far otherwise now Though it be our duty to be habitually and actually holy righteous yet we are stript of the moral Image o● God empty of G●a●e bent to act according to the corrupt Bials we have derived from the first Adam which warps us away from God and his holy ways and strongly inclines us to Unholiness and Unrighteousness Instead of being a habitation of righteousness the heart of man is become a cage of every impious unclean and hateful lust Mat. 15.19 Men ate by nature since the fall full of enmity against God inordinately and idolatrously in love with themselves and uncharitable and injurious unto others How miserably were our first Parents deceived Under a pretence of being like to God they lost his image and favour 3. To teach us That the grace and love of God towards fallen man is very wonderful in that God gave his only Son to recover poor lost sinners out of that wicked and woful estate of unholiness and unrighteousness that such as believe on him may be pardoned and justifyed freely through the Redemption that is in Christ Jesus and that by the Grace of God bestowed on them in Regeneration and Sanctification they might be recovered to the Image of God again to put off the old man the corrupt nature derived from the first Adam to put on the new man the grace and holiness that is from Jesus Christ the second Adam whereby they become again after the Image of God in holiness and righteousness Eph. 4 22 23 24. There had never been among the Posterity of fallen man a habitation of righteousness and mountain of holiness had it not been for this wonderful love of God in Christ Jesus for mankind was all gone aside they were altogether become filthy there is none that doeth good no not one Psa 14.3 If therefore any of the race do become holy and righteous and do good again we may conclude that they were created in Christ Jesus to good works for by nature they are dead in trespasses and sins 4. To teach us That it is a vile abuse of Christ and his Gospel and the doctrine of the free grace of God to make as if C●●●stians were thereby freed from the direction and authority of the Moral Law or that the motives to Obedience to it were abated by the Gospel It is certain that Christ did not Obey the law that we might have liberty to Break it nor did he suffer that we might have liberty to violate it with impunity but that we might be saved from the Curse of the law and from the dominion of sin and might be the Servants of God and have our fruit unto holiness and the end everlasting life Although the law was never given to fallen man as a Covenant whereby he could be justifyed yet doth it continue as a Rule of life And the Lord Jesus is so far from abolishing it that he puts it into the inward parts of believers and writes it in their hearts Jer. 31.33 It was the error of the Jews in the Apostles time to think the law was given as a Covenant of Works by the keeping of which they might be justifyed and have eternal life Against this the Apostle argues that the inheritance was by Promise and that God gave it to Abraham by promise and the law which was given at Sinai 430 years after could not disanul it and makes it an absurd thing for any to think that righteousness comes by the law and if so saith he then Christ is dead in vain Gal. 2.21 Gal. 3.17 18 21. The Jews took the law in that sence as when Luther calls it Moses Mosissimus a strict Covenant of works but had lost that sence of it wherein Luther calls it Moses Aaronicus A ●●arker dispensation of the Covenant of grace a Schoolmaster to bring them to Christ The Apostle knew now to urge Obedience to the moral law and to lay men under obligation to holiness and righteousness by its authority and motives without urging a necessity of perfect and personal Obedience to it in order to Justification and eternal life He could and did urge it as a Rule of life without making it a Covenant of life and rule whereby men could be justifyed Acts 13.38 39. Through this man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins and by him all that belive are justifyed from all things from which you could not be justifyed by the law of Moses He could deny the law to justify and yet not make Christ the Minister of sin He could preach the free grace of God without casting any blemish upon the law or incouraging Sinners to continue in sin because grace had abounded Rom. 6.1 Compared with the foregoing Chapter and did maintain that the grace of God which bringeth Salvation agreeth with the law in this it teacheth men to deny ungodliness and worldly lusts and to live soberly righteously and Godly in this present world Titus 2.11 12. 5. To teach us That Christians in the times of the Gospel may and ought to make use of the Scriptures of the Old Testament for their Instruction Example Comfort Although the Ceremonial law be totally abolisht as to its Practice yet forasmuch as it typed out or prefigured Christ his Graces Actions Sufferings and benefits and was some way instructive about moral duties the understanding of it is many ways useful to Christians as might be shewed in Apostolical argumentations So Heb. 9. throughout 1 Cor. 9.8 9 13 14. The judicial law so far as it was local and peculiar to the Jews binds not yet

throughout and Deut. 28. throughout And the way of God was accordingly So that if a man had known before hand now that People would have acted towards God and one another he might have written their History in a good measure before things came to pass Hence they were so condemned for not knowing the way of the Lord which means not only the way of his Doctrine but of his Discipline and Providential Dispensations Jer. 5.4 Therefore I said surely these are poor they are foolish for they know not the way of the Lord nor the judgment of our God Yet must not this be so strictly taken as if God dealt with them according to their deserts for had they been dealt with according to the First Covenant they were never good enough to deserve the Blessings they were always bad enough to deserve greater Wrath than ever fell upon them They were always less then the least of Gods Mercies God always punished them less than their Iniquities deserved and upon their Repentance Humiliation and Reformation God was always ready to pardon and turn their Curses into Blessings as upon their Apostacies and Declensions he turned their Blessings into Curses and was wont to distinguish between weakness and wickedness between Sins of Infirmity and Sins of Enormity His Severities were for the most part against presumptuous Sinners and such Sins as violated the Covenant There were also at that time by Divine Appointment Sacrifices of Expiation and Atonement not only for particular persons but for the Congregation not only for the Sins of private persons but of the Priests Rulers also Hence in Judgment God remembred mercy many a time he forgave them and did not stir up all his wrath and in some instances his Judgments were unaccountable but ordinarily they were as the light and the Equity of them very discernable 4. Gods Judicial Proceedings with the Jews before the Coming of Christ are instructive to people and places professing the Christian Religion that it is like to fare with them as to happiness or misery according as it goeth with them as to Holiness and Righteousness For the proof of this I offer to your consideration the following Arguments which for brevity I shall but name 1 That God is the same now as he was then as holy and righteous as ever he was Did he then love Righteousness and hate iniquity So he doth still therefore his Way and Discipline is like to be much what the same now as it was then 2. His Church is the same Church now though not the same people God hath but One Church Christ hath but one Body from the beginning to the end of the World Cant. 6.9 Eph 5.23 25 27. 3. This Law requiring Holiness and Righteousness is the same not one tittle of it is passed away 4. Gods Name and Honour is alike concerned in the ways and behaviour of his people now as it was then Did the Sins of the Jews give occasion to the Enemies of the Lord to blaspheme 2 Sam 12.14 So do the Sins of Christians now See 1 Tim. 6 1. That his Name and Doctrine be not blasphemed 5. They were under the Covenant of Grace as well as we and we under the authority and direction of the Law as well as they Heb. 4.2 plainly affirms that they had the Gospel preached to them and in James 2.8 it is evident that Christians are required to fulfil the Royal Law When Paul saith Believers are not under the Law he means not under the Curse of the Law though under the Command of it 6. The Apostle speaking of Gods Judicial Proceeding with the Jews in Instances of Severity saith All these things happened unto them for Ensamples and they are written for our instruction upon whom the ends of the world are come 1 Cor. 10.11 7. The Apostle saith that Godliness hath the promise of the life that now is as well as of that which is to come 1 Tim. 4.8 and consequently Ungodliness hath the Threatning of the life that now is as well as of that which is to come And of like import is that 1 Pet. 3.10 11 12. He that will love life and see good days let him refrain his tongue from evil c. for the Eyes of the Lord are over the Righteous that is his Providence is active about them for good but his face is against them that do evil that is the frowns and rebukes of Divine Providence are against them that do evil 8. Gods Judicial Proceedings with his professing people in the Old World and afterwards till Moses's time were much what the same as they were afterward as the Book called Genesis the Book of Job 2 Epist of Peter and Jude plainly show 9. Experience hath convinced the Christian Churches of this and many of the New-Testament Promises Threatnings Argumentations and Prophesies show the truth of it 10. That this is no new Doctrine may be seen in the Confessions of Faith set forth by the Assembly of Divines and the New England Confession in the Chapter concerning the Law of God Sect. 6. The Threatnings of it viz the Law serve to show what their Sins deserve and what afflictions in this life they may expect for them although freed from the Curse thereof threatned in the Law The Promises of it in like manner shew them Gods approbation of Obedience what Blessings they may expect upon the performance thereof although not as due to them by the Law as a Covenant of Works All this notwithstanding I would not be understood as if the Dispensations of God now did exactly quadrate with his Dispensations to the Jews before Christ came The Church was then in its non-age and under a certain Tutorage proper to that time when the promises and threatnings that relate to the other World were more darkly and more rarely mentioned and temporal promises and threatnings more frequently insisted on and the accomplishment more visible and conspicuous and Dispensations more Corporal God did more visibly plague Disobedience and reward Obedience than now although he hath not left himself without witness but maketh all the Churches to know that he searcheth the hearts and tryeth the reins and renders to his people according to their works Rev. 2.23 And the same is evident by all the Epistles to the Churches of Asia in which it is manifest that our Lord Jesus Christ who hath the Government of the Church and World declareth that he will deal with them as they deal with him Obj. Doth not Solomon say that all things come alike to all and that there is one event to the Righteous and to the Wicked c. Eccle. 9 1 2. A. Solomons meaning is not that it is alwayes so but that it is sometimes so and that notwithstanding temporal promises and threatnings God hath reserves for the display of his Soveraignty whereby unbelievers will be hardned in their sin and good men will be humbled and their faith and patience exercised And