Selected quad for the lemma: love_n
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A47178
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A sermon preach'd at the parish-church of St. Helen's, London, May the 19th, 1700 by George Keith.
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Keith, George, 1639?-1716.
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1700
(1700)
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Wing K211; ESTC R18917
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16,538
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34
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Doctrine Outwardly Is not the Inward Teaching of the Spirit or Light within sufficient without any other thing So some do Argue To this I Answer It is one thing what God could or can do it 's far another thing what he is pleased to do He could Teach us all without the written Word as well as he Taught the Apostles before the Word was committed to Writing but he hath not seen meet so to do he hath a regard to our Weakness A School-master that is able can Teach his Schollars without Books but they cannot so well Learn without Books therefore he Teacheth them with and by Books to condescend to their weak Capacity When God Almighty spake from Heaven by an Audible Voice to the People of Israel they were so affraid that they prayed that God would not Speak to them viz. immediately they were not able to bear it but that God would speak to Moses and by Moses to them which was granted Many who pretend to the same Inspirations in Prophecy that the Apostles had should God Inspire them as he did them in that Extraordinary and Miraculous way and manner as he did the Prophets of old they should find they could not be able to bear it Such Miraculous Extraordinary Inspirations that God gave to the Prophets would be like new Wine in their old Bottles that would burst and break them asunder What God hath joyned together we ought not to put asunder he hath so ordered it most Wisely and Graciously that the Spirit of God as the principal Agent should Teach us and work all Saving Knowledge and Faith in us by the Written Word Preached or Read as his Instrument Thirdly The Death of Christ and his Love in Dying for us is made known to us by the Holy Spirit his Inspiring and Imprinting into our Hearts a sense of his Love He sheds abroad his Love into our Hearts by the Holy Spirit that he has given us according to Rom. 5.5 Christ in his Prayer to his Father St. John 17.26 Prayed in behalf of all that should Believe in him to the end of the World even for us as well as for them who were then with him That the Love wherewith thou hast Loved me may be in them and I in them It ought greatly to affect our Hearts to consider and think that he had us in his Heart and Thoughts at that very time when he prayed this Prayer to his Father and he still hath us in his thoughts who ever Lives to make Intercession for us that the Love wherewith the Father hath Loved us may be in us and he in us Not that the Love wherewith the Father Loved the Son could be strictly and properly speaking contained in us or comprehended by us for that being an infinite Love how could or can it be contained in us who are poor finite Creatures or comprehended by us How can a Finite thing contain that which is Infinite But the Holy Spirit which is called in Scripture The Spirit of Love worketh some Inward sense and impression of the Love of God and Christ in the Soul whereby the Soul that has this Inward sense and impression may know it Fourthly The Love of Christ is made known to us and hath its Influence upon us by his Infusing and Inspiring into our Hearts and Souls If we be true Believers a vigorous and active Principle of Love and Charity that becomes in us a Principle of a Holy and Vertuous Life mightily inclining us to Love both God and Christ and also to Love our Neighbours and all Men even our very Enemies after the example of our Saviours Love And we being acted by that Principle of Love we are thereby enabled with great freedom and readiness with great joy and chearfulness to perform our respective Duties both to God and Man This Principle of Charity Infused or Inspir'd into the Soul is all one with that which is called The Grace of God in the Soul the Grace of Sanctification that includes all the Vertues in it and tho' the Operations be various and manifold yet they all proceed from one Root Seed and Principle This Principle of God's Grace some do not distinguish it from the Holy Ghost but hold it to be one and the same therewith but this is a great Error and dangerous The Holy Ghost is one and the same God with the Father and with the Son the Grace of God and the God of Grace are distinct as the Effect and the Efficient the Gift and the Giver Grace is weaker or stronger greater or lesser hath its several measures therefore it cannot be God himself which is an Infinite Being and hath neither Parts nor Passions to whom nothing can be added and from whom nothing can be diminished This Principle of Love that is in Believers inclining them to Love God and Christ it is so to speak the reflection shadow or image of the Love of God and of Christ towards us As when we look into a Looking-Glass the Glass reflects the image or shadow of the Face back again upon the Beholder the which image hath a likeness to the Original but is as far short of it as a shadow is to the Body or Substance whose shadow it is Or like the Echo which is nothing but the reflection of the Voice or Word of the Speaker Therefore it is that St. John said We Love him because he hath Loved us our Love to him being the reflection of his Love to us and as it were the Daughter and his Love to us as the Mother But to the end that his Love may work this powerful constraint upon us it must not only be known by us but after it is known we must by the help of the Holy Spirit which is given to us frequently Meditate upon it and upon the Death of Christ which his Love constrained him to undergo for us that by frequent Meditation thereof we may have it fixed in our Hearts and become as a burning Fire in us according to that in Psal 39.4 My Heart was hot within me while I was Musing i. e. Meditating the Fire Burned This is also clear from the words in the Text The Love of Christ constraineth us because we thus judge God Almighty is pleased to work upon our Hearts by his Gospel Outwardly and by his Spirit Inwardly as we are Reasonable Creatures enabling us to form a sound and firm Judgment of things both of Causes and Effects and to view and consider the excellent Order and Harmony of them that the Wisdom of God hath appointed Had God only infused a Spiritual and Supernatural Principle of Grace into our Hearts mightily inclining us to Love and Obey him without affording us certain Arguments and Reasons Convincing and Perswading our Reasonable Understandings why we should so do on that supposition our Love and Obedience had not been such a rational and free Love and Obedience suiting our rational Nature and Faculties as now it is he having given us
Christ in two distinct Natures but undivided and most Gloriously and Inseparably United for ever It was an Ancient Heresie most justly Condemned above Twelve hundred Years agoe by the Orthodox Fathers That Christ had but one Will from which they were call'd Monothelites i. e. such as did hold that Heresie That Christ had but one Will. They were also call'd Eutychians from Eutyches the Author of it They conceited that Christ's Manhood-Nature was transmuted or melted into his Godhead-Nature and consequently that the Will of his Manhood was transmuted or melted into the Will of his Godhead which is an abominable Error for the Transmutation of any one Created Substance into another Created Substance is impossible then surely as impossible is it that the Substance of Christs Manhood can be transmuted or changed into his Godhead It is to be fear'd that too many do not well Consider nor well and duly Meditate upon this two-fold Love of Christ so as to have their Thoughts fix'd upon it that it may have the greater influence upon them If ye rightly understand and consider and deeply ponder this two-fold Love of Christ the one where with he loves you as God and that love of his is one and the same in nature with the Father's Love and the other wherewith he Loves you as Man as he is now Glorified in Heaven in the true intire Glorified Nature of Man consisting of a Glorified Soul and Body the same for Substance he had on Earth tho' wonderfully changed in Manner and Qualities yet no ways changed in his Love towards Man but rather heightened and increased that will have a double force and influence upon you much greater than if ye should consider his Love singly either as he is God or as he is Man As they have not a right knowledge and belief of Christ who only believe that he is God and do not believe that he is Man also and will not allow that his Manhood having a created Soul and Body is any part of him whereof he consisteth as the intire Christ and Saviour Nor have others a right knowledge and belief of Christ who only believe that he is Man and not God also both such sorts of men have not the true Faith but Err greatly concerning the Faith and too many of both sorts are now in this Nation so they have not a right knowledge and belief of the Love of Christ who do not believe it in both respects above mentioned Thus then we are with true Faith Love and Devotion to consider our Lord Jesus Christ in his two-fold Nature as he is both God and Man and as each Nature acted its part in the work of our Redemption and that it behoved so to be that the Author of our Eternal Salvation should be both God and Man Had he not been Man he could not have died for us which the justice of Gods Law required that he who should be our Saviour should dye for us and undergo the Curse that was due to us for our Sins as accordingly he did and had he not been God his Death and Sufferings had not been of that Merit and Value before his Father for our Reconciliation and Eternal Salvation But yet more particularly I think to lay before you how and after what manner the Death and Sufferings of Christ and also how and after what manner the Love of Christ are the effectual means whereby he bringeth true Believers to this high Dignity and Priviledge and High and Holy and Heavenly Calling not to live unto themselves but unto Him who Died for them and Rose again His Death and Resurrection are only exprest in the Text but by a Synecdoche of the part put for the whole his whole Active and Passive Obedience is understood from his Descent and Conception in the Virgins Womb to his Ascension and Glorification in the Heavens But his Death being a principal part that is it which here and elsewhere is most frequently mentioned in Scripture First The Death of our blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ was an effectual means to advance us to this high Dignity above mentioned that it was a perfect Attonement for us wherein he made a full and plenary satisfaction to Divine Justice for our Sins and did purchase and procure by way of Merit our Reconciliation with God Having made Peace through the Blood of his Cross and having Reconciled us in his Body of Flesh through Death to present us Holy and Vnblamable and Vnreproveable in his sight Col. 1.20 21. And by the Merit of his Death having obtained the Remission and Pardon of our Sins for he dyed in our stead the Just suffering for the Unjust and being our Surety he paid our Debt and became a Curse for us But this is not so to be understood that any are actually Pardoned Justified or Reconciled unto God before that Faith and Repentance and a real work of Conversion is wrought in them but the Pardon was then purchased for all tho' it is not given unto any until they be actually Converted and sincere Faith and Repentance is wrought in them Secondly That the Merit of our Saviours Death and shedding of his precious Blood did procure and purchase to us the Holy Spirit with the saving and sanctifying Graces thereof by which he applieth to us the vertue and efficacy of the same for our Conversion Regeneration Justification and Eternal Salvation Now it was necessary that what Christ Did and Suffered for us should be done in Love as accordingly it was done in the highest Love both to God and also to us As it was this his exceeding great and high Love that made it so acceptable unto the Father so it is the same that doth most effectually work upon our Hearts and Souls to Love him and to Live unto him who Died for us and Rose again That the Apostle adds to Christ's Dying his Rising again doth Instruct us That his Resurection was as necessary as his Death If Christ had Died and had not Rose again from the Dead he could not have been our Saviour He was delivered for our Offences and Rose again for our Justification He behoved to overcome Death by rising from the Dead and not only by his Rising but by his Ascending to the Father he gave full evidence that what he Did and Suffered for the Sons of Men was fully accepted by his Father and that he was a Sacrifice of a sweet smell unto God But what ever Vertue Merit or Efficacy Christ's Death and the Love which moved him to dye for us hath before God in order to procure or purchase our Reconciliation with God Pardon and Justification and the Grace of Sanctification yet it hath not that influence upon us or any to cause us to live to him and to God through him but as his Death and Sufferings and Love which moved him to dye for us are made known to us In the time of our Ignorance of this great Mystery how God so