end propounded to and attainable by the world on condition of believing as healing was to the wounded Israelites by looking upon the brazen Serpent unto which Christ is resembled ver 14 15. Christ so sets Gods good will before the world there as may let it see and move it to believing as its duty But as M. Owen would have it understood we may say VVhat He would fasten upon us Solvite mortales curas c. Let every man take his own course and swim down the stream of a fatal necessity If there be any salvation to be had for him he must have it God will bring him to it though he look not after it and if it be otherwise it s in vain to think of it it s not so much his fault as Gods Wil that he believs not as a late Resolver hath too badly insinuated While he determins that there is no other cause why some believe not the Gospel preached to them but only the Wil of God himself As for his Reason viz. because this is the most eminent and transcendent love of God c. That would be considered how far its true and whether it will insorce his conception quite beside the tenor of our Saviours expressions Love may be considered either according to the things it acts forth as tending to the good of the party loved or according to the inward strength of affection as affording us means of good or possessing us of that good In regard of the first this wasa most glorious eminent and transcendent act of Love God afforded many means of good to the world but none of them in themselves so worthy and so glorious as his Son nor is there any thing in which either so much of Gods heart or good will to the world is to be seen that he delights not in their death but rather in their conversion and living or so much good to be met with as in him In nothing hath God condescended more to man or provided so much good for him As to its act then and provision of means to our good this is the most eminent act of his Love to us But yet this act of giving Christ is but the provision of good for us and of the best mean and way to it It s not the possessing us of the good in him with reference to that some that were loved so as to have Christ given as a way to life for them may not be the objects of so intense affection as others for whom he also gave Christ nor come to experiment that love of Delight or Fellowship in which his Love in giving Christ perfects it self in them that believe on him This act then I say of love to the world in which God gave forth Christ though it be the most eminent and transcendent in regard of his provision of a mean to its good and though it be that through which the most choise delightful acts of his Love are met with by those that believe on him yet as its comprehensive of the world is not an absolute purpose of all their salvation The same most eminent expression of Love may be acted toward many and out of exceeding great good will to them All too and yet may not be with the like intensness and eminency of affection and purpose for endevouring to make it beneficial to All as we noted above in the instance of David lib. 3. cap. 9. In a word Gods greatest love to the world was not an unchangeable absolute purpose of saving every one of them and therefore the giving Christ out of love to the world was not a giving him out of such a purpose to save every one of them The phrase So God loved will not evince it For though that word So intimates so exeeedingly so really and heartily to such a remarkable astonishable heighth yet it proves not either that he loved it equally to his Son or so as to purpose absolutely the eternal salvation of all of them For our Saviour expressing that So tells us that it was so as to give his Son That every one that believes in him should not perish c. but not so as to give all things to it as he says of his Son v. 35. which yet is the same love in which he loves his chosen his called and believing ones Joh. 17.24 Nor says he so as to cause them to believe in him and have eternal life So that that word So will not prove that his conception It s true as he also minds us That the Scripture says God commended his Love to us in this That Christ died for us though that 's not all the commendation of it but that he did that for us while we were sinners and ungodly And I think its a marvellous commendation of his Love that he died for All while sinners and they are the more to blame that withhold this so great commendation from multitudes by which they should be induced to believe in him love and serve him But will that prove that that Love was not his compassion and pity towards men that is therein commended or that it was an unchangeable purpose of making all those he so loved to answer his love with love again and so to attain to eternal salvation Cannot Love be commendable exceeding commendable except it be so received by all it acts towards as to make them grateful and so to attain the effects that it produces to the grateful Was not Gods Love to Israel in bringing them out of Egypt by a mighty hand and outstretched arm and taking them out of the midst of another Nation by signs and wonders to be a people for himself and speaking to them out of the midst of the fire from heaven an exceeding commendable love a love flowing from and most eminently of any other acts tending to the accomplishment of his Covenant made with Abraham Deut. 4.31 32 33 c. and yet all they to and upon whom all those most glorious acts of his love were acted were not therefore possessed of that end The land promised to Abraham to which they tended nor was his love therein then a purpose absolutely to possess them of that end except as Mr. Owen here argues he failed of his end The greater commendation it is of Gods Love that he gave Christ the greater ingagement it is to the world to believe on him love and serve him and the greater its sin that it not so answer such a love to them and the greater will his terror be in judging them that Christ died for All and yet many that had their lives through his Death lived not to him 2 Cor. 5.10 11.15 for God is a jealous God and may be provoked to jealousie by men and what is jealousie but love inraged or the fury that springs up from love abused as when he that loves hath his love slighted and others prefer'd before him Sure the Apostle uses this very love and its greatness
the truth of what it defendeth rest not in the bare belief of it as if that was enough for thee but follow on to inquire and seek after God that hath such good will toward thee and walk out in what he discovers of himself to thee that so he may be pleased to discover himself more to thee and draw thee by his Spirit into union with and conformity to his Son that thou mayest have the utmost healing that the death of Christ brings to the believer even salvation with eternal glory The right use of truth is in being lead from the world and thy own self to God by it and so attaining the end propounded to thee in it If thou not liking what is writ wi lt reply upon me I desire thee to do it soberly and as a seeker of truth rather then of victory bate pride and passion which will but darken thine understanding and nothing advantage thee in thy answering and take heed lest for fear of losing thine honour or for desire to get any thou robbest God of the honour of his truth and shuttest thine eyes against those flashes of his light that he darts into thee Better lose thine honour then ingage against Gods truth for it If thou likest the truth pleaded for but findest defect or wriness in any of my expressions in asserting it I shall be willing to be helpt to see better by thy spectacles if thou pleasest to lend them me In a word I say to thee with the Poet Si quid novisti rectius istis Candidus imperti Si non his utere mecum And so committing thee with my self and this ensuing Treatise to Gods protection I remain Thy friend and servant in the Gospel of Christ Jesus John Horn. ΘΥΡΑ ΑÎΕΩΓΜΕÎΗ OR A VINDICATION OF THE RECORD of GOD Concerning The extent of the Death of Christ in Answer to Mr. Iohn Owen of Cogshall in Essex The Preface WHereas God who is love it self beholding mankinde faln and through the subtlety of the Serpent plunged into death and misery was pleased out of pitty towards him to finde out a way for his recovery even to send forth his own proper Son his Word and Wisdom to take upon him the nature of man so faln with the infirmities weaknesses death and misery attending it yea the whole punishment that the sin of man had in that fall contracted to it that so he dying for man man might be delivered out of that death and life and immortality might be again brought to light yea whereas the Son of God having accordingly given himself a ransom for all it hath pleased the Father out of the same love he bare to man in sending him further to provide for his good in exalting this his Son that suffered and making him Lord and Christ a Prince and Saviour one that should have and answerably hath power and authority over all things and Salvation in him authority and fitness to save and deliver out of evil and to bring to life and glory whoever of the persons of men listen and look to him for Salvation whoever obey his Word submit to his Spirit and give up themselves to be ordered by him and to that end hath in these last dayes given forth a commission to certain Elected and chosen persons appointed for that purpose by him to be his Witnesses and Embassadors to the whole world in general to proclaim publish and declare this that God hath done in and by Christ Jesus for them and to let them know his good will toward them that he would not that any of them should perish but all come to Repentance and to the knowledg or acknowledgment of his truth that they might be saved to which end he hath also given and constituted his Son to be a witness and a Leader to conduct them to Salvation and upon these grounds hath willed them to exhort command intreat and urge all and every man as they have opportunity to it to accept this grace believe the Gospel repent and turn to God from their dead works and from their follies and to Jesus as the only one constituted by him to be his Salvation even to the ends of the earth So it is that since these holy men of God to whom the tenor of the Gospel and doctrine of truth was first committed have faln asleep the vigilant and wicked enemy of mankinde hath not only through his subtlety prevailed with multitudes of those men to whom this proclamation hath been made to reject persecute and put away this Embassage both from themselves and peoples under them and posterities succeeding them and with many others to be slothful and not to take care to propagate this Doctrine of their Lord and Master but also by occasion of this wickedness and slothfulness of men many that pretend themselves to be understanding men and servants of God unto their brethren have come with a counter-doctrine pretending to have better insight into the minde of God then the letter of the Apostolical preaching doth hold forth even as at first Satan pretended to the woman to have a more sublime knowledg of the minde of God and to teach her better understanding of it then in the simple belief of Gods words to them they had attained telling men that God sent not his Son for all of them but only for here and there one they nor any man else not knowing who they be and that Christ gave himself only for them and for no others and this they pretend to have from a more Seraphical understanding of a more secret will of God by which means they both contradict the tenor of the holy Commission delivered out to his Saints and left by them upon record for us by the instinct of his spirit and take away those certain and more excellent grounds motives and inducements to believe repent seek after and love God which that Commission affordeth making the Gospel to give such an uncertain sound that none can by it be induced to prepare himself to battel as is more largely shewed in the Epistle to the Reader In which doing they greatly deny at least disserve the Lord that bought them in that in stead of making him lovely to all and an object meet for all to commit themselves to and forsake all for the worshipping and confessing of they render it doubtful what one hath cause so to do and not rather to hate him as a fore yea eternal hater of them that had such desire to their misery as therefore to create them yea therefore to do all that he doth about them that they might at last for ever be more heavily tormented by him So that they do herein as a company of slaves or persidious Traitors should do to a King who having made open proclamation of satisfaction received by the hand of some Prince for the mischief done him by a company of rebells and of his good will toward them all that he would have them to lay
as an argument of terror to them that ill requite it reject it or receive it in vain 2 Cor. 5.11 with 6.1 Heb. 2.3 and 10.26.29 and 12.22.24.25 2 Thes 2.10 11. which were vain arguings if because this love was so commendable therefore it was an absolute unchangeable purpose of bringing all that Christ was given for to eternal salvation But he says further Argum. 3. That Gods love is a Velle bonum alicui a willing good to them He loves and therefore sure they are the object of his Love to whom he intends the good which is the issue and effect of his love viz. not perishing but having eternal life But that happens onely to the Elect Believers c. In which Mr. Owen slipt out of the matter in hand the nature of the love to the object of it and builds his Argument but upon an Axiom of the Schoolmen that were not so far Gods privy Councellors as that we may build our saith upon all their Maxims And he faulters too in his Argument For whereas his Major speaks of Gods intending that end and issue that men perish not His Minor tells us of what happens which makes his Argument to continue a Quartus terminus Surely God tells us he so far intends not perishing eternal life to others that he hath no delight in the death of the wicked but rather that they turn and live and that he willeth not that any perish but that all come to Repentance Ezek. 33.11 2 Pet. 3.9 I know because men think themselves wise in this world and prefer their Philosophical Rules before the Apostles counsel To become fools that they may be wise that they will not bear the truth of those sayings but muster up objections against them and say with Nicodemus How can these things be if God willed not that they perish but that all should come to Repentance then these things must happen to all and none are loved of God but they to whom those things happen And so they will teach men to blaspheme that goodness of God that leads men to repentance and to say It was not goodness because they are not prevailed with but according to their own hard hearts treasure up wrath to themselves by sinning against it yea and will make this so wonderfull a transcendent testimony of Love no love except it had been God so loved the world that he not only gave his son that every one that believes might not perish but also will make men so to believe and receive him that they shall never perish VVell then might the Israelites for the far greatest part of them say It s in vain for us to serve God and wherein hath he loved us seeing whatever great things he did for them they found not that he so absolutely purposed their eternall salvation that he would by his omnipotent power compell them to it for but a remnant of them shall be saved But for that willing none to perish but rather to turn and live and so a willing salvation to men God may be said so to will two wayes First In willing it to be and so providing it in Christ and propounding it to men c. and willing or requiring them to look to him for it with promise of conferring it on them in so doing 2. To purpose or determine that this or that man absolutely shall be saved In the first way he hath willed salvation to the world in generall having put it in Christ and willed the Gospell to be preached throughout the VVorld and they all to listen to it and obey it but not in the second way Now some may not receive or receive in vain Gods grace willing their salvation in the first way and turn it into wantonness and so it hath not in them its effect it hath in others that receive it throughly shall we therefore conclude There was no grace extended to them the other only and not they were the object of his love in providing salvation for and propounding it to the world But he adds 4 This that was the cause of giving Christ is the cause of giving all good things with him Rom. 8.32 therefore it must be towards them only that have all those good things I deny the consequence The same love that led God to appoint the brazen Serpent for healing led him to heal them that looked up Ergo he set it up only for them that looked up This argument slides also from the nature of the love to the Object of it The same love that led God to give his Son to the World leads him to give eternall life to them of the World that believe and so to give us that believe All things but it follows not therefore that the object of Gods love in its first act was not distinct from or at least not larger then Believers 5 His last argument is from the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies saith he to rest in his love and so it must be a peculiar love This is but vain for this word is used of Christs love to the young man that had great possessions and went away from him Vers 21. Mark 10.22 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and so to the Israelites of old that were many of them loved no more and so to Judas Psal 109.3 4. 2. He tells us There is a difference in our acceptions of the word World which I conceive to be sinfull mankinde in generall He to be the Elect scattered abroad in the World with a Tacit opposition to the Nation of the Jews My Reason for mine is 1. Because the word World speaking de mundo contento primarily so signifies as He shall judge the World in Righteousness Psal 9.8 How then shall God judge the World and All the World is become guilty before God Rom. 3.6 9. 2. Because Christ is expresly said to be the propitiation for the sins of the whole World the Ransom for All men 3. Because it here sustains the nature of a whole out of which believers are taken as parts He loved the world that every one that believes that is that every one of it or of the world that believes c. that 's evidently the sense of the place Now its non-sense to say That every one of the Elect that believe for that intimates that some of them might not believe It s as if he should have said of the Israelites He brought Israel out of Egypt that they that follow him obediently in the wilderness might enter into Canaan like that in Iohn 12.48 where the same phrase is used I am come a light unto the world that whosoever believes in me should not abide in darkness c. He is a light to every man John 1.9 a light to them that hate his light Joh 3.19 but they for hating of it shall be deprived of it and abide in darkness John 12.35 26. but all of this world to whom he vouchsafes his light that believe
be one of them for ought I know 4.5 The promise of life upon believing and the assured salvation of all believers without exception These two are of the same nature with the former only the soul hath this to except It s not every believer for many fall away in time of temptation having no root in them as my faith cannot have if I know not that Christ dyed for me and so grow not upon Gods love therein evidenced to me The soul cannot so believe as to love God and so but with a dead faith unless it believe his love first It may see all its endeavors to believe and to rest on God to be but fleshly strivings out of self principles and at the best it argues Gods love but from its own believing which it may justly question the heart being deceitfull and he a fool that trusts for it for evidencing his condition This is but a promise and an assurance of thriving to all that eat duely of a meat which it knows not whether it may or can duely eat or not for to eat the flesh and drink the blood of Christ and so to believe on them is when the soul beholding the love of God and Christ in his Death and sacrifice commended to it doth gather boldness and incouragement to love and cast it self upon God and so grows up into the full assurance of peculiar love to him even to eternall life without the knowledge of love to the soul first it can but at highest come to this It may be I am one that God loves and perhaps not well I will leave thinking about it and tyring my self with thoughts if I can and let it alone I must submit when all is done to be disposed to Heaven or Hell by him which indeed is a condition most sit and needfull for the Gospell to be preached to but is far from faith in God which works by Love and is justifying These things The call to believe the command threatning promise c. are good evidences that the ransome is given and accepted for All and there is good provision in Christ for them God never using to call men to any ordinance that he appointed not for them and coming with this they may incourage thee to believe on and love him that gave his Son for thee to believe on And this implyed by them is that declaration that good tidings to sinners that indeed draws them into believe through the spirits working in them or else if they turn their backs upon it renders them throughly guilty when they shall say in their hearts O what did God for me and what cause had I to believe and to have stayed upon him but I refused it As the Israelites in Egypt were indeed sinners for not believing when God had done so much for them to ingage them to it His conclusion then under this head is false viz. That those are enough to remove all doubts and fears much less which I would rather urge against it are they sufficient to incourage and imbolden the heart and frame it to believe but more especially is that false that follows in him viz. That those are All that the Scripture holds out to that purpose It holds out others as we have noted from Acts 3.26 13 37. 1 Tim. 2.4 5 6. but of this he can take no notice they are nothing for his purpose I could give him back here some of his own expressions as that in pag. 283. That if pride and error had not taken too much possession of mens minds they could not so far deny what they reade in plain texts of Scripture as if they had never seen them to maintain their corrupt and false opinions But he answers further 4. That that perswasion which asserts the certainty of the Death of Christ to All believers and 2. That affirms the command of God and call of Christ to be infallibly declarative of that duty which is required of the person commanded and called which if it be performed will be assuredly acceptable to God 3. That holds out purchased free grace to all distressed burthened consciences whatsoever and 4. Discovers a fountain of blood alsufficient to purge all the sin of every man in the World that will use the appointed means for coming unto it that doctrine cannot possibly be the canse of any doubt or scruple in the hearts of convinced burthened sinners whether they ought to believe or no. I answer that this is in a manner the same with the former and there answered I will adde this touching the second particular that its ambiguous whether by the person called he mean by man in the preaching of the Gospell or by God effectually for many are of that mind that God cals not nor holds forth Gospell to all that the Ministers declare it to but only to the Elect if he be of that mind too it s not so undoubtedly true to the hearer as he would make it that God requires what the Minister doth because they may be divided the command and call may be intended only to some that the hearer knows not whether he be one of or not though the Preacher out of ignorance direct it to all and this may beget much doubting in the hearer whether its Gods voice to or him no. Again he supposeth more in this Doctrine he pleads for in two last particulars then is in it as that it holds forth purchased free grace to all distressed burthened consciences there are many among the Heathen have their consciences accusing them yea sometimes like furies burthening them there are many that profess Christ conscious of heinous sins and are ready to despaire and make away themselves for them there are many burthened that they can no more walk up to the righteousness and labor to stablish righteousness to themselves and cannot be setled Will Master Owen say that their doctrine holds forth purchased free grace to all these that I deny for it says he purchased free grace only for the Elect and that all such are Elected I suppose he will be put to it to prove seeing many such go on in their sins notwithstanding their burthens and many seek to put them off and sometimes do stifle them by worldly imployments and vanities and many actually despair and make away themselves If he say he means not such the matter is where it was the distressed conscience may yet doubt and is apt so to do whether it may not be one of those in the issue As for that in the fourth that there is an alsufficiency in the blood of Christ for all that will use the appointed means c. I will not stand to tell him though I might that his speech here is like one of them that in us he uses to tax with-holding Free-will which seeing he declaims against I hope he will be so charitable as to allow us the like liberty of speaking without fastening upon us that Odium But I say
Soveraignty towards all in a most equal dispensation in which he justifies himself to all that plead with him to be good and holy And yet this doctrine leaves him at liberty too to do to any one more or less to make one more exemplary and singular in mercy and another in severity as he pleases But now the doctrine opposed by us derogates from God in these things for it speakes of him in respect of most as an Abaddon not a Saviour an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not a friend and lover of men but a hater and destroyer of them for what else I pray you speakes that language that they preach as a truth concerning the greatest part of men that God hates them from eternity and so in hatred made them and necessitated their sinning and perishing Is this to represent God lovely and gracious or dreadful and one that delights in mans misery and ruine I know they say his love is but velle bonum creaturis to will that that is good to creatures and so that he may be said to love them in that he gives them outward good things in which I conceive they either give too scant a definition of his love or call that good in it that upon second thoughts if made their own portion they would scarcely deem so I conceive his love is rather to be thus defined A velle bonum creaturis quo iis benè esse possit a willing good things to creatures for their good for otherwise the willing of a good thing is not good if it have in it a destructive intention as for a man to will another a massy Wedge of Gold that he might cast him into the Sea and drown him with it and yet such is their doctrine of Gods willing good things to most for they make his first or eternal thoughts of them as to themselves to be their misery and so all the bounty patience and whatsoever they have from him to be to that end that they might by them arrive at it as some have said Gods dealings with some men are as if one should hang a man in a Goldchain or tie a wedg of Gold about his neck to sink him Quis talia fando temperet à lachrymis Now while they thus deny the extent of his mercy and goodness and give such direful representations of him they also by consequence obscure his justice for whereas his justice is illustrated by mercy they that obscure this must needs obscure the other also Justice is then seen in acts Retributive when voluntary unnecessitated transgressions are severely punished and by how much the more have been the advantages incouragements and liberty afforded for doing what is required so much the cleerer is the equity of punishing the fault committed How do they then cleer or magnifie Gods justice that make him to punish only necessitated wickedness Yea that make the Decree of eternal vengeance upon such and such persons to be in order of nature Antecedaneous to any consideration of sin deserving it for these to be some of their conceptions and the sum of their expressions too they well know that are acquainted with any thing in this controversie Now I propound to any rational understanding whether of these two most declare and glorifie justice for a master to punish his servant for not doing something that he could not do or doing what he could not but do yea what he himself necessitates him to do or for a master to punish his servant for that he gave him command and ability yea also incouragement and promised assistance for doing and he voluntarily and slothfully neglected or refused to do it Sure any man that hath his wits about him will say this latter But now against this particular I know what they object and its Mr. Owens in his preface They say the earth-worms of the world must not prescribe to God what way to glorifie himself in it s rather for us to ascribe that glory to him that he makes his own then devise ways for his glory by our inventions and speak lies in his behalf which things are in themselves rightly spoken onely they therein intimate that those things which we have said of God are of our devising and ascribing to him which he neither ascribes to himself nor owneth at our hands to take off which we shall come to another particular viz. That 2. The perswasion I have defended is a truth of Gods own revealing and not of our devising but on the contrary theirs a falshood not revealed by him but devised by them in which they as well give God the lye as deny him to be love What I here defend is grounded on the Scripture-expressions in maintaining which I indeavor to keep close to them and subject reason to faith theirs have no Scripture expression to maintain it but leans upon reason exalting it self against faith They are the plain Scripture expressions that God is love hath loved the world is good to all the Saviour of all men especially of them that believe that he delights in mercy but delights not that the wicked should die but rather turn and live that he is not willing that any should perish but that all come to Repentance that his goodness forbearance and long-suffering is not to be despised it leading to repentance even such as not repenting treasure up wrath to themselves against the day of wrath c. So also that Christ dyed for all and every one that he gave himself a ransome for all and is the propitiation for the sins of the whole world if any hear him and believe not he doth not judg him because he came not to judg the world but to save the world That those whom he shall judg to death he will so judge for their not believing in the light he gave them for not hearing his voice not receiving the truth but imprisoning it in unrighteousness c. these and many such like are the revelations and expressions of the Holy Ghost in the Scriptures upon which we ground our perswasion desiring simply to believe and hold them for true yea though all things therein held forth we knew not how by reason to comprehend judging him true and his word pure and perfect but our reasons and wisdom against it and where it Judges it absurd to be folly and bruitishness We believe and receive also all those places that they produce to us as that he came to save his people gave himself for his Church Sheep c. that the Saints and faithful were elected in Christ Jesus before the foundation of the world that God said to Rebecca concerning Jacob and Esau before they were born or had done good or evil that the elder of them with his posterity should serve the younger with his and that God said by Malachy that he loved the one and hated the other and that God chuses not either according to birth or works in us
it which is not to be seen by climbing up into heaven to search into Gods secrets but by finding in themselves faith and sanctification they say and those too such as are so and so qualified as may evidence them to be fruits of election and so men must have the effects before and without their proper cause which is love discovered to men Tit. 3.4 5 6. they must have all these Repentance Faith Love to God and men Justification Sanctification yea and perhaps too eternal Glory before they shall see any solid ground or motive to repent believe in him serve and love him or that Christ hath done any thing for them by vertue of which he can justifie and sanctifie them and bring them to glory with him And so they are not lead to deny ungodliness and worldly lusts and to live soberly righteously and godlily by Gods grace appearing in the Gospel to them but deny ungodliness and live godlily or rather pretend and seem to do so that so grace might appear to them and that they might see the gospel declaration to belong to them The Gospel doctrine is to them but like the law that is a doctrine that consists of duties commanded with promises and threatnings annexed without Gospel motives of Gods love propounded the viewing of which things the Spirit of Love breaths in to lead and to produce the things required and so their endeavours after those works and duties are looked upon as the fruits of grace and goodness yea as the arguments of their Election past and future happiness when they may be as far from both as the Pharisee that denied Gods free Grace to Publicans and sinners and yet judged himself a partaker of Gods Grace by his works of righteousness magnifying grace against free will and thanking God as giving such grace in those things which were but the products of his will neglecting and abiding ignorant of that grace in Christ which would have truly corrected both his Judgment and will such the effect of this limiting restraining doctrine as theirs also was Men are led hereby to bottom the Gospel it self with all arguments of love and goodness therein leading to faith and repentance upon their faith and repentance which they pretend they may have before they know whether they have any solid ground for them or no as if they could winde in themselves into the perception of Gods love by their frames and endeavors and not first be wrought up to them by the love and goodness of God perceived by them and as if men should look to themselves and their endeavors as the glass through which they shall see Gods love as for them and not rather upon God and Christ as declared in the Gospel to love them as the glass in which they may see their obligation to God in Christ and be moved to and strengthened in their seeking after him hoping in him In that their way thou mayst see that God commands thee to repent or change thy minde to Judg him good and to love him and that he threatens thee if thou dost not and promises great things to thee if thou dost but whether thou beest one of them that he intends any good in his promises to or that art in a possibility of attaining them or only hast them propounded to thy hearing without good will towards thee but that thou mightest thereby have the greater destruction that by it thou knowest not for it presents no act of love from him that according to it thou canst say respects thee or takes thee in as the object of it only do all those things first repent believe love serve him and then it shall be true for thee to believe that he hath good will to thee a most preposterous way that doth to men as Pharaoh to the Israelites takes away their straw and bids them get it themselves and yet exacts their number of brick takes away that declaration of Gods love and good will to men that should properly move them to repent believe c. and sets men upon seeking arguments and demonstrations of these to themselves and yet not fail to perform those duties required of them A doctrine it is that presents less love to this or that man then the Law it self did whereas the Apostle magnifies the true Gospel as more excellent and more un vailed for it set some certain demonstrations of Gods goodness to the Israelites before them as his bringing them out of Egypt chusing them in their Fathers to be a peculiar people to him and many typical sacrifices representing Christs death for them upon which they were commanded to love and serve him but for ought this tells thee thou wert hated by him from all eternity yea this suggests to thee that all he doth to thee may be but to bring thee to misery Nay I might safely say Gods dealings with the Gentiles represented more goodness as to their particulars without suggestions of eternal hatred of them then this kind of Gospell-preaching ascertains any one man of as yet unregenerate as truly goodness and out of good will to him in particular And O how injurious is that doctrine to men that withholds the most absolute perfect motive to their duties and way to meet with consolation Whence it comes to pass that first many are led by it into presumption to lean upon themselves and their own works as evidences of that distinguishing love of God that makes them sure of salvation as the Pharisee Luke 18.9 10. and so of their being pure and righteous when as yet they have never believed and through faith received that love of God into their hearts thats preached in the Gospel to wash and purify them yea to bring them out of themselves into Christ that they might be reckoned after him conformed to him to salvation These are of those that justifie themselves and labour to establish a righteousness of their own and are ignorant of and fight against the righteousness of God despising others and hindring them of that Gospel of grace that should be opened to them stumbling as much that the Death of Jesus Christ should be preached to all to ungodly and sinners not so qualified as they as ever did the presumptuous proud Pharisees that Christ should eat and drink with Publicans and sinners and that his Apostles should preach the Gospel to the uncircumcised Gentiles 2. Others again are held in bondage all their dayes and are ever ready to fall into desperation while not having the Love of God and his goodness and grace propounded to them as for them that should beget faith hope fruitfulness c. or being hindered from believing it as so propounded by occasion of this limiting doctrine and yet being pressed on to believe repent be humble and broken that so they may know that God hath good will to them and hath given his Son for them they labor and strive and finde nothing which they can attain to
bring into Canaan all that he brought out of Aegypt and then prove it by shewing that he so intended to all that believed and followed him Or else 2. Those places show not that those things so mentioned were the absolute intentions of God and Christ taken upon themselves to be effected by them without suspending them upon condition in us and if the Minor take not the word intended in that sense it suits not with the Major but contains a quartus terminus and the major not so taken is untrue If it be said the words are I came to save that that 's lost he gave himself that he might purge Vs and suffered for the unjust to bring us to God c. and where things are so spoken of as the ends and aimes of God in acting there though we have not the expressions He intended this and that yet we are to understand that God absolutely intended to accomplish and bring about those things and so that all those that are the object of those acts which were acted to such an end obtained or shall obtain that end Then I deny it and will prove it that in such speeches where two acts are mentioned as end and means and God the agent in the act directed to such an end it is not safe to say that alwayes that act propounded as the end in his acting was absolutely intended to be and answerably is brought about by him in all those upon whom or for whom he acted that act that 's mentioned as the means as to instance Act. 17 26 27. He made of one bloud all the kinde of men to inhabit all the face of the earth and hath determined the times appointed and the bounds of their habitation that they might seek the Lord c. Here is end and means propounded the making all of one bloud bounding their times habitations the means directed to this end that they might seek the Lord. Will any man hence say that God absolutely intended that he would cause all that he made and whose times and habitations he bounded to seek him and who ever seek him not and so call those in Rom. 3.11 were not made by him So John 1.6 7. John was sent to bear witness to the light that all through him might believe Doth it follow that because that was the end propounded therefore God absolutely purposed to make all believe to whom he bare witness and so its true that he bare witness to none else is not that contrary to Mat. 11.16 17 18. and 21.32 So John 5.34 Christ tels the cavilling Jews that he spake those things to them that they might be saved will it follow that it was his absolute intent that they should all be saved hear him or not or to make all hear him and be saved even those that would not come to him that they might live vers 40. Christ came to save that which was lost Doth it follow that he absolutely determined to bring all them to eternal life to whom he came even those also to whom he came and they received him not John 1.11 So Psal 105.33 34. He brought his chosen into Canaan that they might observe his Statutes and keep his Laws Therefore he intended to make them all do so and all that he brought into that land did so contrary to Psal 106.34 35 36. And to say no more God came down to bring Israel out of Aegypt to bring them into Canaan Exod. 3.7 and he brought them out thence that he might bring them into and give them that land Deut. 6.23 Ergo he absolutely purposed it concerning all that came out of Egypt and no more were brought out thence then were brought into Canaan Such his Argument Like to which he hath another taken from the effects of Christs Death Lib. 2. cap. 3. pag. 66. the Minor of which Affrmes that his Death sanctifies and and purges all them for whom he dyed redeems them from Law Curse Death c. none of all which he proves none of all those Scriptures alledged for proof This argument he hath again in lib. 3. cap. 4 where we shall speak further to it having such a clause in it as All for whomsoever he dyed or any thing sounding that way they being but applicative speeches not universal assertions It s such an argument as this The Lord brought us out of Egypt and brought us into this place viz. Canaan Deut. 26.8 9. And the Lord made you to go up out of Egypt and hath brought you into this Land Judg. 2.1 Therefore all that God brought out of Egypt he brought into Canaan Besides he hath for the bottom of this Argument this proposition in p. 4 line 71. and again in page 66. that the things before recounted are the immediate fruits and products of Christs Death namely Reconciliation Justification Sanctification Adoption Glorification which is as true as that the dispossessing the Canaanites and the giving their Land to the Israelites was the immediate fruit and product of their bringing out of Egypt over the red Sea as may be seen by what we sayed to them p. 10. No one of those things as accomplished in men is the immediate fruit and product of his Death Not Reconciliation though that be by the Death of Christ yet not immediately there is requisite to it beside Christs death the word of Reconciliation to declare it and that heard and submitted to as is plain 2 Cor. 5.19 20. We beseech you be ye reconciled to God yea and all these things come between the death of Christ and Reconciliation and are mediums of it Justification is not the immediate fruit and product of his death but mediante fide We are justified by faith Rom. 5.1 thence we have believed that we might be Justified Gal. 2.16 and that presupposes the word and spirit opening the death of Christ and shedding abroad the love of God and sprinkling the bloud of Christ upon the soul as in Tit. 3.5 6 7. He shed on us the Spirit abundantly that being justified by his Grace we might be made heires c so 1 Cor. 6.11 ye are Justified by the Name of the Lord and by the Spirit of our God Sanctification is not the immediate fruit and product of Christs Death but mediante fide too Sanctified by faith that is in Christ Jesus Acts. 26.18 and so there intervenes the being called out of the world and Church't Ephes 5.26 27. Adoption is not the immediate fruit and product of Christs death but hath Faith and Justification intervening John 1.12 To them that received him he gave this priviledge to be the sonnes of God to them that believed on his Name Gal. 3.26 27. Ye are all the Sons of God by faith in Jesus Christ Tit. 3.7 That being Justified by his grace ye might be made heirs c. And I am sure glory and immortality follows all these except we will have the inheritance go before the heirship and right to it
But of this enough and to this Chapter CHAP. II. Animadversions upon some passages in the second and third Chapters of his First Book THe second Chapter being only speculation about the nature of end and means To Chap. 2. and not at all applyed there to the question I shall pass over only noting a mistake in that expression about the nature of Moral means which he hath pag. 6. line 15 16. that in a moral sense when the action and the end are to be considered in reference to a Moral rule or law prescribed to the agent then the means are the Deserving or Meritorious cause of the end Which I conceive to be false looking upon Moral as contradistinct to Physical or natural as there he doth for it would then follow that Faith as a means considered in reference to the Law of Faith should be the Meritorious cause of its end that is Justification and Salvation and so good works which I think All Orthodox and Protestant Divines do utterly disclaim Though Faith be the way to justification and eternall life yet it s no wayes the meritorious cause otherwise we should be justified not only per fidem but propter fidem too not ex gratiâ but ex debito merito and so that distinction of the Apostle in Rom. 4.2 3 4. is quite overthrown but no more to that it being but by the by His third chapter is spent about the consideration of God as the agent in the work of Redemption To his 3. Chap. about which there is no express difference between us as to the main only a few expressions drop by the by that are considerable as That 1 Tim. 4.10 who is the Saviour of all men chiefly of them that believe calls not God a Saviour with reference to his Redeeming us by Christ but his saving and preserving all by his providence A strange conceit in which opponit non opponenda for though its true he sayes Vs by his providence yet that that providence of his is saving to sinners yea so much as in this life without respect had to the mediation of Christ much less that it s so saving specially to believers as that it becomes the motive and ground to them of such trust in God 2 Cor. 4.17 18. and 5.1.13 14. Phil. 3.20 1. as carries them out to suffer and labour in his Gospel as there it s affirmed to be is unreasonable to conceive and it disagrees with what he sayes to this business in other places where he tells us it was eying God as one that had prepared things not seen eternal in the heavens for them and eying Christs death for All that they might live to him and glorifying his love therein to his and his brethrens hearts expecting a saviour from heaven to change their vile bodies that made them despise their lives and liberties preach the Gospel through sufferings reproaches crosses how ever little esteemed as beside themselves Now here to think the Apostle cuts off all that consideration of his saving and only pitches upon him as a providential Saviour in a salvation out of Christ or without the consideration of Christ intervening as the lovely object of Trust and Confidence in all their labor and afflictions is too jejune and erronious but we shall meet with this again in his eighth chapter Again in considering the obligation and Covenant between God and Christ he promises something that will utterly overthrow the Universal Redemption but defers it to another after-place in lib. 3. chap. 1. where we shall meet with it and give it its answer only whereas he tells us p. 16. that the promise in Isa 53.11 is inconsistent with their perswasion who in termes have affirmed That the Death of Christ might have had its full and utmost effect and yet none be saved To that I shall say how I conceive that may be affirmed and how not not standing here upon it that that in Isa 53.11 is a prophesie of but not a promise uttered to Christ 1. It might have been so supposito quod Deus eam aliter ordinasset as it might have been undertaken and indured and as God might have decreed it might have been so 2. To look upon it as it was indured and take it by it self simply as Death though to such and such ends without Resurrection from which it is distinct then also it might have been so had he not risen too all its effect would not have saved any man So the Apostle intimates 1 Cor. 15.14 16 17. 3. It might have had its full effect as only offered to God without application to men and none saved had it been its end intended it had been contrary to that in Isai 53.11 but the effect and end of a thing differs much The Carpenter builds a house the effect of his work is the house it self the end of its building habitation the end of Christs Death is that men might be saved by him the effect of it as a thing simply done by him between God and him is not the salvation of any one without application of it or dispensation of spirit to men through it so that had Christ died and rose too and done no more none had been saved to the utmost except the business of his Priesthood be in vain and a thing that might have been spared ' so that its effect it might have had as a thing endured by him and none saved as they take saving in that high 4. But to say the thing that God aimed at and that was covenanted to be granted to Christ upon or as a reward of his Death might have been effected or performed and yet none saved is indeed cleerly false nor did the speech opposed affirm so much but that 's as much I suppose as upon second thoughts he aimed at est act Whereas he saies pag. 17. That the pleasure of the Lord that was to prosper in the hand of Christ was the bringing of many sons to glory that 's a truth but whether it be all the truth or no he tells us not and so deals not so fully and plainly as he should whether the glorifying of God in the convincing and just and righteous judging of the rest be not the pleasure of the Lord too he saith nothing much less disproves it and yet I think he shall do that and the pleasure of the Lord too in that matter shall prosper in his hand In the same pag. he tells us the request of our Saviour John 17. was neither for more nor less then God had ingaged himself to him for and that was for a full confluence of the love of God and the fruits of that love upon all his Elect in Faith Sanctification and Glory But of that he gives us no proof neither that there he asked no less for as for more I will not question nor that he requested Faith for all his Elect or any of them To the first I propound to him
Whether the salvation of Abraham and Isaac c. was not in the Covenant made between God and Christ if not then some more are saved then were included in that Covenant If yes then I demand what passage in that Prayer requests that they might believe and be sanctified if none then he asked less in that Prayer then God had ingaged himself to him for To the second I desire him to shew in what passage he prayes for the faith of the Elect in all that Prayer not from the sixth to the twentieth for he tells his Father they had it already and I suppose he will not be able to prove that he prayed to his Father there to give them that which they had before that prayer at least in that degree in which they had it nor in ver 20. for them he supposeth as future believers as he makes them the suppositum of his prayer his prayer is not that they might believe but that believing which he supposeth they should they might be one viz in body priviledg and injoyment of the grace of God in Christ except he will say Faith is prayed for in ver 21. and 23. when he saith that the world might believe but first that 's for the world not for the Elect secondly that he himself denies to be the faith of the Elect and so the fruit of that love here said to appertain to the Elect but only a conviction not for any good of the world but onely for the vindication of his people cha 7. pag. 47. therefore I desire him to shew me in what place of that prayer that Faith he here speaks of as a fruit of Gods electing love is prayed for In pag. 19. He tels us That it seems strange to him that Christ should undergo the pains of hell in their stead who lay in the pains of hell before he underwent those pains and shall continue in them to eternity To which I need not say with many of the Antients that he emptied hell by his death Bishop Vsher in his Answer to the Irish Jesuit upon Limbus Patrum c. and descent into those pains as Bishop Vsher relates nor will I put him to prove that any were as then or yet are undergoing those pains before the judgment of the great Day when they shall be sentenced thither which will be somewhat hard for him to do except he take that in Luke 16. to be a Narration or History of things really done and think that the rich man see Lazarus in Abrahams bosome and could call from hell to heaven to him but I say it will not follow from our saying That Christ gave himself a ransom for All that he must undergo those torments for All which were properly inflicted upon men for their abuse of that liberty which he virtually gave them to injoy by his after-death His enduring the sentence of the death he found them under as in Adam was enough to pay for that dispensation of life liberty grace mercy to them which they in their several times injoyed upon the ingagement of his future dying See more to this in cha 3. li. 3. without induring those torments for them to which they stood by the word adjudged for their not receiving him who was the Author of such liberty and mercy to them in those hints of truth and reproofs and counsels in his Spirits strivings despised by them Hence we may fall into an Answer of a Dilemma there propounded to us and again repeated chap. 3. lib. 3. viz. That God imposed his wrath due unto and Christ underwent the pains of hell for either all the sins of all men or all the sins of some men or some sins of all men If the last then all have some sins to answer for and so no man shall be saved if the second then that is it he affirms if the first then all should be saved or why not This may seem at the first view such a three-headed Monster as that there is no conquering it but through Gods assistance we shall grapple with it About his suffering the pains of hell I shall not question with him it s an ambiguous word and variously used And as no Scripture uses his expressions perhaps in his intention so as the Scripture uses the word hell I have no ground from Scripture to deny the expression therefore to the thing it self I may say that in severall respects all those three branches of the Dilemma are true and yet his consequences will not follow As 1. He underwent the wrath of God for some fins of all men 1 Tim. 2.6 Rom. 5.18 else he could not give himself a ransom for them all nor his righteousness come to All men to justification of life nor any favor of God be extended to them except he interposed between God and that sin that in its desert and by Gods sentence of death stopt the passage of all good flowing upon them unless hindred by mediation But then he says All have some sins to answer for Nego consequentiam that follows not for he that bears some sins of all may yet bear also all of some those two are not inconsistent had he said But some sins of any that had excluded All of any but some of All doth not those that may be but some of one mans sins may be All of another as suppose he bare all sins in genere but the sin against the Holy Ghost he then bare all some mens sins Heb. 10.26 for some men are not guilty of that but are kept from it but yet in respect of their sins that run into that he bare but some of their sins not all as so considered 2. He underwent the wrath of God for all the sins of some that is gave such satisfaction to his justice that no sin they have shall be their condemnation namely of those that believe and walk in the light with him as it is 1 John 1.7 Rom. 8.1 otherwise the phrase as he expresses it the Scripture hath not But then that 's it he faith No sure for he says he bare only All the sins of some men and dyed for none else but those some but so neither the Scriptures nor we say He might bear the punishment of all the sins of some men and yet not them only 3. He underwent the wrath of God for all the sins of All men in some sense considered That is as they were sinners in his first stepping in to undertake for men as sin was upon them through the fall of Adam and bound them to curse and death and so they needed a mediator or else they must presently be cut off and perish and so in a consideration and view of them as previous to his steping in to mediate And his bearing all of them was enough to ransome them all from that first condemning sentence and yet neither follows it so that all must then be eternally saved because there are other
26.26 1 Pet. 2.21 22. But that that was his end that Mr. Owen propounds towards the conclusion of his 1. Chap viz. That All and every one of them for whom Christ dyed should have All those things conferred upon him that he procured for any or that they All should certainly be brought to God and to eternal glory I deny and leave for him to prove which there he doth not But let us see if he disprove none of the ends laid down by me He tels us Chap. 2. that it was not meerly his own Good he aimed at in his death That it was not meerly his own is without doubt but that it was also his own glory to be manifested is as evident and therefore also he prays the Father for that Iohn 17.4 5. but he says further While he was in the way he merited nothing for himself Whereas the holy ones of God have deemed him worthy to receive honor and glory power and riches Rev. 5.9 wisdom and strength for that his suffering c. and I think God judged him so too for as a reward of his sufferings he hath given it him and that Christ had no eye at that in regard of his humanity as he insinuates is not to be believed seeing the Apostle expresses he had Rom. 14 9. Heb. 12.2 he procured the exaltation of his humane nature and the manifestation of his glory as the word of God more brightly by his sufferings and that God predestinated it to that glory otherwise then by sufferings I no where finde nor I think he neither It s true that was not the onely thing nor perhaps the main thing in his eye He aimed more at the glorifying of his Father and that the world through him might be saved but that That was not in his eye nor procured meritoriously by him and so no end aimed at by him in making satisfaction for sin seem strange positions and yet these are Mr. Owens Conceptions and Conclusions quite cross to that of Rom. 14.9 before mentioned Sure if he procured any thing meritoriously of the Father he procured his own exaltation in the humane nature especially that glory of it to be the habitation and storehouse of that fulness that he hath for us which to me is more plain then that it may be denied in that Psal 68.18 He led captivity captive and received gifts in the man and in Rev. 5. its 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he prevailed to open the Book and unloose the seals which was his honor as well as our commodity ver 4 5. whence that after-confession 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 thou art worthy to take the Book and open the seals c. ver 7 8. He errs again when he saith The Dominion he hath over All is not founded on his Death for the Scripture saith expresly to this end he died 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that he might have Dominion and for this cause God highly exalted him because he humbled himself and bare the sins of many Isai 53.12 Phil. 2.10 11. But Mr. Owen seems here to leap over hedge and ditch to his own purposes not considering how full the Scriptures are against him And indeed how can we expect a concurrence of Scripture to disprove a Scripture Assertion But let us see how he confirms his opinion He indeavors it from Heb. 1.3 He was appointed heir of all things But what then In what nature was he so appointed Sure he needed no appointment or constitution for his Divine Nature seeing Dominion over all was essential to that If in the Humane Nature united to the Divine then through what way was he appointed to become heir was it not the same in which he was begotten to be his Son and is it not said of him upon his Resurrection in that regard Thou art my Son this day have I begotten thee then he was begotten in the Humane Nature to possession of the Divine Glory Besides may it not as well follow that therefore he purchased no glory for his Elect for they were appointed preordained to it too before the foundation of the world So that this is proofless to that particular His next is Heb. 2.7 8. God hath put all things under his feet But doth he not speak of that as a consequent to his abasement Thou madest him little lower then the Angels thou crownedst him with glory and honor c And expresly in ver 9. We see Jesus for the suffering of Death crowned with glory and honor I marvel what could make him quote this place of all the rest it being rather full against him He asks if Christ died for all those things that are subject to him Sed quid hoc ad Rhombum It s enough that he died that he might have such dominion over them which he hath partly by dying for them as in men and partly by conquest over them as in the devils and partly by gift as a reward of his service performed by him to his Father as in all things Phil. 2.10 11. Again He asks if he have not dominion over the Angels Yes and what then But he died not for them True but what then Did he not die that through death his Humane nature might be taken up into glory transcending theirs But he sayes All things are rather given him out of the Immediate love of the Father What he means here by Immediate I well know not if that without consideration of his death and sufferings the forecited Scriptures say enough against him If he mean onely that that was the bottom-fountain of his giving all to him Then doth he not see how by that manner of reasoning he also overthrows the effect of Christs death that he pleads for in procuring grace and glory for his chosen for by the same reason he purchased not that neither nor eyed it they flowing from the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the good pleasure and love of God as is declared at large Ephes 1.4 5 6 7. and 2.4 5. c. Certainly in all this Argument he hath horribly mistaken But yet at length he sayes Suppose this be true What proof follows from thence of the general Ransom seeing this Dominion is a power of condemning as well as saving and it s not reasonable to assert that Christ died to Redeem them that he might have power to condemn them nay if he died to Redeem them then he aimed not at any such power to condemn them To this I onely say 1. We ground not our Assertion of the generality of the Ransom upon this bottom meerly but upon plainer testimonies also onely we assert this end 2. We say at the power of saving or condemning them he aimed though not at their condemnation And that Rom. 14.9 proves He had not power over them to save them nor were there any just ground for their looking to him for salvation as the case stood he not dying to ransom them from the power of that condemnation that was already
justification by a lesser revelation of God then Paul had Josh 2.10 11 12. with Heb. 11.31 and so Cornelius before Peters coming to him believed in a lower act by less light then Peter brought to him and the Ninivites by far lesser then the Jews rebelled against now that power accompanies these mediums too in their lesser or greater dispensations is evident in that the Spirit is said to have preached to striven with men even those that yet obeyed it not Gen. 6 3. 1 Pet. 3 19. the hand of the Lord was stretched out with his reproofs and councels Prov 1.24 and in the effects it produceth as that they attain to some knowledg of God convincements illuminations c. against which they often willfully rebel and close their eyes and I say further that God doth in many by these means effect faith and bring them actually to believe and I conceive many more might have faith did they not wilfully turn away from God for I conceive a fore going act propounded or injoyned to men you may call it a condition if you please upon which they might be brought to believe Whereas Mr. Owen askes what that is I answer it is to listen to the voice of God not hardning the heart So Isa 55.3 hearken diligently and your souls shall live by diligent attendance to the voice of God the soul is quickned up to a life of faith and hope in God so Isa 49.1 Listen O Isles unto me and hearken ye people from far and in Psal 95. To day if ye will hear his voice harden not your hearts Lift not up your reasons and understandings against the authority of God be swift to hear hear him out and make not haste to speak and cavil against him As also to minde those demonstrations of his Divine Power and Goodness that he affords not winking with the eye and wilfully turning from the light when he makes it appear or from the means of light which beheld would give us to see what he holds forth to us according to that Call Hear ye deaf and look ye blinde that ye may see Isai 42.18 So Behold my servant whom I have chosen ver 1. And look to me and be ye saved Isai 45.22 And consider the works of God Job 37.14 That that is to be known of God is in them manifested c. Rom. 1.19.20 But then Is not this same hearing and listening believing I answer No It s but a mean to it We are to attend that we may believe by this hearing Faith and the spirit of it are given unto us But it will be objected Its obeying and obeying is believing So M. Owen But there is a fallacy in that for neither is every Act of hearing obeying nor every Act of obeying the believing spoken of As obeying in some acts follows believing so in some it may be but a tendency to the meeting with that which will cause us to believe so believingly to obey Take this Simile Two men are at controversie suppose a Master and a Servant the Master would have him do such things as the servant doth not nor will The Master begins to expostulate with him and to shew him reasons for his demands the servant hears what he says this is not yet an act of obedience to his Master for perhaps he may yet prove refractory and more obstinate then before and perhaps in hearing he may be perswaded and become obedient to him being convinced and changed in minde by what he hears till which change his act of hearing will not denominate him obedient or pass for an act of obedience Mr. Owen saith If we can propound a condition for Faith that is not Faith he will hear it And yet I suppose he will not think his hearing us propound it an act of obedience to us at all But then he says This is procured by by Christ or not In the sense before explained we grant it procured otherwise not and that to the power of exercising it is absolute but as to the act of exercising of it its voluntary and to the most uncompelled or unnecessitated Many have absolute power and ability given them of hearing and seeing the hints of Light and Truth that come from God that yet have it in their choise whether they will act so or so and therefore are faulted for not acting as they might for not chusing the fear of the Lord Prov. 1.29.30 For shutting their eyes against his Light and stopping their ears Matth. 13.15 Acts 28.27 And yet the cause of Faith is not resolved into our selves but into him that gives the power to hear and that speaks such words when we do listen as overcomes our reason and our hearts Our faith is justly still ascribed to him For if he spake not we could not hear yea if he gave us not power to hear yea if when we hear he spake not suitable words and exercised not power with his words we should not yet believe in him So that Inference is as absurd as these That because the blind man went and washed in the Pool of Siloam Therefore he was the cause of his own healing or Not Christ so much as he and The ten Lepers were the cause of their own cleansing because they went on their own legs to shew themselves to the Priests at his Commandment VVe avoid also all his following Consequences If by procuring Faith he means his meriting and obliging God to cause all to believe in him for whom He died For denying that it follows not either 1. That Faith is an act of our own wills and so our own as not to be wrought by Grace and that its wholly sited in our own power to perform that spiritual act No such thing follows upon that Proposition denied 1. That Faith is an act of the VVill no man can deny for in it the Will closes with an Object propounded as good to be relied on but that it s not wrought by Grace is clearly false from what is said above It s our act to hear and yet not that without the VVord of God buts t is Gods Act even the act of his Grace to perswade us by what he speaks to lean upon him and believe in him Besides 2. God might freely work it in some without being obliged to it by the Death of Christ the same love that led him to give Christ may sin being removed and the enmity being slain by Christ work as much as it pleases without being obliged and tied to work it Besides 3. Christ might oblige him to work it in some and yet not in all He died for So that every way this is inconsequent And we neither 1. Contradict any Scripture Nor 2. Speak contrary to the nature of the new Covenant of Grace which indeed is sealed by Christs Death to believers but says not that Christs Death obliged God to make this and that man much less all he died for to believe Nor is it 3. Destructive
death of Christ to make them all affect him It reaches but to a way-making and foundation laying unto that And indeed it s to be minded that Reconciliation is neither there spoken of as the act of Christ toward God as had it signified an ingagement putting upon him it should rather have been but as the act of God in Christ God was in Christ reconciling nor as of a thing accomplished and done as had it been of a meritorious reconciling it might have been with respect to the act of Merit so spoken of the act of Meriting being a thing already done but onely as of a thing then * It s but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in fieri in the doing and as the following vers ver 20. argues not as yet done while that exhortation to be reconciled is but yet a pressing It s as if he should have said God hath been doing that in Christ for the world that tends to and makes for its reconciling or being reconciled to him he hath taken that out of the mid-way that stood against the shewing himself gracious to them and receiving them into favor nothing is wanting on his part to their being at one with him nay he hath done that in Christ that may induce them thereto as in Matth. 22.4 His Oxen and Fatlings are killed and he hath prepared a dinner and all is ready for receiving them upon which ground also as there the servants were sent out to the guests with that good tidings and thereupon to invite them to come to the wedding so here the Apostles were sent out former hints of his goodness in the Wisdom of God afforded Joh. 1 4 5. 1 Cor. 1.21 being not in the wisdom of the World understood or discerned plainly to declare this that God had done in Christ for them and to intreat them to be at one with him which as it intimates as I said before that they were not yet in their hearts reconciled to him for why then needed any further beseeching of them thereto So doth it no more prove that they must be all so reconciled and that Christ had obliged God thereto Mat. 22.4 then that phrase All things are ready come ye to the Wedding argues that Christ had obliged God to make all those bidden guests to feast with him and the following Caveat in Chap. 6.1 warning them not to receive the Grace of God in vain both argues that there is such a receiving it and that there is danger that some such as this grace is affirmed to concern may so receive it and so by consequence not be reconciled in their hearts at all to him So that this place duly weighed rather overthrows Mr. Owens Assertion then contributes any the least mite to its confirmation He produces also Rom. 11.15 The casting off of the Jews is the reconciling of the world which neither speaks a title of Christs death nor can be understood to make any thing for a meritorious reconciling Reconciliation there signifying only the occasional way and means of reconciling As Salvation Acts 28.28 is the means of saving He quotes also Rom. 5.10 If being enemies we were reconciled to God by the Death of his Son c. and Col. 1.21 Now are ye reconciled in the body of his flesh through death But neither will they serve him up to his purpose For neither of them either speak in that latitude as All for whom Christ died nor of a meritorious reconciling onely but of Reconciliation at least inchoativè accomplished in mens persons In Rom. 5. The Apostle having said Verse 1. That the believer being justified by faith in Christ is at peace with God which is all one with Ver. 2 3 4 5. is reconciled and is lead to rejoyce in the hope of the glory of God even in afflictions shews how Faith nourishes and acts the soul in that hope from what principle and by what considerations viz. By minding the great love of God in giving his Son to the Death for it when in a miserable condition Ver. 6 7 8. and the great love of Christ in so dying for it and the state to which God hath there-through already brought it viz. Ver. 9 10. A justified and reconciled estate VVhence it leads the soul thus hopefully to judge and reason Hath God shed his Sons blood for me that I might have good ground of believing in him and overcoming me to believe therein hath he justified me there-through Compare ver 1.9 with Chap. 3.25 how shall he not much more now save me me or us that are thus justified from wrath to come And again Hath God made me of an enemy his friend by such a way at such cost as the death of his Son how much more wil he now that I am no more his enemy but his friend reconciled to him save preserve me in and bring me safely out of all afflictions and trials unto glory by his life seeing he shall not need to die again to do that for me Yea not only so says he but it leads too to Glory in God himself through Jesus Christ through or by whom it hath now now that it believes and is justified received the atonement 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by a Metonymy the Grace of God that effected this reconciliation and brought it in to be the reconciled of God as he had before ver 10. affirmed He says not we were reconciled in the time of Christs dying that would have been rather 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But the reconciliation which we now have received in receiving him to wit and in which we are reconciled we have it by his Death That phrase By his Death that men so stumble at I have explained before lib. 1. cap. 1. This then says nothing of Christ meriting of or obliging God to reconcile that is turn the affections of all to himself for whom he died nor says that in Col. 1.21 22. any thing more for it but that the believing Colossians were of enemies to God become now his friends reconciled to him onely the Apostle there tell us what was the bond or medium of their agreement viz. The body of Christs flesh through or by means of death that is he having in that his body suffered for our sins and offered up himself to God God there takes up his delightful dwelling and is propitious towards us now we also by Faith closing with and feeding on that his body as it hath or he therein died for us God and we are at one But what is this to his meriting of God that he actually reconcile all for whom he died His last proof is Ephes 2.15 16 where the Apostle having said that the Ephesians sometimes strangers to God and his Church were now made neer by the blood of Christ which we may either understand of that cleansing of the state of the Gentiles in general and opening a free access into his Kingdom to
say much to these places quoted by him to hold forth the thing meant by the word Merit viz. Isai 53.5 Heb. 9.12 Acts 20.28 save that they prove not any obligation put upon God to do those things there mentioned to all that he died for but onely that God was pleased to do such things upon such considerations or by such mediums Onely the latter place of Acts 20.28 seems least to the business for it speaks not of Christs meriting of God but Gods procuring acquiring or obtaining as the 〈◊〉 most usually signifies a people to be a Church by that way of his blood the sufferings of Christ But to pass those things Let this be observed which himself grants lib 4. cap. 1. That however pretious and valuable the sufferings of Christ be yet they oblige and binde God to nothing but according to his own appointment and free ingagement Having noted that we come to his Argument which is this That Christ did merit and purchase by his death for all those for whom he died all those things which in the Scriptures are assigned to be the fruits and effects of his death But all have not all those effects and fruits Ergo he died not for All. Ans If by his Major he means He procured them into himself as into Gods Treasury to be free for them all to look after and come to him for and to be dispensed to all that do look after him and come to him Then it nothing hurts us But then his Minor assumes not rightly as it doth not however for it should be thus That Christ hath not purchased all those things for All and not as it is That all have them not But if in his Major he means as he seems to do that he obliged the Father to bestow upon All for whom he died and bring them to enjoy all those things which his Death either as presented to God or as believed by us is said to effect as his after-enumeration of its effects argue him to mean then I deny it and desire his proof of it which because he brings not his Argument falls to the ground and needs no further answering Onely I shall minde the Reader that the effects enumerated by him are such for the most part as it produceth in us by believing on it such as the Delivering us from the hand power of all our enemies which we are not till called nay till raised from the dead from wrath to come which we are not till justified by faith as is evident by his own confession against the Socinians The works of the Devil which are overcome and destroyed by him in being believed on Ephes 6.13.16 the curse of the Law which he says we are subject to till believers Cap. 8. Sect. 6. from our vain conversation the present evil world the earth and from men all which he doth by his blood and sufferings as being accepted of God they are made known to us and withall the Covenant ratified by it held forth to us By letting us see such love in God towards us and such good-will in Christ with such perfection to save us and so great promises ratified to believers he moves and perswades us to let go our vain conversations renounce the world its fellowships vanities and wickedness to cease cleaving to the earth and earthy men and having our confidence in them and reliance on them for teaching worship satisfaction delight c. Thus God is said to have bought Israel to himself Deut. 32.6 in that he by so great things done for them purchased or gained them in to own and follow him And so in Hos 3.2 Gods buying Israel to be a people for himself is compared to Hoseahs buying an harlot off from other lovers to be his wise for a certain consideration or Sum given her So Christ buys men unto God from other things by setting before us his great sufferings for us and profering to us the great glory he will thereby bring vs to if we will renounce all for him But this note is over and above what was needful for shewing the invalidity of the Argument All his other quotations too are impertinent and none of them prove either that God is obliged by the Death of Christ and ought to grant to and possess all for whom he died of those good things that he mentions or that he was or is bound thereby otherwise then as he freely ingaged himself to do them to any They say That by his Death we are reconciled as we may say By Joabs Mediation Absolom was recalled from banishment and brought into Davids favor Which speech proves not that the inward worth of his Mediation bound David to that So He is our Propitiatory through Faith in his blood and God hath set him forth to be so that proves not that he obliged God to forgive the sins of All he died for The like I might say for Peace-making and salvation Believing on him we are at peace with God and shall be saved by him but no place sayes All that he died for shall be saved or that God ought to make them all believe and so save them as was before shewed For his next Instance from the Phrases 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Inst 6. For All and for Many and Interrogatory Whether Christ died in the stead of All It s answered in those Chapters that speak about Satisfaction with all the Queries he propounds upon it Onely I shall spake to one of them viz. Whether Christ hung upon the Cross for Reprobates I say I conceive as they were men faln in Adam he did but not as besides that Reprobated also It s like that The Gospel was preached to the dead 1 Pet. 4.6 and the Spirits in prison Was the Gospel preached to dead men and men in hell Yes To them that are now dead and in hell But not when and as dead and in hell Men were not Reprobates as they were the Objects of Christs Death but as they are considered and actually found guilty of sinning wilfully and pertinaciously against the truth discovered and benefits afforded to them through his Death If we will speak of things according to the Scripture If otherwise Eâdem facilitate rejicitur quâ asseritur The Scriptures say men that corrupt themselves and notwithstanding the means of purging used to them which sure are all consequent in order of Nature to the death of Christ for men there being nothing affordable to men towards purging according to the demerit of Adams sin but All were forthwith to have perished stand out and remain in their corruptions are the reprobate silver men rejected of God Jer. 6.30 And for such obstinacy against God in lower or higher means the Scripture often tells us that God reprobates or rejects men as is to be seen in Rom. 1.19 20 21 28. Gen. 6.3 Psa 81.9 10 11 12. Pro. 1.22 23 24 25. Matth. 13.15 16. Acts 28.27 2 Thess 2.10 11 12. And no
of Faith as rightly as the Apostles No no Our charge yet stands faster against them then that the strongest hand of them All can move it They cannot preach or represent God Doctrinally in that their way as an object that the people they speak to hath good ground to rest in for safety and satisfaction for they know not confessedly whether he hath appointed Christ as a medium of access for them and as a Sacrifice and Ransom for their souls They can tell men he is able to save them that believe provided they be the Elect otherwise not but cannot assure that he is a meet object for them to believe through because they cannot assure them he hath done any thing for them And thus we have viewed his previous Considerations Come we now to view his following Answers to our Arguments CHAP. II. An Answer to his evasions from those Scriptures that declare Christ sent for the world and the whole world BEfore he comes to the Arguments that he would Answer he dips his Pen in Gall and slings durt upon the faces of them that will not forsake the sure Word of God to take heed to his contradictory Conclusions made against it Pretending his Opinion to be undeniably confirmed by the Word of God by many Demonstrations and innumerable Testimonies of Scripture though not one place hath been brought to the purpose for it Yea I will make Mr. Owen this offer That if he can produce any one Testimony of Scripture that denied Christ to have died for any one man of the world or that limits his Ransom and Propitiation to fewer then All I say That limits it and I will yield him the Cause and say that I have been egregiously deceived But to let that pass Our first general Argument he frames weakly and then makes us by reasoning as weakly to defend it that so he might have the more advantage against it I would make this and the second from general expressions of Scripture into one thus That Matter or Article of Faith Argum. that is frequently delivered in the largest and most general expressions of Scripture without other Scripture in any place excluding any or limiting as but to some is to be received according to the latitude of those large expressions But such is this business of the Death of Christ as the Ransom it s delivered in the largest and most general expressions and no other Scripture any where limits it but to some or excludes any particular Therefore according to the latitude of those expressions its to be received The Major of this is founded upon this Rule Every Word of God is pure nothing to be added to it nothing to be taken from it But to limit where it no where limits or to exclude where it excludes not is to take from it of our own heads and therefore is not to be attempted Besides it may be seen by induction No other Truth that is so frequently laid down in such general terms is taken limitedly to fewer if no other Scripture limit or restrain it or the very Circumstances of the places where it is as might be instanced in Creation Sinfulness Preservation Resurrection Judgment The Minor hath been cleared throughout this Discourse that though there be places that speak not of all its object as also there are many about Creation Sin Resurrection Judgment yet there is no limitation of it in any of those places as a Ransom or Propitiation to a less object then the general places will reach to And that the largest expressions are used about it is clear as All men Rom. 5.18 1 Tim. 2 6. Every one Heb 2.9 The whole world 1 Joh. 2.2 That those phrases are in themselves extendible to All and Every man in the world is plain and confest by Mr. Owen That sometimes in the Scriptures they are so used and that very usually too and most properly as is easie to shew And therefore may so signifie there His Argumentations from the word World I disclaim nor doth he finde any so to use them as he propounds them We argue not the extent simply from the word World but from the words All and Every and whole World and we understand the word World extendible as far as them not from the word World simply but from these other places reaching it to the whole World and All men As when it s said God created man upon the earth the force of the word Man proves it not that he created every Man in the world but yet we believe it extendible so far because other Scriptures say it of All Nations of men and that he made them of one blood The Argument from the word World we use against their conceit of For the Elect onely In that we never finde any Scripture calling the world Elect or the Elect the World but distinguishing them from the world they being in election separated from the world They that would have us restrain general words but to some particulars must shew us some ground for it that the Scripture somewhere in the same business so restraineth them for the restraining of a word usually and Properly of a large extent in other things is no sufficient ground for our straitning it in this or another thing where the Scripture doth not plainly declare that it ought to be so straitned And this is our defence against them in straitning this Word to the Elect. But Mr. Owen endeavors to shew that the general words in such places ought to be straitned from the consideration of the places themselves Beginning with that in Joh 3 16. In which the great Saviour of the world assisting us we will follow him He thereupon first gives us our construction of the place and that with as much weakness as he can I shall give my Paraphrase my self thus God beholding man faln even the men of the world pitied him in that condition and out of pity to him sent him for a Saviour his own onely Son to this end and with this intention that he dying for him and rising again and being perfected for saving man all those of mankinde whosoever that upon declaration of him do believe on him should not perish but have eternal life In which observe 1. That the motive of Gods sending his Son was that love or good will that he bore to lost man and readiness to shew forth his mercy to them in providing a fit medium and way to salvation 2. The object of this love was Mankinde faln as here expressed indefinitely but as other Scriptures explain this indefinite All men the whole world 3. His act of giving was both to death for men and in the Gospel preaching Him to men as an object to be believed on 4. The end That whosoever believes should not perish In which we have 1. The Way to the participation of the choise benefits of him viz. believing on him 2. The Extent of that choise benefit whosoever believes In which is also
the freedom for all or any to look after that benefit and through Faith to obtain it Now in this Mr. Owen differs from us That he notes the world to signifie lost men of all sorts both Jews Gentiles peculiarly loved and that love to be an unchangeable act or purpose of Will concerning their salvation intending absolutely the salvation of all this world to whom he gave him that whosoever believeth not to be a distributive of that general the world but the very self-same with the word World Before he confirm his own he labors to evert the other and 1. Against that pity or propensity to be affirmed to be in God to the good of the creature he says thus If there be no natural affection in God whereby he is necessarily carried to any thing without himself then no such pity or affection to their good as is here intended I deny the Consequence for though there be no such thing as necessarily is so carried yet there is that 's voluntarily and freely carried so Gods Will that is in him to do this or that is not necessarily carried to do this or that but freely but being freely carried to this or that it s necessarily carried in a way suteable to his holy good Nature Now that there is that in God that carries him to desire or approve freely the good of man appears in that he is said to be Love 1 Joh. 4.8 Now Love freely seeks the good of things So again he swears that he delights not in the death of the wicked but rather that they should turn live Yea and saith of him that dieth That he hath no pleasure in his death Eze. 33.11 18. ult And bewails those that had miscarried through their folly and deprived themselves of his mercy Psal 81.11.14 Isai 48.17 18. And so our Saviour the express Image of God wept over and pitied the folly and misery of Jerusalem Luke 19.41 But then he says This intimates imperfection in God But he is not imperfect I answer no the imperfection is in our conception this in him is highest perfection As Moses saith He is perfect though he says He took the Isaelites out of Egypt to bring them into Canaan and many came not in that might seem an imperfection in God and that he failed of his expressed purpose but the imperfection is in our apprehension So he said of Elies house He would establish it but afterwards said otherwise But we are to believe what he says though it seem to us who want ability to comprehend him to argue imperfection The rest of his Reasonings are meer carnal he brings no patch of Scripture to prove that God hath not such good will to man but vainly pries and inquires Why doth not God ingage his power to accomplish it and how comes it hindered Which are brutish reasonings against Gods Assertions When he says Hadst thou done thus I would have done so and so And O that thou hadst done so And I delight rather he should live Then to say why doth not God effect it then Nay rather Who is vain brutish man dust and ashes to dispute against God and reject his Words upon his shallow Reason Will man propound to God what shall be Wisdom to him Doth not he indeed say That his Wisdom is foolishness to men And doth not Mr. Owen here make it good and say It s brutish wisdom amongst men But know O vain Earth-worm That the Wisdom of God is indeed foolishness to men and they cannot comprehend it and the wisdom of men is foolishness to God 1 Cor. 1.19.22.23 24. It s wisdom O vain man to give credit to the Word and Oath of God and say Amen to it That he delights not in the death of the wicked but rather that they shall turn and live how ever foolish it seems to man and whatever absurdities his wisdom findes in it For the foolishness of God is wiser then the wisdom of man and that weakness and imperfection that appears in Gods wayes is stronger then the strength of men His ways are unsearchable his judgments past finding out Not to be measured by the shallow models our Reason but his Words are all Words of Truth and he that will understand his Wayes must believe them and be willing to deny the wisdom of the flesh which is enmity to God and which God will destroy and become a fool that he may be wise The Scriptures we see in Psal 81.14 Isai 48.17 18. Ezek. 33.11 and 18.32 1 Tim. 2.4 hold forth what I speak of The Nature of God which is Love acting forth it self in expressions of good Will to men yea men in general and such as miscarry His other exception with its confirmations being onely against his acting necessarily are all vain and invalid For conformation of his own Exposition That by Love is meant an unchangeable purpose or act of his Will to save them He gives this Reason Because its the most eminent and transcendent love that ever God bare or shewed towards any miserable creature Well Let us first reade it according to his Exposition and see what it will help him It will run thus God so Loved that is unchangeably purposed the salvation of the world That he gave his onely begotten Son that whosever believeth in him should not perish c. Which is in effect that he so unchangeably purposed the salvation of lost mankinde as that he provided the most eminent transcendent medium for it to be saved by upon condition of believing And so it will be an unchangeable conditional purpose to the world and an unchangeable absolute purpose to believers that have that condition And may it not consist or rather spring from his pity and compassion to faln man so to will and purpose Yea and may not the word Love rather signifie that pity in which he so purposed then that purpose that sprung therefrom seeing its the more prime moving cause of his sending Christ that is here spoken of Or will this Exposition content him No though this is as much as the words will bear with the following expressions in the Text yet this is not it he aims at but this That his Love signifies an absolute unchangeable purpose of saving every one for whom he gave Christ and so of giving and causing them all effectually to receive whatsoever is needful to their salvation But the Text speaks not up to this conception for then it should rather have been thus God so loved the world that he gave his onely begotten Son and will make it believe in him so that it shall never perish c. But neither such not to that purpose is our Saviours expression Such an expression indeed would have represented God as propounding the salvation of the world as an end undertaken by himself to accomplish and bring about with all the mediums conducing thereunto without condition on our part whereas our Saviour speaks of it as an
in him shall not abide in darkness But Mr. Owen says By the World are meant the Elect scattered abroad in the World opposed to the Nation of the Jews that this last clause is untrue appears by this that he was speaking this to a Jew to draw him to believe and therefore the Word World must not be opposed to them as excluding them but let us see how he refutes ours and confirms his own opinion Against our latter observation from the reading of the Words He so loved the Elect that all of them that believe should not perish viz. that it would seem by that as if some of them might not believe he replies why Because he sent his Son that they might not perish To that I answer No but because the phrase is Distributive not that it believing as supposing that all that VVorld that Christ was given for shall believe but that whosoever or every one that believes as supposing that though there is ground for all the VVorld to believe yet all would not So that the place holds not forth that Christ must and will keep from perishing All for whom he was given as Mr. Owen suggests but all whosoever and whatsoever that believe in him But he answers again That God designs the salvation of all them in express words for whom he sent his Son To that I reply that by designing c. meaning his purposing to bring them All to eternal salvation its openly untrue for he says no such thing there that he loved the world and gave his Son that every one of it should be made to believe and be saved as I appeal to the Text it self but if he mean as he doth not that salvation might be propounded to it and it have a way by which it might in believing come to be saved then I deny it not but so it s said of unbelievers John 5.34 40. VVhereas we say that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is divisive and partitive as to that Totum the word world going before to this he says that If it be so then it restrains Gods love to some and not to others I answer No but it it shews by whom and by what way the utmost end of this love or most choise blessing of it is to be injoyed Gods love in providing a Medium through which men might look for and meet with salvation respects the world in generall nor doth that saying that whosoever believes put a bar against any of the world as if they might not in looking up to Christ be saved but it implies that the world as simply such or as in that state of sin and blindness in which God out of pity sent his Son for it is not the object of Gods absolute intention to give eternall life but those of it that believe and the word Whosoever is both an incouragement for all or any to believe and carries in it a supposition that the whole VVorld likely might not believe As the setting up the brazen Serpent to whom Christ is compared ver 14. was an act of love to all the strange Israelites though the benefit of healing was to be obtained in their looking up to it and by none of them that refused to look up so was the gift of Christ to the world though the unbeliever not receiving him is not saved But then 2. He denies that that phrase is restrictive but only declarative of his end how it s not restrictive I have even now said but that its Distinctive not taking in the whole world as the certain Object or subject of eternall life is shewed also and is very evident I conceive to all that have but common judgment and so that it s not only Declarative of his end but declarative of it in such a way or expression as implies that the Object that injoyes that end may at least be fewer then the object of giving him to such an end It s not that all the world shall not perish but that whosoever believeth perish not c. Besides no other Scripture says that the whole world for whom Christ was given did or shall believe on him but expresly to the contrary that some to whom God gave Him as the true bread saw and believed not Iohn 6.32 36. and that many to whom he came received him not He came to his own things amongst which his own Nation was and his own Nation or people received him not So that for his exposition we have nothing but his bare saying and that offering violence to the Text too as if it had been said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that it should believe and be saved c. indeed he after adds some reasons we shall weigh them also 1. His first is From what he said before about that love wherewith he loved it which was such a love as cannot be extended to All which being refuted before needs no further Answer See before Li. 3. Ca. 9. The world of mankinde share in this great act of Gods love the sending forth of Christ and yet not all attaine the utmost intention of it 2. His second is from vers 17. Giving a reason of this that he says it was an act of his love to the world whereof he gives a double proofe one Negative he sent him not to condemne the world the other affirmative but that the world through him might be saved he says the word World there must needs signifie believers and Elect because it s said that the World through him might be saved which if it be understood of any but believers God must needs fail of his end This is answered before in the first Chapter of the first Book where he have shewed 1. That the word saved is sometimes used in a lower sense then the having eternal life as the deliverance out of that condemnation fore-come upon us and so the world may be said to be saved and the grace of God saving to All men Tit. 2.11 Rom. 5.18 1 Tim. 2.6 2. That such speeches do not always declare the intention of God which he will bring about but an end propounded to men which they in attending to the means set before them ought to press after and might attain to and that its his good will they should look after it and in looking after it attain to it See the Instances thereof Acts 17.26 27. Joh. 1.7 Psal 105.44 45. Like to which is this He sent his Son into the world not to condemn the world but that the world through him might be saved that is That he being filled with authority power and sufficiency to save them they might have him as a Saviour or way to salvation to look and listen to and in walking in his Light and Truth might attain salvation Which end set before them they many of them miss by despising him who is the way to it Therefore our Saviour distributing the world in two parts in the next verse tells us not who might have been saved
ever that were broken off might and did miss of by observing lying vanities forsaking their own mercies Jonas 2.8 either by unbelief or negligence in a vain cursory receit of the Ordinances and grace of Reconciliation therein tendered So that neither doth that conclude the thing intended namely that by the word world is there meant only Gods Elect and Chosen His proof from Colos 1.6 Lib. 3. ca. 6. We have before spoken to in Chap. 1. That of 2 Cor. 5.19 We have also spoken to largely before in the Chapter about Reconciliation Onely I shall add here that the word world cannot there mean the Elect onely for then no need of fearing that any toward whom that grace was vouchsafed should receive it in vain as is intimately feared by the Apostle Chap. 6.1.2 As for the Argument used from the Non-imputation there spoken of we have shewed it to be weak also God reckoned not the sins of the world to it in that he winked at them and did not demand satisfaction at their hands for them but preached forgiveness to them which indeed was a very great blessing but it comes to life and happiness onely upon them that receive it and believe as the Apostle says Rom. 4.6 7 9. His reasons why the Elect should be called the world as they are especially the three first very slender ones so they do all fall to the ground except it can be first proved that it is so called 4. His fourth Reason is like Nicodemus's How can these things be Why doth not God give the Gospel to all then who do any perish c. He might as well say If God brought Israel out of Egypt that they might go to Canaan why did he not make them all trust in him and carry them all thither This is not to believe the VVord of God that says Christ is the Propitiation for the sins of the whole world c. But to set our Reason against it though we could say God hath told us more about his revealing Christ then he doth believe viz. That He is the true Light that inlightneth every man that comesin to the world But hewil there say too as the manner of our darkness and unbelief is at every truth of God that it cannotcomprehend Durus est hic sermo How can this be for he will scarce conceive that the Word can sparkle through the Humanity united to it into the hearts of every man except the Manhood too be plainly declared or that that divine being that the Gentiles are led to see in the VVorks of God is no other then the VVord that was incarnate and is the true God this may seem as strange to him as that to the Jews Before Abraham was I Am and may meet with as many stones about it For Truth is full of Paradoxes to the wisdom of the Flesh though plain to him that findes understanding Besides God hath sent his Gospel to All Nations and Peoples though many have put the light from them and chosen darkness rather even whole Countries and Peoples and therefore shall be justly condemned not for that they had it not but because when God sent it they received it not but have from age to age slighted and rejected it 5. He heaps up another nest of absurdities upon us As 1. That we cannot understand this to be All and Every man except we grant some to be loved hated from eternity But how our granting that should depend upon that large extent of the Word it will pose Reason it self to conceive and Scripture too Sure he meant Except we deny it as we do if by hatred he mean a purpose not to send his Son for them without their disobedience to his Son and the light extended through him to condemn and destroy them 2. He says We must make the Love of God toward innumerable to be fruitless and vain We deny that too For there-through they injoy their lives liberties patience bounty goodness hints of truth to their mindes some more some less as he sees fit in his wisdom and God shall receive much glory Though its true and no absurdity to say that some do reject much grace or receive it in vain in regard of many further fruits it would effect yea and turn that that was for their welfare into a snare Turning that grace and goodness into wantonness that should lead them to repentance 3. That then the Son of God is given to them that never hear word of him nor have any power to believe Answer It s not said He gave him to the world but gave him simply out of love to the world and give him he might for them to whom so properly he may not be said to give him I suppose you think he was given for if not also to some children that die in infancy and yet they never hear of him and so many former Jews might never hear of him distinctly as that he should be crucified and yet they had good by that they heard not of Death came in upon All through Adam though many never heard of him and so may and doth much mercy by Christ to such as never hear distinctly of him And did men in that mercy grope after God as the Apostles say they might haply finde him What power God gives to men to yield up to the light that comes from him I cannot say for others I am not in their bosoms but for my self I am sure more then I have acted forth and followed him in And that God gives no power to believe or at least soberly to attend to God that they might be helpt to believe but onely where men indeed do believe is as inevident as that God gave not power to Adam to forbear eating the forbidden fruit because he did not forbear I cannot see into those secrets how far God acts or acts not upon others but the not seeing such secrets shall be no reason to me to wave what is revealed if not plainly in this yet in other Scriptures of larger expression If Mr. Owen see into mens spirits and can tell us what God doth to all and how far he deals with them or finds the Scripture expressing it let him demonstrate to us that God doth give no power to any to attend to him in the ways wherein he useth to beget faith according to the means vouchsafed but onely to them that are actually brought to faith and I shall listen to him 4. He says Then God is mutable in his Love Answer That follows not for so far as he says he loved it he acted and never altered it he did give his Son and never reversed it that whosoever believes should not perish c. And yet we being mutable and corrupting our selves God may say to us as well as to Ephraim Hos 9.15 I will love them no more and yet the alteration in us onely not in him The effects of the same act may be different to an object without
in hand evidently sheweth for he saith not onely As by one offence judgement came untocondemnation so by one righteousness to justification of life but expresly maketh the comparison too in regard of their objects As by one offence to all men to condemnation so by one righteousnesse to All men to justification of life I would faine know of M. Ow. what the Apostle says in the 18. v. distinct from what he said before in the precedent verses taking away his equalizing of the Object So that that speech looks but like an Assertion of one resolved not to own a truth be it never so plainely exprest if it suit not with his own opinion that he maintaineth Again whereas he denies that Heb. 2.9 holds out that Christ stood in the roome of every man and refers us for proof to what he said to that Scripture his saying to it being proved impertinent and vaine already we need not here give him any further Answer Sure he that dyed for every man stood in the roome of every man in that his dying or else M. Owens own Argument from the force of the words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 chap. 10. lib. 3. are meer vanities Whereas he sayes further that no one word of God sayes that all men were given to Christ to redeem I answer nor did T. M. say so but having spoken of the Death of Christ in the roome of all mankind and his Resurrection he added by Parenthesis that they are all given him and shall be brought unto him quoting for proof Phil. 2.8.11 Rom. 14.9 which intimates his meaning to be that they were given into his dispose as upon his resurrection and that all are given to Christ in that sense Psal 2.8 9. fully declares I will give thee the Heathen for thine inheritance and the utmost parts of the Earth for thy possession and thou shalt rule them with an Iron Rod c. But I deny that ever the Scriptures say God gave any man to him that he should dye for him In dying for men he bought them rather and upon that God gave all to him in a generall way to rule over them and he gives him some by his gracious call to be his peculiar charge and to be set free by him from all their inthralments in conscience and from the power of pollution and temptation Whereas he sayes Christ is called the last Adam in respect of the efficacy of his death to the promised seed If he meane in that regard only it s but his meer Assertion and so till it be proved needs no more answering it being the same in substance with what he said before against the extent of the Object of his death contrary to Rom. 5.18 which we have even now answered Against this passage of T.M. that Christ by his death brought all men out of the Death they fell into by Adam he opposes this that the Death men fell into in Adam was a death in sin and the guilt of condemnation thereupon For which he quotes Ephes 2.1 2 3. To which I desire the Reader to remember what I said above about Redemption Chap. 5. lib. 3. that we fell into a twofold death in Adam one as the naturall and proper fruit and consequence of that sinning the deading all our powers to that that was spiritually good 2. The wages and punishment of this sin that is destruction and utter ruine Ioh. 8.31 32. The latter of these Christ bare for us not the former for then he should have had our pollution in him too which is crosse to truth Therefore when we speak of bringing us from the death we fell into in Adam we are to be understood of that Christ endured for us not the other which he brings us out of by his Word and Spirit received into us and not by his dying onely or Resurrection also And therefore M. Owen here prevaricates as in another passage fastned upon M. More he abuses him for he no where tells us as M. Owen charges him that the presenting himself just before the Father was the ultimate thing by Christ intended not a tittle that way He hath also many heavie words against M. More for saying God accepted the Sacrifice of Christ as if all had dyed risen sacrificed satisfied c. which spring from his owne mistake as if Christ in dying for All was said to dye and satisfie for all sins that ever they should or might commit and so procure an acquittance and discharge from them All to be without faile as on his part and what ever failing in any condition happen on their part made over unto all which as its contrary to those intimations that speak of their perishing for whom Christ dyed as a thing possible yea and of some ments pulling swift condemnation upon themselves whom he bought which could not be were that position true so it s also a gap to all carelesness and licentiousness for then let all men take what course they will Either Christ dyed for them or not if not no endeavour can do them good God is their enemy and hated them before they offended him even from all eternity and they must have no better do what they can then what the hatred of an Omnipotent God will produce unto them if he did Then eia agite nothing can pull a dram of wrath upon them their score are all wiped off both what they have run into and what they shall The Apostle never preached such Doctrine but that they that walk in the light as he is in it that walk not after the Flesh but after the Spirit that are rooted in the Faith and not moved from the hope of the Gospell shall have this benefit by Christs death that no condemnation shall befall them all their sins are cleansed c. Verily Christ putting himself into the place of Adam in the day that he sinned and in due time bearing that heavie death that else had seised on All and overcoming it and presenting himself to God as a Conqueror over it was far more acceptable to God then if all men in the world had dyed and overcome For we had done it but for our selves and out of love to our selves but he out of obedience to his Father and love to us and the same worke is far more acceptable to God when done out of Charity then when done out of selfe-love and meer necessity Beside the dignity of his Person and neernesse to his Father far above ours but I pass that too Heobjects further against T. M. because he sayes comparing Christ and Adam in respect of the effect and fruit of their works in the publick place that as by the sin of Adam all his posterity were in and by him deprived of that life and righteousnesse they had in him and are fallen under sin and death though secretly invisibly and in some sort inexpressibly so by the efficacy of the obedience of Christ All men without exception are redeemed
I finde no other price mentioned in the New Testament but the blood of Christ either as shed or as also testified if Mr. Owen doth let him shew it for us to devise prices is to add of our own heads to the Scriptures Now if Christ be the price it s not material whether we say that the Lord that bought them be God or Christ the act of buying or purchasing being attributed to both Acts 20.28 1 Cor. 6.20 Rev. 5.9 Christ buys men unto God and God buys men by Christ God gave Christ as a price to purchase men and Christ gave himself for and gives himself to men And there are these two things in this buying or price by which people are bought 1. Christ given by God and Himself to the Death for men that they might be preserved and delivered and from the destruction due to them in Adam 2. Christ given of God and by Himself to them in point of tender and free offer as in Joh. 6.32 and at least good things given unto them by and through him And as I understand none are said in Scripture to be bought or redeemed from their vain conversations or unto God from men till this price made known to them buy them off from their love to those other things and ingage them for God to be his Thence men reason inconsequently from those Scriptures which say By the blood of Christ men out of all Nations Peoples or Families are bought or redeemed to God As that in Rev. 5.9 and 14.4 and 1 Pet. 1.18 19. which speak of the efficacy of his blood declared and believed ingaging their hearts and spirits to and for God as Hosea bought him a wife by a price given her Hos 3.2 to deny the extent of Christs given himself a ransom and dying for men These two things then I understand in this place of Peter 1. That God had given Christ to the death and he gave himself a ransom for these false Teachers amongst all the rest of men and thereby they with all other were delivered from perishing in that sentence of death which should in Adam have else destroyed them and had with others their liberty to the Church and Kingdom of Christ 2. That God in the Gospel presenting this his love unto them and this his Son that dyed for them or the Son presenting himself so and so as the onely Lord and Saviour able and ready to save them with promises of salvation upon their submission to him bought them or disingaged their hearts from their former idols worships vain and evil ways called ver 20. the pollutions of the world and had ingaged and purchased their affections to his Gospel People Salvation and Glory set before them and so to the service of him and they now after all this denying him as the Israelites after their bodily redemption did Deut. 32.6 They brought upon themselves swift destruction If Mr. Owen would fasten any other sense upon this place he must shew us that any people are said to be bought or redeemed from their vain conversations as these were ver 20. for such are the pollutions of the world by any other price then the bloud of Jesus 1 Pet. 1.18 or 2. That some are bought with that for whom it was never shed That God glorifies it to and purchases those by it for whom it hath done nothing nor shall do any thing for we have proved and do believe him to have dyed for All. If he perform either of those two things we shall listen further to his exposition Whereas he sayes The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 answers to the Hebrew word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he deals not ingeniously with his Reader For the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in all those places he brings for proof of it viz. Deut. 7.8 15.15 and Jer. 15.21 and in all other places generally so far as I find yet is in the Greek translated by the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and not by the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and so those places of 1 Pet. 1.18 and Luke 1.78 may better be applyed to that observation that Mr. Owen thence makes then this The Hebrew word that Answers to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He objects further the Apostles not mentioning the Word Price Isa 55.1 But that 's frivilous for if we speak of buying things especially of Gods buying a price is necessarily intimated as the correlate to buying though we may buy the grace of God without price yet he buyes not us at that rate we are well paid for what ever God hath of us Whereas he would have this buying to be onely a deliverance by Gods goodnesse from the defilements of the world a seperation of them from them by the knowledge of the truth Besides that that note is grounded on his former mistake that the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 answers to the Hebrew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to deliver I would faine have him shew me that God extends any reall goodnesse to men without Christs buying them from their obligation to the misery contracted to them by Adam or else that rather confirmes that Christ dyed for them and the knowledge of him as so dying for them and able and ready thereby to save them bought them yea what else is it to know him Lord and Saviour How Lord but by dying for them especially how else a Saviour Againe did God give them any thing in that truth made known to them worthy their forsaking the world for him had they any share right interest in that truth namely in the knowledge of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ was there any good for them to get there for to be sure the worlds good they were not like to get by that knowledge in those dayes If yes then whence proceeded that if he never dyed for them if it declared no salvation as attainable by them would men leave all and expose themselves to persecutions for meer uncertainties when they could not be told that Christ had done any thing for them or God by Christ or that Christ was a Mediator for them to attaine to happinesse by If they had no right to the truth nor that had any thing of goodnesse in it for them what had they to doe with that truth that so little concerned them If he say it had matter of advantage in it for them for ought they knew they might think it had though it had not Then I answer they had made but a blind bargain and they knew not the Lord and Saviour Christ Jesus It was rather a mistake about him that gave them that escape from the worlds pollutions then any knowledge of him had they known him rightly they should have known that they had no such reason to let all go for him that had excluded them his mediation and could not save them not having dyed for them And then having made some tryall and
not finding that which they had mistakingly looked for but that he was a dry tree and barren wilderness to them was it not more excusable that they should leave him and take such comforts as the world would afford them and not go on to suffer for him that would not save them he having not dyed for them Whereas he further adds that the Apostle is silent about washing them in the bloud of the Lamb what a sorry shift is that How many places speak of buying men and yet mention not the washing them in the bloud of the Lamb where yet there is no doubt but his bloud was the price that bought them as to instance in Rev. 14.4 1 Cor. 6.20 Again What is it to wash in the bloud of the Lamb I feare there may be some mistake in that Is it any thing else but when the death sufferings or bloud of Christ declared in the Gospel set home by the Spirit do cause the heart for his loves sake that so loved it to renounce its vanities affections lusts c. and removes its fears despairs horrors c. that the guilt of sin before the remedy was known filled it with do we think that this washing the souls in the bloud of Jesus is without application of the bloud to it Was there ever such a washing heard of in which the medium of the washing and the thing washed were not to each other applyed Or do we fancy any bodily or materiall application of the materiall bloud of Christ that issued out of his side Sure it s nothing but through the Spirits revelation of the death and sufferings of Christ for us and the hope therein set before us a cleansing of the heart and conscience from guilt and pollution And is not that intimated here Is not the knowledge of Jesus Christ Lord and Saviour to know him as one that dyed for us and is appointed to be our Mediator and way to God able and ready to save us by vertue of those his sufferings for us could there be lesse in that knowledge of Christ that will give a man escape from the worlds pollutions and when that knowledge doth wash from pollutions is it not the bloud of Christ therein known that washes Was not that it that washed Paul from his former conceits in his Pharisaisme and from all his pollutions Phil. 3.7 8 9. Tit. 3.4 5 6. and that washed the believing Corinths 1 Cor. 6.11 because he names but the knowledge of Jesus Christ and the appearance of Gods love to man the name of Christ and Spirit of God as the way of his and their washings shall we say neither he nor they were washed in the bloud of Christ These are sorry evasions unmeet to shift off the shining truth with 3. But his last evasion is vainer then any of these viz. That he might speak of them only 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not according to Truth but according to appearance for which he quotes again that formerly answered place of 2 Chron. 28.23 As if the Apostle writing Dogmatically and laying down Propheticall declarations of things that would be and aggravating the hainousness of their sinne that should deny Christ should conjoyn things according to truth not conjungible If he had spoken of some particular person then in being there had been somewhat more shew for such an evasion and yet in truth not enough to make the Apostle couple as incompatible things together in his expressions as to talk of Christs or his Elects perishing But much lesse colour when he speaks of things in the Theory and Dogmatically not with Designation of this or that person This is but all one as to say Christ or God seemed but to be their Lord and Master and they to be his servants by way of purchase and so they had the more ground of denying him seeing he was not what he seemed to be nor had done what he seemed to do And whereas he addes That its the custome of the Scripture to ascribe all those things to every one that are in fellowship of the Church which are proper to them only that are true spirituall members of it as to be Saints Elect c. Not to examine the truth of that again were it so yet it could not be of force here these in the very formality of them as the subject spoken of being stiled false Teachers Sure though he might write to All in fellowship with the Church that is in Doctrine and Profession as Saints c. as in some sense they were truly yet it s not supposeable that he judged these he looks upon as departed from the Truth and false Teachers to be such or to be bought by Christ if he thought indeed such manner of people were never so bought To be a member of the Church and to be Elect are terms very competible but to be and so to be spoken of as a false Teacher bringing swift destruction on himself and yet in the same view to be looked upon and spoken of as bought by the Lord if no such are indeed bought is componere non componenda to couple words and things together that are we not competible like those that talk of Almighty nothings So that wee see no solidity in his exceptions to this place neither Whereas in his winding up he tels us that this will not conclude Vniversall Redemption and 2. That those who are so redeemed may perish is contrary to expresse Scripture and 3. That this could be no peculiar aggravation of the sin of any if the matter was common to All. These are but prevarications For 1. We conclude not hence the universality of Christs death but onely that it s not so bounded up to the Elect onely as Mr. Owen and his partners bound it 2. That its contrary to expresse Scripture as to Rev. 14.4 That any so redeemed should perish is a speech fallacious and untrue For 1. How knows he that that in Rev. 14.4 is expresse Scripture and speaks according to truth and not only according to appearance more then this might not we by as good Authority say that the Apostle speaks there but according as things seemed to him in a vision but not that all he sayes there is spoken according to truth as he hath to say so of Peter here 2. What means he by So redeemed if only that Christ dyed really for them and not in shew only and that the knowledge hereof and of that salvation that thereby is in him even for them to look after and attainable to them by Faith bought them really off from the world and engaged them to Christ then there is no such passage in Rev. 14.4 as that none such can perish That speaks onely of a certain number redeemed from the earth and men that were virgins and defiled not themselves but followed the Lamb where ever he went But it says not either that All bought by Christ and brought to escape the pollutions of the
their souls in particular whereby they become weary heavy laden and burdened 4. A serious full recumbency and resting the soul upon Christ in the promise of the Gospel as an Alsufficient Saviour able to deliver and save to the utmost them that come to God by him Ready able and willing through the preciousness of his blood and sufficiency of his ransom to save every soul that shall freely give up themselves to him for that end amongst whom he is resolved to be one Now says he in doing all this there is none called on by the Gospel once to inquire after the purpose and intention of God concerning the particular object of the death of Christ every one being fully assured that his Death shall be profitable to them that believe in him and obey him but after all this and not before it lies upon a believer to assure his soul of the good will and eternal love of God to him to send his Son to dye for him in particular I might here return him his own words with admiration Oh what a preposterous course is this and how differing from the right way of the Gospel 1. I would know what is that Gospel that men in the first place are to believe to be true Is it onely that Jesus Christ is the power and wisdom of God to salvation and the connexion of faith and salvation That we have shewed before to be untrue The Word of God it self tells us that the Gospel used to tell men of Christs being sent of God to turn them in particular from their sins and to lay down that as the ground of Repentance and believing on him 1 Tim. 2 4.6 And the Apostlesays expresly that that wâs the Testimony or Gospel that God ordained and sent him to preach ver 7. Acts 3.26 And that God would have all to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth for there is one God and one Mediator between God and man the Man Christ Jesus who gave himself a ransom for All and can a man believe that to be true and not believe that he gave himself a ranson for him Is he no body So that what he says in this first step overthrows him But 2. See the preposterousness of these men that that the Apostle writ about the High-Priesthood of Christ to the believers as peculiarly useful for them to lead them up to perfection in their faith and confidence viz. That Christ hath the office of an unchangeable Priesthood is able to save to the utmost all that come to God by him because he ever liveth to make intercession for them that is here produced as the ground to draw in unbelievers though the intercession there mentioned is not affirmed there for any as while yet unbelievers and on the other hand that which the Apostle tells us was the Testimony whereof God had made him a Minister an Apostle to preach to the Gentiles that were ignorant of God as that before repeated that is not to be preached as true for any ones particular and as so to be believed by him till they are made believers Who would think that wise men should go so preposterous a way but that its the judgement of God for their leaning to their own wisdom and no more then is fore-prophesied that God will destroy the wisdom of the wise c. 3. He impertinently mixes the object of faith with the operations of that object attended to and believed as conviction by the Spirit of their need of a Redeemer and recumbency in him with the truths of God that lead to that convincement and reliance on him The Argument is about the object of faith needful to be believed by all that hear the Gospel that they may believe to justification And he tells us of an order in the operations of God upon mens spirits before they believe as they should do And yet he minds not that the convincement of the great sin of unbelief is not kindly effected till men see they have ground of believing and yet believe not till when the heart rather thinks it is sin and presumption to believe But when it sees that Christ hath done so much for it then it must needs be convinced that it sins greatly in not betrusting it self wholly to him 4. He confounds the object of faith about the Mediation of Christ and the object of his Death with the secret Purpose and Counsel of God about our particular right to and injoyment of eternal salvation 5. He talks of rolling the soul upon Christ in a Promise whenas he cannot prove that any can have him in a Promise to be rolled on further then he is supposed first to have dyed for him the Promises being sealed in his blood and the way of closing with them is believing in his blood which how should men do whâ—le its wholly doubtful to them whether they have any thing to do with his blood or nor Indeed 6. He supposes that a soul is brought to believe in God and to trust in his mercie through Christ before it know of any love in God toward it whereas he uses to draw with the cords of love and testimonies of his goodness It s goodness seen in him leads us to repentance It s not only a letting sinners see a need of a Saviour that there is one able to save them that go to God by him that will suffice to draw in a man that yet cannot see him as a way for him to go to God by as he is not for any otherwise then he hath died for them Heb. 10.19 20. to rowl himself upon God for salvation Never yet could any sinner that indeed was convinced to be so and to be under wrath and that saw Gods Justice and Anger against him hope in and expect help from God by Christ not being first perswaded that Christ had done so much for him that he might have salvation through him Many men may delude themselves and take their own self-actings for acts of Grace as the Pharisee did Luke 18.10 11. and from their endeavors and self reformations seem to commit themselves to God and conclude themselves to be believers that yet never knew what it is rightly to believe The true Gospel-believers believe through Grace 2 Cor. 6.1 as they Acts 18.27 That is by the grace and goodwill of God declared to them in the Gospel The grace of God appearing to them teaches them to live godlily and saves them from their former disobedient condition Tit. 2.11 12. and 3.4 5. They do no per 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Pharisee argue Gods grace towards them by their frames towards him that God loved them first because they as they conceive love him but on the contrary they therefore love him because he first loved them and sent his Son for them Believing Gods Testimony of what Christ hath done for them they are helped through the power of God to believe
not ever true that he that believes that God delivered him from one danger is confident he will from another much less That that belief in all that so believe yea or in any is the confidence that he will deliver from another 2. Whereas he askes if it include not a sense of the spirituall love of Christ I answer That where the Death and Resurrection of Christ are opened to the heart by the Holy Ghost there the love of God is shed abroad into the heart also but not wherever this proposition is believed viz. Christ dyed for me many a man believes that and yet seeth not into the glory of it nor the depth of goodness held forth in it and so hath not the love of God therethrough shed into his heart yet the minding God in this is the way to meet with the holy Ghosts displaying that love Many Israelites believed that God brought them out of Egypt 2 Pet. 1.9 that had not such a view of his power and love therein or at least like them that forget that they were purged from their old sins forgat what they had seen as to be lead to confidence in God for the future by it 3. Whereas he says By this a man must believe before he believe What strange thing is that with reference to diverse acts of believing did not he himself say that we must have a faith of reliance and recumbence in Christ and before that too believe many truths of the Gospell before we can believe that Christ dyed for us so that there is believing before believing and believing before believing again and yet he counts that absurd in us when we say only we must believe the word of God to be true before we can by it be led to believe in God we must believe Gods goodwill to us-ward and a medium provided for us by whom to go to God before we can be perswaded to go to him by faith whom otherwise we look upon as angry and dreadfull ready to consume us We cannot put our confidence in his blood and there through rise up to assurance of eternall life except we first be perswaded that he shed his blood for us So long as we doubt whether he be a Mediator for us or no and whether he hath given himself to ransome us from death we shall doubt whether God will accept us or no or whether he hare us from eternity or not and whether we have any thing to do to take incouragement from the blood of Christ to approach him because we know not we have any right unto it Nor can Master Owen nor all the world beside to help him make it appear to be otherwise but that the soul will question whether it may expect salvation from God or betrust it self with God so long as it knows not but he hates it and Christ hath never done any thing with him for it 3. He denies That a perswasion that it was Gods will that Christ should dy for him in particular neither is nor can be necessary that a sinner be drawn to believe because other grounds will do it without The consequence of this is that many things were spoken unnecessarily by the Apostles Act. 3.26 as when Peter says Christ was sent to turn every one of them from their iniquities And Paul that the grace of God reconciling the world 2 Cor. 5.19 20. 6.1 was to them Corinthians to perswade them to be reconciled That he preached to the Corinths in the first place that Christ dyed for our sins 1 Cor. 15.2 3. And so all those generall phrases that include mens particulars But let us see what other grounds he gives viz. That it is the duty of sinners as such to believe Math. 11.28 Isa 55.1 To believe in what in the blood of Christ as Rom. 3.25 Then it supposes it shed for them all and so it s a truth according to the Gospell-declaration but denying the extent of his Death how can he make it out that sinners as such * A quatenus ad omne valet consequentia which reaches to All sinners ought to believe in Christ What have sinners if not Elect to do with Christ besides he had said before they must be sinners so and so convinced and qualified before they are to be called upon to believe in Christ And I fear he will upon second thoughts say that those Scriptures hold forth that sinners not as such but as so qualified with thirsting after Christ and being weary c. are there required to believe but many a soul is hereby put upon doubting whether it be Elected or so convinced and thirsty c. as is required and so whether God be not an enemy to it from eternity and so whether it hath cause of trusting in him 2. The command of God John 3.23 That shews it to be its duty if it could be proved to extend to it for that says That we believe in his name and a soul may more justly doubt whether that We reach to it seeing they that deny the extent of Christs Death and teach it to doubt of it use such applicatives as We to oppose an Universality and to signify but the Elect and Church c. This therefore yet leaves the soul to doubt whether it may hope in him for salvation especially being told that these things God sends to men indefinitely that the Elect onely might be brought to him he hath no goodwill to any other and that its Elect it knows not commands to believe while men are taught to doubt whether the object to be believed in as such pertains to them can give no more security from doubting then the building with one hand and pulling down with another secures the building from falling 3. The threats against unbelief That indeed doth as much as the threat for not keeping the Law fils the soul with terror on every side while it hears that God commands more to believe then have cause so to do and threatens them for not believing and yet gives them nothing to induce them to it no evidence of his goodwill to them to draw them to believe this may fill them with hard thoughts of God representing him to them like one that bids another eat or else he will kill him but yet gives him no meat to feed on no evidence of his goodness that may induce him to hope and trust in him 4. The alsufficiency of the blood of Christ to save all believers This may make the soul say O how happy are they that do believe and that have his blood to drink for its able to save them but as for me I know not whether it belong to me or not or whether one drop of it was shed for me and so how I can lean upon it I hear it s not sufficient to save any that it was not shed for not for want of inward worth in it but because it s not for them and I may