A09376:49
A cloud of faithful witnesses, leading to the heavenly Canaan, or, A commentary upon…A cloud of faithfull witnesses, leading to the heauenly Canaan, or, A commentarie vpon…
A cloud of faithful witnesses, leading to the heavenly Canaan, or, A commentary upon the 11 chapter to the Hebrews preached in Cambridge by that godly, and judicious divine, M. William Perkins ; long expected and desired, and therefore published at the request of his executors, by Will. Crashawe and Tho. Pierson, preachers of Gods Word, who heard him preach it, and wrote it from his mouth.A cloud of faithfull witnesses, leading to the heauenly Canaan, or, A commentarie vpon the 11 chapter to the Hebrewes preached in Cambridge by that godly, and iudicious divine, M. William Perkins ; long expected and desired, and therefore published at the request of his executours, by Will. Crashawe and Tho. Pierson, preachers of Gods Word, who heard him preach it, and wrote it from his mouth.
London: printed by Humphrey Lownes for Leo. Greene, 1607London: printed by Humfrey Lownes for Leo. Greene, 1607
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
First, whereas faith gives a substance, and being to things that are not, we learn that the Fathers in the old Testament that lived afore the incarnation of Christ, were truly partakers of the body and blood of Christ.
First, whereas faith giues a substance, and being to things that are not, we learne that the Fathers in the old Testament that liued afore the incarnation of Christ, were truly partakers of the body and bloud of Christ.
If any allege that this is strange, considering that Christ had then no body & blood, neither had he any until the Incarnation: & how then could they receive that, which then was not?
If any alledge that this is strange, considering that Christ had thē no body & bloud, neither had he any vntil the Incarnatiō: & how thē could they receiue that, which thē was not?
I grant it is true, they then had no being, and yet the Fathers received them: but how can this be? I answer by the wonderful power of saving faith, which makes things that are not in nature, to have in some sort a being & subsistence: and so was Christ (though he was to come) present to the believers of the old time. For, Apoc. 13.8. Christ is a Lamb slain from the beginning of the world: That is, slain as well then as now: and that not only in the counsel & decree of God, whereby he ⟨p. 7⟩is borne & slain in all times and places: nor only in regard of the eternal power, efficacy, and merit of his death: but also even in respect of the heart of the believer, whose faith makes that, that is locally absent, after a sort truly and really present: even so also is Christ a Lamb slain even from the beginning of the world.