A09950:143
The Breastplate of Faith and Love
The breast-plate of faith and love. A treatise, wherein the ground and exercise of faith and love, as they are set upon Christ their object, and as they are expressed in good works, is explained. / Delivered in 18 sermons upon three several texts, by the late faithful and worthy minister of Jesus Christ, John Preston, Dr. in Divinity, chaplain in ordinary to his Majesty, Master of Emmanuel College in Cambridge, and sometimes preacher of Lincolns Inn.The breast-plate of faith and love. A treatise, wherein the ground and exercise of faith and love, as they are set upon Christ their object, and as they are expressed in good workes, is explained. / Delivered in 18 sermons upon three severall texts, by the late faithfull and worthy minister of Iesus Christ, Iohn Preston, Dr. in Divinity, chaplaine in ordinary to his Maiesty, Master of Emmanuel Colledge in Cambridge, and sometimes preacher of Lincolnes Inne.
London: printed by W. Jones for Nicolas Bourne, 1630London: printed by W. Iones for Nicolas Bourne, 1630
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.
As a quality it works; and in this sense it hath nothing to do with Justification.
As a quality it workes; and in this sense it hath nothing to doe with Justification.
It justifieth us as it is an instrument,1 and that not by altering the nature of sin; that is, by making sin to be no sin, but by taking away the efficacy of sin.2 As, for example, when a man hath committed sins, Faith doth not make his sins to be no sins; indeed, it scattereth them as a Cloud: You may consider it after this manner: First, it cannot be that that sin that is once committed, should be made to be no sin; for what is once done, it cannot be undone, GOD himself ⟨p. 60⟩cannot do that, because it is a thing that cannot be; for when the sins are committed, they do remain so: and therefore, I say, it cannot be that that which is sin should be made to be no sin; we cannot make Adultery to be no adultery, for the nature and essence of the thing must remain. Well now what doth faith? It doth this, though the sin be the same that it was, yet it takes away the sting and the guilt of sin, by which it puts us into the state of condemnation, and by which it binds us over to punishment. As the Lions to which Daniel was cast, they were the same as they were before, they had the same propenseness, and disposition to devour as they had before, they had the ordinary nature of Lions; but at that time, GOD took away from them that fierceness that was in them, so that they did not devour him, though they were there still: so it is with sin, the nature of sin is to condemn us▪ but now when GOD shall take away this efficacy from it, it doth not condemn: and this is that that faith doth.