A09990:176
The new covenantThe nevv covenant
The new covenant, or the saints portion A treatise unfolding the all-sufficiency of God, and mans uprightness, and the covenant of grace. delivered in fourteen sermons upon Gen. 17. 1. 2. Whereunto are adjoined four sermons upon Eccles. 9.1. 2. 11. 12. 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 nevv covenant, or the saints portion A treatise vnfolding the all-sufficiencie of God, and mans uprightnes, and the covenant of grace. delivered in fourteene sermons vpon Gen. 17. 1. 2. Wherevnto are adioyned foure sermons vpon Eccles. 9.1. 2. 11. 12. By the late faithfull and worthie minister of Iesus Christ Iohn Preston. Dr. in Divinitie, chaplaine in ordinary to his Maiestie, maister of Emmanuel Colledge in Cambridge, and sometimes preacher of Lincolnes Inne.
London: printed by I. Dawson for Nicolas Bourne, 1629
Part › Sermon 4: THE FOURTH SERMON.Part › Sermon 4: THE FOVRTH SERMON.
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.
For hence comes the difficulty:1 how shall the strength of my lusts, this crooked and perverse heart of mine, and the straight ways of God stand together?
For hence comes the difficultie:1 how shall the strength of my lusts, this crooked and perverse heart of mine, and the straight wayes of God stand together?
- 1Ob.
It is very true.1 Is thy heart continue in that temper, it is impossible;2 but the Lord, that is All-sufficient, is able to take away that reluctancy: for he doth in the work of grace, as he doth in the work of nature: he doth not as we do, when we would have an Arrow go to the mark, when we throw a stone upward, we are not able to change the nature of it, but we put it on by force: God carries all things to their end, by giving them a nature suitable to that end. An Archer makes an impression upon an Arrow, but it is a violent impression; God carries every thing to that end, to which he hath appointed it; but with this difference, he makes not a violent impression, but a natural impression, & therefore he doth it not by an only immediate hand of his own, as we do, but he causeth the Creature to go on of it self, to this or to that purpose, to this or that end. And so he doth in the work of grace; he doth not carry a man on to the ways of righteousness, leaving him in the state of nature, taking him as he is, but he takes away that heart of his, and imprints the habits of grace in it, and he changeth a mans heart, so that he is carried willingly to the ways of God, as the creature is carried by a natural instinct to its own place, or to the thing it desires. So that thou mayst think thus with thy self: It is true; if I have my old heart, my old lusts