A26892:1380
A Christian Directory
A Christian directory, or, A sum of practical theology and cases of conscience directing Christians how to use their knowledge and faith, how to improve all helps and means, and to perform all duties, how to overcome temptations, and to escape or mortify every sin : in four parts ... / by Richard Baxter.A Christian directory, or, A summ of practical theologie and cases of conscience directing Christians how to use their knowledge and faith, how to improve all helps and means, and to perform all duties, how to overcome temptations, and to escape or mortifie every sin : in four parts ... / by Richard Baxter.
London: printed by Robert White for Nevill Simmons, 1673
Title page typeset from the transcription.
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.
I. To Trust in God is, upon the apprehension of the All-sufficiency, Goodness and faithfulness of1 God, to quiet our hearts in the expectation of the safety or benefits from him which we desire, rejecting the cares, and fears, and griefs that would disquiet them, if they had not the refuge of these hopes. It containeth in it a crediting the Word or Nature of God, or judging it to be a sufficient ground of our security and expectation: And then security and expectation built upon that ground make up the rest of the nature of trust. Looking for the benefit, and finding a complacency and quietness of mind, in the ground discovered, and ceasing all other cares and fears which would else disquiet us. Aquinas and other School-men often call Affiance, spes roborata, a confirmed hope. There is a twofold Trust in God• One is for that which he hath not promised to do: but yet we think that we find reason sufficient from his Nature it self, and relations, to expect: This may be more or less certain and strong, as our collection of the Will of God from his Nature, is more or less sure and clear. The other is, when we have not only Gods Nature, but his Promise also to trust upon: And this giveth us a certainty (it we certainly understand his promise.) To the last sort I may reduce that trust in God for particular benefits, when we have only a promise in General, which maketh not the particulars known and c•rtain to us: As the promise that all shall work together for our good, doth give us but a probability of health or outward protection and deliverances, because we are uncertain how far they are for our good. All that is promised is sure: But whether this or that be good for us, must be otherwise known. But those general promises which contain particulars as surely known as the promise it self, do make every one of the particular benefits as sure by promise as the general: As the promise of the pardon of all our sins, ascertaineth us of the pardon of every sin in particular. Where there is a promise, we Trust Gods faithfulness as well as his Nature; but where there is none, we Trust his Nature only. As a Child doth quietly trust his Parents, without a promise, that they will not kill, or torment, or forsake him.
I. To Trust in God is, upon the apprehension of the All-sufficiency, Goodness and faithfulness of1