A30241:806
CXLV expository sermons upon the whole 17th chapter of the Gospel according to St.…
CXLV expository sermons upon the whole 17th chapter of the Gospel according to St. John, or, Christs prayer before his passion explicated, and both practically and polemically improved by Anthony Burgess ...
London: printed by Abraham Miller for Thomas Underhill, 1656
Title page typeset from the transcription.
Sermon 32: Of the peculiar Propriety Gods People have in him and he in them.
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.
Secondly, This right and propriety is mutually reciprocal; God is theirs and they are Gods, only Gods propriety in them is the cause of their propriety in God, You have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, saith Christ, Joh. 15.16. So that this is very comfortable to observe, that this right is mutual, God is their God, and they are his people, God challengeth them as his, and they may claim God as theirs▪ as you see the Covenant of grace runneth reciprocally, I will be their God and they shall be my people, Jer. 31.33. this is expressed under those similitudes of a Vine and a branch, of an husband and a Wife; The wife hath power over and right to her husband as well as the Husband to the Wife, The Vine hath a relation to the branches as well as the branches to the Vine, only as the good of the branch lieth in being in the Vine, but the Vine doth not fetch succour from the branch; So it's here, we are the Lords and the Lord is ours, only the Lord hath no advantage, nor hath he any good in that we are his, but the cause of our happiness is that he is ours, so then let the people of God know, that the ground and rise of all their spiritual advantage is because God hath a propriety in them, not so much because they have a propriety in God; It's because God loveth them, God will not loose what is his, that they are preserved from sin and hell; Indeed till we be actually Gods by believing, though we be his by Election, yet we cannot make use of our Interest; That is hidden and secret; Paul though he was the Lords by Election before the foundations of the world, yet till brought home, till believing, he cannot say, the Lord is his, Therefore till God be ours both by Election and the saving effects of it, we cannot say, I am my Beloveds, and my Beloved is mine, Cant. 2.16.
Secondly, This right and propriety is mutually reciprocal; God is theirs and they are Gods, only Gods propriety in them is the cause of their propriety in God, You have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, saith Christ, Joh. 15.16. So that this is very comfortable to observe, that this right is mutuall, God is their God, and they are his people, God challengeth them as his, and they may claim God as theirs as you see the Covenant of grace runneth reciprocally, I will be their God and they shall be my people,