A30243:1114
Spiritual refining
Spiritual refining: or A treatise of grace and assurance Wherein are handled, the doctrine of assurance. The use of signs in self-examination. How true graces may be distinguished from counterfeit. Several true signs of grace, and many false ones. The nature of grace under divers Scripture notions or titles, as regeneration, the new-creature, the heart of flesh, vocation, sanctification, &c. Many chief questions (occasionally) controverted between the orthodox and the Arminians. As also many cases of conscience. Tending to comfort and confirm saints. Undeceive and convert sinners. Being CXX sermons preached and now published by Anthony Burgess sometime fellow of Emanuel College in Cambridge, and now pastor of the church of Sutton-Coldfield in Warwickshire.Spiritual refining: or A treatise of grace and assurance Wherein are handled, the doctrine of assurance. The use of signs in self-examination. How true graces may be distinguished from counterfeit. Several true signs of grace, and many false ones. The nature of grace under divers Scripture notions or titles, as regeneration, the new-creature, the heart of flesh, vocation, sanctification, &c. Many chief questions (occasionally) controverted between the orthodox and the Arminians. As also many cases of conscience. Tending to comfort and confirm saints. Undeceive and convert sinners. Being CXX sermons preached and now published by Anthony Burgess sometime fellow of Emanuel Colledge in Cambridge, and now pastor of the church of Sutton-Coldfield in Warwickshire.
London: printed by A. Miller for Thomas Underhill, 1652
Title page typeset from the transcription.
A TREATISE OF GRACE and ASSURANCE; Being CXX. SERMONS. › Section 5 › Sermon 40
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.
Fifthly, God doth not accept our religious services without this new Creature, 1because they cannot be so much as called good, and holy in a Scripture-sense without this. God saith not unto thee as unto the Centurion, Thy Prayers are heard; Neither doth God, as it's said of Noah's Sacrifice, smell a sweet savour, till thou art made new, and changed from thy Original estate. For they are not good or well done, because to have a good action there is required all the conditions, Bonum est ex integris causis, malum e quolibet defectu, one defect is enough to make an action evil, but it cannot be good unless all circumstances are concurrent; now the Scripture, to have it good praying, good hearing, requireth; First, That the man himself be made good: Make the Tree good, and then the Fruit will be good; Cleanse the inside first: The heart is the good Treasure; so that a man cannot do any thing after a godly manner but by a renewed nature, he may do it after a customary and seeming religious manner, so that men may admire it, but he cannot do it with a gracious foundation, till his nature be healed: Then as the principle must be good, so the manner also, that is, after a fervent, zealous and heavenly manner, not with a mere lip-labour, or bodily presence; there must be motions and earnest stirrings of heart: Take heed how you hear, and pray with groans unutterable: and lastly, as you heard all this must be to God, pleasing God, aiming at God, looking at God, and not at man; so that all our spiritual duties are to be of him, and by him, and to him; and no wonder if so much be required to the right discharge of any holy duty, for Aristotle requires as much to any virtuous action; He saith, That only can be called a righteous action which is, justa, à justo, justa, from a just man, in a just manner; and so that is only a godly duty, which is done by a godly man, in a godly manner, to a godly end.
Fifthly, God doth not accept our religious services without this new Creature, 1because they cannot be so much as called good, and holy in a Scripture-sense without this. God saith not unto thee as unto the Centurion, Thy Prayers are heard; Neither doth God, as it's said of Noah's Sacrifice, smell a sweet savour, till thou art made new, and changed from thy Originall estate. For they are not good or well done, because to have a good action there is required all the conditions, Bonum est ex integris causis, malum e quolibet defectu, one defect is enough to make an action evil, but it cannot be good unlesse all circumstances are concurrent; now the Scripture, to have it good praying, good hearing, requireth; First, That the man himself be made good: Make the Tree good, and then the Fruit will be good; Cleanse the inside first: The heart is the good Treasure; so that a man cannot do any thing after a godly manner but by a renewed nature, he may doe it after a customary and seeming religious manner, so that men may admire it, but he cannot do it with a gracious foundation, till his nature be healed: Then as the principle must be good, so the manner also, that is, after a fervent, zealous and heavenly manner, not with a meer lip-labour, or bodily presence; there must be motions and earnest stirrings of heart: Take heed how you hear, and pray with groans unutterable: and lastly, as you heard all this must be to God, pleasing God, aiming at God, looking at God, and not at man; so that all our spirituall duties are to be of him, and by him, and to him; and no wonder if so much be required to the right discharge of any holy duty, for Aristotle requires as much to any virtuous action; He saith, That onely can be called a righteous action which is, justa, à justo, justa, from a just man, in a just manner; and so that is onely a godly duty, which is done by a godly man, in a godly manner, to a godly end.