A30243:1259
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 6 › Sermon 46
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.
1. From the Efficient cause, God rich in mercy; with the impulsive cause, For his great love wherewith he loved us.
2. From the Meritorious, or as the Logicians call it, the Procatarcticall cause, moving God from without, through Christ Jesus.
3. From the Final cause, To show forth the exceeding riches of his Glory. From this description so magnificent and full of spiritual glory, ariseth verse 8. a sure and solid proposition, By grace ye are saved: From the first to the last, all is of Grace: And grace that is without us, viz. The good love of God, not any dwelling in us. We are saved: Salvation is here either put for justification, because by that we are entitled to heaven, or else we are said to be already saved, because we have the seal and pledge of it here; and it is begun in us, and also we have a sure right to it: ⟨p. 284⟩and qui jus habet ad rem, rem ipsam videtur habere: some understand salvation, as much as a purgation, or deliverance from sin; for as sin is called death, so freedom from it, may be called life and salvation: it comes all to one. In the next place we have the instrumental cause of our salvation, and that is Faith: And lest we should be thought to have this faith of our selves, as if God indeed gave his mercy & grace to those that believe, but we did believe by our own power; God giveth the Oil, and we bring the vessel to receive it, he presently addeth, and that not of your selves, it is the gift of God: And as if the spirit of God would herein expressly provide against all those subtle opinions that craftily undermine Grace, he further addeth by way of opposition, Not of works, giving also a reason of the whole, lest any man should boast: Whereupon my Text is brought in as a reason to prove all is of Grace, For we are his workmanship. The strength of this argument lieth upon that rule in Logic, Nothing can be a cause and effect too, in the same consideration. But our works and holiness, they are the effects of his grace: We are his workmanship, therefore they cannot be a cause; and yet lest by magnifying of Grace, and setting up of faith, excluding all that we do, he might seem to jostle out good works, and an holy life, he saith, We are created in Christ to do them, only they are effects flowing from grace, not causes producing grace. I shall at this time only insist upon the Apostles reason set down generally in the Text. We are his workmanship, [Greek or Hebrew], his figment, translate some, his Creature, others; our translators well, His workmanship.