A30243:2253
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 10 › Sermon 88
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.
First, Natural tenderness ariseth from the bodily constitution, or natural temperament of a man; whereas this gracious softness is the work of God in a supernatural way: Thus in the Text, I will give the heart of flesh: God as the Author of grace makes this; so Zach. 12. I will pour upon them the spirit of prayer, and they shall mourn for their sin, Rom. 8. Those groans unutterable, which came from an heart of flesh, are wholly attributed to the spirit of God; so that the tender heart of the one, is like Egypt, that is not made fruitful by rain from heaven; whereas the other comes only from above: If then you go to the fountains from whence these streams flow, they are as far distant as heaven and earth; and if ye see them both melting and dissolving into tears, under the chastisements and judgements of God upon them; the one hath a spring from under the earth, the other from heaven above: Do not therefore presently conclude grace is there, when you see a tender, soft, yielding disposition, for this may come from nature, as well as grace; it may be a natural complexion, not a principle of Sanctification within.
First, Natural tenderness ariseth from the bodily constitution, or natural temperament of a man; whereas this gracious sofness is the work of God in a supernatural way: Thus in the Text, I will give the heart of flesh: God as the Author of grace makes this; so Zach. 12. I will pour upon them the spirit of prayer, and they shall mourn for their sin, Rom. 8. Those groans unutterable, which came from an heart of flesh, are wholly attributed to the spirit of God; so that the tender heart of the one, is like Egypt, that is not made fruitful by rain from heaven; whereas the other comes onely from above: If then you go to the fountains from whence these streams flow, they are as far distant as heaven and earth; and if ye see them both melting and dissolving into tears, under the chastisements and judgements of God upon them; the one hath a spring from under the earth, the other from heaven above: Do not therefore presently conclude grace is there, when you see a tender, soft, yielding disposition, for this may come from nature, as well as grace; it may be a natural complexion, not a principle of Sanctification within.