A30243:2467
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 11 › Sermon 98
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.
Thus you see the Text runneth without any Ifs; God will take away the heart of stone, nothing shall frustrate his intention. The Lord hath said it and it will come to passe. Iter ad gratiam is per gratiam, perque ipsam venitur ad ipsam. Grace makes way for it self. As by the light of the Sun, we come to see the Sun, God doth not only offer grace to the heart, but sanctifieth the heart to receive it. He doth not only give the oil but the cruise to receive it. He giveth the bread of life, and the stomach also to eat it.
Thus you see the Text runneth without any Ifs; God will take away the heart of stone, nothing shall frustrate his intention. The Lord hath said it and it will come to passe. Iter ad gratiam is per gratiam, perque ipsam venitur ad ipsam. Grace makes way for it self. As by the light of the Sun, we come to see the Sun, God doth not only offer grace to the heart, but sanctifieth the heart to receive it. He doth not only give the oil but the cruise to receive it. He giveth the bread of life, and the stomack also to eat it.
To open this Doctrine, Consider
First, That a promise is a far more comfortable thing then a mere prediction. God doth many times merely fore-tell what he will do, but at other times he doth also promise what he will do: a prophecy of what will be, and a promise differ very much. This Text is not a mere prediction, or a mere prophecy, but it is a gracious ⟨p. 575⟩promise: Now a Promise is only of that which is good, either temporal or spiritual, but a Prophecy or Prediction may be of that which is evil, as well as what is good: All the desolations and calamities that came upon Jerusalem, were prophesied of; but we cannot say they were promised, for Promises are to be embraced, as Paul excellently expresseth it,