A30345:115
A treatise of the covenant of grace wherein the gradual breakings out of Gospel…A treatise of the covenant of grace wherein the graduall breakings out of Gospel…
A treatise of the covenant of grace wherein the gradual breakings out of Gospel grace from Adam to Christ are clearly discovered, the differences betwixt the Old and New Testament are laid open, divers errors of Arminians and others are confuted, the nature of uprightness, and the way of Christ in bringing the soul into communion with himself ... are solidly handled / by that faithful servant of Jesus Christ, and minister of the Gospel, John Ball ; published by Simeon Ash.A treatise of the covenant of grace wherein the graduall breakings out of Gospel grace from Adam to Christ are clearly discovered, the differences betwixt the Old and New Testament are laid open, divers errours of Arminians and others are confuted, the nature of uprightnesse, and the way of Christ in bringing the soul into communion with himself ... are solidly handled / by that faithfull servant of Jesus Christ, and minister of the Gospel, John Ball ; published by Simeon Ash.
London: printed by G. Miller for Edward Brewster, 1645
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.
The party upon whom the Promises of mercy are settled, is here propounded as the seed of the woman, and under the next degree as the seed of Abraham: called the Angel of the Covenant, The1 head of all things to the Church: even Jesus Christ the only begotten Son of God, who being God over all blessed for ever. ⟨p. 38⟩Rom. 9. 5. should come of David and Abraham, and so of Eve 2according to the flesh, for she was the mother of all living. Christ God and man is made of God an Adam (often opposed to the first Adam, 1 Cor. 15. 21, 22, 23, 45.) Head, root, common receptacle and store-house, in whom are treasured all good things, which from him are communicated to the faithful. As in Adam our being natural, our hopes of life and death, and in event our condemnation, was received, before ever they came to be applied and received actually in us: So in Christ as in a common storehouse every thing is first placed, which afterward is to be imparted to any believer. The first Adam▪ created after the Image of God, but a mere creature only, was entrusted with the Promise of life for his posterity, and betrayed all the body: But now God of3 his infinite mercy ordaineth a second Adam, even the seed of the woman, that is, Christ-man, but lifted up above the condition of a creature by union unto the Divine Person, that so as man he might be fit to receive that trust for men, as God he4 might undergo the burden and charge, which was now greater then God laid upon the first Adams shoulders. To have put the prime right of the Covenant upon every particular, had left occasion to infinite falls; and withal opened a g•p to dis-union, which the Lord abhorreth: To have chosen out a mere creature, and under the fall, how could he have made satisfaction for sin formerly committed, or free himself from the bondage of Satan? Therefore that the Promise might be sure to the Heirs of Promise, God puts this honour and charge upon Jesus Christ, who was the seed to come, to whom the Promises were made, and in whom all the Promises for all his brethren are Yea and