A39660:850
Englands duty under the present gospel liberty from Revel. III, vers. 20
Englands duty under the present gospel liberty from Revel. III, vers. 20 : wherein is opened the admirable condescension and patience of Christ in waiting upon trifling and obstinate sinners, the wretched state of the unconverted, the nature of evangelical faith ..., the riches of free grace in the offers of Christ ..., the invaluable privileges of union and communion granted to all who receive him ... / by John Flavell ...Englands duty under the present gospel liberty from Revel. III, vers. 20 : wherein is opened the admirable condescension and patience of Christ in waiting upon trifling and obstinate sinners, the wretched state of the unconverted, the nature of evangelical faith ..., the riches of free grace in the offers of Christ ..., the invaluable priviledges of union and communion granted to all who receive him ... / by John Flavell ...
London: printed for Matthew Wotton, 1689
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.
IV. Inference.
If the opening of the heart be the main design of the Gospel,1 then Christ and Faith ought to be the principal Subjects that Ministers should insist on among their people.
- 14. Infer.
There are many other useful Doctrines, which may and ought to be opened and pressed in their time and place. Moral duties, &c. have their excellencies; but Christ and Faith are the great things we are to preach. Let men be once brought to Christ, and the rest will follow; but to begin and end with Morality will never make men Gospel Christians. Grace teaches Morality, Titus 2. 11. but Morality without Grace saves no man. I doubt not but it hath been a grand Artifice of the Devil to confound Grace with Morality; and make men believe that nothing more is required unto mens salvation but a civil sober conversation in the world, and so lay by the principal part of the Gospel, which opens and presses the necessity of Regeneration, Repentance, and Faith in the Blood of Christ: Such preaching as this answers ⟨p. 341⟩not the end and design of Christ in the conversion of Souls; such toothless preaching disturbs not the Consciences of men; the Lord help all his Ambassadors to mind the Example and Charge of their Redeemer, and laying aside all carnal interest, to apply themselves faithfully unto the Souls and Consciences of their hearers, not as men-pleasers, but as the servants of Christ.