A39669:1715
The Method of Grace
The method of grace, in bringing home the eternal redemption contrived by the Father, and accomplished by the Son through the effectual application of the spirit unto God's elect, being the second part of Gospel redemption : wherein the great mystery of our union and communion with Christ is opened and applied, unbelievers invited, false pretenders convicted, every mans claim to Christ examined, and the misery of Christless persons discovered and bewailed / by John Flavell ...The method of grace, in bringing home the eternal redemption contrived by the Father, and accomplished by the Son through the effectual application of the spirit unto God's elect, being the second part of Gospel redemption : wherein the great mysterie of our union and communion with Christ is opened and applied, unbelievers invited, false pretenders convicted, every mans claim to Christ examined, and the misery of Christless persons discovered and bewailed / by John Flavell ...
London: printed by M. White for Francis Tyton, 1681
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.
viz. 1. What Christs bringing us to God imports. 2. What influence the death of Christ hath upon this design of bringing us to God.
First, What Christs bringing us to God imports: and certainly 1there be many great and excellent things carried in this expression: more generally it notes our state of reconciliation and our state of glorification: by reconciliation we are brought nigh to God, Ephes. 2. 13. Ye are made nigh, (i. e:) reconciled, by the blood of Christ. Heb. 12. 22, 23. we are said to come to God the Judge of all. By reconciliation we are brought nigh unto God now; by glorification we shall be ⟨p. 337⟩brought home to God hereafter, 1 Thes. 4. 17. We shall be ever with the Lord: but more particularly this phrase, that he might brings us to God, imports,
- 11.)
First, That the chief happiness of man consisteth in the 1enjoyment of God: that the creature hath as necessary dependence upon God for happiness, as the stream hath upon the fountain, or the image in the glass upon the face of him that looks into it. Look as the sum of the creatures misery lies in this, depart from me; separation from God is the principal part of damnation: So on the contrary, the chief happiness of the creature consisteth in the enjoyment and blessed vision of God,