A39669:2084
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.
Fourthly, It was the virtue, and efficacy of the spirit of God which gave the natural world its being by Creation, Gen. 1. 2. the spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters; it hovered over the chaos; as the wings of a bird do over her eggs, as the same word is rendered, Deut. 32. 11. ⟨p. 431⟩cherishing as it were by incubation, that rude mass by a secret quickening influence, by which it drew all the Creatures into their several forms, and particular natures. So it is in the new Creation: a quickening influence must come from the spirit of God, or else the new creature can never be formed in us, Joh. 3. 8. So is every one that is born of the Spirit: and ver. 6. that which is born of the spirit is spirit.
Fourthly, It was the vertue, and efficacy of the spirit of God which gave the natural world its being by Creation, Gen. 1. 2. the spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters; it hovered over the chaos; as the wings of a bird do over her eggs, as the same word is rendred, Deut. 32. 11. ⟨p. 431⟩cherishing as it were by incubation, that rude mass by a secret quickening influence, by which it drew all the Creatures into their several forms, and particular natures. So it is in the new Creation: a quickning influence must come from the spirit of God, or else the new creature can never be formed in us, Joh. 3. 8. So is every one that is born of the Spirit: and ver. 6. that which is born of the spirit is spirit.