The Doctrine of the Saints' Perseverance

Ans. First when men seriously promise any thing, which is wholly, and absolutely in their power to Accomplish & bring about, causing thereby good men to rest upon their words, & to declare unto others their repose upon their honesty and worth; if they do not make good what they have spoken, we account them unworthy promise breakers, and they do it at the peril of all the repute of honesty, honour, and Faith they have in the world. With God it seems it is otherwise; He makes a solemn Gracious Promise to Paul that the lives of all them in the Ship with him, should be saved: Paul on whom it was as much incumbent as on any man in the world not to engage the name of God (that ⟨p. 123⟩God whom he worshipped and Preached) in any thing, whose truth might in the least be liable to exception, being in the way of declaring a new Doctrine to the world,¹ which would have been everlastingly prejudiced by any misprision of the Faithfulness of that God, in whose name & Authority he preached it. The sum of that Doctrine also being the exaltation of that God, in opposition to all the pretended Deities of the world: He (I say) boasts himself upon the Promises that he had received,² that there should be no loss of any mans life among them, v. 22. v. 25. he gives the reason of his confident Assertion, when all hope was taken away, v. 20. I believe God (saith he) that it shall be even as it was told me; His Faith in God was in reference to the event, that it should come to pass, as it was told him. Faith in God, Divine Faith can have nothing for its Object, that may fail it. He doth not say, that he believes that God will be Faithful to his Promise in General, but also tells them wherein his Faithfulness doth consist, even in the performance and accomplishment of that which he had promised. This he informs the Centurion, and the rest in the ship with him: and if in the issue it had otherwise fallen out, there had not been any colour of Justifying the Faith of that God he served, or his own truth in being witness to him. Had any perished, those that remained would have argued him of lying. Yea but saith he not himself, except these abide in the ship ye cannot be saved? He did so indeed, and thereby declared the necessity of using suitable means, when Providence affords them to us, for the Accomplishment of appointed determined ends.