A53702:28
An humble testimony unto the goodness and severity of God in his dealing with…
An humble testimony unto the goodness and severity of God in his dealing with sinful churches and nations, or, The only way to deliver a sinful nation from utter ruin by impendent judgments, in a discourse on the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, Luk. 13, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 / by John Owen.An humble testimony unto the goodness and severity of God in his dealing with sinful churches and nations, or, The only way to deliver a sinful nation from utter ruine by impendent judgments, in a discourse on the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, Luk. 13, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 / by John Owen.
London: printed for Nathanael Ponder, 1681
Title page typeset from the transcription.
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.
There is in this Commination an Appearance of Severity, beyond the Rule established, Exod. 20. 5. There God declares, That as he is a jealous God, which ⟨p. 4⟩Title he assumes to himself, with respect unto the highest Provocations, that he will visit the Iniquity of the Fathers on the Children to the third and fourth Generation of them that hate him. But here the Vengeance and Punishment due unto the Sins of an hundred Generations, is threatened to be inflicted on that which was present.
There is in this Commination an Appearance of Severity, beyond the Rule established, Exod. 20. 5. There God declares, That as he is a jealous God, which ⟨p. 4⟩Title he assumes to himself, with respect unto the highest Provocations, that he will visit the Iniquity of the Fathers on the Children to the third and fourth Generation of them that hate him. But here the Vengeance and Punishment due unto the Sins of an hundred Generations, is threatned to be inflicted on that which was present.
Something in our passage may be spoken for the Vindication of Divine Justice herein, seeing we may be more concerned in that Divine Commination than the most are aware.
1. The Case here is particular. That in the Commandment respects the Common Case of all false Worshippers, and their Posterity; but this respects Persecution unto Blood and Death of the true Worshippers of God. Now though God be very much provoked with the Sins of false Worshippers, yet he can either bear with them, or pass over their Sins with lesser Punishments, or at least for a long season; but when they come to Persecution and the Blood of them who worship him in Spirit and in Truth, in his appointed season he will not spare them; their own, and the Iniquities of their Predecessors, shall be avenged on them which will be