A57982:115
The trial & triumph of faithThe tryal & triumph of faith
The trial & triumph of faith: or, An exposition of the history of Christs dispossessing of the daughter of the woman of Canaan Delivered in sermons; in which are opened, the victory of faith; the condition of those that are tempted; the excellency of Jesus Christ and free-grace; and some special grounds and principles of libertinism and antinomian errors, discovered by Samuel Rutherfurd, professor of divinity in the University of St. Andrews. Published by authority.The tryal & triumph of faith: or, An exposition of the history of Christs dispossessing of the daughter of the woman of Canaan Delivered in sermons; in which are opened, the victory of faith; the condition of those that are tempted; the excellency of Jesus Christ and free-grace; and some speciall grounds and principles of libertinisme and antinomian errors, discovered by Samuel Rutherfurd, professor of divinity in the University of St. Andrews. Published by authority.
London: printed by John Field, 1652
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.
But why do we not hear and see Christ revealing himself in his ways and works? Reason would say,1 If Hell and Judgement were before our eyes, we should hear and come to Christ: Suppose we saw with our eyes for twenty or thirty years together, a great furnace of fire, of the quantity of the whole earth, and saw there, Cain, Judas, Ahitophel, Saul, and all the damned, as lumps of red fire, and they boiling and louping for pain in a dungeon of everlasting brimstone, and the black and terrible devils with ⟨p. 51⟩long and sharp-toothed whips of Scorpions, lashing out scourges on them; and if we saw there our Neighbours, Brethren, Sisters, yea our dear Children, Wives, Fathers and Mothers,2 swimming and sinking in that black Lake, and heard the yelling, shouting, crying of our young ones and fathers, blaspheming the spotless Justice of God; if we saw this, while we are living here on Earth, we should not dare to offend the Majesty of God, but should hear, come to Christ, and believe and be saved. But the truth is, If we believe not Moses and the Prophets, neither should we believe for this, because we see with our eyes, and hear with our ears, even while we are in this life daily, pieces and little parcels of Hell, for we see and hear daily some tumbling in their blood, thousands cut down of our Brethren, Children, Fathers, Malefactors hanged and quartered, Death in every house: These, these be little hells, and little coals and sparkles of the great fire of hell, and certain Documents to us, that there is a Hell. Yet we neither hear nor come to Christ.
But why do we not hear and see Christ revealing himself in his wayes and works? Reason would say,1 If Hell and Judgement were before our eyes, we should hear and come to Christ: Suppose we saw with our eyes for twenty or thirty yeers together, a great furnace of fire, of the quantity of the whole earth, and saw there, Cain, Judas, Ahitophel, Saul, and all the damned, as lumps of red fire, and they boyling and louping for pain in a dungeon of everlasting brimstone, and the black and terrible devils with ⟨p. 51⟩