A59693:263
Theses Sabbaticæ, or, The doctrine of the Sabbath wherein the Sabbaths I. Morality, II.…
Theses Sabbaticæ, or, The doctrine of the Sabbath wherein the Sabbaths I. Morality, II. Change, III. Beginning. IV. Sanctification, are clearly discussed, which were first handled more largely in sundry sermons in Cambridge in New-England in opening of the Fourth Commandment : in unfolding whereof many scriptures are cleared, divers cases of conscience resolved, and the moral law as a rule of life to a believer, occasionally and distinctly handled / by Thomas Shepard ...Theses Sabbaticæ, or, The doctrine of the Sabbath wherein the Sabbaths I. Morality, II. Change, III. Beginning. IV. Sanctification, are clearly discussed, which were first handled more largely in sundry sermons in Cambridge in New-England in opening of the Fourth COmmandment : in unfolding whereof many scriptures are cleared, divers cases of conscience resolved, and the morall law as a rule of life to a believer, occasionally and distinctly handled / by Thomas Shepard ...
London: printed by T.R. and E.M. for John Rothwell, 1650
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.
Thesis 91.
The commanding will of God, called Voluntas mandati, is to be our rule, and not the working will of God, Voluntas decreti, or the will of Gods decree: for we cannot sin by fulfilling the one, but we may sin in fulfilling the other. Gods secret and working will was fulfilled when Josephs brethren sold him into Egypt, and when Nebuchadnezzar afflicted Gods people seventy years, as also when the Scribes and Pharisees caused Christ to be crucified: yet in all these thing• they sinned and provoked Gods wrath against them; How? Was it in crossing and thwarting Gods working will or the will of Gods Decree? No verily, for it's expressly said, that Christ was crucified according to the determinate counsel and will of God, Acts 4.28. It was therefore by crossing Gods commanding will. It is therefore a hellish device of Libertines to exempt men from all Law, and from the sense of all sin: Because (say they) all things good and evil come from Gods will, and all things that are done are wrought by him, and all that he doth is good, and therefore all sinful actions are good, because God works them; for what have we to do to take the measure of our ways by his working will? Gods will is his own rule to work with, not our rule to work by: Our actions may be most sinful when his working in and about these may be most just and holy, for though God purposeth to leave the creature to fall and sin, yet he so purposed it, as that it should be only through their own fault that so they sin: And although a Christian is to submit humbly to the just dispensations of God when he leaves it to any evil, yet Gods working will in all such dispensations must not be our rule, for then we must will not only our own sin, but our own affliction and perdition for ever, for all these are contained under his working will: It is therefore a most subtle and pernicious practice in many, who when they are overtaken with any sin, or hampered with sin, they wash all off from themselves, and lay all the blame (if any be) upon God himself, saying, ⟨p. 77⟩