A66104:26
Love's pedigree, or, A discourse showing the grace of love in a believer to…Love's pedigree, or, A discourse shewing the grace of love in a believer to…
Love's pedigree, or, A discourse showing the grace of love in a believer to be of a divine original delivered in a sermon preached at a lecture in Boston, Febr. 29 1699/1700 / by S. Willard ...Love's pedigree, or, A discourse shewing the grace of love in a believer to be of a divine original delivered in a sermon preached at a lecture in Boston, Febr. 29 1699/1700 / by S. Willard ...
printed by B. Green and J. Allen, 1700
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.
7. Hence the spring or rise of all this must be from his love or good will to us. When we have searched into all the causes of Regeneration, in which this gracious principle is wrought in us, we must ultimately determine it hither: we are made to partake in this Grace, because God hath appointed us to it; and the reason why we were so appointed, was because it so pleased God; Mat. 11. 25. 26. Thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them to babes; even so Father, for so it seemed good in thy sight. God therefore tells Israel, that he loved them because he loved them; Deut. 7. 7, 8. The Lord did not set his love upon you, because ye were more ⟨p. 18⟩in number, &c. but because the Lord loved you. In timating that the motive of this love was no• where to be sought out of himself; and on this account God assigns our effectual calling to a love of his own that never had any beginning, Jer. 31. 3. I have loved thee with an everlasting love, therefore with loving kindness have I drawn thee; and needs must it be so, for he is the first cause and last end of all things, Rom. 11. ult. Of him, and through him, and to him are all things Nor could his Grace be otherwise absolutely free, and sovereign, as the Gospel every where assures us that it is.
7. Hence the spring or rise of all this must be from his love or good will to us. When we have searched into all the causes of Regeneration, in which this gracious principle is wrought in us, we must ultimately determine it hither: we are made to partake in this Grace, because God hath appointed us to it; and the reason why we were so appointed, was because it so pleased God; Mat. 11. 25. 26. Thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them to babes; even so Father, for so it seemed good in thy sight. God therefore tells Israel, that he loved them because he loved them;