N00302:690
Mercy magnified on a penitent prodigal, or A brief discourse, wherein Christs parable of…
Mercy magnified on a penitent prodigal, or A brief discourse, wherein Christs parable of the lost son found, is opened and applied, as it was delivered in sundry sermons, / by Samuel Willard teacher of a church in Boston in New-England. ; [Two lines from Luke]
printed by Samuel Green for Samuel Philips, 1684
Title page typeset from the transcription.
Mercy Magnified ON A PENITENT Prodigal. › Sermon 19 › DOCT. True Repentance is practical Repentance.
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.
USE 1. For Information:
1. Here see how vain it is for men to rest in empty and impracticable purposes of repenting and returning unto God, as if therefore their state were good. True Repentance indeed begins at the Will, but it is as certain that if it be true, it rests not there but proceeds farther, and the whole man will be exercised in it; if the heart be really turned to God, that man is right; but then his life will be changed too.
This Doctrine doth not blame men for resolving and promising, but for doing no more, for sitting still and thinking they have done sufficient: beware then of resting here: ask your hearts on what grounds they purposed, & if good, why then do they not perform them? Heaven will not be won with a few empty ⟨p. 281⟩wishes, and faint promises; but there must be wrestling, striving, overcoming: the Son promised his Father to go and work in the Vineyard, but went not, and what did that promise come to? God will not be so mocked.