N00302:719
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.
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.
3. Saving Faith whereby we are entitled to Salvation, is not of man himself, but of grace: •e that believes shall be saved, but God gives men to believe, Eph. 2.8. it is the gift of God. Men would live and die in unbelief, did not he exert his Almighty power: Faith is a creating work, 2 Cor.4.6. and the operation of the same power which raised Christ, Eph. 1. 19,20.
3. Saving Faith whereby we are entituled to Salvation, is not of man himself, but of grace: •e that believes shall be saved, but God gives men to believe, Eph. 2.8. it is the gift of God. Men would live and die in unbelief, did not he exert his Almighty power: Faith is a creating work, 2 Cor.4.6. and the operation of the same power which raised Christ, Eph. 1. 19,20.
4. The saving efficacy of all the means of Grace is of God: it is not in them, they have not power in themselves to produce this grace in us, but that is according to his pleasure: it was he that touched Lydia's heart, Act. 16. the virtue of the means, lies not in the skill, grace, good will of instruments, nor all their industry but in him, I Cor.3.6. some are converted at the first Sermon they ever heard, others have heard a thousand, and are yet in their Sins: Sermons are but the Prophets staff in the Servants hand.