N00458:90
The barren fig trees doom. Or, A brief discourse wherein is set forth the…
The barren fig trees doom. Or, A brief discourse wherein is set forth the woeful danger of all who abide unfruitful under Gospel privileges, and Gods husbandry. Being the substance of sixteen sermons preached on Christ's parable of the fig-tree. / By Samuel Willard, teacher of a church in Boston. ; [Four lines from Matthew]The barren fig trees doom. Or, A brief discourse wherein is set forth the woful danger of all who abide unfruitful under Gospel priviledges, and Gods husbandry. Being the substance of sixteen sermons preached on Christ's parable of the fig-tree. / By Samuel Willard, teacher of a church in Boston. ; [Four lines from Matthew]
Boston: printed by Benjamin Harris, 1691
Sermon 2 › Doctrine 2: DOCTRINE II. ALL visible Professors are Fig-trees planted in Gods Vineyard.
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.
5. The Gospel offers a Conditional Covenant to men. In all Treaties and Transactions between God and Men, Precepts and Privileges are put together, and there is a close connection made between them, there is a certain dependence of the one upon the other, Mark 16. 16. God reveals a new Covenant in the Gospel to men, he opens to them the terms of it, and requires that if they will be related to him in it, they must put themselves under these conditions: and in the visible Covenant, he accepts men on such conditions: they promise so to do, and he promiseth that if they fulfil according to their engagement, he will do so for them.
5. The Gospel offers a Conditional Covenant to men. In all Treaties and Transactions between God and Men, Prec•pts and Priviledges are put together, and there is a close connexion made between them, there is a certain dependence of the one upon the other, Mark 16. 16. God reveals a new Covenant in the Gospel to men, he opens to them the terms of it, and requires that if they will be related to him in it, they must put themselves under these conditions: and in the visible Covenant, he accepts men on such conditions: they promise so to do, and he promiseth that if they fullfil according to their engagement, he will do so for them.
6. Hence men, by openly owning and submitting to Gospel Terms, bring themselves under this Conditional Covenant. It is a grand mistake to think, that there are none in Covenant with God, but those who are absolutely under the Promise of Salvation: the very notion of a Covenant implies a dependent Condition, to which the Privileges of it refer. The Visible Covenant then, thus stands: God offers Christ, and Salvation by him, in the Gospel, tells men, if they believe and repent they shall be Saved; presents the Gospel Ordinances as means to work Faith and Repentance in them, and so bring them to Salvation: they accept of the offer professedly, submit to the terms, and now they are taken under the Covenant, and must stand or fall to the Conditions of it: when they have thus done, they are said to be in God's Vineyard; and on this very account it is, that a People in the Visible Covenant, have so many warnings, and cautions given them, as, Psal 50,