N00583:49
Reformation the great duty of an afflicted people. Setting forth the sin and danger…
Reformation the great duty of an afflicted people. Setting forth the sin and danger there is in neglecting of it, under the continued and repeated judgments of God. : Being the substance of what was preached on a solemn day of humiliation kept by the Third Gathered Church in Boston, on August. 23d. 1694. / By Samuel Willard, teacher of the said church. ; [Four lines from Zechariah]
printed by Bartholomew Green, 1694
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. That men will not receive the help which otherwise they might have, to remove all the other impediments of their Reformation. It is true, none can turn themselves, till God put in his Grace and turn them, he must first draw us, before we can run after him: it was a right Prayer which Ephraim put up, Jer. 31. ⟨p. 32⟩18. Turn thou me, and I shall be turned. But God, in his Ordinances, offers to his People, together with reproofs, all the Assistance and Grace that is wanting to the doing of that which he requires of them: he useth all means and endeavours with them, tendering them his hand, but they reject him, they will have none of him, they had rather go without his help; they are not willing to be rid of their sins: they are therefore said to resist his Spirit; and hereupon, the reason rendered why God at length leaves them up to their sinful ways, and gives them over to their vile courses to sin without any restraints, is because they would not accept of these his gracious offers, Psal. 81. 11, 12. My People would not hearken to my voice, &c. So I gave them up to their own hearts lust; &c.
3. That men will not receive the help which otherwise they might have, to remove all the other impediments of their Reformation. It is true, none can turn themselves, till God put in his Grace and turn them, he must first draw us, before we can run after him: it was a right Prayer which Ephraim put up, Jer. 31. ⟨p. 32⟩18. Turn thou me, and I shall be turned. But God, in his Ordinances, offers to his People, together with reproofs, all the Assistance and Grace that is wanting to the doing of that which he requires of them: he useth all means and endeavours with them, tendring them his hand, but they reject him, they will have none of him, they had rather go without his help; they are not willing to be rid of their sins: they are therefore said to resist his Spirit; and hereupon, the reason rendred why God at length leaves them up to their sinfull wayes, and gives them over to their vile courses to sin without any restraints, is because they would not accept of these his gracious offers,