N01056:56
Free-grace, maintained & improved. Or, The general offer of the Gospel, managed with considerations…
Free-grace, maintained & improved. Or, The general offer of the Gospel, managed with considerations of the great things done by special grace, in the election and redemption and vocation of those who embrace that offer. And the illustrious doctrines of divine predestination and humane impotency, rescued from the abuses, which they too frequently meet withal; and rendered (as they are) highly useful to the designs of practical piety. : In two brief discourses; published at the desire of some, who have been greatly apprehensive of growing occasions for such treatises.
Boston: printed by B. Green, 1706
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.
Our Lord-Redeemer then Accepted the Charge thus Committed unto Him. He took the very Names of those, for whom He would become an Atonement and an Advocate. He Promised unto His Eternal Father, That He would not only become a Man, but also be Born of a Woman, and be Made under the Law, and Appear in the Form of a Servant, and become Obedient unto the Death of the Cross, and thoroughly discharge the part of a Surety for His Chosen, and Save them unto the uttermost. [See, Heb. 10.5, 7. and, Joh. 14.31.]
Hence it is, That the Chosen of God, even ⟨p. 18⟩while they are yet in their Sins, are called, Joh. 10.16. The Sheep of the Lord Jesus Christ. Yea, He vouchsafes to call them; Heb. 2.13. The Children which God has given me.
Finally. There is a Special Intent in the Heart of God, and of our Lord Redeemer, that they who are Chosen by God, and Given to the Lord-Redeemer, shall have a Distinguished and Peculiar Share in His Redemption. Our Lord-Redeemer has Engaged, and Obeyed, and Suffered, with a Distinguishing and a Peculiar Eye, to those whom the Father has Given unto Him. The Virtue and Success, of our Lords Engagement in the Work of Redemption, depends not merely upon the Uncertainties, of what Respect the Free-Will of Man, may happen in Time to show unto it. For so, it might happen, That no man at all should ever be the better for that Redemption: which must by no means be imagined! Our Lord, in the work of Redemption, has bought Faith for Some; He has bought this Favour for some, That they shall by Faith be brought actually to Enjoy the Benefits of His Redemption. Oh! Let none of the Faithful be so Ungrateful, as to say, My Faith is a Grace, which the Blood of my Redeemer never bought for me! If this Grace be Bought for any; the Grace, to Receive, and by Receiving to Enjoy, the Redemption of the Lord Jesus Christ; Then it must be Bought for a Special Number, who are known unto the Lord. Surely, The Great God never so fully Intended the Redemption of our Lord Jesus Christ,