N01446:78
A guide to Christ. Or, The way of directing souls that are under the…
A guide to Christ. Or, The way of directing souls that are under the work of conversion. Compiled for the help of young ministers: and may be serviceable to private Christians, who are enquiring the way to Zion. / By Solomon Stoddard, A.M. and Pastor of the church in Northampton. ; With an epistle prefixed, by the Reverend Dr. Increase Mather.
Boston: printed by J. Allen for N. Boone, 1714
Directions How to guide Souls through the Work of Conversion.
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.
2. That there is no such Doctrine in the Scripture that any sort of mens day of grace is past, before the day of life is past, except they be guilty of the Unpardonable Sin. It is taught in the Scripture, that God will strive with some men, only a limited time, and then destroy them, Gen. 6.3. My Spirit shall not always strive with man, yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years. It is also taught, that God does harden some Nations in order to great misery, Isa. 6.10, 11. and sometimes in order to their Unchurching, Joh. 12.40. It is also taught, that God may harden some particular persons before Death, and never more strive with them in any remarkable way. Rev. 22.11. Let him that in filthy, be filthy still: But there is no such thing taught, that there is any sort of men that may be described, or any particular person that may be known unto himself or others, whose day of grace can be said to be past before his death. When men say their day is past, they only fear, they do not know it.
3. That such Scriptures as seem to evidence th• their day is past, do not determine any such thing it is said, Prov. 29.1. that he that being often reproved, hardeneth his neck, shall suddenly be ⟨p. 17⟩destroyed. But it is evident, that God waits longer upon some persons than upon others: Some Threatenings are universal, and some are indefinite: showing what God does many times do; so it is said, Heb. 10.28. If any man draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him; but the Backsliding here spoken of seems to be the Unpardonable Sin; he had been speaking of that, ver. 26. and seems here to have reference to the same sin; for in other cases God does speak encouragingly in his Word unto Backsliders,