N02384:1703
A complete body of divinity in two hundred and fifty expository lectures on the…A compleat body of divinity in two hundred and fifty expository lectures on the…
A complete body of divinity in two hundred and fifty expository lectures on the Assembly's Shorter catechism wherein the doctrines of the Christian religion are unfolded, their truth confirmed, their excellence displayed, their usefulness improved; contrary errors & vices refuted & exposed, objections answered, controversies settled, cases of conscience resolved; and a great light thereby reflected on the present age. / By the Reverend & learned Samuel Willard, M.A. late Pastor of the South Church in Boston, and vice-president of Harvard College in Cambridge, in New-England. ; Prefaced by the pastors of the same church. ; [Six lines of Scripture texts]A compleat body of divinity in two hundred and fifty expository lectures on the Assembly's Shorter catechism wherein the doctrines of the Christian religion are unfolded, their truth confirm'd, their excellence display'd, their usefulness improv'd; contrary errors & vices refuted & expos'd, objections answer'd, controversies settled, cases of conscience resolv'd; and a great light thereby reflected on the present age. / By the Reverend & learned Samuel Willard, M.A. late Pastor of the South Church in Boston, and vice-president of Harvard College in Cambridge, in New-England. ; Prefac'd by the pastors of the same church. ; [Six lines of Scripture texts]
printed by B. Green and S. Kneeland for B. Eliot and D. Henchman, 1726
AN EXPOSITION OF THE ASSEMBLY's SHORTER CATECHISM: IN Two Hundred a… › Sermon 63 (Question 19 cont.)
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.
though they are reduced to poverty, yet they are not starved; though they are in pain, yet it is tolerable; so that in his very judgments he remembers mercy for them. (4.) AND he oftentimes succours them in their miseries, and brings them out of them. There are many temporal salvations that he affords to them. They, when they are groaning under their oppressions, cry, and he so far hears them, as to send them relief, and they are freed again. This the Psalmist observes in many kinds of distresses, and that is the burden of the song, Psal. 107.6. Then they cried unto the Lord in their trouble, and he delivered them out of their distress. And the vilest sinners upon the earth, have such experiences as these, if they would observe and improve them. Now all this is the common mercy of God, which is no obstruction to the due execution of justice, in the due season of it, nor gives to sinners any the least security against it. 2. THERE is his special saving grace, which he purposeth to extend to some. This is not, as the other, a common favour; but it is intended for some, who yet are of the same number, and are fallen under the same condemnation with others; but yet God hath in his good will to them, ordained them to everlasting life; but in their natural state they are equally children of wrath with the rest, Eph. 2.3. Now with regard to these let us observe, (1.) THAT God hath executed the curse on His own Son standing in their room. As they stood devoted to all miseries, by the sentence ⟨p. 222⟩of the law, and justice stood engaged to that sentence, so was the Son of God surrogated in their place, to bear the wrath of God, instead of them, that so they might be saved, and yet justice have its triumph. For this reason is he said to be made sin for us, 2 Cor 5.21. To have all our iniquities laid upon him. Isal. 53.6. To be made a curse for us, Gal. 3.13. For the case stood so, that we must needs have suffered in person, except some surety interposed, and was accepted for us. (2.) THAT now He useth the miseries which they are under by the curse, to drive them to Christ. The curse lies on these as well others, whiles they are unregenerate, and all the evils they suffer are from it;