Survey of the Spiritual Antichrist, Part 2 · Chapter 40 – Chapter 42
CHAP. XL. Antinomians, the perfectists of our time, say, wee and our works are compleatly perfect.
ANtinomians aTowne …sser. of grace, …. p…. 76.77.78. …a…on Honey combe, … 13.173ascribe not onelyonly an imputative perfection, in that Christs perfect righteousnesse is made ours, but also an inherent perfection to the Saints. But wee judge our state and persons through Christ to be perfect, but our duties, and begunne sanctification are not perfect, but is so in growing as the Moone, as a vessell not full to the brime and banks of the soule, it receives quarts and gallons more. Its true justification removeth the evill of works, as touching all guilt, or obligation to eternally revenging justice. But as Christs grace addeth to our good works no dignity and perfection of meriting, as Papists say, so doth it not remove the inherent blot of sinne,How Christ removeth the sinne▪ cle…ving to our work. that cleaveth to our good works, so as it should give to these works, inherent perfection, and remove their sinnefull defects; for as sinne dwelleth in our persons after wee are justified, though it bee not imputed: so doth sinne cleave to our most gracious acts, but is not accounted on our score, because the surety hath answered our bill, and removed the sinnefull imperction from them, but hath not made them inherently perfect, so as there should remaine nothing in the works of the justified, that is contrary to the Law of God.
But the truth is, Antinomians, with no face of truth, can say, that Christ removeth the sinnefull imperfections that adhere to our good works done by the Grace of Christ, when we are in the state of justification, because if nothing wee doe in the state of justification be sinne; since pardoned sinnes to Antinomians are no sinnes, and have lost the nature and being of sinne, being remitted and pardoned before they be committed, these sinnes that cleave to our good works are no sinnes, and so the good works must be perfect, as the person is perfect.
1. Because Antinomians go upon this ground, that nothing inherent in the persons, not the in-dwelling corruption of nature, nor the adherent sins that cleave to our works, nor any thing a justified man can doe, is sinne, or contrary to the Law; but that person, or works, being pardoned, both are as perfect as the person and works of Christ. A most blaspemous ground; for what we want of perfect sanctification, (and wee want much in this life) so farre are we sinnefully imperfect. 2. Paul acknowledgeth his sinnefull imperfection, bRom. ….23, 24 25. Gal 5.17. Phil. 3.…I find a Law in my members, rebelling against the Law of my minde, not as cI…m. …. Ec…les. 7.20 Prov. …0.9. Rom. 3.12.if I were already perfect 3. In many things we offend all: If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man. Hence the man that is perfect, sinnes not; but d1 Ioh▪ 1▪ 8.9.10.there is none in the earth that sinneth not, and doth good. 4. Wee crave pardon of sinnes, as we seeke dayly our dayly bread? Its contrary to Christian humility, to say wee are perfectly d1 Ioh▪ 1▪ 8.9.10.cleane.
Object. God can accept nothing that is unperfect and sinnefull because they are accursed, Gal. 3.10. For God is veritie it selfe, and will not suffer the losse of the least jot of the righteousnesse the Law requireth. But all our best works are polluted with sinne. eTowne of. pag. 77.78.Towne.
Answ. This proveth with the Papists, that God cannot judge us righteous by faith, because wee are sinners in our selves. 2. God cannot accept sinnefull works, as no sinnefull works at all, he cannot accept of sinnes as no sinnes, and of our good works as not polluted with sinne in themselves, his judgement then should not be according to truth, true; but he can well accept our works, though polluted with sinne, as pardoned and washen, not from their sinnefull imperfections, inherent, or adherent to them, (for then they should be intrinsecally perfect, and God should judge amisse of them) but as washen from their guilt, and obligation to eternall wrath; so he can well judge them perfect in Christ. 3. Legally cleane, so as they shall never actually condemne us; and 4. that of meere grace.
CHAP. XLI. Antinomians say, we are compleatly saved in this life as in heaven.
SO we thinke Antinomians faile wickedly with Libertines, who say, aTowne ass. pagpunc; 58.59 60We are as actually saved, and as perfectly, as …. 155.156the glorified in heaven; and not cSaltmarsh Fre… g…. 140.in hope onelyonly, or in reall beginning, in regard of Christs sitting in heaven, and therefore good workes can no more bee the way to heaven (saith Towne) then my walking in the Citie, in which I am already, can be my walking to the City. But so while we are absent from the Lord in the d2 Cor. 5, 6.…, 2▪ 3.body, even in this life wee should be in heaven, whereas the dissolution of our earthly eIoh. 6.37, 44.tabernacle, the raysing of us up at the last fPhil. ….23.day, are betweene us and the full redemption of our bodies. And this is that which Libertines and Familists say, that all the resurrection of the body, and life eternall, they know is our union with Christ in this life, the Grammar of Hymeneus and Philetus, who said, the f2 Tim. ….18Resurrection was already past. 3. We know but in part, our love is not perfected in this life, 1 Cor. 13.11, 12, 13. And we are not perfect men in Christ, till we meet all in the unity of Faith, Ephes. 4.13. (3) The generall assembly of all the first borne, is not yet convened; we need a Temple, and Ordinances, and a Sunne, and a Moone; in the other life the Lambe shall be our Temple. 4. The other life is such, as in it wee can neither marry, nor dye, but are as the Angels, Luk. 22.36, 37. Phil. 3.20, 21. 1 Cor. 15.40.41. (5.) Antinomians say, this dreaming that we are as cleane of sinne as Christ, and so Christed and Goded with Christ, as the Libertine Pocquius, said; Calvin. in Opus. pag. 463. and Nicholas the Libertine, cap. 34. (6.) Paul saith, Wee are saved by hope, and wee hRom. 8.24.hope not for what wee have already. Our life is hid with iCol. 24…. 1 Ioh. 3.….Christ in God. 1. He that beleeveth hath life, not in the compleat and full fruition; yet really, in the certaintie of faith and hope. 2. In the right claime purchased by Christ. 3. In the beginning, first fruits, and the degrees of grace tending to glory.
CHAP. XLII. Our happinesse is in sanctification, as well as in justification.
OUr happinesse is not meerely passive, as aTowne. asser. pag. 47, 48.49. Saltmarsh. 56 57.Towne saith, and in being justified as if that were all; for though our blessednesse be in justification, as the cause and fountaine, in that sinne is not imputed to us, yet it is in sanctification and acting of holy duties, as in the effect, in that there is bPsal. 32.1.….no guile in the Spirit, that we are undefiled in our cPsal. 119.1.way, and are dMatth, 5.2.3.4….poore in Spirit, meeke, that wee mourne, hunger, and thirst for Christ, &c. 2. We should not oppose Antinomians, if they meane nothing, but that Christ is the seed, floure, and Mother-blessing, and that our chief blessednesse is in being freely justified in his bloud. 2. If their sense be that all blessednesse in acts of Sanctification, doe so farre render us blessed, as they flow from the free grace of Christ, and as we bring forth fruits to God, being imped and ingraffed in Christ, as a branch of wild Olive, is blessed, not because it is such a crabbed and fruitlesse branch, but because it is ingraffed in the true Olive, and partaketh of the sweetnesse, life, and sappe thereof, and from thence bringeth forth fruit; but we know Antinomians doe reproch acts of Sanctification, as Pharisaicall Poperie. 2. That they call so walking, selfe-seeking of righteousnesse in our selves; which to us is a cursed, not a blessed condition: and 3. they cannot endure that holy walking should be any thing but a matter of courtesie commanded by no Law, nor by any written Gospel-command, but a fruit of the immediate acting of the Spirit. 4. They censure us for ascribing blessednesse to any acts of Sanctification, whereas we say with our Saviour, eIoh. 13.17.if we know these things; happy are we if we doe them, they that heare the fLuk. 11.28.word of God, and doe it, are more blessed then the womb that bare Christ, and they are blessed who gRevel. 2….…4doe his Commandements, that hPsal. 10.6.….keepe judgement, that iPsal. 1▪9.2.keepe his testimonies, that keepe kProv. 8.3….the waies of wisdome, that lMath. 5.10 1 Pet. 3.14.suffer for Christ; all which we judge inconsistent with that which mCrispe vol. 1. ser. 4.89.Crispe saith, that Sanctification is not a jot of the way to heaven.