( 227 ) SANCTIFICATION A PROGRESSIVE WORK. CHAP. IL (1, 2.) Sanctation described. (8.) With the nature of the work of the Holy Spirit therein; which is, (4.) Progressive. (5.) The wayand means whereby holiness is increased in believers. (6.) Especially byfaith and love, whose exercise is required in all duties ofobedience. As also, (7.) Those graces whose exercise is occa- sional.(8.) Thegrowthofholiness expressed, in an allusion unto that ofplants, with an insensibleprogress. (9.) Renders grace therein to be greatly admired; and is discerned in the answerableness of the mask of the Spirit in sanctificationand supplication.(10.) Objections against the progressive nature of holiness re- moved. HAVING passed through the consideration of the general concernments of the work of sanctification, I shall in the next place, give a description of it, and then explain it more particularly in its principal parts. And this I shall do, but under this express caution, that I do not hope nor design at once to represent the life, glory and beauty of it, or to comprise all things that eminently belong unto it: Only, I shall set up some way-marks, that may guide us in our progress or future inquiry into the nature and glory of it. And so I say that, Sect. 2. o Santification is an immediate work of the Spirit of God on the souls of believers, purifying and " cleansingof their natures from the pollution and un- cleanness of sin, renewing in them the image of God, and thereby enabling them, from a spiritual and ha- " bitual principle of grace, to yield obedience unto " God, according unto the tenor and terms of the 4, new covenant, by virtue of the life and death of Je- " sus Christ." Or, more briefly; " It is the universal renovation of our natures Ùy the Holy Spirit into the " image of God, through Jesus Christ." Hence it fol- lows, that our holiness, which is the fruit and effect of this work, the work as terminated in us, as it compris- eth the renewed principle or imageof God wrought in us, so it consists in an holy obedience unto God by Jesus Christ, according to the terms of the covenant of grace, from the principle of a renewed nature. Our apostle expresseth the whole more briefly yet, namely, He that is in Christ Jesus is a newcreature, 2 Cor. v. 17. 3L For herein he expresseth both the renovation of our natures, the endowment of them with a new spiritual principle of life and operation, with actings towards God suitable thereunto. I shall take up the first gene- ral description of it; and, in the consideration of its parts, give some account of the nature of the work, and its effects; and then shall distinctly prove and confirm the true nature of it, wherein it is opposed or called into question. Sect. 3. (1.) It is, as was before proved, and is by all confessed, the work in us of the Spirit of God. It is the renovation of the Holy Ghost wherebywe aresa- ved; and a real, internal, powerful, physical work it is, as we have proved before abundantly, and shall af- terwards more fully confirm. He doth not make us holy, only by persuading us so to be. He doth not only require us to be holy, propose unto us motives un- to holiness, give us convictions of its necessity, and thereby excite us unto the pursuit and attainment of it; though this he doth also by the word and ministration thereof. It is too high an impudency fòr any one to pretendan owningof the gospel, andyet todeny a work of the Holy Ghost in our sanctification. And there- fore both the old and new Pelagians did, and do avow a work of his herein. But what is it that they really as- cribe unto him? Merely the exciting our own abilities, aiding and assisting us in and unto the exercise of our own native power, which, when all is done, leaves the work to be our own, andnot his, and to us must the glory andprise of it be ascribed. But we have already n6
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