Serra. CXLIX. in order to a Chrifti'tn Life. 3 21 apingGrace: -as it keeps us conftant in a good courfe, it is called perfevering Grace : and may have feveral other denominations, in feveral other refpe&s : for it is fuited to all our Decagons and neceffities. Secondly, To this Grace and Afliflanceof God, the Scripture doth conftantly at- tribute our Regeneration, and Sanctification, and Perfeverance in Holinefs. We are faid to be born again of the Spirit, to be fanftifaedby the renewing of the HolyGhoft; to be led by the fpirit of God, and through the flint to mortifie the deeds of the flefh, to do all things through Chrifi irengthning'of us, and to be kept by the power ofGod through faith unto falvation. All which, and many more Texts that I might in- ¡lance in, do plainly exprefs to us the fupernatural Affiftance of Chrift, whereby we'become good, and are enabled to do any thing that is good, and preferved and continued in a good courfe. As the Scripture loth every where attribute fin to our own corrupt Hearts, and to the Temptation and Infligation of the Devil ; fo does it conflantly afcribe all the good that we do; to the.Grace of Chrift, or, which is all one, to the bleffed motions and aflìftances of God's Holy Spirit. For the Spirit of God is called the Spirit of Chrili, yea Chrift, Rom. 8. 9, ro. Butye are not in the flefh, bet in theSpirit, iffo be that the Spirit of God dwell in you Now if any man have not the Spirit of Chrift, he is none of his. And 'if Chrift be in you, the body is dead becaufe offin. By which it is evident, that the Spirit of God, and the Spirit of Chrift, and Chrift, do in this Text lignifie one and the fame thing. Thirdly, There is great reafon to affert the neceffity of this Grace and Affiftance to thefe purpofes; whether we confider the corruption and impotency of human Nature, the orange power of evil Habits and Cuftoms, the ficklenefs and incon- flancy of human Refolution, or the malice and activity of the Devil to feduce and tempt us to fin. a. If we confider the corruption and impotency of human Nature. This the Light of Nature cannot but acknowledge. The Philofophers and wife Men a. mong the Heathen, were fenfible of a great depravation in our Souls, and dege- neracy from the divine Life ; and therefore they prefcribed feveral ways and me- thods for the purifying of our Souls, and the raifing of them to that Purity and Perfefrion, to which they fuppofed they were defigned: but they were wholly ignorant from whence this depravation came; and therefore many of them fuppo- fed a Pre-exiftence of Souls, that is, that our Souls, which now inhabit thefe Bodies, had lived in a former State, and for fome faults they had committed in that State, were by the juftice of God fentenced to be imprifoned in thefe Bodies, as a punifhment for their former fins. They could not imagine that our Souls came Impure out of God's hands; and to avoid that inconvenience, they imagin- ed a former State wherein theyhad finned. And this was the belt account they could give of the general depravation of mankind. But the Scripture bath given us a more certain account of this; that by one man fin enter'd into the world, and death by fin. This is the true fource and Original of the univerfal degeneracy Of Mankind, and of the weaknefs and impotency of human Nature. The fall of our firft Parents bath derived corruption and weak- nefs upon the whole Race and pofterity of Adam; for whatfoever is born of the flefb, is flefhh. So that confidering our natural impotency, there is great need of a fupernatural and extraordinary power and affiftance, to recover us from this degeneracy, and to renew us after the image of himwho created us, in righteoufnefs and true holinefe. And therefore when the Scripture fpeaks of the Redemption of Chrift, it reprefen& our Condition, not only as miferable, but helplefs ; Rom. 5.6. For when we were yet without flrength, in due time Chrifl died for the ungodly. When Mankind was under an utter impotencyof recovering it felf out of that frate of fin and mifery into which it was plunged, in the fulnefs of time, that is, when God thought it moll convenient, he fent his Son into the world, to die for 'inners ; and by that Spi- rit which railed him from the dead, to enable us to mortifie our lufts, and to rife- to newnefs of life. Tt The
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