Welcome to the Doctrine of Justification by Faith through the Imputation of the Righteousness of Christ Explained, Confirmed, and Vindicated by Dr. John Owen. We will be continuing to read from page 39 for this reading. This Reformation Audio Resource is a production of Stillwaters Revival Books. many free resources as well as our complete mail order catalog containing classic and contemporary Puritan and Reformed books, CDs and much more at great discounts are on the web at www.swrb.com also please consider, pray and act upon the important truths found in the following quotation by Charles Spurgeon As the Apostle says to Timothy, so also he says to everyone, give yourselves to reading. He who will not use the thoughts of other men's brains proves that he has no brains of his own. You need to read. Renounce as much as you will all light literature, but study as much as possible sound theological works, especially the Puritanic writers and expositions of the Bible. The best way for you to spend your leisure is to be either reading or praying. And now, to SWRB's reading of the doctrine of justification by faith through the imputation of the righteousness of Christ, explained, confirmed, and vindicated, which we hope you will find to be a great blessing, and which we pray draws you nearer to the Lord Jesus Christ, for He is the way, the truth, and the life, and no man come unto the Father, but by him." John 14 verse 6. Of this repugnancy unto the mystery of the wisdom and grace of God in Christ, and the foundation of its whole economy, and the distinct operations of the persons of the Holy Trinity therein, there are two parts, or branches. Number one, that which would reduce the whole of it unto the private reason of men, and their own weak, imperfect management thereof. This is the entire design of the Sassanians. Hence, number one, the doctrine of the Trinity itself is denied, impugned, yea, derided by them, and that's solely on this account. They plead that it is incomprehensible by reason. For there is in that doctrine a declaration of things absolutely infinite and eternal, which cannot be exemplified in, nor accommodated unto, things finite and temporal. This is the substance of all their pleas against the doctrine of the Holy Trinity, that which gives a seeming life and sprightly vigor to their objections against it. Wherein yet, under the pretense of the use and exercise of reason, they fall, and resolve all their reasonings into the most absurd and irrational principles that ever the minds of men were besoughted withal. For unless you will grant them that what is above their reason is therefore contradictory unto true reason, that what is infinite and eternal is perfectly comprehensible and, in all its concerns and respects, to be accounted for, that what cannot be in the things finite and of a separate existence cannot be in things infinite, whose being and existence can be but one. With other such irrational, yea, brutish imaginations, all the arguments of these pretended men of reason against the Trinity become like chaff that every breath of wind will blow away. Thereon, they must, as they do, deny the distinct operations of any persons in the Godhead and the dispensation of the mystery of grace. For if there are no such distinct persons, there can be no such distinct operations. Now, as upon a denial of these things, no one article of faith can be rightly understood, nor any one duty of obedience be performed unto God in an acceptable manner. So, in particular, we grant that the doctrine of justification by the imputation of the righteousness of Christ cannot stand. Parentheses number two. On the same ground, the incarnation of the Son of God is rejected as atapon, atapotaton, the most absurd conception that ever befell the minds of men. Now, it is to no purpose to dispute with men so persuaded about justification. Yea, we will freely acknowledge that all things we believe about it are graodes muthoi, no better than old wives' tales, if the incarnation of the Son of God be so also. For I can as well understand how he who is a mere man, however exalted, dignified, and glorified, can exercise a spiritual rule in and over the hearts, consciousness, and thoughts of all the men in the world, being intimately knowing of and presented unto them all equally at all times, which is another of their fopperies, as how the righteousness and obedience of one should be esteemed the righteousness of all that believe, if that one be no more than a man, if he be not acknowledged to be the Son of God incarnate." Whilst the minds of men are prepossessed with such prejudices, nay, unless they firmly assent unto the truth in these foundations of it, it is impossible to convince them of the truth and necessity of that justification of a sinner which is revealed in the Gospel. Allow the Lord Christ to be no other person but what they believe Him to be, and I will grant there can be no other way of justification than what they declare. though I cannot believe that ever any sinner will be justified thereby. These are the issues of an obstinate refusal to give way unto the introduction of the mystery of God and His grace into the way of salvation and our relation unto Him. And he who would desire an instance of the fertility of men's inventions in forging and coining objections against the heavenly mysteries in the justification of the sovereignty of their own reason, as unto what belongs to our relation unto God, need go no farther than the writings of these men against the Trinity and incarnation of the Eternal Word. For this is their fundamental rule in things divine and doctrines of religion, that not what the Scripture says is therefore to be accounted true, although it seems repungent unto any reasonings of ours, or is above what we can comprehend. But what seems repugnant unto our reason, let the words of the Scripture be what they will, that we must conclude that the Scripture does not say so, though it seem never so expressly to do so." Non-English words. So says Schlichting. Footnote. See volume 2, page 349. Jonas Schlichtingus was a Sassanian author. He wrote quote, a confession of Christian faith published in the name of the churches which in Poland acknowledge one God and his only begotten son Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit, end quote, if appeared in the year 1642. The works of this Athenian author form one volume in the Bibliotheca Fractum Paulinarum, end footnote, quote, wherefore because the scripture affirms both these, end quote, that is the efficacy of God's grace and the freedom of our wills, quote, we cannot conclude from thence that they are not repungent, but because these things are repungent unto one another we must determine that one of them is not spoken in the scripture, end quote. No, it seems, let it say what it will. This is the handsomest way they can take in advancing their own reason above the scripture, which yet savors an intolerable presumption. So, Socinus himself, speaking of the satisfaction of Christ, says in plain terms. Footnote, see volume 2, page 392. The two, Sozini, were descended from an honorable family and were both born in Cyena. Laeres, the uncle, in 1525, and his nephew Faustus in 1539. The former became addicted to the careful study of the Scriptures, forsaking the legal profession, for which he had undergone some training, and acquiring in furtherance of his favored pursuit the Greek, Hebrew, and Arabic languages. He is said to have been one of the forty individuals who held meetings for conference on religious topics, chiefly in Vicenza, and who sought to establish a purer creed by rejection of certain doctrines on which all the divines of the Reformation strenuously insisted. To these Vicente colleges, as the meetings were termed, Socinians had been accustomed to trace the origin of their particular tenets. Dr. Macri, in his History of the Reformation in Italy, page 154, assigned strong reasons for discarding this account of the origin of the Sassanianism as unworthy of credit. Laerius never committed himself during his life to a direct avowal of his sentiments, and was on terms of intercourse and correspondence with the leading reformers, intimating, however, his scruples and doubts to such an extent that his soundness in the faith was questioned, and he received an admonition from Calvin. He left Italy in 1547, traveled extensively, and at length settled at Zurich, where he died in 1562, leaving behind him some manuscripts to which Dr. Owen alludes, and of which his nephew availed himself in reducing the errors held in common by uncle and nephew to form of a theological system. The nephew, Faustus, had rather a checkered life, tainted at an early age with the heresy of his uncle. He was under the necessity of quitting Siena, and after having held for twelve years some honorable offices in the court of the Duke of Tuscany, he repaired to Basil, and for three years devoted himself to theological study. The doubts of the uncle rose to the importance of convictions in the mind of the nephew. In consequence of divisions among the reformers of Transylvania, who had become anti-Trinitarians, he was sent for by Balladarta, one of their leaders, to reason Francis David out of some views he had regarding the adoration due to Christ. The result was that David was cast into prison where he died, so seen as using no influence to restrain the Prince of Transylvania from such cruel tolerance, a fact too often forgotten by some who delight in reproaching Calvin for the death of Cervantes. He visited Poland in 1579, but before his visit, the anti-Trinitarians of that country had, by resolution of their synods in 1563 and 1565, withdrawn from the communion of other churches and published a Bible and a catechism, commonly known from Rakua, the town in which it was first published, as the Rakuvian Catechism. Faustus Sosinus, was not at first well received by his Polish brethren, but he overcame their aversion to him, which at one time was so strong that he was nearly torn to pieces by a mob. He acquired considerable influence amongst them, managed to compose their differences, and became so popular that his co-religionists adopted the name of Sosinians, in preference to their old name of Unitarians. He died in 1604, His tracts were collected into two folio volumes of the Bibliotheca Fractum Paulinarum. Starting with mistaken views of private judgment, he inferred from competency of reason to determine the credibility of doctrine. But his views differed from modern rationalists, inasmuch as he adhered more to historical Christianity as the basis of his principles, and was by no means so free in impugning the authenticity of scripture. when it bore against his system. His heresies assumed a shape more positive and definite than is generally fancied, and affected the doctrines of the Trinity, the divinity of Christ, on which his views were somewhat akin to Arianism, the necessity of the atonement, the nature of repentance, the efficacy of grace, the sacraments, and the eternity of future punishment." End footnote. Quote, For my part, If this doctrine were extant and written in the Holy Scripture, not once, but often, yet would I not therefore believe it to be so, as you do. For, where it can by no means be so, whatever the Scripture says, I would, as I do with others in other places, make use of some less incommodious interpretation, whereby I would draw a sense out of the words that should be consistent with itself." and how he would do this he declares a little before, non-English words. He would explain the words into another sense than what they sound or propose by unusual tropes, and indeed such uncouth tropes does he apply as so many engines and machines to pervert all the divine testimonies concerning our redemption, reconciliation, and justification by the blood of Christ. having therefore fixed this as their rule, constantly to prefer their own reason above the express words of the scripture, which must therefore, by one means or other, be so perverted or rusted, as to be made compliant wherewith. It is endless to trace them in their multiplied objections against the holy mysteries, all resolved into this one principle, that their reason cannot comprehend them, nor does approve of them. and if any man would have any a special instance of the serpentine wits of men winding themselves from under the power of conviction by the spiritual light of truth, or at least endeavoring to do so, let him read the comments of the Jewish rabbis on Isaiah chapter 53 and of the Sassanians on the beginning of the Gospel of John. Number two, the second branch of this repugnancy springs from the want of a due comprehension of that harmony which is in the mystery of grace and between all the parts of it. This comprehension is the principal effect of that wisdom which believers are taught by the Holy Ghost. For our understanding of the wisdom of God in a mystery is neither an art nor a science, whether purely speculative or more practical but a spiritual wisdom. And this spiritual wisdom is such as understands and apprehends things, not so much, or not only in the notion of them as in their power, reality, and efficacy towards their proper ends. And therefore, although it may be very few unless they be learned, judicious and diligent in the use of means of all sorts, do attain unto it clearly and distinctly in the doctrinal notions of it, yet are all true believers, yea, the meanest of them, directed and enabled by the Holy Spirit, as unto their own practice and duty, to act suitably unto a comprehension of this harmony, according to the promise that, quote, they shall be all taught of God, end quote. Hence, those things which appear unto others contradictory and inconsistent one with another so as that they are forced to offer violence unto the scripture and their own experience in the rejection of the one or the other of them, are reconciled in their minds and made mutually useful or helpful unto one another in the whole course of their obedience. But these things must be farther spoken unto. Such a harmony as that intended there is in the whole mystery of God, for it is the most curious effect and product of divine wisdom. and it is no impeachment of the truth of it, that it is not discernible by human reason. A full comprehension of it no creature can in this world arise unto, only in the contemplation of faith. We may arrive unto such an understanding and admiration of it as shall enable us to give glory unto God and to make use of all the parts of it in practice as we have occasion. Concerning it, the holy men mentioned before cried out, Ho, annex ignaeus to, deimi urgaeus. Quote, O unsearchable contrivance and operations, end quote. And so is it expressed by the apostle as that which has an unfathomable depth of wisdom in it. Ho, bathos plutu, etc. Quote, Oh the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God, how unsearchable are his judgments and his ways past finding. Romans chapter 11 verse 33 to 36. See to the same purpose Ephesians chapter 3 verses 8 to 10. There is a harmony, a suitableness of one thing unto another in all the works of creation. Yet we see it is not perfectly nor absolutely discoverable unto the wisest and most diligent of men. How far are they from an agreement about the order and motions of the heavenly bodies, of the sympathies and qualities of sun-dried things here below, and the relation of causality and efficiency between one thing and another? the new discoveries made concerning any of them do only evidence how far men are from a just and perfect comprehension of them. Yet, such a universal harmony there is in all the parts of nature and its operations, that nothing in its proper station and operation is destructively contradictory either to the whole or any part of it. but everything contributes unto the preservation and use of the universe. But although this harmony be not absolutely comprehensible by any, yet do all living creatures who follow the conduct or instinct of nature make use of it and live upon it. And without it, neither their being could be preserved nor their operations continued. But in the mystery of God and His grace, the harmony and suitableness of one thing unto another, with their tendency unto the same end, is incomparably more excellent and glorious than that which is seen in nature or the works of it. For whereas God made all things at first in wisdom, yet is the new creation of all things by Jesus Christ ascribed peculiarly unto riches, stores, and treasures of that infinite wisdom. Neither can any discern it unless they are taught of God, for it is only spiritually discerned. But yet, is it by the most despised? Some seem to think that there is no great wisdom in it, and some that no great wisdom is required unto the comprehension of it. If you think it worth the while to spend half that time in prayer, in meditation, in the exercise of self-denial, mortification, and holy obedience, doing the will of Christ, that they may know of His word, to the attaining of a due comprehension of the mystery of godliness, as some do in diligence, study, and trial of experiments who design to excel in nature or mathematical sciences, wherefore there are three things evident herein. Number one, that such a harmony there is in all the parts of the mystery of God wherein all the blessed properties of the divine nature are glorified, our duty in all instances is directed and engaged, our salvation in the way of obedience secured, and Christ as the end of all exalted. Wherefore We are not only to consider and know the several parts of the doctrine of spiritual truths, but their relation also one unto another, their consistency one with another in practice, and their mutual furtherance of one another unto their common end. And a disorder in our apprehensions about any part of that whose beauty and use arises from its harmony gives some confusion of mind with respect unto the whole. Number two, that unto a comprehension of this harmony, in a due measure, it is necessary that we be taught of God, without which we can never be wise in the knowledge of the mystery of His grace, and herein ought we to place the principal part of our diligence in our inquiries into the truths of the gospel. Number three, all those who are taught of God to know His will unless it be when their minds are disordered by prejudices, false opinions, or temptations, have an experience in themselves and their own practical obedience of the consistency of all parts of the mystery of God's grace and truth in Christ among themselves, of their spiritual harmony and cognate tendency unto the same end. The introduction of the grace of Christ into our relation unto God makes no confusion or disorder in their minds by the conflict of the principles of natural reason, with respect unto our first relation unto God and those of grace, with respect unto that whereunto we are renewed." From the want of a due comprehension of this divine harmony, it is that the minds of men are filled with imaginations of an inconsistency between the most important parts of the mystery of the gospel from whence the confusions that are at this day in Christian religion do proceed. Thus the Sassanians can see no consistency between the grace or love of God and the satisfaction of Christ. But imagine if the one of them be admitted the other must be excluded out of our religion. Wherefore they principally oppose the latter under a pretense of asserting and vindicating the former. and where these things are expressly conjoined in the same proposition of faith, as where it is said that, quote, we are justified freely by the grace of God through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God has sent forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, end quote, Romans chapter 3 verse 24 and 25, they will offer violence unto common sense and reason rather than not disturb that harmony which they cannot understand. For although it be plainly affirmed to be a redemption by His blood, as He is a propitiation, as His blood was a ransom or price of redemption, yet they will contend that it is only metaphorical, a mere deliverance by power, like that of the Israelites by Moses. But these things are clearly stated in the Gospel. and therefore not only consistent, but such as the one cannot subsist without the other, nor is there any mention of any a special love or grace of God unto sinners, but with respect unto the satisfaction of Christ as the means of the communication of all its effects unto them." See John chapter 3 verse 16, Romans chapter 3 verses 23 to 25, Romans chapter 8 verses 30 to 33, 2 Corinthians chapter 5 verses 19 to 21, Ephesians chapter 1 verse 7, etc. In like manner, they can see no consistency between the satisfaction of Christ and the necessity of holiness or obedience in them that do believe. Hence they continually clamor that, by our doctrine of the mediation of Christ, we overthrow all obligations unto a holy life. And by their sophistical reasonings unto this purpose, they prevail with many to embrace their delusion, who have not a spiritual experience to confront their sophistry with all. But as the testimony of the Scripture lies expressly against them, so those who truly believe and have real experience of the influence of that truth into the life of God, and how impossible it is to yield any acceptable obedience herein without respect thereunto, are secured from their snares. These and the like imaginations arise from the unwillingness of men to admit of the introduction of the mystery of grace into our relation unto God. For suppose us to stand before God on the old constitution of the covenant of creation, which alone natural reason likes and is comprehensive of, and we do acknowledge these things to be inconsistent. But the mystery of the wisdom and grace of God in Christ cannot stand without them both. So, likewise, God's efficacious grace in the conversion of sinners and the exercise of the faculties of their minds in a way of duty are asserted as contradictory and inconsistent. And although they seem both to be positively and frequently declared in the Scripture, yet, say these men, their consistency being repugnant to their reason, let the Scripture say what it will. Yet, is it to be said by us that the Scripture does not assert one of them? And this is from the same cause. Men cannot, in their wisdom, see it possible that the mystery of God's grace should be introduced into our relation and obedience unto God. Hence have many ages of the church, especially the last of them, been filled with endless disputes in opposition to the grace of God, or to accommodate the conceptions of it unto the interests of corrupted reason. 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Be perfect, be of good comfort, be of one mind, live in peace, and the God of love and peace shall be with you.