Bullinger:

We must not here carefully and curiously search and dispute, whether all men be drawn by God, or whether faith be given only to a few? And albeit thou see that all men believe not, & even those which daily hear the word of God to withstand it, yet thou must not despair nor say: these therefore do not believe (the which indeed is true) because they are not of the number of the sheep of Christ, and therefore peradventure I am not elected also, nor shall be endued with faith by God, what shall it then profit me to hear sermons? But rather we must comfort ourselves with the most sweet promises of God’s hand. For the Lord says, “I will not the death of a sinner, but that he be turned and live” [Ezek. 18.]. And Peter says, “that God is patient toward us, and would not  have that any man should perish, but that all should repent” [ 2 Pet. 3.]. And Paul says, the Scripture says, “everyone that believes in him, shall not be ashamed. For there is no distinction, either of Jew or Greek.  For there is one Lord of all, rich unto all that call upon him” [Rom. 10.]. Therefore let every man be of good hope, that God in time, will give faith unto him also.

Henry Bullinger, Common Places of Christian Religion, (Imprinted at London by Tho. East, and H. Middleton, for George Byshop, 1572), 144-145.

This entry was posted on Friday, August 22nd, 2008 at 8:31 am and is filed under God's Will for the Salvation of All Men. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

One comment

 1 

Beautiful.

Brad

August 22nd, 2008 at 11:43 am

Leave a reply

Name (*)
Mail (will not be published) (*)
URI
Comment