Bergius:

1) Q. 38. But the quickening virtue, and the purgation of our sins, is ascribed to the flesh and blood of Christ; which is indeed a divine property.

A. The quickening Virtue and Purgation of our sins is ascribed to the flesh and blood of Christ, not as an essential property of the Deity, but as the virtue and fruit of his sufferings, which is the perfect propitiatory sacrifice which he gave for the life of the World, by which God purges us from sin and quickens us. But therefore is it the perfect propitiatory sacrifice, because it is not the flesh and blood of a mere man, but of the son of God himself, and because he gave it and shed it for us, in perfect love and obedience. And it is as much as to say, “My flesh gives life to the world, that is, thereby the world receives life, for that I came from Heaven, and took true flesh of man upon me, and gave it for the life of the world.” The blood of the Son of God cleanses us from all sin, that is, hereby have we cleansing from all our sins, that the Son of God has shed his own blood for us.    Johannes Bergius, The Pearle of Peace & Concord. Or A Treatise of Pacification Betwixt the dissenting Churches of Christ, (London: Printed by T.C. For John Rothwell, at the Fountain and Bear in Cheap-side; and John Wright, at the Kings Head in the Old Bayly 1655), 35-36. [Some reformatting; some spelling modernized; and underlining mine.]

2) Q. 49. But what do they accuse your doctrine for?

A. They charge us that we [the Reformed] as if we teach, First, that God did not will at all the Salvation of all men, but has chosen some few merely of his won will and pleasure without any respect of their belief or unbelief to salvation, and rejected the rest and the greatest part of men to damnation. So that the Elect if they live so wickedly, yet must be saved; but that the rejected, if they never so piously, yet must be dammed…

4. [And] that it was not at all the will of God, that Christ should suffer and die for all men, but only for some certain persons, namely the elect.    Johannes Bergius, The Pearle of Peace & Concord. Or A Treatise of Pacification Betwixt the dissenting Churches of Christ, (London: Printed by T.C. For John Rothwell, at the Fountain and Bear in Cheap-side; and John Wright, at the Kings Head in the Old Bayly 1655), 49 and 50. [Some reformatting; some spelling modernized; square bracketed inserts mine; and underlining mine.]

Read the rest of this entry »

Dabney:

1) But it is objected that the report suggests error concerning the application and extent of the atonement. On this subject there are two aspects which Calvinists have always distinguished. One regards the nature of the atonement; the other its design; and we all hold that, in its intrinsic nature, the atonement is infinite. This is the consequence of the infinite dignity of the Mediatorial Person. Its value is, intrinsically, as sufficient for the sins of all men as of one. Its limitation to the elect is not to be sought, then, in it nature, but in its design; and this design, as to its actual application to them, is nothing else than the decree. It is not something else, different and separate, but the decree itself. Now the section of our report under remark, in its first sentences, speaks of the nature of the atonement, and in its last of its application. In its first sentences it uses general terms, “man’s guilt,” “our sins,” etc., for it is speaking only of the nature of Christ’s atoning work, which has no limits.’ And in speaking thus, I claim that the report does but imitate the Scriptures–”God so loved the world,” etc.; “Behold the Lamb of God which takes away the sins of the world,” etc.–and the Confession itself. Why, then, should it be charged with error for using the same sort of language which the Bible itself does in this connection? But when the report proceeds to speak of the application of redemption, it declares, as I assert, in exact accordance with the spirit of our standards, that God applies it to all the elect, and to no others; and that this application is itself through the purchase of Jesus Christ. We do not invent a statement to establish a supralapsarian order of sequence between the purpose to save the elect and to send Christ to die; but neither does the Confession. It merely declares that redemption is applied through this work of Christ precisely to those to whom it was God’s eternal purpose to apply it; and that is, his elect. The report speaks the same thing.

Moreover, the committee used the word redemption, as they believe, in strict accordance with Calvinistic usage, in a sense distinct from the word atonement. Redemption means, not only a provision of a vicarious penalty to satisfy for guilt, but in addition all the gracious gifts, of active obedience to be imputed, of effectual calling, of sanctification, and of glorification, which make up a completed salvation. All this is designed, purchased, and bestowed for the elect in and through Christ. And in this view they may quote, among many Calvinistic authorities, this of old Willison, Catechism, Ques.: “How doth Christ redeem his people from their bondage?” Ans. “Partly by price, or purchase; partly by power, or conquest.”

In a word, the committee intended to express summarily that sound, but not ultra, view of the atonement held by Calvinists, and expressed in the ancient formula, “Christ died sufficiently for the race, efficaciously for the elect.”  R.L. Dabney, ‘Speech on the Fusion of the United Synod,” in Discussions: Evangelical and Theological, 2:307-308. [Some reformatting; some spelling modernized; and underlining mine.]

Read the rest of this entry »

Baxter:

1) 355. The next distinction of God’s Will, is into Absolute and Conditional; which some Divines use and others condemn, and say that God has no Conditional Will. The common answer which most Schoolmen and other Papists agree with the Protestants in, is, that there are Conditions rei volita of the event of the thing Willed, but no Conditions of the act of Volition in God. As Aquinas says of Causes, Deus vult hoc esse propter hoc; non autem propter hoc vult hoc. 1. There are both Causes and Conditions of the event willed of God. 2. Denominatione extinseca ex conotatione objecti his Will is hence called Conditional; meaning but a Volition of Conditionals.

356. That God wills Conditions, and Conditional Propsitions, and Grants, is past all controversies. For he wills own word, which is his work: But his word has conditional promises and threats: And as his word also may be called his will, he has a Conditional will, because a Conditional word. Richard Baxter, Catholick Theologie (London:  Printed by Robert White, for Nevill Simmons at the Princess Arms in St. Pauls Church-yard, 1675), 1:55.  [Some spelling modernized; some reformatting; marginal comments not include; and underlining mine.]

2) 2. When I speak (before in the Argument) of Gods will, it is not of his will of Decree, but of his will as he is in the relation of Rector per Leges and so giveth that Salvation as executor of his Laws and Sentence, which by his Laws he first gave Right to. God as Rector and Legislator neither will nor can give Salvation to any that Christ dyed not for, if they should believe: But God as Legislator or Rector would give salvation to all that Christ Dyed for if they believe, though it were supposed that he had foreknown or decreed that such men would not believe. Only it would follow that God was mistaken: And therefore such a thing will never come to pass; for God will not be mistaken. It is God as Legislator to whom it belongs to be true, in making good his promises, which is the thing in Question. Richard Baxter, Universal Redemption of Mankind by the Lord Jesus Christ, (London: Printed for John Salusbury at the Rising Sun in Cornhill, 1694), 129. [Some spelling modernized and underlining mine.]

3) 5. In so doing God doth all that belongs to him to do as Legislator: For it must be understood that here he speaks those words [that the World by him might be saved] not as absolute Lord meerly or properly, but as Rector per Leges, And it belongs to him as Legislator, only to propound Salvation, to Man as his end: And to promise it on his conditions, and prescribe those conditions and command Man to perform them: And to threaten him with the loss of that end (of Salvation) if he perform them not. But to give faith, which is the condition it self, doth not belong so God as Legislator. (No Man living can claim the first Act of faith, or effectual Grace thereto, from God by any promise that he has made): But he giveth it as Dominus absolutus, and as one that may do with his own as he list. So that it is Finis prescriptus & conditionaliter datus, that is here spoken of; and not Finis Decretus to be by God eventually infallibly accomplished. It is the end of Gods Law, and Legislative Will, and so of God as mere Legislator or Rector per Leges: And not of his decretive Will de eventu, and of God as absolute Lord above Laws, without them disposing of his own. (The prediction of Events doth collaterally and secundum quid belong to his Law: But not per se and directly.)

And 6. Consider, that if it be never so much denied that God has properly a conditional Will de rerum eventu, yet it is beyond all question true, that he has a conditional Will de debito, (officii, Præmii & Pænæ) and so his Law is conditional most commonly. He has constituted the Debitum pramii, the dueness of Salvation on condition of believing, loving and sincerely obeying Christ. And therefore they must nor deny conditional promises and threatnings, though they deny conditional, decrees. This I add, because I know they here usually answer that God intendeth no end conditionally, but where he intends also the condition it self, that so it may be equivalent to absolute: But he intends as Legislator that Faith shall be the prescribed means to Glory, and Glory the end promised to all that perform that condition; and so conditionally giveth it.

7. Consider also that even in regard of Gods Will de Eventu, our Divines generally with the School men confess and maintain that God has a conditional Will in this Sense. That is, that he wills such a thing shall be a condition of the accomplishing, giving or event of another thing; and so that he wills Faith shall be a condition of Salvation: Though nothing be the condition of Gods Act of Willing, So that ex parte voliti it is conditional, though not ex parte actus volentis. This Dr. Twiss says oft consid. of Tilenus Sinod of Dort and Arlis reduced Page 61. He saith [Ger. Vossius interpreteth the Will of God touching the Salvation of all, of a conditional Will, thus: God will have all to be saved, to wit, in case they believe: Which conditional Will in this Sense, neither Austin did, nor we do deny] And Page 143, 144, I willingly profess that Christ died for all, in respect of procuring the benefit, (of Pardon and Salvation) conditionally on condition of their Faith] and against Cotton p. 74 [Still you prove that which no man denies, viz. that God purposed Life to the World upon condition of Obedience and Repentance, provided that you understand it right; viz. that Obedience and Repentance is ordained of God, as a condition of Life, not of Gods purpose. Richard Baxter, Universal Redemption of Mankind by the Lord Jesus Christ, (London: Printed for John Salusbury at the Rising Sun in Cornhill, 1694), 305-308.  [Some spelling modernized and underlining mine.]

Baxter:

General Conditional Decree:

1) 101. It is a thing so contrary to the nature of Christianity, and the Spirit of Christ in his Saints, to extenuate Christ’s Merit’s, Purchase, Interest or Honor, or rob him of his due, that doubtless so many sincere Christians would never be guilty of such injurious extenuations, and narrowing of Christ’s successes, but that they cannot reconcile special Grace with universal, and mistakingly judge them inconsistent: Nor durst opprobriously reproach his universal Grace, as they do, by calling it vain, lame, imperfect, a mockery, &c. if the conceit of their defending some truth by it did not quiet and deceive their Consciences. Whereas indeed universal Grace and special, do as perfectly and harmoniously consist, as Nature and Grace do, and as the foundation and the building, and as any generical and specific Natures: And so doth a general Decree, that [All who will believe shall be saved, and that this Promise shall be made to the world] with a special Decree that [Paul shall believe and be saved.]

But on two accounts I pass by all the rest about the extent of Redemption, 1. Because I must give you a special Disputation or Tractate on that subject. 2. Because the most Judicious of English Divines (so far as I can know them by their works) Bishop Davenant has said so much in his two Posthumous Dissertation de Redempt. & Prædestinat. (Published out of the hands of Bishop Usher) as might suffice to reconcile contenders on these two points, were not men slothful in studying them or partial or incapable in judging these matters. Richard Baxter, Catholick Theologie (London:  Printed by Robert White, for Nevill Simmons at the Princess Arms in St. Pauls Church-yard, 1675), 2:53-54.  [Some spelling modernized; some reformatting; marginal comments not include; and underlining mine.]

Conditional Decree:

2) 2. We affirm that God has many Decrees which are conditional in respect of the thing decreed. So Dr. Twisse frequently tells you. He makes one thing a means and a condition of the event of another. And he says that God has conditional Promises and Threatenings; [“If thou confess with thy mouth, and believe in thy heart,” &c. “thou shall be saved.”] And we believe that God’s will made these Promises and Threats, and that they are the true signs of his Will: And that he will fulfil them. And so far he has a conditional Will, and conditional expressions of his Will.

3. But as to the Act of Volition, we believe that his Wills are eternal, and have no proper condition of their existence; because being existent, they are Necessary necessiate existentiæ; e.g. God never had such a Will as this, [If thou repent, I will purpose or will to pardon thee if thou repent, or to make the pardoning conditional promise]; But [If thou repent I will pardon thee, and whether thou repent or not, I will conditionally pardon thee, or make that Covenant which says, I will pardon thee if thou repent], our Acts are the Conditions of God’s Gifts and Acts, but not of his Will, as suspended on those Acts. Richard Baxter, Catholick Theologie (London:  Printed by Robert White, for Nevill Simmons at the Princess Arms in St. Pauls Church-yard, 1675), 2:16-17.  [Some spelling modernized; some reformatting; marginal comments not include; and underlining mine.]