IX.] THE INTERCESSION OF CHRIST. 375
question whether sin, looseness, profaneness, do not separate between God and men, more or less; but whether believers shall not be pre- served from such looseness and profaneness as would make a total separation between God and them? And if God [Christ?] inter- cedes, as is added in the close, that nothing may make him an- enemy to us, certainly he must intercede that no sin may do it, — for indeed sin is something in this business, — and this must be as to the keeping us from it. I suppose no man thinks any thing in all this discourse of Mr Goodwin's to look like the least attempt of proof that Christ doth not intercede for the perseverance of saints; neither hath he confidence enough positively to deny it, and there- fore spends his whole discourse hereabout in evasions and diversions- Let it be directly denied that Christ doth not intend that the faith of believers may not fail, that his saints may be preserved and saved, and we know what we have to apply ourselves unto; and if the contrary cannot be proved, the saints know what they have to trust unto, that they may no longer lean on that which will yield them no supportment. If this will not be, let it on the other hand be granted that he doth so intercede; for "de unoquoque affirmare, aut negare, verum est." As to this, then, he proceeds: —
Secondly, " Were it granted that part of Christ's intercession for his saints is, that their faith may never fail, yet the intent thereof would not necessarily, nor indeed with any competent probability, be this, that no sin nor wickedness whatsoever that shall or can be perpetrated by them might cause them to make shipwreck of their faith, but rather that God would gi'aciously vouchsafe such means and such a presence of his Spirit unto them as whereby they may be richly enabled to keep themselves in faith and good conscience to the end."
Ans. Whether prejudiced men will grant it or no, it is clearly proved, if the words of Christ themselves may be taken for proof, that he intercedes for his saints that their faith may not fail, and that notwithstanding the interposition of any such sins as they can or may (" suppositis supponendis," amongst which is his intercession) fall into. So he tells Peter, upon the prediction of his dreadful fall, that nevertheless he had prayed for him that his faith should not fail. That they may fall into such sins, and continue in such, as are inconsistent with their acceptation with God, according to the terms and tenor of the new covenant, is that which we have been disprov- ing all this while, and which our author ought not, as he doth in all his reasonings, to suppose. In the not failing or dying of their faith, in their preservation therein, is included their deliverance from the perpetration of the sins intimated, or at least from such a manner of committing any sin as should utterly separate them from God. It is the continuance of a living faith that Christ prays for; and where
S7G DOCTRINE OF THE SAINTS' PERSEVEEANCE. [ciIAP.
that is, there will be works of new obedience, and there will be the work of that faith in purifying the heart and mortifying of the sins supposed. Farther; the way here prescribed and limited to the Lord Jesus how he shall intercede for his, and for Avhat, — namely, not for -actual perseverance and continuance in the faith to be wrought in them by the exceeding greatness of the power of God, but for means to enable them to preserve themselves, — we are persuaded he walks not in ; and that much upon this account, that the way whereby God begins and carries on believers in the way of faith and obedience is not by such a supply of means as leaves them to themselves to work and effect the things for which they are so supplied, but he himself " works in them to will and to do of his own good pleasure, fulfilling in them all the good pleasure of his goodness and the work of faith with power," giving them all their sufficiency, and preserving them by his power " through faith unto salvation/' To make feith, and per- severance therein, to follow such a supply of means as leaves the production of them to the power of the wills of men, so that after God hath done all that on his part is to be done or performed, — that is, quickened them being dead, giving them new hearts and spirits, shone into their minds, to give them the knowledge of his glory m the face of his Son, etc.,— it is yet uncertain whether ever faith shall be wrought in their souls or no, or rather whether men so supplied with means will believe and persevere or no, is an asser- tion that will never be proved to eternity, nor, wliilst truth is truth, is it capable of proof. " The granting of such means and such a pre- sence of liis Spirit, that men may be enabled to work for themselve.s," is an expression exceedingly uusuited to all the promises of the new covenant. Whatever either of the Spirit of grace or the means of it is given out to believers, Christ intercedes that his Father would keep them, not that they should keep themselves. He was too well acquainted with our frame and our temptations to desire we might be our own keepers. God forbid we should be left to our own pre- sei-vation, to the hand of our own counsel and power, though com- passed with all the supposed sufficient means, that may be not even- tually effectual! God creates a defence uj)on our glory, and doth not leave it to our own safeguarding. Our salvation is not in our own custody. That the Father doth not keep us or preserve us^ that the Son doth not intercede that we may be so preserved, that the S[)irit doth not make us meet for and keep us unto the inherit- ance of the saints in light, but that in the use of means we are, as Adam was, our own keepers, are some of the principles of that new way of administering consolation to believers which Mr Goodwin hath found out. This, then, is the utmost which Mr Goodwin will allow to be (for disputation's sake, not that he really believes it) granted, that Christ intercedes for his saints as to their continuance and pre-