Page:A Treatise of the Covenant of Grace (John Ball).djvu/222

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to the world to condemn the world: but that the world through him might be saved. And,John 12.47. I came not to judge the world, but to save the world. Here the motive from which the gift of Christ is derived is common love.The particle Who, is not ever distributive of the subject to which it is attributed. See Revel. 2.25, 26. 2 Cor. 5. 15. The word World cannot be taken for the elect only: for then it will be as if it had bin said, God so loved the elect, that he gave his only Sonne, that whosoever of them believed in him should not perish. The world that Christ came to save, was that world into which he came; and that comprehended both beleevers and unbelievers: and in the same place, it is divided into them that shall be saved, and them that shall be damned: and there should be no force of reasoning in the latter place, if the world did not comprehend unbelievers under it. Thus these passages are urged for universall redemption. But the principall textsIsa. 54. 5. Deus totius terrae vocabitur.
Ut 1 Joh. 2.2.
Joh. 4.42.
Rupert, Tuit. in Joh. Mundum sanè quem dilexit Deus, humanum genus accipimus, id est, vivos & mortuos; mortuos, scil. qui venturum in fide expectaverint: vivos, qui in illum, sive ex Iudaeis, sive ex Gentibus, credituri erant. speake plainly of the daies of grace, when God sent his Sonne into the world, and when according to the prophesies and promises made before, the Gentiles were to be called to the faith, added to the Church, and received into Covenant. And the world is taken communiter & indefinitè, for the world, as it is opposed to the Jewish Nation alone, not universaliter pro singulis, for every man in the world of what time or age soever, or of this time in speciall. The sence then is, In the fulnesse of time, God manifested so great love unto the world of Jew and Gentile, not of the Jew alone, That he gave his only begotten Sonne, and in the Ministery of the Gospel, seriously invited them to beleeve, and entered into Covenant to bestow life and happinesse upon condition of their unfained faith on Jesus Christ. As God loved Israel, whom he chose to be his peculiar people under the old Testament: so in the times of grace he extended his love to the world of Jew and Gentile. And as amongst the Jews God manifested so much love to the body of that Nation, as to enter into Covenant with them, and vouchsafe unto them the meanes of grace, but unto some he shewed more speciall love, so as to call them effectually, and make them heires of salvation: In like manner in the last times or daies of the new Testament God manifested so much love to the world, as it is opposed to the Jewish Nation, as that in the ministery of the Gospell he entreated them to be reconciled, and entered into a Covenant of peace with them: but unto some he bare and manifested more peculiar love, in that he called them effectually, and made them heires of life. Neverthelesse, when these Texts be expoun-ded