Proposition 1

PROPOSITION I:

That God useth a great deal of patience with some sinners under the Gospel. Though he affords them the means of grace, and they do not presently give them due entertainment, but neglect them, yet he does not always presently fall upon, and cut them off from these means, but suffers them to live a great while under them, and waits upon them. Here observe.

1. That the patience of God is sovereign and arbitrary. It is an act of his mere good pleasure: as he owes to no sinners a room in his Vineyard, or so much as an offer of grace; so, upon their neglecting to improve the means, and refusing the offers of grace made to them, he might righteously take away his Gospel from them, or them from it; and although he would be severe, yet he would be very just. The New Covenant is a Covenant of Grace, and all that is done for men in it, is therefore free: as he acts his pleasure in choosing who shall be put into the Vineyard, he does it no less in determining their continuance in it.

2. This patience is exerted towards some and not all. As God is sovereign so he makes use of his sovereignty, to let us know that he is so. How many are there that are born in places where the Gospel is enjoyed, who never live to years of understanding, to have any offer of grace made to them; of whom, though God can work his grace in them by his Spirit, and has given godly parents good reason to hope well concerning them, (but this dispensation is a secret;) this is a truth, that they are taken out of the Vineyard, before they are capable of the moral means used in it. We find also such to whom the Gospel has been offered, and at their first refusal of it they have been discarded (Acts 13:45, 46). Yes, such an injunction Christ laid upon his Disciples (Matthew 10:14).

3. Hence also God uses his pleasure in the timing his patience to these and those. All that are waited upon have not the same measure of the day of grace, and season for bearing fruit; but some a longer, and some a shorter time, having no other bounds, but his will: nor has he told any sinners how long it shall be. He would not have any such to presume, but calls all to improve the present time; does not acquaint them when he will put an end to his patience if they repent not: some sinners are cut down in their full strength, others are suffered to live and grow old, and all this while God is patient, he bears and forbears, for there is no hour in which they are not open to his displeasure, and giving him provocation to fall upon them in his anger: and there are some whom he will make to experience his forbearance to the uttermost (Romans 9:23).