the works of john gill vol2 SAMPLE

Part 3: Chapter 7
the latter, were these things given out, to whom God had never
decreed to give repentance and perseverance.
Besides, allowing that these threats, cautions, and exhortations are
made to such to whom he had decreed to give repentance and
perseverance, they are to be considered as means leading on, and
blessed, in order to the enjoyment of what God had determined to
give; and, therefore, it must accord with the wisdom of providence to
make use of them.
(8.) “Is it suitable 45 to the sincerity of his providential dispensations,
of which his dealings with men, by his revealed will towards them,
make so great a part, to move them to the performance of their duty
only by motives, which he knows cannot work upon them, without
that farther aid he, from eternity, hath determined to deny them?”
I reply; that if, by performance of duty, is meant that men should
convert themselves, repent of sin, and believe in Christ, to the saving
of their souls, it will not be easy to prove that God makes use of any
motives to move any persons to do these things of themselves; and
still more difficult to prove, that he makes use of any to induce such
persons thereunto to whom he does not give that grace which only can
enable them to do them.
If by performance of duty, is meant moral obedience to the law of
God, this is every man’s duty, whether he has any motives to it or not;
and if God makes use of any motives to induce unto it, which, without
his grace, do not, and cannot, work upon them, the insufficiency of
them does not arise from any thing in the motives themselves, nor
from the denial of God’s grace, nor from his determination to deny it,
but from the perverseness and wickedness of men’s hearts; wherefore,
it is not unsuitable to the sincerity of providence, to make use of such
motives, though they do not, and he Knows they cannot, influence
without his grace, which he is not obliged to give, and which he has
45 Whitby, p. 511; ed. 2. 489.
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