Objection 22: Difference Maker – Whitby’s refutation of Arguments in favor of irresistible grace
II. OBJECTION TWENTY-TWO. "If man doth anything towards his conversion, which another neglecting to do is not converted, he makes himself to differ from that other, which yet seems not consistent with St. Paul's enquiry, ' who made thee to differ from another " (1 Corinthians 4:7)
ANSWER. The apostle manifestly speaks here of those extraordinary gifts of the Spirit, the gifts of tongues, and prophecy, &c. on the account of which they were puffed up for one against another, counting one a man of better gifts than another. Now these gifts being immediately infused without human industry, and conferred upon Christians without any such co-operation of their faculties, as is required to the exercise of any Christian duty or moral virtue, it cannot, with like reason, be enquired of these duties, as it may be of those gifts, 'who made thee to differ from another in them? Nor can it from them be duly inferred, that no man does anything to make himself differ from another in any virtue, or pious dispositions. For to what purpose are men continually exhorted and stirred up by powerful motives to all Christian duties, and particularly to excel in virtue, if these exhortations and motives be not proposed to engage them to exercise these Christian virtues, to ' chose the good and refuse the evil.
And if one man, upon consideration of those motives, does chose to live a pious life, whereas another will not be persuaded so to do, does he not differ from that other by virtue of that choice? And though the grace of God by way of excitation works in us thus to will, yet since our faculties do first deliberate upon, and then comply, and chose to do the thing to which this grace excites us; if to consider be to differ from him that does not consider, and to comply with and to embrace the call of God be to differ from him that disobeys the same call, it must be certain, that as God's grace preventing and exciting, so my faculties co-operating, tend to make me differ from another. And does not God himself declare, that men do somewhat to make themselves differ from others, by praising them who did what others neglected to do; as in the case of the Beraeans, (Acts 17:10-11) the elder and the younger son; the publicans and harlots compared with the Scribes and Pharisees, the penitent Publican and the proud Pharisee?
To the question then, when two are equally called, and one converted, who is it that puts the difference? The answer grounded upon God's own righteous judgment will be this, " that man puts the difference, and not God only; because God judges not his own acts, but the acts of men, dealing with every many according to his own works; and because every righteous judge finds a difference and does not make it, where the sentence is so vastly different."
ANSWER. The apostle manifestly speaks here of those extraordinary gifts of the Spirit, the gifts of tongues, and prophecy, &c. on the account of which they were puffed up for one against another, counting one a man of better gifts than another. Now these gifts being immediately infused without human industry, and conferred upon Christians without any such co-operation of their faculties, as is required to the exercise of any Christian duty or moral virtue, it cannot, with like reason, be enquired of these duties, as it may be of those gifts, 'who made thee to differ from another in them? Nor can it from them be duly inferred, that no man does anything to make himself differ from another in any virtue, or pious dispositions. For to what purpose are men continually exhorted and stirred up by powerful motives to all Christian duties, and particularly to excel in virtue, if these exhortations and motives be not proposed to engage them to exercise these Christian virtues, to ' chose the good and refuse the evil.
And if one man, upon consideration of those motives, does chose to live a pious life, whereas another will not be persuaded so to do, does he not differ from that other by virtue of that choice? And though the grace of God by way of excitation works in us thus to will, yet since our faculties do first deliberate upon, and then comply, and chose to do the thing to which this grace excites us; if to consider be to differ from him that does not consider, and to comply with and to embrace the call of God be to differ from him that disobeys the same call, it must be certain, that as God's grace preventing and exciting, so my faculties co-operating, tend to make me differ from another. And does not God himself declare, that men do somewhat to make themselves differ from others, by praising them who did what others neglected to do; as in the case of the Beraeans, (Acts 17:10-11) the elder and the younger son; the publicans and harlots compared with the Scribes and Pharisees, the penitent Publican and the proud Pharisee?
To the question then, when two are equally called, and one converted, who is it that puts the difference? The answer grounded upon God's own righteous judgment will be this, " that man puts the difference, and not God only; because God judges not his own acts, but the acts of men, dealing with every many according to his own works; and because every righteous judge finds a difference and does not make it, where the sentence is so vastly different."
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