Tag Archives: Thomas Goodwin

“He abounds more in grace than thou in sinning” by Thomas Goodwin

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“When the name of God and Christ are simply and alone apprehended they may be sufficient ground for faith to rest upon and nothing can be more comfortable to a poor distressed believer.

Because the name of God, that is, God’s attributes, and Christ’s righteousness, do sufficiently, and adequately, and fully answer all wants and doubts, and all objections and distresses that we can have, or can be in.

Whatsoever our want or temptations be, He hath a name to make supply.

For example, to take that His name in pieces, mentioned Exodus 34:5-6, consider every letter in that His name, and every letter answers to some temptation may be made by us.

Art thou in misery and great distress?

He is merciful; ‘The Lord merciful.’ The Lord, therefore able to help thee; and merciful, therefore willing.

Yes, but thou wilt say, ‘I am unworthy; I have nothing in me to move Him to it.‘

Well, therefore, He is gracious; now grace is to show mercy freely.

Yes, but I have sinned against Him long, for many years; if I had come in when I was young, mercy might have been shown me.

To this He says, ‘I am long-suffering.’

Yes, but my sins every way abound in number, and it is impossible to reckon them up, and they abound in heinousness; I have committed the same sins again and again; I have been false to Him, broke promise with Him again and again.

His name also answers this objection: He is abundant in goodness. He abounds more in grace than thou in sinning.

And though thou hast been false again and again to him, and broke all covenants, yet He is abundant in truth; also better than His word, for He cannot to our capacities express all that mercy that is in Him for us.

Yes, but I have committed great sins, aggravated with many and great circumstances, against knowledge, and willfully.

He forgives iniquity, transgression, and sin; sins of all sorts.

Yes, but there is mercy thus in Him but for a few, and I may be none of the number.

Yes, there is mercy for thousands. And He keeps it; treasures of mercy lie by Him, and are kept, if men would come and take them.”

–Thomas Goodwin, The Works of Thomas Goodwin, Volume 3 (Grand Rapids, MI: Reformation Heritage, 1861/2006), 3: 326, 328.

“I am swallowed up in God” by Thomas Goodwin

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Thomas Goodwin died in London at age eighty. His son wrote this about his father’s final days:

“In February 1679, a fever seized my dear father, which in a few days put an end to his life.

In all the violence of it, he discoursed with that strength of faith and assurance of Christ’s love, with that holy admiration of free grace, with that joy in believing, and such thanksgivings and praises, as he extremely moved and affected all that heard him.

He rejoiced in the thoughts that he was dying, and going to have a full and uninterrupted communion with God.

‘I am going,’ said he, ‘to the three Persons, with whom I have had communion: they have taken me; I did not take them. I shall be changed in the twinkling of an eye; all my lusts and corruptions I shall be rid of, which I could not be here; those croaking toads will fall off in a moment.’

And mentioning those great examples of faith, Heb. 11,

‘All these,’ said he, ‘died in faith. I could not have imagined I should ever have had such a measure of faith in this hour; no, I could never have imagined it. My bow abides in strength.

Is Christ divided? No, I have the whole of His righteousness; I am found in Him, not in my own righteousness, which is of the law, but in the righteousness which is of God, which is by faith of Jesus Christ, who loved me, and gave Himself for me.

Christ cannot love me better than He doth; I think I cannot love Christ better than I do; I am swallowed up in God.’

Directing his speech to his two sons, he exhorted them to value the privilege of the covenant. ‘Now,’ said he, ‘I shall be ever with the Lord.’

With this assurance of faith and fulness of joy, his soul left this world, and went to see and enjoy the reality of that blessed state of glory, which in a discourse on that subject he had so well demonstrated.

He died February 1679, and in the eightieth year of his age.”

–Thomas Goodwin, Memoir of Thomas Goodwin, D.D., Composed Out of His Own Papers and Memoirs, By His Son, The Works of Thomas Goodwin, Volume 2 (Grand Rapids, MI: Reformation Heritage, 1861/2006), 2: lxxiv–lxxv.

“The Spirit prays in you, because Christ prays for you” by Thomas Goodwin

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“Let us consider what Christ did when He was come to heaven and exalted there: how abundantly did He there make good all that He had promised in His last sermon!

For, first, He instantly poured out His Spirit, and that ‘richly’ (as the apostle to Titus speaks), and He ‘being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, He hath shed forth this which you now see and hear,’ says the apostle in his first sermon after, Acts 2:33.

He then received it, and visibly poured Him out. So Eph. 4:8, it is said, ‘He ascended up on high, and gave gifts unto men … for the work of the ministry (4:15), and for the jointing in of the saints to the increase of the body of Christ’ (4:16), that is, for the converting of elect sinners, and making them saints.

And the gifts there mentioned (some of them) remain into this day, in ‘pastors and teachers,’ &c. And this Spirit is still in our preaching and in your hearts, in hearing, in praying, and He persuades you of Christ’s love to this very day; and is in all these the pledge of the continuance of Christ’s love still in heaven unto sinners.

All our sermons and your prayers are evidences to you, that Christ’s heart is still the same towards sinners that ever it was, for the Spirit that assists in all these comes in His name, and in His stead, and works all by commission from Him.

And do none of you feel your hearts moved in the preaching of these things, at this and other times? And who is it that moves you?

It is the Spirit who speaks in Christ’s name from heaven, even as Himself is said to ‘speak from heaven,’ Heb. 12:25.

And when you pray, it is the Spirit that indites your prayers, and that ‘makes intercession for you’ in your own hearts, Rom. 8:26, which intercession of His is but the evidence and echo of Christ’s intercession in heaven.

The Spirit prays in you, because Christ prays for you. He is an intercessor on earth, because Christ is an intercessor in heaven.

As He did take off Christ’s words, and used the same that He before had uttered, when He spake in and to the disciples the words of life, so He takes off Christ’s prayers also when He prays in us; He takes but the words as it were out of Christ’s mouth, or heart rather, and directs our hearts to offer them up to God.

He also follows us to the sacrament, and in that glass shews us Christ’s face smiling on us, and through His face His heart; and thus helping of us to a sight of Him, we go away rejoicing that we saw our Saviour that day.”

–Thomas Goodwin, The Heart of Christ in Heaven, The Works of Thomas Goodwin, Volume 4 (Grand Rapids, MI: Reformation Heritage, 1861/2006), 4: 107-108.

“It is mercy that hath brought us there” by Thomas Goodwin

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“We were dead in sins and trespasses, we were children of wrath by nature, hell was our place.

It is the exceeding riches of His grace that pulls men out of that miserable condition, and sets them upon that height and top of blessedness and happiness in the world to come.

It is thy mercy, say they in the Lamentations, that we are not consumed; Thy mercies fail not.

It is the mercy of God that we are not in hell.

And when we are in heaven, it is mercy that hath brought us there.

And it is mercy and grace that continues us there forever.”

–Thomas Goodwin, “Sermon 19: Ephesians 2:7,” The Works of Thomas Goodwin, Volume 2 (Grand Rapids, MI: Reformation Heritage, 1861/2006), 2: 303–304.

“All the glory and all the grace” by Thomas Goodwin

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“Lastly, here is ‘in Christ Jesus‘ added, for all God’s kindness, and all His grace towards us, is in Christ (Ephesians 2:7).

It is an infinite magnifying of the Lord Jesus, that He alone, being in heaven, is able enough and worthy enough to take into His possession all the glory and all the grace that ever God means to bestow upon His children.

He hath done it, my brethren.

Had not He been a person answerably glorious, we could not have been said to sit in heavenly places in Christ Jesus, or that the riches of His grace should be shown in His kindness toward us in Him.

But so great a person is Jesus Christ, God and man, that look as the sun, if there were ten hundred thousand stars more to be created, and the heavens to be filled with them all, there is light enough in the sun to enlighten them all; so there is in Christ.

And therefore, my brethren, never think to set up without this Lord Jesus Christ.

Do not think that He only serveth to bring you unto God, and there to leave you. No, He will never leave you to eternity.

All the kindness that God shows you to eternity is in Christ Jesus.”

–Thomas Goodwin, “Sermon 19: Ephesians 2:7,” The Works of Thomas Goodwin, Volume 2 (Grand Rapids, MI: Reformation Heritage, 1861/2006), 2: 293–294.

“The gospel is the best news that ears ever heard” by Thomas Goodwin

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“Our commission is to tell this message to all and every man in the world. And upon this ground, that reconciliation is to be obtained from God for them, to entreat them to be reconciled.

And when men accordingly seek it, as thus revealed to them, though by us, it is as if God had done it:

“Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us: we pray you in Christ’s stead, be ye reconciled to God. For He hath made Him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.”(2 Cor. 5:20-21)

‘As though God,’ and, ‘I in Christ’s stead,’ says the apostle.

And this, my brethren, is to preach the gospel unto men, which is the best news that ears ever heard, or tongues were employed to utter, which took up God’s thoughts from eternity, and which lay hid in His breast, which none but He and His Son knew, which, if it were but for the antiquity of the story of it, it is worth the relating, it being the greatest plot and state affair that ever was transacted in heaven or earth, or ever will be.”

–Thomas Goodwin, “The One Sacrifice,” The Works of Thomas Goodwin, Volume 5 (Grand Rapids, MI: Reformation Heritage, 1862/2006), 5: 482.

“Jesus Christ in all His glories is the great and eminent subject of the gospel” by Thomas Goodwin

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“1. In Christ all the riches of God and the knowledge of Him are laid up, as the treasury and subject of them; and so discovered and communicated to us objectively in the knowledge of Him. Thus, in Colossians 2:2-3, the apostle further explains it.

For having termed the gospel the mystery of God and of Christ, he adds, ‘In whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge;’ not only to be revealed by Him, or subjectively known in and by Himself; but (which is the proper scope of the apostle) objectively set forth, and contained in Him alone, and in the knowledge of Him made known to us.

2. In Christ shines ‘the glory of God’ (2 Cor. 4:6, ‘The light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ’), as the lively image of all His features and perfections, and evidences of His inward counsels and affections.

That therefore which I here insist upon is, that Jesus Christ in all His glories is the great and eminent subject of the gospel, (Rev. 1:1).

3. It is the gospel of God (namely, as the author of it), but it is concerning His Son Jesus Christ our Lord. God had but one Son, and He made this gospel on purpose to honour Him, and set Him forth.

It is all, and every word of it, some way or other concerning Him, or about Him. God made it purposely to set His Son Christ forth to us; and in setting forth His Son, Himself also.

It is therefore termed (Colossians 2:2) ‘the mystery of God the Father, and of Christ,’ Christ, in that series of truths about Him held forth in the whole New Testament, is the sum of this newly revealed wisdom of God, (1 Cor. 1:24).”

–Thomas Goodwin, “A Discourse of the Glory of the Gospel,” The Works of Thomas Goodwin, Volume 4 (Grand Rapids, MI: Reformation Heritage, 1862/2021), 4: 263–264.

“Reconciliation is His masterpiece” by Thomas Goodwin

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“Are not all God’s attributes His nature, His justice as well as mercy? His hatred of sin, as well as the love of His creature?

And is not that nature of His pure act, and therefore active, and therefore provokes all His will to manifest these His attributes upon all occasions?

Doth not justice boil within Him against sin, as well as His bowels of mercy yearn towards the sinner?

Is not the plot of reconciliation His masterpiece, wherein He means to bring all His attributes upon the stage?”

–Thomas Goodwin, “Of Christ the Mediator,” The Works of Thomas Goodwin, Volume 5 (Grand Rapids, MI: Reformation Heritage, 1862/2021), 5: 16.

“God stamped upon His Son all His glory” by Thomas Goodwin

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“He is the Son of God, and second person, and therefore the express image and brightness of His Father’s glory, (Hebrews 1:3) the essential substantial image of His Father, which transcends infinitely more all other drafts of Him than the image of a king in his son begotten like him, and in a board or tablet.

But this image, you will say, it is too bright for us to behold it shining in His strength, we being as unable to behold it in Him, as we were to see His Father Himself, who dwells in light inaccessible, which no eye can attain to.

Therefore that yet we may see it as nigh and as fully and to the utmost that creatures could; this Godhead dwells bodily in a human nature (Colossians 2:9), that so shining through the lantern of His flesh we might behold it.

His human nature and divine make up one person, and being so, are united together in the highest kind of union that God can be to a creature, and the nearest and fullest communications follow always upon the nearest union.

To Him therefore as man are communicated these riches of glory that are in the Godhead, as nearly and fully as was possible unto a creature; and being thus communicated, must needs shine forth in Him to us to the utmost that they ever could unto creatures.

And therefore more clearly than if millions of several worlds had been created every day on purpose to reveal God to us.

God having stamped upon His Son all His glory, that we might see the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, (2 Cor. 4:6).”

–Thomas Goodwin, “A Discourse of the Glory of the Gospel,” The Works of Thomas Goodwin, Volume 4 (Grand Rapids, MI: Reformation Heritage, 1862/2021), 4: 232.

“A righteousness that is able to cover the sins of millions of worlds” by Thomas Goodwin

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“In the gospel, and work of redemption, we see a righteousness of that breadth that is able to cover the sins of millions of worlds; of that length that it reacheth to eternity, and no sin in God’s people can wear it out or nullify the virtue of it.

And those attributes which God accounts His greatest riches and greatest glory, (Rom. 9:23), even His mercy and free grace, which He intends most to exalt, never saw light till now.

The doctrine of salvation by Christ being the stage, wherein only it is represented, and elsewhere it is not to be seen, and upon it acts the greatest part, for all passages in it tend to this, to shew, as, that ‘by grace we are saved,’ (Eph. 2:5) and therefore, the whole work of salvation is called ‘mercy,’ (1 Peter 2:10) all God’s ways to His people are mercy, (Ps. 25:10), the whole plot and frame of it is made of mercy, and therefore the doctrine of the gospel is called grace, (Titus 2:10-11).

Mercy manageth the plot, gives all other attributes, as it were, their parts to act.

Mercy enters in at the beginning, acts the prologue in election.

And mercy, giving Christ, continues every part of it, sets all a-work, ends the whole in glory.”

–Thomas Goodwin, “The Glory of the Gospel,” The Works of Thomas Goodwin, Volume 4 (Grand Rapids, MI: Reformation Heritage, 1861/2021), 4: 230-231.