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{Sermons on John 1:47
The Doctrine Explained}
Correspondingly, I understand a sincere, godly person to be the same person who, in the foregoing discourse, is meant by a precise or circumspect Christian. This is one who will not venture his soul on that cheap, easy, external, and careless way of Christianity that most do. But he labors to make certain of the matter and do thorough work, by setting himself to live up to the height and exactness of those principles of Christianity that he has received from Scripture (Philippians 2:12–13).
When I say that godliness is no fantasy, I mean by “fantasy” that which has no reality except in the imagination. It has no foundation in the Scriptures, but is a mere imagination or airy notion, a contrivance of people’s own brains. This is the reproach that the unholy world casts upon strict godliness. It is supposedly a mere fiction or a dream of people’s own hearts. It is supposed that the inward likeness to God, the exact walking with God, living in fellowship and communion with God, the joy of God, the life of faith, the soul’s hearty living for God and the Lord Jesus, and the like—that these are mere imagination; there are no such things, but they are people’s own dreams and delusions.
Now, this is what I will prove and make good to you: that this godliness, in its greatest purity, preciseness, and spirituality is not, as claimed, an empty thing. But, it is fully and really that which it asserts itself to be. It has clear foundations in, and a clear and obvious conformity to, the good, acceptable, and perfect will of God revealed in the Scriptures.
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