"The practice of the precepts of the Gospel"

From Richard Warner's The Sermon on the mount; in five discourses (1840) - five sermons preached "on several successive Sunday afternoons" - from the first sermon, a clear statement of the Scriptural teaching that "the practice of the precepts of the Gospel" is "a condition of everlasting salvation":

Fully convinced, myself, of the high duty incumbent upon the Ministers of the Gospel, of not "shunning to declare" unto their hearers, "the whole counsel of God": deeply feeling (I humbly trust,) the responsibility which rests upon the Preacher of God's word, of "keeping himself pure from the blood of all men", by rightly dividing the word of truth, "and holding up moral righteousness", - (or the practice of the precepts of the Gospel, embodied in a life of piety, virtue, sobriety, honesty, and brotherly love,) as well as Faith, to the solemn attention of his congregation - assured in my conscience, that, without this "Faith working by love": without this visible righteousness; without this personal holiness, "no man can see the Lord" - deep would be my grief: lasting my sorrow; and great my dread of the future account of my ministry; if I permitted those who listened to my pulpit instruction, to depart from the house of God, without a deep impression upon their souls, of the necessity of moral righteousness; of obedience to the commands of Jesus Christ, as a condition of everlasting salvation: without having enjoined them, directly or indirectly, in humble imitation of the holy Apostle, to "add to their faith, virtue: and to virtue, knowledge: and to knowledge, temperance: and to temperance, patience: and to patience, godliness: and to godliness, brotherly kindness: and to brotherly-kindness, charity" - without having reminded them, of the worthlessness and vanity of all professions of faith; and all "forms of godliness"; unless they be accompanied, by personal holiness; and a true Christian disposition and conduct - in the solemn words of my, and their, great Lord and Master Jesus Christ - "Not every one that saith unto ine, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of Heaven, but he that doeth the will of my father which is in Heaven".

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laudable Practice

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