Sir,
you will one day find that our own works or merits, purgatory, the
suffrage of your church, or any parts of it, when we are dead, the surplusage of the works or
merits of other sinners, are pitiful things to come into competition with the
blood of Christ and pardoning mercy in him . . . But, as I said, I am
persuaded that when many of you are in cold blood, and think more of God than
of Protestants, and of your last account than of your present arguments, you
begin to believe that mercy and the righteousness of Christ will be a better
plea, as to your own particular concernments, at the last day. Seeing,
therefore, that Protestants teach the necessity of good works, upon the cogent
principles I minded you of in my “Animadversions,” I suppose it might not
be amiss in you to surcease from troubling them about their merit which few of
you are agreed about, and which, as I would willingly hope, none of you dare
trust unto.
Reference
The
Works of John Owen, Vol. 14, Banner of Truth Trust 1991. pp 203-204.
