THE FOUNDATION AND FAITH OF OUR OPPONENTS CONCERNING CHRIST JESUS, TOGETHER WITH THEIR PROPER CONTENTS, FRUITS, ENDS, AND PROMISE.
HONORABLE reader, take heed. The following is the whole contents, conclusion, sense, explanation, foundation and meaning of the faith and doctrine of our opponents, concerning the incarnation of our Lord, whereby they, by their human wisdom and the cunning of the old serpent, proclaim that all the glorious promises concerning Christ, the Son of God, contained in Moses and the prophets, such as, of grace, mercy, remission of our sins, peace of conscience, reconciliation, and life eternal, are concluded, in the unclean, sinful flesh of Adam, which they call clean although they confess that it is of him without any Scripture.
They confess publicly (witness their own confession), that there are two Sons in Christ; of which the one is the Son of God, from everlasting, without mother, and impassive; and the other, the son of Mary, or the son of man, without father, and passive. Which two sons, they say (but without Scripture), are united into one; so that the man, Christ, who visibly walked, ate, drank, sighed, wept, and hung on the cross, and who cried to his Father: "Father into thy hands I commend my Spirit," and who lay in the tomb three days, was not the Son of God.
They make the Holy of holies, the ever blessed Christ Jesus, a sinful and accursed man; [one of their number asks publicly: If Christ were holy, why was he adjudged unto death by the judgment of the Father, on account of sin?] and say that he partook of sinful flesh, that he might be tempted and be subject to, or guilty of death. They place their salvation in an earthly, sinful creature of the unclean, sinful seed of Adam, and make Christ Jesus not alone of the sinful and accursed flesh of Adam, Abraham and David, but also, a gentile of the gentiles, namely, a Syrian of the daughters of Bethuel and Laban, Gen. 24; 29:18, a Canaanite of Rahab, a Moabite of Ruth, Matt. 1:5, and an Ammonite of the mother of Rehoboam, of the Son of Solomon, 1 Kin. 14:21.
They make a creature of the unclean, sinful flesh and seed of Adam, their seat of grace, and sin-offering, their High Priest, Mediator, Advocate, Intercessor, and Reeonciler, and falsely call him the Son of God. I say falsely; for they publicly confess that he had no father. Call them their Lord and God, still, they say and write that he is of earth, and not of heaven. They worship, honor and serve him as they do the Father himself. Oh, abomination!
They garble and break the Scriptures, because they do not believe the testimony of John, that the Word was made flesh. They adulterate the plain confession of the angel of God, concerning the Father and the Son himself, of John the Baptist, of Peter and of all the apostles, of Paul, and of all the Scriptures, which unanimously testify that the conceived, born, suffering, whole Christ, outwardly and inwardly, visible and invisible is inseperable, the first and only begotten Son of God.
They break and contradict the whole gospel and the precious epistle of John in which he testifies more than sixty times that Christ confessed himself to be the Son of God and confessed God to be his Father. Also, frequently, that he went forth from the Father, that he was sent and came from heaven.
They garble and profane the Holy Scriptures quite lamentably, heap one abominable flattery and fictitious explanation upon another. Christ, say they, has taken on himself our human nature of Mary; then, there are two sons and natures combined into one person and Son. Now the Son of God has put on the flesh and blood of Mary, dwelt therein, placed his tabernacle or tent therein.
One of their learned writes, "That the Son of God has brought all his attributes to the son of man." Another writes, "That the man Christ was God's adoptivus filius, that is, the adopted and well-pleasing Son of God." Still another, "That the one nature in Christ was quite divine, and the other half divine and half human." Some write, "That the divine nature also suffered." Others write and say, "That he only suffered in his human nature and not in his divine nature. Micron says, "That Mary's blood became in her, our flesh; that Christ's flesh is of our flesh, and that, notwithstanding he is of earth, and of Adam's seed, he is still called heavenly, on account of certain virtues," and other like anathematic words and self-conceited glozings and abominations, of which not a word is found in the Scriptures.
Is it not a pity, nay, a horrible thing, to wade in such pure, limpid waters, with such filthy feet, and thus to obscure the precious and bright sun of righteousness with such infernal exhalations of the anti-christian doctrine? Rev. 9:2. And that for no other reason than that they do not trust the testimony of John and of the angel; do not believe the Almighty power of the Father, judge every thing according to nature and not according to the Scriptures, and attribute more to Mary than belongs to a true mother, according to the ordinance and word of the Lord.
From which it incontrovertibly follows, and is manifest, according to the doctrine and testimony of John, that they, alas, have neither the Father, nor the Son; "Whosoever denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father," 1 Jn. 2:23, that the wrath of God abides on them, and that they shall not see life; for they do not believe in the name of the only begotten Son of God; that they must die in their sins; for they do not believe that it is he, Jn. 8:24; that they do not vanquish the world, that they are not in God, nor God in them; for they do not confess that Jesus is the Son of God, 1 Jn. 4:3. Oh! how well it would be if these poor people would take heed, rightly confess Christ, the Son of God, and give him his due praise and honor.