The Westminster Confession of Faith
Chapter 9 - Of Free Will
- God hath endued the will of man with that natural liberty, that it is neither forced, nor by any absolute necessity
of nature determined to good or evil.
- Man, in his state of innocency, had freedom and power to will and to do that which was good, and well pleasing
to God; but yet mutably, so that he might fall from it.
- Man, by his fall into a state of sin, hath wholly lost all ability of will to any spiritual good accompanying
salvation: so as, a natural man, being altogether averse from that good, and dead in sin, is not able, by his own
strength, to convert himself, or to prepare himself thereunto.
- When God converts a sinner, and translates him into the state of grace, He freeth him from his natural bondage
under sin; and, by His grace alone, enables him freely to will and to do that which is spiritually good; yet so,
as that by reason of his remaining corruption, he doth not perfectly, nor only, will that which is good, but doth
also will that which is evil.
- The will of man is made perfectly and immutably free to good alone, in the state of glory only.
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