Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	according_a	good_a	work_n	2,753	5	6.1002	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A52043	Meroz cursed, or, A sermon preached to the honourable House of Commons, at their late solemn fast, Febr. 23, 1641 by Stephen Marshall ...	Marshall, Stephen, 1594?-1655.	1641 (1641)	Wing M762; ESTC R19516	35,043	59

and ye visited me not Verily I say unto you inasmuch as you did it not unto the least of of one of these ye did it not to me As if the Lord at that great day did take notice of nothing but what the carriage of all people hath been to or against his Church and children What greater evidence can there be in the world that men are blessed or cursed than this that they either do or do not help the Church of God This will yet be clearer if we consider the Church First as it stands in relation to God Secondly as we stand in relation to the Church First as the Church stands in relation to God when I speake of God in relation to the Church or the Church to God you must alwayes understand God in Christ Emanuel God is in Christ reconciling the world unto himselfe And thus the Churches relation to God gives us two excellent grounds of this doctrine First the Church and the meanest member of it is united to him made one with him they are not only his servants his friends such as he loves but he and they make but one person I meane one mysticall person Insomuch that throughout the whole Scripture he that blesseth them blesseth him he that curseth them curseth him he that relieveth them relieveth him he that fights against them fights against him he that touches them touches the Apple of his eye all the relations which argue intimacy tendernesse and dearenesse meete in this conjunction betwixt God and his Church he is their Father they are his children he is their head they are his members he is their husband they are his wife yea they are called by his name and he vouchsafes to be called by their name Take but this for granted and you will make no doubt but all men are blessed or cursed as they do or do not help the Lord The Lord Jehovah is the fountaine of all blessednesse more than the Sunne is the fountaine of light from his favour and good will necessarily flows all happinesse and consequently all are blessed or cursed according as the aspect betweene God and them is malignant or benevolent This ground is fully laid downe in that forementioned placed Matthew 25. You did it to them therefore you did it to me you refused it to them therefore you refused it to me It is clearely there taught but I believe there is no man on earth that understands it or believes it fully And that very Text gives me a hint to thinke so Because the very righteous themselves though they do all to the Saints out of the good will they beare to Christ yet when Christ shall acknowledge this and say Come ye blessed you fed me you cloathed me you visited me They shall answer Lord when saw we thee an hungred or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sicke or in prison and administred unto thee It shews that themselvs did not fully understand how neare they were to Christ for whom they did all these things I have somewhere read a story of a Sarazen Embassador who being with a Christian Prince and seeing Nobles and great men to wait upon him and the Prince himselfe to waite upon a Table full of poore ragged people desired to know what they were to whom he shewed so much respect he answered to this effect they were the servants of his Lord and that he served his Saviour in them Well said the Embassador if your Lord have no better servants than these I desire to be none of them I care not for your Religion And truly it is a hard thing to perswade not only Sarazens but even Christians themselves that whatsoever is done to poore abjects the off-scouring of the world should be done to Christ himselfe No earthly Prince would do so equally to accept and reward him that should give a nights lodging or any succour to one of his meanest and basest groomes as if it had beene done to the person of himselfe or of his son Yet this is the very case betwixt Christ and his Church Secondly another ground from the Churches relation to God is this that as their persons are neerely united to him so their cause is his cause As they account every cause of God to be their cause so God accounts every cause of theirs to be his cause 2 Chro. 20. Moab and Ammon and they of Mount Seir came with a huge army against Jehoshaphat hee and his people being suddenly surprised betake themselves to prayer and seeke helpe from God Now marke what Gods answer was Be not you afraid nor dismaied by reason of this great multitude the battell is not yours but Gods Was not the battell theirs all they were worth lay upon that battell their wives and children their lives and liberties their countrey and religion lay all at the stake and yet the battell none of theirs that is not so much theirs as Gods so in the 74. Psalm When Asaph had laid down all the Churches sufferings the pulling down of their Synagogues the wasting of their Countrey the reproach and scorn cast upon them by their enemies he interests God in all this Arise O God plead thine own cause remember how the foolish man reproacheth thee forget not the voyce of thine enemies Thus is their cause Gods cause their enemies Gods enemies and indeed if we look into it narrowly whatsoever is done to them and their cause good or evill is done for Gods sake This then is a strong argument to prove men blessed or cursed according as they joyn with or oppose the cause of God Because first if it be Gods cause it is a good cause Secondly it is a noble cause Thirdly it is a successefull cause First I say it is a good cause The just Lord that is in the midst of his Church will do no iniquity The righteous Lord loveth righteousnesse Now you know it is a blessed thing to have a good cause though it be a meane cause David often pleaded this before God that his cause was just his cause was upright Let them shout for joy that favour my righteous cause And on the other side it must needs be a cursed thing to manage a cursed cause when David's cause was good his adversaries must needs bee evill and then he could foretell that they should be ashamed and brought to confusion clothed with reproach and dishonour who opposed themselves against him Secondly being Gods cause it is a noble cause a man may possibly among men have a good cause and the thing but a trifle a thing of no great consequence but if it be Gods cause let it appeare never so contemptible it is subservient to the highest end that can possibly be thought of The salvation of soules the glory of God c. Honour uses to put men upon hard and desperate services men will runne wrestle fight for a crowne

where First I shall shew what is requisite to prepare us and fit us to bee the Churches servants Secondly how and wherein they that are fit should help the Church First men must bee fitted for it this Mercury is not made of every wood the Lord needs no Instruments if hee use any it is propter munificentiam not propter indigentiam because hee meanes to honour them not because they can benefit him and therefore hee will make them choice spirits rare and singular men to whom he will thus communicate his owne glory and three things must meet in them First They must be godly a Generall in an Army neither gives pay nor command to any untill they bee duly entred into his muster-book Now men are never numbred among the Lambs followers their names are not entred into his List untill they be Saints Read Revelation where ever the Lambs followers are described They are such as have washed their Robes made them white in the blood of the Lamb serving him night and day they are redeemed from the earth in their mouth is found no guile They that are with the Lamb are called and chosen and faithfull And it must needs be so for so long as men are in their unregenerate condition they are Satans vassals in the maine there is not in them a substratum of reall usefulnesse to the Church their heart cannot be with the Lord nor his people 'T is only the new life which is the right principle of this service which is here expected If therefore the Lord hath kindled in any of your hearts a desire to doe him service I beseech you first humble your souls deeply before God for your sinnes get your Robes washed in the blood of the Lamb rest not till the Spirit of Christ come to dwell in you and when yee have once with the Thessalonians given your selves first to the Lord then yee are fit to give your selves to the Church for the Lords sake Secondly as they must be godly who would be servants to the Church so they must learn to deny themselves they must be taken off from all private selfe-engagements they must set light by their own ease their own profit and their own life If any man saith Christ come to me and hate not his father and mother and wife and children and brethren and sisters yea and his own life also he cannot bee my Disciple Search through all the Scriptures you shall hardly finde a man who ever was fitted to bee usefull in the Church till he had set himselfe aside No man that warreth entangleth himselfe with the affaires of this life that he may please him who hath chosen him to be a souldier And therefore it was the A B C which Christ taught all his followers even this lesson of selfe-deniall You shall read Mat. 20. v. 22. That when the mother of Iames and Iohn came to seek preferment at Christs hand for her two sonnes that the one might sit at his right hand and the other at his left in his Kingdome Christ presently nips that motion in the head and tells them that instead of expecting such high and pleasant things in this world they must if they meant to be his Apostles prepare to drink of his cup and to be baptized with his baptisme that is take paines and suffer trouble And verily sad experience hath taught this that men are never cordiall to the Church of Christ who embrace this present world It is recorded of the King of Navarre then a Protestant being pressed by Beza to appeare more in the cause of God and to owne religion to the purpose He makes him answer to this effect That he was their friend but he resolved to put no further to Sea than that he might get to shore if a storme should rise he resolved not to hazzard his hopes of the Crown of France and you know what became of him So when men will make religion as twelve and the world as thirteene they will in sad tryals with Demas forsake the cause and servants of God and embrace the present world Like those Potters recorded in the first of the Chro. who dwelt among plants and hedges There they dwelt with the King for his work A brand which the holy Ghost sets upon them who when Cyrus proclaimed liberty and encouragement to returne to Ierusalem to rebuild the Temple and set up the worship of God refused to goe back with their brethren and chose rather to dwell among plants and hedges than to hazzard a gainefull trade which they made of the Kings work O beloved take heed of these choaking thorns the riches cares and pleasures of this world especially beware of the world when it comes with flattering allurements Many ships have been swallowed in a calme when they have out-rid severall stormes Troubles and persecutions like the wind in Plutarchs Parable make men gird their cloak their profession of religion and service to the cause of God closer to them when the warme Sunne-shine of preferments steales it from them Rebus in adversis facile est contemnere vitam There is a notable story of a souldier of Antigonus one whom the Prince observed to be a very valiant man ready to adventure upon any desperate service and therefore much favoured him and observing that he still looked pale and lean would needs know what he ayled and finding that he had a secret and dangerous disease he caused all possible meanes to be used for his recovery which when it was accomplished the Prince observed him to be lesse forward in service than formerly and demanding the reason he ingenuously acknowledged that now he felt the sweetnesse of life and was loth to lose it And thus doe many thousands who with Ionathan when they come into a wood that drops with honey leave the chase of Gods enemies and feed upon the sweetnesse of worldly advancement But O yee Worthies fly all these things with Paul esteem your lives not deare to you Let no earthly thing move you so you may finish your course and service appointed you from and for the Lord Iesus Christ and conclude with Esther if I perish I perish Thirdly whosoever would bee a reall usefull instrument for the good of the Church must get an unfaigned love to the Church planted in his heart that it may beare fruit in his life and actions All we do is nothing but our labour of love Love will force more than the strappado draw more than a yoke of oxen It is a sweet and strong tyrant When the Apostle Paul had pressed the Corinthians earnestly to study for the best gifts to make them usefull in the Church and to this purpose gives them a catalogue of the severall gifts and graces which Christ for this end had shed abroad when hee ascended up on high Yet in the last verse of that chapter hee promiseth to shew them a more