Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	good_a	grace_n	work_n	7,426	5	6.4759	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A60992	A sermon preached before His Grace George Earl of Melvil Their Majesties high commissioner, and the nobility, barons, and burrows, members of the high court of Parliament. In the Parliament-House, upon Sunday, May 11, 1690. By John Spalding, minister at Kirkcudbright.	Spalding, John, 1633?-1699.	1690 (1690)	Wing S4796; ESTC R221641	18,386	25

measure of desirable harmony and Union in a State or Church and every one as one stick of Bands in the hand of the Lord and with one consent Zeph. 3. 9. And with one shoulder Amos 9. 11. Help up with the fallen tabernacle And ye are to understand this sign so as 1 Though people may be of different and imperfect Light and Sentiments in some things 1 Cor. ●3 9. Yet in the main Truths and Concerns of the Church and Nation they may and ought to be as one man 1 Thes. 5. 13. Not striving who shall hold the Candle least by their strugling they put it out 2. That the wisdom of God may out-wit the Devil and his Instruments in making the differences among his people not only prove the mean of Discovery of the hearts and principles of many Luke 2. 35. But to be the occasion of their more closs uniting among themselves and this fire of Division to separat Heterogenials and congregat Homogenials And 3. That this Union and Concord as it is the Ornament and Beauty of a Society set in Majesty Ezek. 7. 20. and makes them comely as Ierusalem and as it is the strength and safety of a Corporation a shaft of Arrows not being broken so easily as single ones so is it a Terror unto Enemies and makes them terrible as any Army with banners and occasions Enemies to saint in their opposition saying as in the primitive times Behold how they love one another And 3. It 's a good sign of a time when there are some hopeful beginnings of Good breaking up resembling the voice upon the top of the Mulberry-trees 2 Sam. 5. 24. And the little cloud like a mans hand seen upon the top of mount Carmel 1 King 18 44. which sign is so to be understood as 1. We are not to despise the day of small things Zech. 4 10. But 2. To look upon them as arles of and so many steps towards his Work his strange Work his Act his strange Act which shall make us all cry with shouting grace grace unto it And 3. As God mercifully engaging some in a good Cause and Course to the saving of their Souls building of their Houses and comfort at Death he hath by these beginnings wherein ye have been instrumental happily brought you over to his side and I desire to be perswaded that he will never suffer you to retreat which if ye do he hath a witness against you in these things in your own Consciences that ye condemn your selves in these things that now ye allow 4. Ye are to observe and understand the dark Providences of the times with reference both to Mercy and Judgment Eccl. 8. 5. A wise mans heart discerneth both time and judgment And 1. With respect unto mercy observe and understand 1. How the Lord doth great works by small means Deborah Iudges 5. A weak woman the worm Iacob Isai. 41. 14. Threshing mountains Rams Horns Iosh. 6. 4. bringing down high walls a Straw in the hand of Omnipotency will do great things By unexpected means bringing Instruments from afar not thought upon to do service to his Church Exod. 3. 10. From their common and ordinary Employments as Gideon Iudges 6. 11. from the Threshing-floor and from his enemies as Cyrus Isai. 45. 1. To loose the loins of kings and break the gates of brass and elevating them above their ordinary sphere and ability to do exploits making the feeble among them as David Zech. 12. 8 And the weak as an Angel of God By no visible means Zech. 4. 6. Not by power or by might but by my Spirit saith the Lord Yea from the furnace of Affliction Ioseph brought out of Prison to Rule and as many of you are lately come from your Bonds to the Bensh By contrary means that would seem to destroy Clay and Spittle that of themselves tend to mar the sight yet applyed by Christ Ioh. 9. 6. heal blind eyes by affliction to bring about the Deliverance of his Church by darkness to bring light and by scattering to gather Yea by means that have no rational or probable connexion with the effect what rational connexion can be imagined betwixt the King 's not getting sleep calling for a Book to divert him c. Esther 6. 1 2. and the Deliverance of the Church yet the Lord brings forth their Deliverance that way a Drummer in his Drunkenness Ringing the Town Bell in Beziers in France giving the Besieged Protestants the alarm just when their enemies were assaulting them was an observable Providence 2. How the Lord by very impressions and apprehensions upon the Spirits of enemies makes them fly when none pursueth and one to chase a thousand and two to put ten thousand to flight a famous instance whereof ye have in Iudges 7. 13. A Dream of a fellow that a barley cake was tumbled into the Host of the Midianites makes them all run crying this is no other but the sword of the Lord and of Gideon the Sun shining upon the Waters put an impression upon the Moabites to their ruin 2 Kin. 3. 22. c. which makes the overthrow of enemies so easie whereof we in our time have had pregnant proof that as Nahum 3. 12. Their strong Cities fall as ripe figgs into the mouth of the eater and their valiant captains melt as grashoppers in a Sunny day 3. How the Lord makes things fall out contrary to what his enemies design and in all humane appearance may expect The Lord as Isa. 24. 25. turning wise men backward and evidencing that the deceived Ioh 12. 16. and deceiver are his and turning the Counsels of Achitophels to foolishness As for instance the People of Israel would have a King to put them in a happy condition like other Nations 1 Sam 8. 5. But that King destroyed their Nation and David behoved to bear up the Pillars thereof The Church banished from Ierusalem on purpose to destroy it Acts 11. 19 20. And was a very probable mean to effectuat the design but that banishment of the Church proved the preservation of the Church when Ierusalem was destroyed And Paul bound that he might not Preach Phil. 1. 12. But his Bonds do Preach and tend to the furtherance of the Gospel 4. How the Lord brings down his Enemies when their strength is greatest their Combinations strongest and their Confidences highest Nah. 1. 10. When they were drunken as the drunkard with success and folded together as thorns by combinations confederacies and strength then shall they be devoured as stubble fully dry Yea 5. How the Lord brings the darkest hour upon a Church immediately before her delivery and makes her Furnace hotter in the very carrying on of her deliverance As faired with the Church in Esthers time and in Babylon And that is a strange word in Mic. 4. 10. Be in pain and labour to bring forth for ye shall go to Babylon and there be delivered making their light to shine out of obscurity And I may