Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	know_v	lord_n	see_v	3,997	5	3.2299	3	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A77502	The healing of Israels breaches. VVherein is set forth Israels disease. Cure. Physitian. Danger. All paralleld with, and applyed to the present times. As they were delivered in six sermons at the weekly lecture in the church of Great Yarmouth. By John Brinsly minister of the Word, and pastor of Somerleiton an adjacent village. Published by order of a committee of the House of Commons.	Brinsley, John, 1600-1665.; England and Wales. Parliament.	1642 (1642)	Wing B4716; Thomason E119_14; ESTC R17352	81,006	146

office they being also the Lords Shepheards to seeke straving wandring sheepe and finding them to bring them home again To this purpose let them make use of a three-fold direction the best that either my reading or experience will furnish me with Let them first be blamelesse in their lives Secondly Painfull in their Callings Thirdly Meek and wise in their carriage I will but touch upon each having a respect to the Audience 1. Blamelesse in their lives {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} This Paul requires from his Bishop or Pastour for in that place they are both one A Bishop must be blamelesse Blamelesse viz. in life and conversation walking as it is said of Zacharias the Priest and his wife Elizabeth {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} without just reproofe This blamelesnesse of life and conversation consisteth in three things You have them all together in that knowne place 2 Tit. viz. in living First soberly Secondly righteously Thirdly godly All which as all Christians so the Ministers of the Gospel ought to have a speciall regard unto to live Godly that they may be Patterns of Piety and Holinesse to live righteously that they may be patterns of Justice and Integritie to live soberly that they may be patterns of Sobrietie and Temperance In all being Ensamples to the flocke as Saint Peter hath it that so those which are weake may not stumble at their lives which being scandalous are great scandals bringing an evill report upon the wayes and Ordinances of God We know what is said of Elies Sonnes how that they by their scandalous lives and courses made men even to abhorre the offering of the Lord And surely it cannot be denied I would not uncover it if it could be hid but that the same cause amongst us hath had the same effect Many being turned aside and many others confirmed in their strayings and that by reason of the scandalous lives of some of the sons of Aaron To help to make up these Breaches let all the Lords Priests which serve at his Altar have Holinesse to the Lord written as in their Hearts so in their foreheads That their lives and conversations may be sober Righteous Godly every wayes Blamelesse then which there will be found no meanes more effectuall for the reducing of those which are gone astray 2. Being Blamelesse in their Lives let them in the 2d place be Painfull in their Callings a watching over their flocks b Feeding them c Warning them not turning over the oversight and care of them unto others which without question hath beene and is no small cause or occasion of straying unto many and so of making or increasing these Breaches When Vzzah and Ahi● and the rest of the Levites for their own ease shifted off the Ark of God from their own shoulders which should have been the supporters of it and laid it upon the Carts the Ark it self was shaken endangered and a Breach thereby made as you may see 2 Sam. 6. To remedy and prevent the like evils that might happen to the Religion and Church of God amongst us let the Lords Ministers take the Ark of God upon their own shoulders putting not their hands only as Vzzah there did but their shoulders also as Vzzah should have done to the work seriously intending the work of the Lord Preaching the Word being instant in season and out of season as St Paul chargeth it upon his Timothy Reproving Rebuking Exhorting and that with all long-suffering 3. Let them bee Meek and Wise in their Carriage I put these two together therein following our Saviour who willeth his Apostles whom he sendeth forth to preach the Gospel that they should bee Wise as Serpents simple as Doves Let the Ministers of Christ have an eye to both To Meeknesse The servant of the Lord must not strive saith the Apostle but be gentle unto all men Patient {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Bearing forbearing A Grace and vertue which the Ministers of Christ had never more need or more exercise of then at this day In Meeknesse instructing those which oppose themselves so the Apostle there goeth on {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} i. e. saith Beza {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Men which are contrary minded to whom the Truth is not yet fully and clearly revealed Such Instruct with meeknesse This will be found the next way to reduce them not to fly upon them with tart and bitter invectives spitting gall and vinegar in thoir faces nor yet presently to fall upon wayes of compulsion making use of the Brachium seculare calling in the secular power which yet in some cases may be done though in the last place as being the last remedy but by Instructing them with Meeknesse Thus dealeth the good shepheard with his tender sheep if it be strayed from the fold finding it he doth not presently set his Dog upon it to worrie it but he layeth it upon his shoulders and so bringeth it home such bearing forbearing must the Ministers of Christ use in reducing and bringing home stray wandring sheep instructing them with Meeknesse waiting if per adventure God will give them repentance to the acknowledgement of the Truth and that they may recover themselves out of the snares of the Devil as it there followeth Let them be Meek But Wise I adde this to the other as being very requisite Who so is awise man saith St James c. Let him shew out of a good conversation his works with Meeknesse of wisdome Such a Meeknesse becometh the Man of God not the meeknesse of Pusillanimity and weaknesse but the meeknesse of wisdome A wise meeknesse that so whilst he beareth with the weaknesse of others he may not feed it nourish it not so bearing and forbearing as that he should thereby in stead of rectifying and reducing rather confirme and strengthen others in their deviations and wandrings A Caution of great use and I wish it may be accordingly regarded by all It was so by the blessed Apostle who though he condescended to the weaknesse of some neere converted ews in Circumcising Timothy yeelding to the use of that Rite not as a necessary Sacrament but as an Indifferent Ceremony so Mr Calvin conceives of it using it adfovendam charitatem non ad pietatis exercitium they are his words not as a Religious Exercise an Ordinance but as a meanes to preserve Vnity and Charity yet afterwards he would not doe the like by Titus nor yet yeeld that it should be done and that because he would not by betraying Gods truth and the Churches liberty confirme and strengthen others in that erroneous opinion which they had of the necessity of that then Indifferent Ceremony as you may see it in the 2d Gal. Thus Paul was willing to yeeld to the weak Brethren in what he might but yet so as that he

that the Truth of God hath beene detained and withheld in unrighteousnesse not finding fruits worthy of it answerable unto it That some have gone about to set up Gods Arke and their Dagon together That others have polluted the Ordinances of God handling them as the Philistines did the Ark with common uncircumcised hands Certainly had wee no other sins these were inough to kindle all that wrath which is either broke forth upon us or else smoaking against us Now therefore that we may be healed Let us make a returne of the Arke of God indeavouring to restore the worship and Religion of God to Primitive Libertie Puritie Power And let us returne it with a Trespasse-offering a Present And what shall this Present bee Why even that which the Apostle calleth for from his Romans That {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} that Living Sacrifice holy and acceptable unto God even Our selves our Bodies our Soules Present and give up both unto God binding our selves by solemne vow and Covenant to a closer walking with and before him so to walke as Becometh the Gospell bringing forth those fruits of Holinesse and Righteousnesse which may bee by Iesus Christ to the prayse and Glory of God Thus Returne we unto him who is the God of our health And Returning to him in the third place let us also Rest upon him In Returning and Resting shall yee bee saved saith the Lord to his people Returning to God Rest wee upon him and him alone In vaine to Rest elsewhere In vaine is the helpe of man saith the Psalmist Vers 11. of this Psalme So David apprehended it in the case of his Kingdome So desperate were the Breaches therein that they were past his Cure David a wise and a gracious Prince one that wished as well to Israel as ever did Cing to his Kingdome and no question hee wanted not a wise and faithfull Counsell which were both able and willing to advise him for the best yet so desperate was the condition of that Kingdome that it was past all their skill to know how to heale it In vaine was the helpe of man And therefore hee betakes himselfe unto God looking up unto him and resting upon him It is not our King or his Great Councell I speake it with a reverent boldnesse though the one Gracious and the other many wise that can heale the breaches in this our Israel All that they can doe is to wish well to the Case and put forth their hands to worke In the meane time it is God that must worke the Cure As it is said of that strange Cure of the Kings-Evil Tangit te Rex Sanat te Deus The King may touch but it is God must Cure And therefore though wee seeke and sue to them and looke at them as Instruments whose hands God maketh use of yet let us not rest upon them being but an Arme of flesh To rest upon the Arme of flesh is the next way to breake it I will not say that this hath beene the means to breake this Arme of flesh heretofore But this I suppose I may say that our overmuch looking at leaning and resting upon Parliaments hath been neither advantageous to us nor them David will make use of his Bow but hee will not trust in it I will not trust in my bow No though a bow of steele the strongest metall and best for that purpose Such is the bow wee must acknowledge which is at the present ready bent for our good An excellent bow promising much yet trust wee not in it It beeing a bow subject to bee broken So was Davids bow though of steele yet hee could breake it A bow of steele is broken by mine armes And such is this bow a bow which being in the hands of God he can breake at pleasure Hee breaketh the bow What herein hee hath so frequently done before our eyes shewes sufficiently what he can doe It matters not what any may thinke of it now that this bow is better strung then formerly yet still is it subject to bee broken Who is there but seeth some flawes in it already Those unhappy Misunderstandings betwixt the Royall Head and Loyall Members of that Representative Bodie which what eye seeth and mourneth not over what care heares of and tingleth not at make the best and least of them they are flawes and these flawes ill Presages shewing that this bow is subject to bee broken It is one of the threatnings which the Lord menaceth Israel with Am. 6. Behold the Lord commandeth saith the Prophet and hee will smite he Great House with breaches and the little or lesser House with Clefts The Great House and the lesser House what meanes the Prophet hereby M. Calvin and some others by the former of these understand their Nobles by the latter their Commons both which the Lord there threatens to divide breake This God can doe by these two Houses in any Kingdome in this Kingdome though never so well anchord and bound together by never so many tyes and bonds Naturall Civill Politicke Religious yet if hee give the word at his command they shall bee smitten with breaches with Clefts divided rent broken This they are subject to And therefore learne wee to looke higher looking at them not to trust in them Nor yet in any other secondary cause or meanes what ever This was the sinne of the Jewes charged upon them by the Prophet Isay when they saw the breaches of the citie of Ierusalem that they were many they used means to repayre them Pulling downe their houses to fortifie the wall as you have it Vers 10. But marke what follows Vers 11. yee have not looked unto the maker thereof neither had respect unto him that fashioned it long agoe They trusted more in their owne fortifications carnall meanes of safety then in God himselfe A vaine thing so to doe It is not the Arme of flesh in these cases that can helpe or heale It is that which the Lord telleth Ephraim or Israel 5. Hos. When Ephraim saw his wickednesse and Judah his wound Then went Ephraim to the Assyrian and sent to King Jareb yet could hee not heale you nor cure you of your wound And why I will bee unto Ephraim as a Lyon saith the Lord and as a young Lion to the house of Juda and I will teare and goe away If God being provoked against a Nation shall give it over unto confusion being unto it as a Lion and as a young Lion rending and tearing it will be in vaine to send abroad for Cure In this Case wee may say of all helpers and healers as Job doth of his friends They are Physitians of no value not able to doe us any good And therefore let it be our care first to seeke unto God Returning unto him thereby seeking to pacifie and appease his wrath Tranquillus Deus tranquillat omina Make peace in heaven