Selected quad for the lemma: death_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	bring_v	hell_n	sin_n	4,853	5	4.8758	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A36854	A sermon preached in the metropolitical Church of Canterbury, October 17, MDCLXXII, at the funeral of the Very Reverend Thomas Turner, D.D., dean of the same church by Peter du Moulin ...	Du Moulin, Peter, 1601-1684.	1672 (1672)	Wing D2567; ESTC R10909	12,567	32

A SERMON Preached in the Metropolitical Church OF CANTERBURY October 17. MDCLXXII AT THE FUNERAL Of the very Reverend THOMAS TURNER D.D. Dean of the same Church By Peter du Moulin D.D. Canon there and One of His Majesties Chaplains LONDON Printed for Henry Brome at the Gun in S. 〈◊〉 Church-Yard near the West End 1672. PHIL. 1.21 For to me to live is Christ and to die is gain THE Gospel is the onely Doctrine of true Wisdom and therefore the onely direction to true Happiness Thereby the Christian learneth to walk before his God unto all pleasing and charitably and uprightly with his Neighbours to instruct his ignorance and correct his perversness to stand fast erected and contented in the several turns of this World to live well and to die well which is all That sacred Doctrine is then most effectual to those great ends when it comes seconded by example and attested by experience Give me lessons like my text and the two before where the Teacher teacheth himself and sets forth his doctrine by his practice The good Apostle was in bonds in imminent peril of death And besides the persecution from Pagans he was maligned by false brethren who preached Christ out of contention not sincerely supposing to adde affliction to his bonds In that double trial see how the holy champion puts on the breastplate of righteousness and the helmet of salvation and takes in one hand the sword of the Spirit in the other the buckler of faith Vers 19. I know saith he that this shall turn to my salvation through your prayer and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ According to my earnest expectation and my hope that in nothing I shall be ashamed but that with all boldness as alwayes so now also Christ shall be magnified in my body whether it be by life or by death For to me to live is Christ and to die is gain or to make it more English Either way or rather both the ways Christ is a gain unto me both to live and to die Yet he had declared before and so he doth after that he held it a far greater gain for him to die for Christ and would rather glorify him by his death than life This was also the godly mind of our dear and highly honoured Dean in his last sickness especially So deep was the gaining of Christ in his pious soul that he could be sensible of no comfort but through death that he might gain Christ The mention of recovery did afflict him yea offend him I fear nothing so much would he say as to recover I long to be dissolved and to be with Christ That sentence was continually in his mouth That resolution was stedfastly fixt in his mind Did any speak to him of life and health and the comfort of his wife and children Away would he answer I have enjoyed all these long enough Christ I would have O when shall I be dissolved and be with Christ Much in the same stile as David As the hart panteth after the water-brooks Psal 42.1 so panteth my soul after thee O God My soul thirsteth for God for the living God When shall I come and appear before God One may tell me that I press the practice of my text before the doctrine But I will say for my self that in this text the practice is the leader of the doctrine Vnto me to live is Christ and to die is gain And to shew how Christ was a gain unto St. Paul and to those that are his followers as he also was of Christ it is the life of the text Yet because the doctrine is the pattern of the practice this is the kernel of the doctrine of the text and the order to be kept in the exposition Christ being sent unto men to be a gain unto them it is presupposed thereby that they are at a loss without him Mans natural losses are the deprivation of Gods knowledge in his understanding and of Gods righteousness in his will Whence follow heavy judgments upon him in his life and eternal woe after his death To help him in this sad condition The Son of God hath brought from the bosom of his Father unto mankind that heavenly doctrine of glory to God on high and on earth peace good will towards men Which being embraced with obedience of faith will prove such a gain unto him that those spiritual losses shall be repaired his temporal wants shall be supplied his afflictions shall be removed or so sanctified that they will prove lucrative unto him And Death that proper and dismal stipend of sin will prove unto him the greatest gain of all for instead of tumbling him down into hell it will powre him into the bosom of his Father which is in heaven that bottomless depth of goodness and glory Of which goodness and glory the summary is to be fully conformed in mans measure unto Christ his soveraine good and to be joined with him for ever To resume these consider a little what a wretched thing a man is that hath not learned Christ As for his understanding he is plunged in deep ignorance knowing neither God nor himself nor his danger nor his remedy Much like one who being fallen from a high place is so stunned with the fall that he knoweth not that he is fallen Carnal men are much like moles that dig under ground with great industry but are blind in the sunshine So naturally ignorant in the things of God that the wisest of this world the Philosophers were divided into more then two hundred opinions about the soveraine good And that the ingenious nations the Egyptians and Grecians were the most monstrous of all in their religions The Egyptians worshipping oxen and crocodiles onions and leeks The Grecians imagining in heaven feasts and combats and adulteries among their Gods And even in our days corrupt men have so intailed ignorance upon religion that we are taught by Popery that faith consisteth in ignorance which is a vertue easily attained Well to heal mens minds of ignorance in the things of God God hath sent his Son into the world 2 Tim. 1. who hath brought life and immortality to light by the Gospel Here is a gain indeed Mat. 13.46 Here is that pearl of great price which that a man may have he must sell all that he hath and buy it Prov. 3. Here is that wisedom the merchandise whereof is better than the merchandise of silver and the gain thereof then fine gold She is more pretious then rubies and all the things thou canst desire are not to be compared unto her The excellency of that gain is then made most manifest when from the illuminating of our understanding it passeth to the regulating of our affections and the sanctifying of our hearts Christ enabling our spirits freely to join with his Spirit to subdue all our inward rebellions and bringing them captives under the throne of Christ say unto him Lord rule

the death of the reconciled and that of the unreconciled sinner as was between the Butler's and the Baker's of Pharaoh going out of the same prison the one to the gallowes the other to enter into the joy of his Master Oh the blessed hope of a soul arrived even into the mouth of that haven of salvation Psal 118. saying with a holy impatience Open me the gates of righteousness I will go into them and praise the Lord This gate of the Lord into which the righteous shall enter Lord Jesu thou art gone in before unto thy Father and our Father and to thy God and our God Oh make good now thy promise that thou wilt come to us and take us to thee Joh. 14.18 that where thou art there we may be also Let me have once let me have now the final completing of my Christian happiness 17.24 and of my gain in Christ It was a gracious speech of St. Ambrose on his death-bed to his friends weeping about him Non sic vixi ut pudeat me inter vos vivere Sed nec timeo mori quia bonum habemus Dominum I did not so live as to be afraid to live among you Neither do I fear to die because we have a good Lord. So did our Reverend dear Dean speak after him but went beyond him in his alacrity and being on the wing for heaven knowing that when this earthly house of this tabernacle was dissolved 2 Cor. 6.1 he had a building of God a house not made with hands eternal in the heavens Therefore did he sigh and long and pant for that eternal house and in that house he now dwelleth beholding Gods face in righteousness My brethren I make no doubt but that every one that heareth me is desirous that Christ may be to him a gain to die so that when his soul departs out of his body it may be received by Christ and brought into his eternal habitations Who can blame you But then I must beseech you to take great heed of dis-joyning the parts of my text For be ye sure that Christ shall not be a gain unto you in your death if you neglect to make him a gain unto you in your life Piety saith St. Paul is a great gain Do you labour to make that great gain by Christ Do you study to follow him who left us an example that we should follow his steps Do you learn of him that he is meek and humble of heart that you may find rest unto your souls Do you learn of him not to seek your glory but that of him that sent him Do you go about doing good as he did Do you love your enemies Do you pray for those that persecute you as he did for those that crucified him I tell you if you do not endeavour to be conformable unto him and to be guided by his doctrine and example in your life you shall not find him a gain unto you in your death The spiritual life of the Christian in this world and his eternal life in the next world is but one life all the difference is in the growth in earth it is growing in heaven it is full grown O let us now to our power make Christ a gain to live so and no otherwise he shall be our gain to die and to live for ever with him after our death The nature of this text requiring an illustration of the doctrine by example Now God sends us here an example which makes a comment upon the text It is true St. Paul speaks here for himself Christ is a gain unto me both to live and to die But he spake it for all to speak after him that could And when I look upon the life and death of our reverend holy and now glorified friend I find that he might have been exactly true in saying Christ is a gain unto me both to live and to die In his tender years he began to dedicate himself unto Christ And though by the means which he was born to and by the goodness of his ex●●●●●ion he might have applied his studies to 〈…〉 lucrative condition then that of the M●●●●●●y by which not one in fifty thrives in 〈◊〉 ●orld yet Christs espectial servant he would 〈…〉 that holy Office And 〈◊〉 ●●uth is God had separated him from the womb for the Ministery giving him the ●●oice●●●●●owments for so high a calling 〈…〉 ●herished in him by his Tutor no 〈…〉 great and good man Archbishop 〈…〉 There is 〈…〉 of all the graces requisite for the Episcop●● and pastoral Office in those hierarchical Epistles to Tim●thy and Titus but may be exemplified in this excellent Divine For he was blameless the husband of one wife vigilant sober of good behaviour given to hospitality apt to teach not given to wine no striker not greedy of filthy lucre not a brawler not covetous one that ruled well his own house having his children in subjection with all gravity not self-willed not soon angry but patient just holy holding fast the faithful word as he had been taught able by sound doctrine both to exhort and to convince the gainsayers Compare the rule with his practice the pattern with his qualities and let envy and detraction find an unconformity between them if they can He was at his first entrance into Holy Orders a most practical useful preacher which few young men attain unto A famous man for the pulpit near fifty years agoe and kept up that high genius to the very last His first step was into the domestick service of that rising active Bishop Laud who took a singular affection to his great parts of nature grace and study and kept him long for his houshold Chaplain But that excellent Judge and encourager of meriting persons King Charles the First being extremely pleased with his extraordinary pious and powerful way of rational preaching after he had heard him twice or thrice at the Court never left solliciting the Bishop to find some setled preferment for him to enable him to attend upon his own person And upon these easie terms came all his preferments And here it is most observable how Christ was a gain unto him for prosperity For in his whole life of above fourescore years he never opened his mouth for preferment never either directly or indirectly importuned any man for any thing never had contest with any competitor for any of his dignities Christ his great and good Master whose glory he sought as his only gain brought him to his fair places without his seeking For this partage of cares he had made with him Lord I will take care of thy service do thou take care of my well being And truly as he was a rare example of an easie advancement so was he a rare example of casting all his cares upon God because God cared for him Among the prosperities wrought for him by the fatherly care of God I must put in the first rank his matching with a wife