Linguistic DNA - Concept Modelling Demonstrator

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	choose_v	life_n	zion_n	18	3	8.6256	4	false

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A18615	The Best choyce a funerall sermon / published at the desire of some of the friends of the dead.		1607 (1607)	STC 5141.7; ESTC S288	17,327	59

THE BEST CHOYCE A Funerall Sermon Published at the desire of some of the friends of the Dead Psal 116.15 Right deare in the sight of the Lord is the death of his Saints LONDON Printed for C. B. dwelling at the Swan in Pauls Church-yard 1607. THE BEST choyce A Funerall Sermon Philip. 1.23 Desiring to be loosed and to be with Christ which is best of all THis Text that I haue chosen being considered as it standeth here related is but a part of a sentence For in this verse with the 22. going before and the 24. following the Apostle consulteth of two things set before him whether hee maye choose not of any inconstant lightnesse neither of any discontentment but because he seeth in either thing good cause to desire it The two things whereof he consulteth whether to choose are life and death in which consultation most men would quickly resolue For many desire life with any conditions as Augustine truly affirmes in one of his Sermons saying Longam vitam etiam malam pene omnes volunt habere all men welnie desire a long long life though euill and troublesome The commoditie of life for which the Apostle can bee content to choose it is the profitable seruice that hee might doe to the Church This he mentioneth as drawing his desire after life in the 24. verse saying Neuerthelesse to abide in the flesh is more needefull for you Where note by the way what it is should make thee desirous to liue in this world onely to profit others and to do the office of a good seruant among thy fellow seruants The commoditie of death for which hee wisheth that is the fellowshippe of Christ in heauen so to be obtained This hee mentioneth as drawing his desire after it in the wordes of my Text saying Desiring to bee loosed and to bee with Christ which is best of all Where note I pray you what is the hope desire of the godly in their death namely to be gathered to their Sauiour If wee consider these wordes apart singled from the rest of the Epistle they containe a perfect instruction concerning the death of true beleeuers wherein are these three things First that death is a thing of the godly to be desired in these words Desiring to be loosed Secondly that the godlie are gathered by death into the companie of Iesus Christ in heauen which is the thing that maketh their death to be so much to be desired in these wordes and to bee with Christ Thirdly that the fellowship of Christ which the godly obtaine after death is the greatest happinesse that can bee desired or obteined in these wordes for that is best of all This Text I haue chosen at this time for this reasoÌ„ We are come togither to coÌ„mit to the grouÌ„d the bodie of a seruaÌ„t childe of God who with all his hart desired to be dissolued Who desired his dissolution with the same reason for which the Apostle desired it namely that hee might be with Christ and desired this fellowshippe of Christ with the same iudgement with which the Apostle desired it because hee knew that to be best of all By the handling of this text you shal see the wisedom of of his choice and his desire and so I hope bee drawen with desire and iudgement to wait for the day of your dissolution that you also may bee gathered to Christ which is best of all Desiring to be loosed eis to analusai for so the Apostle describeth death to bee an vnbinding and loosing of man that the soule set at liberty from the fetters of the flesh may return to his Creator freely Which it cannot doe so long as it is shackled here in the body And this description of death is most conuenient both to confute all Sadduces and also to instruct vs howe to iudge rightly of death Euery childe of man is compounded of these two parties of an humane body that is as the house and dwelling and of a reasonable soule that is the tenant dwelling there So are wee taught in the historie of the first mans creation Gen. 2.7 The Lord Gad made the man of the dust of the ground there is the body the house of clay and hee breathed in his face the breath of life That is saith Tremelius Animam vitalem elementari corpori inspirauit by inspiration hee placed a liuing soule in his elementarie bodie and the man was a liuing soule so soone as these two partes beeing ioyned together the man liueth And that which we cal death is no thing else but the dissoluing of this composition and the seperating of these two parts that the soule may be loose and at liberty to returne vnto God as Salomon describeth death in Ecclesiastes 12.7 Dust returneth to earth as it was and the spirit returnes to God that gaue it Death is not the destruction eyther of the whole man or of any part of him as many suppose that say in the Booke of Wisedome 2.2 Wee were borne at all auenture and hereafter wee shall bee as if wee had neuer beene For the breath is a smoke in our nosthrills and the words are a sparke raised out of the heart which being extinguished the bodie is turned into ashes and the spirit vanisheth as the soft aire Thus foolish men thinke that in death they perish and come to nothing and die as the beasts doe And of this opinion in the Church of the Iewes were the absurd Saduces who beleeued no resurrection to come of the body and therefore thought that the body perished in death And they beleeued that there was no spirit seperated from flesh no such inuisible and spirituall creature and therefore thought that the soule perished in death Their absurd opinion is recorded in Acts 23.8 The Sadduces say that there is no resurrection nor Spirit nor Angel But we beleeue and teach contrarie to all Sadduces both the immortality of the soule remaining after death and also the resurrection of the flesh at the last day For the soule of Lazarus being dead ascended to a place of comfort Luk. 16.22 And all that are in the graue which is the receptacle of our dead bodies shall at the last daye heare the voyce of Christ sending forth his Archangel with the sound of a Trumpet and they shall come forth to iudgement Ioh. 5.28 So that neither body nor soule in death perisheth and ceaseth to bee and death is no destruction of man but the loosing of the Spirrit out of the prison of the flesh and a dissoluing of man into his parts as the Apostle here speaketh desiring to bee dissolued Wherein it behoueth no man to bee an agent to loose himself as they which lay violent hands vpon themselues but we must all be patients and wait vpon God till he that tied the knot of life in thee vntie the same The Apostle to bee with Christ desired not to lose himselfe but to be loosed Desiring to be loosed The Apostle in these words

of the heauenly Ierusalem hath no neede of the Sun neither of the Moone to shine in it for the glorie of God did light it and the Lambe is the light of it Then necessarily it must giue much more true content and delight and bee a greater happinesse to bee and abide with Christ to see his glory then to be abide in Salomons Court and to see his glory Yea so happy a thing it is to be with Christ behold his glory that when hee was transfigured vpon the Mountaine and had onely two of the Saints in company with him Moses Elias and they conferring with him of no pleasant discourse but of his death that hee should shortly suffer at Ierusalem yet the view of that short glorie was so excellent in Peters iudgement that though hee and his two fellowes were open to the checke of all weather on the mountaines top and were not themselues inlightened and glorified with that glorie yet was hee so wholly surprised and rauished with the sight of it that hee would gladly there haue made his continual abode to haue had libertie still to behold the same saying in the 17. of Matthew 4. verse Master it is good for vs to be here if thou wilt let vs make here three Tabernacles one for thee and one for Moses and one for Elias Consider still the circumstances of that glorie of Christ which they then sawe and compare it with the reuealed circumstances of the present glory of Christ which the soules of the faithfull now after dissolution doe see in heauen and it will appeare that though it were a good thing and a signe of great fauour to bee admitted to see that glorie of Christ vppon the mountaine yet it is as my text dooth call it Multo magis melius much better best of all and the full fruit of infinite fauour to be with Christ after dissolution and to be admitted in heauen to behold his present glorie The Lord Iesus for his owne part did then shine in glorie his face as the Sunne his garments as the light So that Peter doth call it in his second Epistle 1. chapter 16. verse Maiestie honour and glory yet putting a difference betweene that and another which he calleth excellent glory From whence that voyce came saying This is my welbeloued Sonne in whom I am well pleased But Iesus was then vpon an earthly mountaine vpon Mount Tabor he was not then vpon Mount Sion which Iohn in the Reuelations saw And he was accompanied onely with two of his Saints wanting the honorable traine of an hundred fortie and foure thousands hauing his Fathers name vpon their fore-heads and with heauenly musicke attending him vppon that mountaine And the glory of Iesus in that open and solitary place was short Peter heard Moses Elias talking with him of his death that should shortly follow at Ierusalem Peter also that beheld that glory was as slenderly accompanied with Iames Iohn and in a sort diuided from the fellowship of the Saints And he was also cloathed with mortalitie and in himselfe still full of frailtie and infirmitie and yet hee was astonished at the view of so great glorie But now is Iesus in heauen sitting at the right hand of God cloathed with maiestie and glorie Now is hee accompanied and attended by armies of Saints and Angells Now is his glorie constant and shall neuer more admit any eclips The Saintes that now come vnto him by putting off their bodies in death they put off mortalitie corruption frailty and all infirmitie they are brought by Angells into the societie of Saints and Angells as the Apostle to the Hebrewes speaketh in the 12. chapter the 22. verse Ye are come vnto the mounts Sion and to the Citie of the liuing God the celestiall Ierusalem and to the company of innumerable Angells and to the congregation of the first borne which are written in heauen and to God the Iudge of all and to the spirits of iust and perfect men and to Iesus to Mediator of the new Testament And while thus accompanied they behold the glory of Christ themselues shall bee transformed into glory Our iudgement esteeming of this happinesse to be with Christ may be directed and helped something by our wordes in recounting this happinesse But yet neither can our wordes expresse nor our heart fully conceiue the great happinesse that the Saints of God finde when departing from vs they come vnto the Lord Christ Is not the naturall childe glad to be with his father and doth he not therein find content Is not the louing wife satisfied to bee in company with her kinde husband and dooth not that please her minde Is not a true hearted and faithfull friend glad to enioy the companie of a true hearted and faithfull friend and doe not they being met reioyce togither Euen so the Christian soule that loueth the Lorde Iesus will desire to bee loosed and to bee with Christ for it knoweth that to be best Such to be the desire of a true holie soule euen by death to come vnto him rather then by still liuing here to be kept from him may appeare by the words of priuate meditation that Augustine vseth in the first chapter of his Soliloquia saying Cur faciem tuam abscondis forte dices non videbit me homo viuet Eia Domine moriar vt te videaÌ„ videam vt hic moriar nolo viuere volo mori dissolui cupio esse cuÌ„ Christo mori desidero vt videaÌ„ Christum viuere renue vt vivam cum Christo O Domine Iesu accipe spiritum meum vita mea suscipe animam meam gaudium meum attrahe cor meum That is why doost thou hide thy face Thou wilt say perhaps no man shall see me and liue Come on then Lord let mee die that I may see thee Let mee see thee though I die here Oh I desire not to liue I desire to die I long to bee loosed that I may bee with Christ I wish to die that I may see Christ I refuse to liue that I may liue with Christ O my Lorde Iesus receiue my spirite O thou my life receiue my soule O thou my ioy drawe my heart vnto thee Those which were present with this man in the time of his sicknesse and houre of his death know with what constant desire he waited for and desired his dissolution therefore desiring to die that hee might be with Christ therfore desiring to be with Christ because he knew it to be best of all That the power of faith and true knowledge of Iesus Christ hadde wrougth in him that he preferred Iesus Christ before al things before life riches friends whatsoeuer knowing that to bee with Christ was more then all Blessed be God that is wonderfull in those that beleeue And let vs by such examples bee moued to treasure vp faith in Christ The Apostle saith in his Epistle to the Philippians 3. chapter 17. verse Looke on them which walke so as they haue vs for an example The Apostle himselfe was the example He desired to be loosed that he might be with Christ which is best of all This man walked so for hee desired to bee loosed that he might be with Christ knowing that to be best of all Let vs looke vpon him and while wee haue time helpes let vs lay hold on faith that knowing death to bee the gathering of vs vnto Christ and that companie of Christ to be the highest happinesse wee may with quiet and glad mindes put off our flesh when the day of our dissolution commeth and may rest in the Lord as this our Brother doth Laus Deo Amen FINIS

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