Selected quad for the lemma: death_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	flesh_n	life_n	spirit_n	9,701	5	5.4408	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A33971	Par nobile two treatises, the one concerning the excellent woman, evincing a person fearing the Lord to be the most excellent person, discoursed more privately upon occasion of the death of the Right Honourable the Lady Frances Hobart late of Norwich, from Pro. 31, 29, 30, 31 : the other discovering a fountain of comfort and satisfaction to persons walking with God, yet living and dying without sensible consolations , discovered from Psal. 17, 15 at the funerals of the Right Honourable the Lady Katherine Courten, preached at Blicklin in the county of Norfolk, March 27, 1652 : with the narratives of the holy lives and deaths of those two noble sisters / by J.C.	Collinges, John, 1623-1690.; Collinges, John, 1623-1690. Excellent woman.; Collinges, John, 1623-1690. Light in darkness.	1669 (1669)	Wing C5329; ESTC R26441	164,919	320

and think that the asserting of it derogateth from Christs plenary satisfaction which indeed would have something of truth in it had not God in that Covenant reserved himself this liberty If Psa 89. 31 32 33 34. they break my Statutes and keep not all my Commandments then will I visit their iniquity with a rod and their transgressions with stripes Nevertheless my loving-kindness will I not utterly take from him nor suffer my faithfulness to fail My Covenant will I not break nor alter the thing that is gone out of my lips By vertue of Gods Covenant with Christ for us their earnest salvation and the welfare of their souls for ever is secured Nay more afflictions as they are tokens of divine wrath and legal demands of satisfaction to Gods Justice cannot fall upon Gods people but he hath reserved to himself the liberty of a Father in love and kindness to chastise his people with rods The people of God therefore should not think it strange if they meet with these dark issues of divine providence nor should any entring into the waies of God promise himself a freedom from afflictions and trials of this nature Christ hath secured us eternal salvation and all necessary means and influences of grace in order to it but he hath not totally exempted us from the rod of affliction But this is not all The second Proposition speaketh yet more The Child of God may not only live but may 2 Prop. also die and fall asleep unsatisfied as to the likeness of God This is true both as to the likeness of God in them and the manifestations of God unto them 1. As to Gods Image in them this lies in the perfection of holiness and is so far true that it is hard to find a child of God whoever as to this died satisfied what Christian on his death-bed ever said he had faith enough or love enough or holiness enough David cryes out Although my house be not so with God And where is the soul that departing to eternity sees not reason to complain that his heart hath not been so with God as it ought to have been The best of men sinneth seven times in a day 2. But it is true also as to the apprehensions of divine love not being able when they die to say assuredly My Beloved is mine and I am his What shall we say to the great example of our Lord and Saviour It is true he knew he was the eternal Son of God that after his resurrection he should be glorified with that glory which he had with his Father from all eternity and in this respect might differ from some of his children who dying may want that certainty and only die with a good hope through grace yet in this dying hour he cryes out My God my God why hast thou forsaken me Nor can we well understand how he should for us die under the curse and sensible feelings of divine wrath unless we grant that he died under the withdrawings of the sensible manifestations of divine love and certainly the Disciple is not above his Master nor the Servant above his Lord. Our own experience also proves it have not we known some persons of whom while they went in and out with us could say These are the anointed of the Lord we saw them walking closely with God fearing every sin making conscience of every duty serving the Lord so far as we could judge in spirit and truth and this not in a fit but constantly yet when they came to die their Candles went out in obscurity We have not seen them in that triumph of faith that fulness of joy and peace which it may be we did expect Not able to say with Job In Job 19. 26. Rom. 8 38. my flesh I shall see God nor with Paul I am perswaded that neither life nor death shall separate me from the love of God in Christ Nor is there any thing in spiritual reason to hinder it Sensible manifestations are none of our necessaries God hath no where promised that they shall not fail the soul in death Mr. Rutherford I remember propounds this to be observed Whether usually when in the time of their life the Saints of God have felt many reflexions of divine love many sensible consolations God hath not left them to die in the dark And on the contrary when any of his children have in the time of their life been full of fear and dejections c. God hath not usually in their sick and dying hours shined upon them with visions of peace It is not to be fixed as a standing Rule for the Almighty is neither to be limited nor tracked in his goings but it may be worthy of our observation Now this seemeth a very hard dispensation Gods people oft-times know not how to live without sensible manifestations of his love but they are much more at loss how to satisfie themselves to die without it May we therefore in any degree of humility guess at some reasons of so sad a divine dispensation 1. In the first place it is enough to a modest soul inquisitive in this particular to say Even so O Father because it pleaseth thee God will have us to know that the wind bloweth both where it listeth and when it listeth and that his Spirit is not less free We shall not know the hour when he will visit his peoples souls nor will he constantly come in at the same hour that he might assert his own liberty to us this may be one and indeed it is the great reason to be assigned of this dispensation 2. The Lord may have a design by it to make a trial of his servants faith It is a good faith that will long maintain a living Saint without sight but it must be a strong faith which will maintain a Christian in his dying hour without it This was the faith of Job Though he kills me yet I will trust in him This is a faith which holds out to the end and shall have the Crown of life which God hath promised It is the last act of faith to serve a departing soul Love goes with the soul into another world Faith parts with it at the gates of death the vision of faith is then changed for the beatifical vision What a man seeth how doth he hope for That faith that seeth Christ through a glass darkly hath its eyes in death quite out The soul comes with open face to behold the glory of God It argues a great spirit in a souldier to fight to his last breath And it speaks a couragious strong faith for a Christian to die believing dying hope is a good hope therefore it is given as the character of a righteous man that he hath hope in death And of the Hypocrite it is said Where is the hope of an Hypocrite when God takes away his soul Job saith that his hope shall be like the giving up of the Ghost Look as dying

I shall shew thee more by and by Further yet when thou acceptedst of the Covenant of Grace offered to thee did not God agree with thee for a penny Is not this the Lords Covenant Believe and be saved This indeed the Lord hath said That whosoever cometh unto him he will in no wise cast away But hath he any where said That whosoever by faith cometh unto him shall walk in the uninterrupted light of his countenance If thou couldest not challenge these comfortable manifestations as thy earnings yet if thou couldest challenge them as debts from God upon compact thou mightest indeed complain of wrong done unto thee in the want of them but there is no such thing promises indeed there are of such kind of mercies as there is of outward prosperity health riches c. to be understood with a reservation to Gods wisdom so far as he sees good for thy salvation and for his own glory But thou wilt say to me this is a poor ground of satisfaction if I were now going down into the bottomless pit God did me no wrong 2. Secondly Therefore I say God under such dark d●spensations is yet exceeding good and gracious to thee if thou findest him but inabling thee to behold his face in righteousness and to watch for his likeness to believe and to live an holy life and conversation David in Psal 73. relates under what a great temptation Psal 73. 1. he was by reason of his own afflicted state and the prosperity of wicked men he begins the Psalm Truly God is good to Israel even to such as are of a clean heart Thou art under a great temptation possibly by reason of that darkness in which it pleaseth God to keep thee as to sensible evidences yet I will shew thee thou hast reason to say Truly God is good to me I will open this in a few particulars 1. Thou hast the hope of glory All thy exercises of grace thy looking up to God thy waiting for him thy fear of offending God thy trouble when thou hast offended him thy love jealousies thy waiting for God all thy exercises of grace are branches springing from that root and indeed the child of God cannot be without hope These all speak thy union with Christ without whom thou couldest do none of these things Now where Christ is there must be the hopes of glory Christ in you the hope of glory saith Col. 1. 27. the Apostle It was a portion of Scripture which often refreshed the soul of this excellent Lady whose funerals we are celebrating if I remember right I have heard her say it was the first piece of Scripture which God sealed to her soul I am sure it was what often refreshed her in her latter daies and to her very last hour it was as the sword of Goliah None to it both for the repelling of temptations and the refreshing of her fainting soul 2. Secondly By hope saith the Apostle we Rom. 8. 24. are saved Now saith the same Apostle Hope that is seen is no hope for what a man seeth why doth he yet hope for The hope of a child of God hath this character it maketh not ashamed David saith no more but that his Rom. 5. 5. flesh should rest in hope Psal 16. 9. And the wise man saith no more but The Righteous Pro. 14. 32. hath hope in his death It is not alwaies true that the righteous man hath assurance in his death but he hath hope in his death an hope that maketh not ashamed in his death and so standeth distinguished from the Hypocrite of whom Job saith Where is the hope of the Hypocrite when God takes away his soul 3. This hope Thirdly is enough to give the soul joy Hence you read of the rejoycing of hope which may be kept firm to the end Heb. 3. 6. it is not so with ordinary hope Solomon saith Hope deferred makes the heart sick But it is so with this good hope through grace because of the certainty that attends it the certainty of the word of promise upon which it leaneth 4. Fourthly Observe what the Apostle saith of this hope Heb. 6. 18 19 20. That by two Heb. 6. 18 19 20. immutable things in which it was impossible for God to lye we might have a strong consolation who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope before us which hope we have as an anchor of the soul sure and stedfast and which entreth into that within the vail whither the forerunner is for us entred even Jesus who is a Priest for ever after the order of Melchisedeck The two immutable things are Gods Word and his Oath His word of promise that is immutable Heaven and Earth shall pass away before a tittle shall pass from it His Oath in that God hath condescended to our infirmity that we might hope stedfastly O nos foelices saith Tertullian quorum gratiâ Deus jurat O infideles si juranti non credamus These two are the grounds of our hope and the Apostle judgeth them sufficient for an anchor for our souls both sure and stedfast yea not only so but to raise a strong consolation to those who fly to it for refuge and why because it is entred within the vail it is fastened in Heaven it is not like an anchor fallen in a sandy soil it is entred within the vail and if you would know how Heaven comes to be so sure a soil for a poor Christians hope the Apostle tells you that our forerunner Christ Jesus is entred there and that in the quality of a Priest an eternal Priest not after the order of Aaron who was daily to offer gifts and sacrifices for sin but after the order of Melchisedeck Christ hath died for our sins and risen again for our justification he hath said that whosoever believeth in him shall not be condemned he hath made this Covenant with every Believer and is now entred into Heaven in the quality of a Priest an eternal Priest who stands alwaies before his Fathers Throne presenting his own mediatory performances and merits unto his Father the soul believeth in him then raiseth an hope of salvation though it wants sensible evidences and this hope is sufficient to give unto the soul a strong consolation having fled to Christ for refuge however to be an anchor to the soul and that both sure and stedfast which therefore should stay it 5. Fifthly Faith and strong Faith is surely enough to carry a soul to Heaven though it wants sensible evidences if it be not what becomes of the Covenant of Grace what became of all the promises repetitions and branches of that Covenant but a child of God may have faith and strong faith and yet want sensible consolation I say a Christian may have faith I do not mean only a faith of assent which the Devils may have Saint James saith they believe and tremble they doubtless do agree to the Propositions of

of death should take the terrour of it off our spirits no man is afraid to go to sleep why should we be more afraid to die but for unbelief and a reproving conscience 2. Were it indeed a perpetual sleep there would be less of relief in it but there shall be an awaking out of this sleep though the night be long there shall be a morning This doctrine of the Resurrection is indeed the great argument of comfort against death The Apostle having mentioned it to the Thessalonians to relieve them as to their sorrow for their friends asleep in the Lord concludes wherefore comfort your solves with these words 3. But yet the feast to which we shall awake in the Resurrection is of a further consequence to relieve us under disturbances of this nature This was that which cleared the Martyr that although he had an ill Supper he should have a good breakfast The sleep of death is not like the sleep the Prophet speaks of When a man dreams he is at a feast and when he awaketh behold he is an hungry Indeed there is no dreaming in this sleep but when the child of God awaketh from it in the resurrection he shall awake to a feast not an imaginary but a real feast where he shall be filled with the likeness of God to all eternity 3. Branch Lastly What we have heard administers great consolation to such as mourn for their friends fallen asleep in the Lord. Have we had any friends who have made it their business to behold the face of the Lord in righteousness and to watch for the Lords likeness who herein have exercised themselves to keep a conscience void of offence both towards God and towards men and possibly have had their sad hours for a long time sitting in darkness and seeing no light and whose Candle possibly hath at last gone out in obscurity as to visions of peace They have indeed died breathing and thirsting after God hoping and trusting in God and quietly committing their selves unto him but not being able to say Lo this is my God I have waited for him this is my God I have waited for him I will rejoyce and be glad in his salvation I say have we known any so have we had at any time any such friends under such circumstances possibly we have been troubled and have had sad thoughts for them but there is no reason what though they have fallen asleep they shall awake what though they fell asleep not satisfied they shall be satisfied with the Lords likeness when they awake they shall be satisfied There are thousands that die without any such troubled thoughts Some it may be with bold and groundless confidences who will awake with terrour and trembling There be many that shall in that day say Lord Lord open unto us have we not prayed in thy name and prophecied in thy name and in thy name cast out Devils to whom the Lord shall say Matth. 7. Depart from me I know you not you workers of iniquity But there is no soul who hath truly believed in the Lord Jesus Christ who hath walked strictly and closely with God and made it his or her business to serve the Lord in truth to mortifie his or her lusts and corruptions but though it may live in the dark and it may be die in some dissatisfactions but that soul shall awake in a glorious resurrection and so awaking shall be satisfied and filled with the consolations of God Mourn for loose walking Professors who have lived here without any fear of God or any care to please God and yet when they die have talkt of full perswasions and been full of presumptuous confidences but be not troubled for holy and gracious souls whose lives have been full of faith and holiness though it may be they have had their fears while they lived and a dark hour when they died hath clouded them yet doubt not of them mourn not for them those persons have not died without hope do not you mourn as those without hope their salvation is certain whether it hath been ascertained to them or no hoping in God committing their souls unto God trusting in him walking with him they shall not be ashamed trouble not your selves for them though they fall they shall rise though they sleep they shall awake though through a too much love-jealousie or through the wise dispensation of God when they fell asleep they were unsatisfied yet when in the resurrection they shall awake they shall be satisfied inessably plenteously abundantly satisfied with the Lords likeness and in the joy of that glorious day they shall forget all their former sorrows Vse 4. What you have heard may be applied by way of Caution 1. To all ungodly impenitent sinners such as never beheld the face of God in righteousness nor at all watch for his likeness yet live without any fears it may be with strong confidences and doubt not of being satisfied with the Lords likeness in the resurrection of the just Oh! the presumptuous groundless hopes of an infinite number of Hypocrites they make no question of salvation and think it great uncharitableness for any to doubt of their eternal welfare yet whoso observeth their lives seeth them neither exercising a good conscience towards God nor man instead of walking in righteousness they live in all manner of wickedness yet they will tell you they hope to be saved by Jesus Christ they are of the number of those whom the Apostle speaks of who are dead in trespasses and sins who still have their conversation in the world according to the power of the Prince of the Air who lives and works in the children of disobedience and walk fulfilling the lusts of the flesh and the desires of the mind without Christ and his righteousness strangers to the Covenant of Promise having no true ground of hope living without a God in the world in all neglect of duty towards God and man yet these men hope to be saved these men hope in the resurrection that they also shall be filled with the likeness of God I shall but offer one text of Scripture to such bold presumptuous sinners it is that in Deut. Deut. 29. 18 19 20. 29. 18 19 20. Lest there should be amongst you man or woman or family or tribe whose heart turneth away this day from the Lord our God to go and serve the gods of these Nations lest there should be amongst you a root that beareth gall and wormwood And it cometh to pass that when he heareth the words of this curse that he bless himself in his heart saying I shall have peace though I walk in the imagination of my heart to add drunkenness to thirst The Lord will not spare him but then the anger of the Lord and his jealousie shall smoak against that man and all the curses that are written in this Book shall be upon him and the Lord shall blot out his name from under Heaven and the

destroyed her That her dulness was no more to holy duties than to any thing else and as I conceived wholly occasioned through these natural causes 4. Lastly I told her it was manifest that God had not wholly withdrawn his quickening grace from her from her sense of her present distemperature and the quickening of her soul to the duty though she did not find such quickening in the duty as she desired she might truly say I sleep but my heart waketh Her heart was awake to a sense of her infirmity though she slept in respect of so full an ability to perform the duty with that life and chearfulness which she desired and had formerly experienced I further told her that Gods dearest servants under sad afflictions or partial desertions had wanted degrees of quickening grace How often doth David cry out Lord quicken me Psal 119. 25 88 154 107. Psal 143 11 c. It was some time before she could be convinced of this that it was an evidence of quickening grace for her soul under its heaviness to be kept awake with the sense of her duty and labour under the burthen of its infirmity but at last she was as to this also in some measure satisfied And now her adversary was inforced in a great measure to quit all his strong holds Some of these temptations returned but her judgement was established her faith strengthened and she was never after kept long in bondage to any of them for an hour or two or for a night she might be in captivity to some of them but one might easily discern from her adversaries shifting from one temptation to another that his strength was tired and he about to leave her soul 7 Tempt Yet after this could one have thought that her adversary should have offered any suggestion to her to have destroyed her self But as to this temptation to which her spiritual adversary had a great advantage from the inexpressible torturing pains which she felt she was not with more advantage violence and subtilty moved than through grace strengthened in the resisting and repelling of it she was not wont to parley with her adversary not affected to keep his counsels once and again she was thus solicited But as God inabled her with indignation to say Get thee behind me Satan so he g●ve her wisdom to discover it to her dearest friends and he quickly gave over this temptation For some time before the Lord translated this servant of his he had prepared her for her dissolution by creating in her strong desires to be dissolved that she might be with Christ She was much prone to suspect her own sincerity and would tell me That she sometimes feared lest she should desire death only to be freed from her pain but she hoped she did not desire it upon that account For some weeks before she died she had many fainting and Convulsion fits in every one almost of which we expected her change when she recovered out of any of them she would be almost angry at her souls recovery and usally her first word was Must I yet live longer I remember above six months before her death I being in Essex wrote a censolatory Letter to her Ladiship in which I had this passage amongst others Madam if ever we come in Heaven possibly we have many months or years Journey thither through this wilderness your Ladiship probably may be there in twelve months to that purpose when I returned her Ladiship thank● me for my Letter and told me it much refreshed her but she was troubled that I should think she had yet twelie months Journey to Heaven she chearsully told me she hoped she had a shorter voyage When the adversary of her salvation perceived he could not baffle her hope nor make the hand of her faith to shake but still she was resolved to keep her hold on Christ and that her soul was willing yea desirous to be dissolved and to be with Christ 8 Tempt He once more attempts to spoil her comfort and molests her with extreme fears of a bitter death and that her saith would then fail and her courage abate This I think was his last assault discerned by us her Ladiship was pleased to impart her fears to me I humbly besought her Honour that now she had prevailed against Satans horsemen she would not suffer her self to be trampled by his footmen I told her Ladiship 1. That it was probable that God would give her whom he had made a combatant with so long and sharp an affliction at last to depart in peace 2. That it was not probable that her dying pangs would be more sharp and violent than what she had already indured and was yet induring 3. That she had no reason to distrust that God who had strengthened her in so many hours and nights and daies of torturing pain for his assistance in the last hour which if it had more of weight and bitterness yet would have less in length 4. That he in whom she had trusted the Lord Jesus Christ had taken away the bitterness of death and payed a price for his Saints perseverance in it so that never any held out to the end who at last was left and failed in it 5. I defired her Ladiship to digest that text Heb. 2. 14 15. For as much as the children were partakers of flesh and blood he also took part with them of the same that through death be might destroy him that had the power of death even the Devil and deliver them who through fear of death were all their life-me subject to bondage Soon after this her distemperature yet heightened her pains grew exceeding great and so continued for some daies till about 4 daies before her death which yet it pleased God to inable her to endure with an admirable patience still she kept her hold fast in God professing to me even in her highest fits of distemper that the Lord was her hope and she had an hold on him and would not let it go let God do what he pleased with her and Satan suggest what he could unto her Some sour daies before her death it pleased God that her pains were in some degrees abated and now by this experience of Gods supportation of her in her last sad r●turn of pain she grew confident that she should be able to stand in the hour of death The day before she died was to her a day of great reviving she had not of many weeks before been so chearful and free from pain At noon coming in as I was wont to pray with her I found her even ravished with the apprehensions of Gods goodness to her giving her some relaxation from pain and I hope I shall not forget how earnest she was in pressing me to praise the Lord with her and for her After prayer she continued very chearful yet on the sudden she laid hold on my hand and drew me to her so as I perceived she would whisper something in