Selected quad for the lemma: duty_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
duty_n	day_n	lord_n	work_n	3,459	5	5.8504	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A62090	Holy confidence well improved, by Nehemiah and the Jews whose faith and spirit were considered and applied to the societies for reformation of manners : in a sermon at Salters-hall in London, on Monday August 16, 1697, and now at their request made publick / by Matthew Sylvester.	Sylvester, Matthew, 1636 or 7-1708.	1697 (1697)	Wing S6331; ESTC R20130	23,194	72

shall see to our great Benefit and Pleasure in the great Glories of his rebuilt Temple and repaired Walls and City 6thly This look'd greatly at their present Work for it was their own concocting and digesting of all those Ministries to their Courage and Endeavours of which their Sense of God was as the Life and Strength Their Hearts would saint their Hands grow feeble their Thoughts would be confounded their Expectations would be baffled and their Spirits stript of Courage were not all these reviv'd upon them by this great Name which they so pertinently and prudently profess'd 7thly This look'd greatly at their own endanger'd Frame Their Enemies were many they themselves but few Their Enemies were crafty busy and malignant whereby they were but as Sheep amongst the Wolves But when they set this God against their Enemies they readily could conclude that all their Enemies would be found Liars as to God and them And 8thly It look'd as greatly at that Reformation which must be vigorously carried on in order to their getting keeping pleasing and honouring their God They knew that the refining of Mens Spirits and the reforming of their Lives were as removing Mountains and as raising Persons from the Dead It is no easy Enterprize to oppose Sinners against their Interests and against their strong Corruptions and to bring Men off from all their darling Lusts and Follies But when they knew that the God of Heaven could make them strong and prosperous whatever might appear exceeding difficult could not be thought impossible VI. The Doctrinal Import of this to us Doct. 1. That which the God of Heaven will prosper in their hands his Servants should resolve on and promote Be the thing enterprized never so difficult costly or unlikely to succeed in humane thought or view yet if God order it and expect it from us as we are his Servants and if he intimates his purpose to succeed us we must not be discouraged or remiss This great and glorious Undertaking to repair the Temple City Walls and to reform the People how intricate and perplexing was it found when once engag'd in by Zerubbabel Joshua Ezra Nehemiah and all the Remnant of the People Contemptuous Scorners despis'd them and reproach'd them Pretenders offer to work with them with the greater Subtlety and Secresy to confound and hinder them The People of the Land disturb them and hire Counsellors to frustrate this their purpose These in confederacy with others misrepresent them to the King and they provoke him to reverse his Order issued out to build and they accordingly prevail And thus the Work was made to cease by Force and Power Ezra 4. When they obtain'd a new Commission from the God of Heaven or rather the Revival of a former Order by Haggai and Zechariah God's Prophets this also was enquired into censur'd and inform'd against by Tatnai and Shethar-Boznai but yet the Elders kept up their Spirit Purpose and Profession and they went on boldly in their Work After this they had mercenary Persons who by Prophecies and crafty Insinuations of instant Enemies and Dangers endeavour'd to obstruct their Progress and all this under great pretence of Friendship tho they design'd hereby to influence these Builders and Reformers into a Distrust of God a contracting a Dishonour to themselves and turning scandalous to the People Yet notwithstanding this the Wall was finished And if some say true a Counter-Temple and Religion at Samaria was advised to to divide them which was accordingly accomplish'd as Josephus tells us Jud. Antiq. lib. 11. cap. 8. And Manasseh who was Grandchild to Eliashib the High Priest and Son-in-law to Sanballat was made their Priest by the Solicitation of Sanballat that so Manasseh might not put away Sanballat's Daughter his Wife as the Elders of the Jews required See Bishop Vsher's Annal. ad Ann. 4381. ex Josepho Hence all revolted thither who would not quit their strange Wives From all this 't is most evident that these in conscience of their Duty to God and of their Encouragements from God went on to build and that they look'd upon all their Enemies and Affronts but as the Trial of their Faith and Courage And this in the Doctrine of it reaches us who have this day discern'd our Duty and espous'd it and who here present our selves before the Lord to bewail the Demolishments of our Walls and Temple and our Reproaches consequent thereupon to consider and confess our Sins whose Sinfulness is so visible in these our Desolations to profess our concurrent solemn Resolutions to set upon reparation-Reparation-work to intreat God's Blessing upon our purposed and commenced Reformations and to make known to all our Relation to God our Confidence in him our Zeal for him our Dependence on him and our great Expectations from him and to testify to all in whom in what and to what purposes we tho differing in Sentiments as to some smaller things of ritual Consideration and Concern do now unite as Brethren to love encourage and assist each other as one in God and Christ to run down Immoralities and to reduce Men to that visibly orderly Behaviour which may conciliate to our Religion our Christianity its just and genuine Reputation and to make us Protestants more exemplary and less scandalous even in the eyes of Rome it self And shall we be discouraged by any thing from attempting to rescue our profess'd Religion from the Reproaches of the Pagan Antichristian Papal World What can be more of God than what is for him And what can be more for God than what is of him And when can we expect his Presence Patronage Countenance and our Success from him if not when we become all Spirit and Vigour against what he hath so frequently and solemnly remonstrated unto and for what he hath told us that he has prepared a Hell and upon what he hath left upon Record the History of so many executed and those so very tremendous Judgments By which 't is evident what he hath most espoused and doth so evidently set his Heart upon No Man I hope of a greater Latitude and Candour for free Thoughts and Searches and Expressions than my self when I see them attended with fit Modesty and Self-suspicion and a true evident Concern for serious Dealings with God and for practical Christian Godliness in those who differ from me in doubtful and inferiour things God himself knows how far I am distrustful of my own Judgment the Weakness whereof doth cost me many a serious sad self-humbling Thought in both my Solitudes and in Conversation Yet other Mens Passions and discouraging Reflections upon me will never make my Judgment better tho they fill my Heart with Grief and force me to lament my self and to refer them to themselves and to their Judg and mine But yet I see no reason that bold-fac'd Atheism Infidelity Anti-scripturism and the daring ridiculing of the Eternal Word and Son of God should escape their deserved Censures so far as liable thereunto by the