Selected quad for the lemma: friend_n

Word A Word B Word C Word D Occurrence Frequency Band MI MI Band Prominent
friend_n abraham_n call_v seed_n 781 5 8.3208 4 false
View all documents for the selected quad

Text snippets containing the quad

ID Title Author Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) STC Words Pages
A60227 The life and death of Sir Henry Vane, Kt., or, A short narrative of the main passages of his earthly pilgrimage together with a true account of his purely Christian, peaceable, spiritual, gospel-principles, doctrine, life and way of worshipping God, for which he suffered contradiction and reproach from all sorts of sinners, and at last, a violent death, June 14. Anno, 1662 : to which is added, his last exhortation to his children, the day before his death. Sikes, George. 1662 (1662) Wing S3780; ESTC R19959 148,120 164

There are 4 snippets containing the selected quad. | View lemmatised text

dunghil because there is no other God that can deliver after this sort Dan. 3. Yet it appears not that Nebuchadnezzar himself worshipped this true God or forsook his false A while after we find him boasting and vaunting as if there were no other God but he Dan. 4.30 What a fickle thing is that Religion that depends upon the Magistrates Decree Darius the Mede when he comes upon the Stage at Babylon he is flattered by his corrupt Courners to turn Pope take upon him to be the holy Father all must pray to him for thirty dayes and not ask a petition of any other God If they did they must to the Lions den Daniel is charged with slighting the King and his Decree The King set himself to deliver him but could not An Angel did by stopping the Lyons mouths Then his accusers with their wives and children were cast to the Lyons and were torn in pieces immediately before they came to the bottom of the Den Dan. 6. What looking-glasses are here for Kings to give them aim what persons to put most value on Idolatrous flattering Courtiers that counsel them to their dammage and disherison or true Prophets and faithful Subjects that advise them for the safety of their Crown and Dignity True they know not to give flattering titles to men for in so doing their maker would soon take them away Job 32. 22. They fear him more than men 'T is the true advantage of Kings to be plainly dealt with by them Flatterers ruine them They are the Traitors as has appeared in all ages Believe it O ye Rulers and Judges if you go on at the rate you have begun should all the Angels in heaven and Men on earth lay their understandings together to demonstrate the requisiteness yea absolute necessity of having made a Parliamentary and popular defence against such corrupt sticklers for prerogative and arbitrary domination when got into armes 1641. 'T is hard to imagine how they should mend that which your selves have given by your most injurious and oppressive practices since your return What should we mince the matter for The world is almost at an end The Devils rage is great because he knows he has but a short time It highly concerns us to deal plainly with one another lest that great deceiver of the Nations cozen us all If men do as wickedly as they can and make a law that no body must tell them of it must every body therefore hold their peace and let them go on What can the Devil desire more Must God and his Messengers have no hearing with you What do you imagine will become of you then Will ye change Religion and the Laws and must no body dare to say so But they will you see Will you put out the eyes of all the good People of England They have eyes and will use them too do what you can as long as their heads are on With these eyes they see clearer what you are about then it may be you are aware The Lord in the late War was a Rebuker of you all in many pitch'd Fields and a continued series of disappointments for many years together If you would but mend the matter as to what this Nation felt when it groaned under the Tyranny of your apostate Conqueror this yet were something Many of the same persons that he abused and oppressed you have slain and so finished his work upon them You should let the oppressed go free ease those heavy burdens that he put upon the People and you encrease them so that the Nation languishes under a general discouragement as to Trade and almost every thing else What work God will suffer to be made by any instruments of cruelty amongst us that are profound to make slaughter though unfit to fight he himself best knows But that God will send deliverance in the close and preserve a remnant in the scramble I am as confident as that there is a God that judgeth in the Earth who will make himself known by the Judgements which he will execute upon all wicked Opposers of him and his People Freely I have received and I freely give you such portion as the Scripture allots you Yet say not O Rulers there is no hope we will therefore fill up the measure of our wickedness and then let God strike Say not thus There is yet hope You may repent of the evil of your doings and quite lay aside all your mischievous and destructive intendments towards this peeled People and you and we together may be a flourishing Nation If the King say as the King of Nineveh Let every man cry mightily unto God let them turn every one from his evil way and from the violence that is in their hands who can tell but God may turn away from his fierce anger that we perish not Jonah 3. 8 9. FINIS Some Notes of Sir Henry Vane's Exhortation to his Children and Family brokenly and imperfectly taken Iune 13. 1662. being the day before his Execution Genesis 18. 17 18 19. And the Lord said Shall I hide from Abraham that thing which I do seeing that Abraham shall surely become a great and mighty Nation and all the Nations of the Earth shall be blessed in him For I know him that he will command his children and his houshold after him and they shall keep the way of the Lord to do Iustice and Iudgement that the Lord may bring upon Abraham that which he hath spoken of him VVE have here a description of God's reasoning within his own mind concerning the open-heartedness he would use towards Abraham who is called his Friend Isa. 41. 8. for the eminency of his Faith by which he was made one spirit and of one mind with the Lord so as he could instantly surrender and perform whatever God called for from him or required of him however hard or contrary to the desire eye and reasonings of flesh and blood The greatest tryal of his Faith and the most signal manifestation of it was the offering up his only begotten son the son of promise of whom it was said In Isaac shall thy seed be called This Typical Father of the Faithful behaved himself but as a pilgrim and stranger even in the earthly Land of Promise seeking yet a better Country a heavenly Heb. 11. 12. He came off readily with this greatest offering of flesh at its best in his Isaac the figure of Christs offering so as by the transforming Baptism of the Spirit to grow up into a perfect harmony with the will of God Rom. 12. 1 2. Hereupon he is termed the Father of the Faithful and hereby Isaac also became a Son of the Resurrection as he was also before in a figure Heb. 11. 12 19. as springing up from Abraham's body and Sarah's womb when both of them were as good as dead The present occasion admits ●o long insisting on this being together with the care he had of his Family but the introductory consideration with God
Israel Chap. 41. 8 9. Thou Israel my servant Iacob whom I have chosen the seed of Abraham my friend unto whom I have said thou art my servant I have chosen thee and not cast thee away Here the holy seed or divine birth of God's Image that makes the true Israelite by faith is described to be of a nature and quality that is incorruptible securing him in whom it is whether Iacob the chosen servant or the seed of Abraham the chosen friend as well as chosen servant from ever being a castaway Hereby is intimated what it is to be the chosen faithful servant and no more and what it is over and above to be the chosen and intimate friend that is called and admitted to see God face to face a friend speaks with friend Thus of Aaron it is said Exod. 4. 15 16. That Moses should speak to him and put words in his mouth and saies God I will be with thy mouth and with his mouth and will teach you what ye shall do And Aaron shall be thy spokesman unto the People he shall be to thee instead of a mouth and thou shalt be to him in stead of God Consider how interpretable this is of the son of man glorified the great Prophet of all in the person of the blessed Mediator set down on the right hand o● the Majesty on high who still reteins the form of a servant or perfection of his natural man in its incorruptible form with which as with a mouth typified by Aaron he comes forth as a head to the holy Angels and Iacob his chosen servant in a suitable way of converse and fruition to their capacity speaking therein to the body of the People whilst at the same time he is in his spiritual manhood exalted to an equality with the eternal WORD as the man God's fellow admitted to a communication with God face to face as f●iend speaks with friend In this glory he is more properly the very mouth of God typified by Moses in a capacity and● fitness for converse with the Bride the Lambs Wife as head to the general Assembly of the first-born who are a sort of saints of greater dignity and preheminence by whom the manifold Wisdom of God or secret Name his WORD shall be made known to principallities and powers Ephes. 3. 10. The lowest sort of all these heaven-born Saints that have but the single portion of the spirit have not onely by the external influence of Christs heavenly Nature such a change as the legal or first Covenant Saint has from the polluted to the cleansed and reformed state of the natural man which make but a member of the mystical earthly Ierusalem that may become the spiritual Sodom but by the very seed of Christ's heavenly nature sown in them they have an inward real partaking of the divine nature or that new principle of Life which baptizes the natural state into a conformity with and subjection thereunto advancing it thereby for ever into a sublimated incorruptible form It is in his Light onely with whom is the fountain of all Life and perfection that we can see Light Psal. 36.9 In the spiritual new-creature discerning onely of a divine communicated understanding and superinduced form can we see that objective light or unveiled glory of God that renders the true heir everlastingly blessed But even amongst the children of the heavenly kingdom the children of the Resurrection there are some of a first and others of a second Resurrection into a more exalted state of Life and glory Yet all the Vessels of glory great and small will be filled from the Ocean of those unutterable riches of divine Glory that are in Christ which no natural eye can see There will be no want or envying one another there Concerning ORDINANCES HAving already spoken joyntly concerning this Sufferers Principles and Doctrine I come now to mention his way of worshiping God and what his Judgement and Practice was as to Ordinances After that way which men call Heresie did he worship the God of his believing Fathers Abraham and the rest Acts 24. 14. He was for worshipping God in spirit and in Truth such the Father seeks to worship him Joh. 4. 23. He lived walked worshipped prayed spake in the spirit and so as the oracles of God 1 Pet. 4. 11. ministring as of the ability that God gave him that God in all things might be glorified This language and way of Worshipping God that is so despicable to man is that onely which hath the praise of God He kept the true mystical Sabbath not thinking his own thoughts c. Esay 58. 13. He was baptized with the holy Ghost and with fire He did in such sort eat the flesh and drink the blood of Christ that he was thereby brought into a conformity with Christ in his death and had etern●l Life abiding in him Iohn 6. 54. This is satisfactory to God in this point that that answers his well pleasing What further shall be said shall not be in order to please but instruct convince and stop the mou●hes of gainsaying men Tit. 1. 9. He that worships God in the power of the single or double portion of the spirit of Christ does undeniably worship him in spirit and truth The power of godliness comes in with this new creation Spirit All Worship Righteousness Ordinances or whatever performed but in the ren●wed reformed enlightned gifted adorned state of our first-creation spirit amounts but to the form of godliness that faith that may be shipwrack'd that interest in Christ and that good conscience that may be lost 1 Tim. 1. 19. They that have not the divine nature in the sence above expressed 2 Pet. 1. 4. are blind and cannot see afar off vers 9. they discern not the land of distances the new Ierusalem They may have great illumination excellent gifts and in the confidence of these they say they see what get they by that Therefore their sin remaineth Iohn 9. 41. that is is unpardonable there remaineth no more benefit of Christ's sacrifice to them There remaineth onely at last upon final refusal and resistance of the new-creature life spirit and way of worship nothing but a certain fearful looking for of judgement and fiery inignation which shall devour the adversaries Heb. 10. 27. and Chap. 6. 4 8. Their light their seeing takes away all cloak for their sin Iohn 15. 22 and 24. The warning which the true spiritual watchman gives them if neglected and despised by them does dangerously set forward this work through their miscarriage under it and becomes a savour of death to them Act. 13. 40. 41. but even so a sweet savour to God as prospering in the thing whereto he sends it and accomplishing his pleasure 2 Cor. 2. 16. Esay 55. 11. These keen concisionists that cannot afford a good word for the true circumcision that worship God in the spirit and have no confidence in the flesh or in the knowledge of Christ after the flesh they
who revealeth his secrets to his servants the Prophets Amos 3. 7. and them that fear him Psal. 25. 14. for the discovering unto Abraham that exemplary vengeance he then resolved to pour out upon Sodom and the neighbouring Cities for their wickedness Abraham by the offering up of Isaac did certainly perform the choicest highest and most acceptable Sacrifice and Service that is required of God or performable by the Faith of Gods Elect. Nothing was so dear to him as the Will of God and God thought nothing too much to give him He must become a great and mighty Nation yea all the Nations of the Earth must be blessed in him Moreover he will not withhold his secret counsels and resolutions from his friend Abraham If he intend to execute his Judgements in the Earth he will unbosom himself to Abraham before-hand and so afford him the opportunity of trying the utmost that may be done by his intercession on behalf of the Generation amongst whom his lot was cast The servant knows not what his Lord is about to do but the Friend the Son all must be discovered to him The Friend will readily do whatsoever the Lord commands Ioh. 15. 14 15. will follow the Lamb whithersoever he goes Rev. 14. 4. therefore is the Lord willing to disclose to him whatsoever he is going about to do The Son that abideth in the house for ever is open-handed free and universal in his love and resignation of all he is or hath unto God and God is as free and open-hearted unto him knowing that he will make a right construction and improvement of his discoveries Observe first then That the life of Faith is the most excellent life and that those therefore that live by Faith in the highest operation of it are of highest esteem with God This is apparant in Abraham's case here before us He was a Believer of the highest rank and therefore the choice Friend of God the Father of the Faithful in whom all Nations are to be blessed He is thought ●it for most intimate bosom familiarity and converse with God 'T was a more excellent operation of the Faith that saves and is Eternal life in the Believer which Abraham did experience and walk in in distinction from ●nd-superiority to the elect Angels and an inferiour ●ort of everlastingly ●aved Men that shall stand about the Throne on which Abraham with others of his more sublimated spirit and higher participations of Christ shall sit as the Bride the Lamb's Wife From the singular notice God here takes of Abraham and the peculiar friendliness ●he shews in revealing to him alone of all mankind his present intendment towards Sodom Observe secondly That ●● it is the 〈◊〉 so is it the great Priviledge and advantage of Believers highly to value and carefully to improve Divine Discoveries Why did God shew this secret to Abraham more than to 〈◊〉 living but because of the singular good use he knew Abraham wo●●● make of it He knew he would instruct and command his Children and Family after him to keep the way of the Lord and to worship him in Spirit and in Truth though a way by men called Heresie God thinks he can never be open enough to a tryed Believer a known Friend Vse 1. How should this encourage us to give up all our Isaacs to him to do with us and all we are or have whatsoever pleases him How willing should this render us to have our Sacrifices fast bound to the horns of the Altar with the threefold cord of God's love to us man's enmity to us and our love to God Whatever we surrender and part with in obedience to the Will of God we are sure to receive again with Usury to die is gain To lose life is the way to find it eternally A Believer draws forth the choicest communicable Excelle●cies and bosom-secrets of Christ. God puts a great value upon every motion of his believing Friends Much tribulation they me●e with in this Vale of tears many affronts and cruel mockings from contradictious men yea bonds imprisonments and cruel death● But the Lord stands by them to assist and give them peace in the midst of all to make them stedfast and unmovable in the work of the Lord and in their sufferings for such work He raises in them such ravishments of joy through the manifestation of the glory that follows that they chuse rather to be tortured and flain than to accept of deliverance in order to obtain a better resurrection than their deliverance from prisons and death would amount unto They abide stedfastly with God unto a temporary death and he then sets upon their heads the Crown of eternal life Consider was not Christ the great Captain of our Salvation made perfect through sufferings did not he pass this way to the Crown and must not he that will live godly suffe● persecution and through much tribulation enter into the Kingdom of God The Apostle bids us consider Christ who quietly endured such contradiction of sinners against himself lest we be wearied and faint in our minds I am now going through the grace of God to resist man unto blood as knowing that I ought to obey God rather than me● I am ready to follow the Lord whithersoever he goes and calls me after him Rest assured of this However dismal and sad the Believers work and condition appears to men God will give besides a holy triumph of rejoycing in the way an expected end an end that will answer and over-answer all the desires and expectations of his soul. Whoever is able throughout to mark the perfect man and to behold ●●e upright in heart will find that the end of that man is peace such peace and so given not as the world giveth but so as no man can take it from him Objection But what peace is this Believers have Is it not their usual lot here to be delivered into the hands of sinners doth not God permit the men of this world the inhabitants of the earth to trample upon and insult over them yea even to ride over their heads Psal. 66. 12. so that they are forced to lay their bodies as the ground and ●● the sheet to their oppressors that go over them Isa. 51. 23. Doth he not suffer the Devil by wicked men to proceed further against them for the tryal of their Faith than he had commission to proceed against Job for the tryal of his patience even to the touching and taking away their very lives and that with all manner of lying aggravations contring in this to fix the black and infamous character of the greatest malefactors upon them and then cry Crucifie them crucifie them away with such people from the earth it is not fit they should live any longer Act. 22. 22. Answ. To this I answer Thus Christ himself was served and therefore all this notwithstanding they may have peace Yea they have the only true peace which passeth understanding In the midst of all
her sucking Child as he will have to you in this case Isa. 49. 15. Wait on the Lord then be of good courage and he shall strengthen your hearts wait I say on the Lord Psal. 27. 14. Wait on the Lord and keep his way so shall he exalt you to inherit the Land and verify ye shall be fed The true believing Seed of Abraham shall in the close possess the gates of their enemies The meek shall inherit the Earth and delight themselves in the abundance of Peace But the transgressors shall be destroyed together The end hope and expectation of the wicked shall be cut off Know this for your comfort though the Lord be pleased to take your Father from your head this day you have other wayes and means to learn and be built up in the mind of the Lord in your most holy Faith Never cease to beg of the Lord more abundant communications of his Spirit of Grace till you be strengthened with all might in your inward man that ye may be able to serve God acceptably and resist the Devil effectually and finally Remember it hath been the prayer of a poor worm on your behalf that ye may so pray and be so answered by your heavenly Father that your joy may be full See and consider the gracious design of God towards you in this very dealing of his with you by taking me away from you Is it not that ye may be brought more singly and immediately to rely upon his Influence that he may bring the Blessings of Abraham more plentifully upon you Once more I say be not discouraged Regard 〈◊〉 the reproaches that are fallen on your Father Say or do men what they will Abraham's Faith will find the Blessing Abraham found in whomsoever it is As for me I can truly say with David The Reproaches O Lord of those that have reproached thee are fallen upon me Psal 69. 9. And he will in his due time take off all such unjust Reproaches from himself from me and all his faithful hidden ones and will make himself known by the Judgments that he will execute in the Earth so that it shall be said Verily there is a reward for the Righteous verily he is a God that judgeth in to Earth God seems now to take all our concerns wholly into his own hands You will be deprived of my bodily presence but Abraham's Blessing shall come upon you If you be under Abraham's Covenant all that 's therein promised will be made good to you as well as to him or me The Lord revive and cause to grow up and flourish whatever is of that Faith of Abraham in you that is in your Father and grant it may more and more appear in my Family after I am gone hence and no more seen in my mortal body Certain PASSAGES in a Letter sent from a Friend out of the Country to one that accompanied Sir Henry Vane to the SCAFFOLD My loving and worthy Friend DIdst thou stand fast by my worthy Friend and bear him company Did thy soul suffer with him and rejoyce with him riding in his Chariot of Triumph to the Block to the Ax to the Crown to the Banner to the Bed and Ivory Throne of the Lord God thy Redeemer Didst thou stand by to see all these put upon him in the day of his Espousals in his solemn Nuptials Was he not my Friend most richly trimmed adorn'd deck'd with all manner of fine Linnen curious Embroyderies Did not the Perfume of his Garments give a good smell to all the Room and Company Was he not like the Lord's the Lamb's Bride made altother ready Was not his Head richly crown'd and his Neck like the Tower of David Didst thou see the Chain about his Neck of one Pearl dazling the Beholders Were not his Eyes like the pure Dove 's fixed above upon his M●te single and clear Was not his Breast-plate strong like Steel Did the Arrows the sharp Tryals and cruel Mockings pierce it Did not his Shield cover him like the Targets of Solomon was it not beaten Gold When it was tryed did it yeeld to the Tempter O precious Faith Tell me my Friend how did he weild his glittering flaming Sword Did not it behave it self valiantly conquering and turning every way to preserve the Way of Truth Liberty Righteousness and the Cause of the Lord and his People Was not his whole Armour very rich Was it not all from the Sanctuary for beauty and strength Oh mighty Man of Valour thou Champion for the Lord and his Host when they were defied How hast thou spoyled them The Goliah is trodden under foot The whole Army of the Philistims fly Is He fled Is He gone from amongst men Was not this Earth this Kingdom worthy of Him Wast thou upon the Mount of Olives with him to see how he was lifted up glorified advanced Didst thou see him ascend and Chariots and Heavenly Hosts the Glorious Train accompanying Him to his Chamber to the Palace of the great King whether he is gone we gazing below after him But will he not come again Will not the Lord his Bridegroom bring him when He shall come to reign and his S●ints with Him Make ready then my Friend G●r● up thy loins Ride through gloriously for the Day is a great Day of Battel And he that overcometh shall sit down with Abraham Isaac Jacob the Prophets the Apostles and our late Friend VANE in the Kingdom of Heaven whither I shall ever long to be prepared to set forward with the first and to meet thee Friend ascending into the Heavenly Place A LETTER from a Person of Quality to a Relation of Sir Henry Vane about a week after the Execution MADAM IF I do later than others give you an account of the share I have in the losse of your generous Kinsman it is because I would not rudely disturb the Motions of so just a Sorrow but I hope that you are assured I have so real a concern in all that relates to you that it was not necessary by an early haste to send you an Information of it I have Madam whilst I own a love to my Country a deep Interest in the Publick Losse which so many worthy Persons lament The World is robbed of an Unparallel'd Example of Vertue and Piety His great Abilities made his Enemies perswade themselves that all the Revolutions in the last Age were wrought by his Influence as if the World were onely moved by his Engine In him they lodged all the dying hopes of his Party There was no Opportunity that he did not improve for the Advantage of his Country And when he was in his last and much deplored Scene he strove to make the People in love with that Freedom they had so lavishly and foolishly thrown away He was great in all his Actions but to me he seemed greatest in his Sufferings when his Enemies seem to fear that He alone should be able to acquaint them with a Change of Fortune In his lowest condition you have seen him the Terrour of a great Prince strengthened by many potent Confederates and Armies you have seen him live in high Estimation and Honour and certainly he dyed with it Men arrive at Honours by several wayes The Martyrs though they wanted the glittering Crowns the Princes of those Ages dispensed have Rich Ones in every Iust man's esteem Vertue though unfortunate shines in spite of all its Enemies nor is it in any Power to deface those lasting Monuments your Friend hath raised of his in every heart that either knew him or held any Intelligence with Fame But Madam I trespass too long upon your patience This is a subject I am apt to dwell on because I can never say enough of it I shall now onely desire you to make use of that Fortitude and Vertue that raised your Friend above the malice and power of his Enemies and do not by an immoderate Sorrow destroy that which was so dear to him your Self but live the lively Representation of his Vertue the exercise of which hath made you alwayes the admiration of Your humble Servant c. The 22d Iune 1662. FINIS Mistakes in Printing PAge 5. line 4. for graze reade grasse P. 7. l. 9. f. obsucre r. obscure P. 8. l. 27. f. two r too P. 12. l. 15. f. others beasts r. other beasts P. 16. l. 7. f. sounded r. founded P. 22. l. 2. f. wilde r. weild P. 23. l. 6. f. to r. too P. 25. l. 31. f. of r. to P. 29. l. 30. f. capacity r. creature-capacity P. 37. l. 24. f. not r. but. P. 50. l. 20. f. Popist r. Popish P. 60. l. 9. f. back-slider r. back-sliders P. 61. l. 36. r. resembled also P. 62. l. 41. f. in r. no. P. 66. l. 5. r. Pentateueh the Tabernacle or P. 68. l. 37. f. triumph r. triumph's P. 70. l. 3. f. which r. with P. 71. l. 6. f. amounts r. amount P. 80. l. 37. r. thorowly knows P. 99. l. 8. f. too r. to There are also several mistakes in the pointing Comma's and other points are wanting in some places redundant in others which obscure the sence but the ingenuous and unprejudiced Reader will easily mend all