Selected quad for the lemma: friend_n
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A44691
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Self-dedication discoursed in the anniversary thanksgiving of a person of honour for a great deliverance. By J.H.
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Howe, John, 1630-1705.
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1682
(1682)
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Wing H3038AA; ESTC R215393
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32,263
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171
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I live I will sing praise unto my God while I have my being Yet your more solemn acknowledgments are justly pitcht upon this day God hath noted it for you and made it a great day in your time You have now enjoy'd a Septennium seven years of mercies And we all hope you will enjoy many more which may all be called the posterity of that days mercy It was the parent of them all so pregnant and productive a mercy was that of this day You do owe it to the mercy of this day that you have yet a life to devote to the great Lord of heaven and earth and to imploy in the world for him And would you think of any less noble Sacrifice Aeschines the Philosopher out of his admiration of Socrates when divers presented him with other gifts made a tender to him of himself Less was thought an insufficient acknowledgment of the worth and favours of a man Can any thing less be thought worthy of a God I doubt not you intend my Lord a life of service to the God of your life You would not I presume design to serve him under any other notion than as his By dedicating your self to him you become so in the peculiar sense It is our part in the Covenant which must be between God and us I enter'd into Covenant with thee and thou becamest mine Ezek 16.8 This is the ground of a settled relation which we are to bear towards him as his servants 'T is possible I may do an occasional service for one whose servant I am not But it were mean that a great person should only be serv'd by the servants of another Lord. To be serv'd but precariously and as it were upon Courtesie only true greatness would disdain as if his Quality did not admit to have servants of his own Nor can it be thought a serious Christian in howsoever dignifying circumstances should reckon himself too great to be his servant when even an Heathen pronounces Deo servire est regnare To serve God is to reign A Religious Noble man of France whose affection I commend more than this external expression of it tells us he made a deed of gift of himself to God signing it with his own bloud He was much a greater man that so often speaks in that style Thy servant that 't is plain he took pleasure in it and counted it his highest glory Stablish thy word unto thy servant who is devoted to thy fear Psal. 119.38 Thy servant Thy servant O Lord the son of thy handmaid alluding to the Law by which the children of bond-servants were servants by birth thou hast broken my bonds Psal. 116. hast q. d. released me from worse bonds that I might not only be patient but glad to be under thine Nor was he a mean Prince in his time who at length abandoning the pleasures and splendour of his own Court whereof many like examples might be given retired and assumed the name of Christodulus A servant of Christ accounting the glory of that name did outshine not only that of his other illustrious titles but of the Imperial Diadem too There are very few in the world whom the too-common atheisme can give temptation unto to think Religion an ignominy and to count it a reproach to be the devoted servant of the most high God but have it at hand to answer themselves even by humane not to speak of the higher angelical instances that he hath been served by greater than we You are my Lord shortly to enter upon the more public stage of the world You will enter with great advantages of hereditary honor fortune friends with the greater advantage of I hope a well cultivated mind and what is yet greater of a piously inclined heart But you will also enter with disadvantages too It is a slippery stage It is a divided time wherein there is Interest against Interest Party against Party To have seriously and with a pious obstinacy dedicated your self to God will both direct and fortifie you I know no Party in which nothing is amiss Nor will that measure let you think it adviseable to be of any further than to unite with what there is of real true goodness among them all Neither is there any surer rule or measure for your direction than this to take the course and way which is most agreeable to a state of devotedness to God Reduce all things else hither Wheresoever you believe in your conscience there is a sincere design for the Interest and glory of God the honour or safety of your Prince the real good and welfare of your Countrey there you are to fall in and adhere And the first of these comprehends the rest You will not be the less inclined but much the more to give Caesar the things that are Caesar 's for your giving God the things that are Gods And that is as hath been said principally and in the first place your self and then all that is yours to be used according to his holy rules and for him whose you are And what can be to you the ground of an higher fortitude Can they be unsafe that have devoted themselves to God Dedicate your self and you become a Sanctuary as well as a Sacrifice Inviolably safe in what part and in what respects it is considerable to be so And who can think themselves unsafe being with persevering fidelity sacred to God that understand who he is and consider his power and dominion over both worlds the present and that which is to come So as that he can punish and reward in both as men prove false or faithfull to him The triumphs of wickedness are short in this world In how glorious triumphs will Religion and devotedness to God end in the other FINIS * By a fall from an Horse Decemb. 5. 1674. * See Sigonius de Repub. Heb. Dr. Outr. de Sacr. Deut. 14.21 Clophenburg Schol. Sacrific and others 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Livius l. 1. 2 Tim. 1.12 2 Cor. 6. Isa. 45.22 Out de Sac. De fund legis pag. 64. Estisne vos legati Oratoresque missi à populo Collatino ut vos populumque Collatinum dederitis Sumus Deditisne vos populum Collatinum urbem agros aquam terminos delubra utensilia divina humanaque omnia in meam populique Romani ditionem Dedimus At ego recipi Liv. ubi priùs Cal. Lex Jurid 1 Joh. 4.20 Revel 1. Rom. 8. Josh. 24. * Read considerately Heb. 11.6 Vse Rev. 5.9 Rom. 10.20 * Isai. 65.1 Mat. 25.45 46. Chap. 11. Jude 21. Rev. 1.6 Hebr. 12. Jam. 1.18 Hebr. 12. Ephes. 3. Epict. Psalm 4. Sen. Monsieur de Renty Cantacuzanus Whose life also among many other remarkable things was once strangely preserved in the fall of his horse