Selected quad for the lemma: grace_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
grace_n	deny_v	teach_v	ungodliness_n	4,302	5	11.7286	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A78566	A brief apology in behalf of the people in derision call'd Quakers. Written for the information of our sober and well-inclined neighbors in and about the town of Warminster in the county of Wilts. by Will. Chandler, Alex. Pyott, Jo. Hodges, and some others.	Chandler, William.; Pyott, Alex. (Alexander); Hodges, Joseph.	1693 (1693)	Wing C1934; ESTC R229320	34,744	78

of men but expects they should improve those talents distributed to them in not only sending forth the Son of his love to dye for their sins that they should not longer live therein but also in sending Joh. 14. i6 i7 26. i6 i3 Tit. 2. ii 12. forth his Light and Spirit of Truth into their hearts to lead and guide them into all Truth and causing his Grace that brings salvation to appear to all men to instruct and teach them to deny all Ungodliness and Worldly Lusts to forsake the Devil and all his Works the Pomps Vanities of this wicked World to rescue and save them from living in the sinful Lusts of the Flesh and help and strengthen them to return to their Obedience and live a sober righteous and godly Life to keep God's Holy Will and Commandments and walk in the same all the days of their Lives Which gift from God to man the Holy Scriptures plentifully testify to under various denominations as Spirit Light Word Grace Seed Leaven Anointing c. By all which we understand that Spirit or Heavenly Talent with which Mat. 25. 14 15. God hath endowed Mankind in some degree or other that he may profit with it in the improvement whereof by a diligent Co-working therewith to the answering those holy ends for which we receive it we doubt not but to be happy in rendring a good account of our Stewardship and entring finally into the Joy of our Lord. Our opposers themselves also pretend to the spirit and grace of God or else what means their praying for its assistance and those plausible fine-spun discourses of it wherewith they sometimes entertain their Auditory We Charitably hope 't is more real than only to beautify and recommend them to the hearers as what they cannot well avoid for that the Scriptures are so full of that Language and if indeed it be real why is that a fault and error in us which is so sound and ornamental in them And we think it very strange that they should apprehend any incongruity in granting this Divine Principle to be a Divine Light to the mind since its proper Office is to teach and Instruct to manifest and point to us our duty as well as to dispose and enable us to perform it and ought to be our leader and governour If the Tit. 2. 11 12. Joh. 14. 17 24. 16. 7 8 13 14. 1 Joh. 2. 27. godly admonitions and exemplary lives of good men were rightly called lights to the world surely much more properly may this whose fountain is light and does more nearly illuminate and inform the understanding and renders those effectual justly challenge that necessary and acceptable appellation If then the Grace and Spirit of God be in the hearts of men surely 't is not wholly unactive there but will be making some attempts towards accomplishing the end for which 't is placed there 't will be at times attacking the enemies and endeavouring to supplant its contrary which being holy and pure in its nature is never reconcileable to sin and evil but ever strives against it and may as men regard it be infallibly known by the nature of its efforts And we dare appeal even to all mankind whether they find not something placed in their minds and Consciences which though perhaps not regent there yet never mingles with nor Consents to their evil deeds but always remains undefiled and testifies against them and convicts reproves and Joh. 3. 20 21. Ephes 5. 13. condemns them for it and also oft-times in the cooler temper of their spirits manifests their states to them and as 't were reasons with them discovering the evil of their ways secretly calling to them to come out of it begetting desires and inclinations sometimes to seek after God and to make their peace with him Now since man in his meer natural State is Totally dead and fallen from God that he cannot as of himself think a good thought and that God only is essentially good and as that which is truly so must needs proceed from him this principle in us that ever convicts us Joh. 16. 8 13. for vice and evil whether in thought word or deed and disposeth us to consider of our latter end and oft makes Prov. 14. 13. men sigh in the midst of laughter reminding them that for those things they must give an account that draws us heaven-ward and inclines us to vertue and goodness to do to all men as we would be done unto to be just sober merciful temperate c. Must needs be something that is not of us but is pure and immaculate and of a divine nature ever aspiring and raising the mind towards its Original Whence it cannot be a Natural Light or meer light of Nature as very many would have it who yet talk of the spirit of God being in Man for 't is an undoubted truth that no agent can act beyond its own sphere and raise its object to a state more noble than it self nor produce effects of a nature more sublime Job 21. 17. Psal 18. 28. than its own Original Besides 't is very clear and evident from Scripture that the mind of man is oft lighted by a light Superiour to that of meer reason and that man by the utmost power and extent of human reason speculation though he may arrive to implicit knowledg that there is a God yet can never attain to a true spiritual and saving knowledge of God without the Concurrence of a Divine Ro. 1. 19. 2 Cor. 4. 6. Prov. 20. 27. Luk. 24. 45. Joh. 1. 9. Ephes 5. 13 14 17. and supernatural Agent For though the mind of man as a rational Being be that Capacity or Candle that is to be Lighted yet 't is Christ that must so enlighten it as to give us a true discerning of those things that appertain to him and his Kingdom and by adhering and yielding obedience to its discoveries we shall know an Accession of more Light Psal 369 Prov. 4. 18. 1 Cor. 2. 10. to the end And the Apostle speaking of what God by his spirit had revealed to them saith expresly that the spirit searcheth all things yea the deep things of God and that as none knows the things of a man save the spirit of man which is in him so the things of God knows no man but the spirit of God That the natural man neither knoweth nor receiveth the things of the spirit of God because they are spiritually discerned and to that end they had received the spirit which is of God The Light of Nature is occupied about natural Objects those things that are within its own Region acting within its own proper Orb but reaches not to that knowledg of God which is life eternal except our natural powers or human capacity be illuminated by the rays of divine light 1 Cor. 1. 20. for the world by humane wisdom knows not God And Christ saith very

disobedience And in another place That Rom. 8. 13. those who live after the flesh shall die So that 't is for want of Peoples embracing the Means and bringing their Deeds to the Light of Christ in their Hearts and heeding the Reproofs of Instruction Prov. 6. 23. Gal. 6. 8. which is the Way of Life for want of sowing to the Spirit and by it mortifying the Deeds of the Flesh that People are lost and sentenced to Perdition and not because they were personally and inconditionally reprobated from all Eternity God who is Lord of all is 1 Tim. 2. 3 4. gracious unto all and would have all Men to be saved but they disobey the Call of God and reject his Offers and resist the Strivings of his Spirit and are deaf to those Knocks of our Saviour for Reception and Entertainment in their Rev. 3 20. Hearts and chuse and prefer the present World and will not deny themselves to follow Christ 'T is not as these Men say because Salvation was never within their reach if 't were not what must we think Were those feigned Tears then that our Saviour shed over Luke 16. 41 42. Matth. 23. 37. Jerusalem when the Day of its Visitation was over Saying also How often would I have gathered thee as a hen gathers her chickens but you would not not you could not If any Men can be so hardy as to entertain an Opinion so derogatory to the Justice Mercy Love and Paternal Care of God and repugnant to the Gospel-message we cannot but admire what should induce them to obtrude it upon others and urge it as though 't was a necessary Point to be believed in the Christian Religion for we cannot apprehend how this begets love to God increaseth Faith in Christ and raiseth our Veneration for him excites to Diligence and encourages Piety which is that which advanceth true Religion but on the contrary that it tends to the indulging some in a Security and procure in others a slight Esteem of the Death and Sacrifice of Christ as being partial and casts them into Despond and probably may encourage both to gratifie the Desires of their Minds to the full extent since nothing can alter such a supposed Decree of God one way or the other Yet we deny not the Prescience of God who fore-knows all things things past present and to come being at once present to him so that it may be said such who believe in Christ with that living active Faith that works by Love and excites to Obedience and persevere therein unto the end and so knows Salvation by him are in him in whom the Election is before the World began and that those who so believe not but reject the Tenders of his Love and by persisting in Disobedience neglects so great Salvation are condemned already Nor do we deny such a Preference as that some are made Stewards over more and some fewer Talents according to which their Improvement ought to be Where much is given much is required and where less is given less is required for God is just and equal in all his Ways he is not a hard Master that he should exact Matth. 25. 14 to the 28. or expect more than the Improvement of his own Had he that received but one Talent imploy'd it and made it two we doubt not but it had been accepted for we believe that none are from Eternity absolutely excluded without any Talent and that a Day also is afforded wherein 't is possible for them to improve it So that though the Grace may work more powerfully in some than in others yet are all left without Excuse There is yet another Opinion dependant on this which we cannot receive neither as they state it for which our Opposers think very ill of us that is once in a state of Grace and ever so that there is no total or final falling away from Grace How this Doctrine promotes true Zeal and Piety and improves Christianity we can't understand nor see no other reason why its Votaries should be so fond of it but because 't is concordant to that of Personal Election and Reprobation so that those who imbrace the one are bound to believe the other But otherwise certainly it tends rather to slacken than spur on People to that care and diligence and constant unwearied watchfulness to Prayer which our Lord so much exhorted to and the Apostles so solicitously presses the Saints every-where to be found in as of absolute necessity What else means those Promises of Reward in the Revelations to those who should overcome and hold out to the end but to ingage them to a constant Perseverance Or what needed it if 't were impossible for them to fall short who I suppose none will deny to have been in a state of Grace And the Church of Ephesus was threatned to Rev. 2. 5. 3. 16. have their Candlestick removed if they repented not and did their first works and that of Laodicea to be spewed out of his Mouth Who can say those foolish Virgins in the Parable were not once in a state of Grace whose Lamps were once lighted and burning as well as trimm'd or else they could not properly be said to be gone out Or that those were not call'd by Saving Grace Mat. 25. 8. in whose hearts the Heavenly Seed sprung up and for a time prosper'd Luke c. 8. v. 7 8 14 15. 'till the Bryars and Thorns the over-care and concern about the things of this Life choak'd it 't was not that they had no day of Visitation from God wherein they might have wrought out their Salvation had they continued to make the Kingdom of Heaven and its Righteousness their first and chiefest Choice and placed their treasure there and disentangled themselves from those unnecessary Cares the Seed that was sown and sprung up was the very same with that which in the honest heart brought forth fruit abundantly Surely Paul that Great Apostle was not of these Mens Opinion when after he had long laboured in the Gospel takes care to keep under his Body least 1 Cor. 9. 27. while he Preach'd to others he himself should be a Cast-away whom yet we doubt not but they will grant was then effectually called and in a state of Grace And the Author to the Hebrews writing in the third Chapter to those he calls holy Brethren and Partakers of the heavenly Calling Verse the 12th exhorts them to take heed lest there was in any of them an evil Heart of Unbelief in departing from the Living God And again Chap. 4. 1. Let us therefore fear lest a promise being left us of entring his rest surely then not eternally reprobated any of you should seem to come short of it Verse 12. Let us labour therefore to enter that rest lest any man fall after the same example of unbelief Again Chap. 6. Verse 4 5 6. speaking of those who had been enlightned and had tasted of