Selected quad for the lemma: head_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
head_n	body_n	king_n	politic_a	2,735	5	10.6730	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A95617	Christ's government in and over his people. Delivered in a sermon before the Honourable House of Commons, at their late publick and solemne fast, Octob. 26. 1642. / By Thomas Temple D.D. and minister of the Church of Battersea in Surrey. Published by order of that House.	Temple, Thomas, d. 1661.; England and Wales. Parliament. House of Commons. aut	1642 (1642)	Wing T634; Thomason E127_37; ESTC R4760	39,793	55

because they are now his 2 Cor. 6.20 and no more our own It were unequall we should expect redemption from him and yet not yeeld obedience to him that is the very end of our redemption Luke 1.72 that wee being delivered out of the hands of our enemies should serve him without feare in holinesse and righteousnesse before him all the daies of our lives Here we should take St. Peters rule to Ananias touching the possession he had sold Why hast thou kept back part of the price while it remained unsold was it not thine owne it was thine owne Acts 5.3 thou mightest have done with it as thou pleasedst but having sold it to God why dost thou now keep back that which is Gods while we were our own we might dispose our selves according to our own wils but now Christ having bought us what right have we to keep back from Christ that which is Christs if we belong to God by the right of purchase why should we defraud God of his due while we were Satans we might give unto Satan the things of Satan serve him whose we were but now being Gods purchase we ought to give unto God the things of God serve him whose we are Vse 1 If Christ bee King of his Church let Gods people comfort themselves in this that Christ reignes that Christ sits as King among us The use David makes of this doctrine Psal 97.1 The Lord reignes what then let the earth rejoyce let the multitude of the Isles be glad thereof We that live here in the Isles have not we a portion in this joy and comfort that we know Christ is King and reignes among us let the earth rejoyce and the multitude of the Isles be glad Indeed if Gods people consider they are but a little flock of kids among many lions 1 Kings 20 27. Mat. 10.16 Cant. 2.2 a few sheep among many wolves a single lilly among many thornes if they consider what machinations what pernicious plots are daily contrived against them if we had not this to support us to know Christ is King that he orders all for the best for us subdues our enemies protects us from plots of malignant persons preserves us in the midst of greatest dangers it might well cast us into despaire of ever holding up our heads with comfort But when we remember that Christ sits as King among us he is above in heaven and laughs at the plots of wicked men Psal 2.4 the Lord has them in derision men may be busie in contriving but Christ is as busie in defeating here is a glorious beame of comfort breaks in upon us under this notion of Christs being King his reigning in the midst of his people Comfortably may we apply that of the Prophet look upon Sion the City of our solemnities Isa 33.20 thine eyes shall see Ierusalem a quiet habitation a tabernacle that shall not be taken down not one of the stakes thereof shall ever bee removed neither shall any of the cords thereof bee broken but there the glorious Lord will be to us a place of broad rivers for the Lord is our judge the Lord is our law giver the Lord is our King he will save us When we look up to Christ and meditate with our selves is not Christ our judge is not he our law-giver is not he our King he will save us we may with comfort look upon Sion the City of our solemnities and shall see our Jerusalem againe a quiet habitation I shewed you before it is one of the prime acts of Christs Kingly office to preserve his subjects if we break not covenant with him he will help us and why should we not then boldly say if the Lord be our helper Heb. 13.6 we will not feare what man can doe unto us then we feare when we know we have many enemies and few helpers but if Christ be our King who can help us why should we feare what man or devill or powers of darknesse can do unto us Vse 2 It informs us in this how we should live one towards another as subjects of the same King the mysticall body of the Church beares analogy with the politick body of the State subjects as they are knit under one head so they should be of one minde and have one heart and that chiefly in three particulars First in love and keeping communion one with another union with Christ the head will produce communion with the members we have fellowship one with another 1 Iohn 1.7 There be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 certaine things which are common among Christian friends Arist Pol. l. 2. c. 3. a community in goods all that beleeved were together Acts 2.44 Ex substantia familiari fratres sumus Tert ap adv gent. c. 39. and had all things common a community in counsels contributing helps of advice upon occasions offered a community in intelligences the Churches in the Acts held intelligence together and the Ecclesiasticall stories tell us at Lions in France the Saints were wont to send to the Saints in Phrygia Omnia apud nos indiscreta sunt praeter uxores Tert. ap adv gent. c. 34. Occultisse notis insignibus noscunt amant mutuò penè antequ●m noverint Man Ejusmodi vel maximè dilectionis operatio notam nobis inurit penes quosdam vide inquiunt ut invicem se diligant Christiani Tert ibid. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Clem. Al. paed l. 3. c. 11. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ibid. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Greg. Naz. de Nonna Orat. 11. concerning the affaires of the Church all things they had common but especially a communion of conversation a delight in the society one of another 'T was a saying of a Heathen in the primitive times what strange people these Christians are they are as well acquainted in half an houre as others are in half a yeare We want this communion among us we keep communion with any kind of people rather then with the Saints of God We every day say we beleeve a communion of Saints but we make it in our practice rather a chymera then a thing reall we delight not in it O this strangenesse and loathnesse to society with good men it is not agreeable with that heavenly conversation Christians should have This should be the ligament of Christians society their relation to Christ as they are fellow Citizens of the heavenly Jerusalem and the houshold of God and knit together under one King Wee should desire to keep the same company here we shall doe hereafter in heaven there our company shall bee God and the Saints so it should be here 'T is true civill commerce may be kept with all but we ought to distinguish in chusing our companions that when we die we may only change our place not our company if here we enjoy the presence of God and society of the Saints our change will be but easie when we go hence we go

but to have a nearer communion with them Secondly in having a fellow feeling with them of their miseries every member of the body hath a sense of the injuries the other members suffer There be certain trees whose leaves 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Clem. Al. Strom. l. 2. if cut or toucht the other leaves contract themselves and for a space hang downe their heads such an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a consent of spirits as Clemens cals it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Clem. ibid. there should be betwixt all the children of God If the man that is in us be spirituall that humane affection which is in us naturally is turned into a brotherly affection as being partakers of the same spirit T is said of Hypocrates twins they laught together and wept together as there will bee a rejoycing with them that rejoyce so there will be a mourning with them that mourne a contracting our spirits with sorrow a hanging down of the head in sense of our brethrens miseries T was the sin of the people for which God threatens them that they lay upon beds of ivory and eat the lambs of the flock and chanted to the sound of the violl Am. 6.6 and drank wine in bowles and annointed themselves with chiefe ointments but were not grieved for the afflictions of Ioseph What nation deeper drencht in this sin then wee have been we have long seen our brethren in France in Germany and now in Ireland wallowing in their blood Each of those Kingdoms ready to crie out with the Church was ever sorrow like my sorrow Is it nothing to you Lam. 1.12 all ye that passe by behold and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow wherewith the Lord hath afflicted me in the day of his fierce wrath O hath not the wrath of God gone over those Countries like waves rolling one after another billow upon billow the famine after the sword and the plague after the famine may not we tell our children Ioel 1.3 and our children tell their children and their children another generation that which the palmer worme hath left hath the locust eaten and that which the locust hath left hath the canker worme eaten and that which the canker worme hath left hath the caterpiller eaten have greater judgements been recorded to posterity then have been executed upon these nations insomuch as all their plenties are devoured what the sword hath left the famine has destroyed and what the famine hath left the plague has consumed Are not the judgements upon our brethren in Ireland such as may well make our eares tingle to heare them Iet 19.3 doe we not now see them as the afflicted Saints are described imprisoned stoned sawen asunder slain with the sword Heb. 11 3● wandring about upon the cold mountains and desarts naked and starving at best in sheep-skins and goat-skins destitute afflicted tormented lying comfortlesse in dens and caves of the earth wives abused before their husbands faces virgins deflowred women with childe ript up poore infants snacht from their mothers breast and dasht against the stones here some lying naked perishing with cold there others starving with hunger the land that was as the garden of Eden now become a barren wildernesse Ioel. 2.3 that brings forth nothing but thorns to crown Christ with as St. Chrysostome speaks of the land of Iudea or nothing but monsters of men that delight to have their hands in the bowels and bathed in the blood of the Saints of God everywhere misery and all the direfull effects of the desolations of warre this I say have wee not long seen and yet ubi viscera where are our bowels yearning upon these afflictions of our brethren may I not say 2 Cor. 6.12 in the Apostles words are we not straitned in our own bowels are not our bowels shut up against our brethren how few of us that leave off any pleasure or take any the least time more to mourne in private for these afflictions of Ioseph are we not as wanton and full of jollity and good fellowship as formerly as if these miseries we see upon others did not at all concerne our selves they who are not sensible of the miseries of their poor brethren 't is a sign they are not subjects of the kingdom of Christ Christ himself hath compassion upon us Heb ● 2 who are his members in our miseries there is no affliction upon Gods people but God is afflicted with them in all their afflictions he was afflicted Es 63.9 Non perdit viscera pia mater ecclesia Aug. ho. 27. Heb. 13.3 1 Pet. 3.8 The Church our mother hath bowels of compassion towards her children and shall we have no sence of our brethrens miseries not be afflicted in their afflictions not remember them that are in bonds as bound with them and them which suffer adversity as being also in the body Bee all of one mind saies the Apostle having compassion one of another love as brethren be pittifull If we love as brethren we shall have these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 these bowels of compassion and pitty one towards another when it is well with them we shall rejoyce as the people of Roma did for Germanicus when they heard he was recovered they went about singing The City is safe our Country safe because Germanicus is safe Then we shall rejoyce and sing Our City our Country our persons Salva Roma Salva patria salvus est Germanicus we are all in a happy condition when our brethren and our Religion and the Church of God is in peace but till that be done till God make our Ierusalem a quiet habitation till God lift up the heads of our brethren againe and give the Gospel a free progresse againe and make Religion flourish again and set up the Kingdome of Christ and his Ordinances againe in their beauty and power and purity in other Nations as well as our owne we must mourne with them that mourne and weep with them that weep and be afflicted in the afflictions of Gods people if wee be not it is a signe wee are not members of the same body nor Subjects of the same King 3. In relieving their causes and persons with the strength of their owne persons and substance brethren and fellow-subjects must contribute to the reliefe and deliverance of those who are of the same bloud and of the same profession with themselves Wee must doe here as Iesse said to David 1 Sam. 17.18 Goe look how thy Brethren fare Wee should be alwayes eying our Brethren the people of God Psal 41.1 to see how they fare consider the poore as the Psalmists expression is that we may relieve them in their distresses Gen. 14.14 Abraham ventured his owne person and all his Family for the redemption of his Brother Lot Saul and all the Israelites hazarded themselves for their fellowes the Inhabitants of Iabes Gilead In the time of persecution 1