Selected quad for the lemma: heaven_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
heaven_n	church_n	earth_n	triumphant_a	4,427	5	11.4398	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A89580	A sermon preached before the Honourable House of Commons, now assembled in Parliament, at their publike fast, November 17. 1640. Upon 2 Chron. 15. 2. The Lord is with you, while yee bee with him: and if yee seek him, he will be found of you: but if yee forsake him, he will forsake you. / By Stephen Marshall, Batchelour in Divinity, minister of Finchingfield in Essex. Published by order of the said House.	Marshall, Stephen, 1594?-1655.	1641 (1641)	Wing M776; Thomason E204_9; ESTC R212613	31,991	52

goes if God goe It is a knowne story in the 1. Samuel 4. that when the Arke that was called the glory of God the visible token of Gods presence in the Covenant of Grace was taken Captive by the Philistines Phineas his wife bowed her selfe and travailed and though they after told her that a Man-child was borne shee regarded it not but called his name Ichabod saying The glory is gone because then Gods presence departed from them What need I say any more The worke of the Incarnation of the Sonne of God and the Redemption of the VVorld by him was such that one maine end of making this goodly frame of Heaven and Earth was that it might be the stage upon which that Worke should be acted A worke wherein not onely all mans happinesse lyes and whence it flowes but wherein all Gods Attributes are glorified to the highest and for which the Church Triumphant shall thinke Eternity short enough to prayse God Of this Worke I say the summe is given in one word Immanuel God is with us And plaine Reason may demonstrate that it must needes be so What is glory but the shining out of excellency VVhat is happinesse but the fruition of the greatest good Now there is no Excellency that shines out in any thing like to that which beames out from God in the Covenant of grace to his people There is no good that any people can enjoy like the fruition of God in that Covenant It is true God manifests himselfe to all the Nations in the World in him they live and move and have their being yet it is as in a darke Cloud they grope after him and cannot feele him but in the covenant of grace men behold him with open face like the Sunne shining in his strength as through a Mirrour Such a Mirrour as the Prince of Orange had that would shew the Sunne in his full bignesse and beauty Thus God shines in the Covenant of grace The Prince is virtually present in all places of his Kingdome but his Court is his Glory So where God is in his Covenant there Heaven is therefore this is usually in the Scripture phrase called the Kingdome of Heaven But if yet more particularly you enquire what Gods presence in his Covenant implyes As he who being askt what God was required first a day then two then three alledging that the more he studyed it the lesse able hee found himselfe to answer it So the more I thinke of this the more unable I see my selfe to make a satisfactory answer what I can take thus To the Nation of the Iewes it implyed something which concernes not us but mystically or analogically As to have the Arke Vrim and Thummim to have God to reveale himselfe in Visions and Dreames To answer by Thunder c. which my haste allowes me not leisure to explaine But to them and to all other people Gods presence in the Covenant of Grace implyes these three things First the owning and acknowledging of them to be his owne separated people knit to him in a league of love he is their God they are his people they have a propriety in God and God hath a propriety in them so that they may say of Him This God is our God and God of them This people is my people Now this is the greatest happinesse nothing can exceed it It hath bin often questioned what was the greatest favour that ever Almighty God did for man Some preferre Creation wherein man received his being and excellent endowments some Redemption wherein man is recovered to a better and surer estate than hee injoyed in Creation but out of question to be a Iedediah beloved of God to be neare to God as his Children as his Spouse is the comprehension of all that can be said or thought of the happinesse of a people And if you looke into the Scriptures you shall see that Gods love to his peculiar people is such a love as carryes with it all relations It is the love of a Father to his Children I will be your Father and you shall bee my Sonnes and Daughters saith the Lord Almighty It is the love that a man beares to the wife of his bosome I will marry thee to mee in righteousnes and truth and mercy It is the love of a friend I have called you my friends And Abraham the Father of all that are in Covenant he was stiled The friend of God And from this interest in God flow innumerable priviledges for being thus beloved of God and precious to him it followes that they are accepted in their services that all their sinnes are pardoned and that they have liberty to aske any thing that is good for them When Solomon was beloved of God 2 Kings 3. 5. God bids him Aske what I shall doe for thee It is but aske and have And this is the confidence that wee have in him that if wee aske any thing according to his will he heareth us They have friendship with all his friends In Zach. 8. 23. Ten men shall lay hold upon the skirt of one that is a Iew of whom they be able to say Wee have heard that God is with you Indeed to have God thus making himselfe over to a people to bee their portion to love them and to owne them is not onely an heaven upon earth but the very heaven of heaven Secondly Gods presence with a people in his Covenant implyes Gods assisting them and prospering all the workes they put their hands unto This is the ordinary expression of the Scripture Every thing prospers where God is It is said of David whithersoever Saul sent him he prospered for God was with him Every house where Ioseph came prospered for God was with him In all undertakings in all Counsels for wars for peace for trade c. Gods aid and assistance comes in If they decree a thing God will establish it If they commit their worke to him the very thoughts of their hearts shall be established Whatsoever they doe God will make it to prosper Thou O Lord workest all our workes for us Whereas now if God be absent all mens endeavours are to no purpose in any kind Except the Lord build the house they labour but in vaine that build it It is to no purpose to plough that field that God will have lye fallow Ye earne much saith God but it comes to nothing ye sow much and bring in little ye eate and have not enough yee drinke and are not filled he that earneth wages puts it into a bottomlesse purse What was the reason the Lord blasted all And it must needs be so all the second causes worke onely by vertue of the first the great wheele carries on all the other A notable example of this that Gods presence is mans prosperity wee have in Hag. 2. where when God had told them that the reason of all their ill successe in their

any man should happen to lose his life in the Lords quarrell as the Angell said to Daniel Hee shall stand up in his lot Hee shall rise up and follow CHRIST cloathed with glory Revelations the nineteenth the Armies in Heaven that followed Christs triumphant Chariot were such as were holy and faithfull and loved not their lives to the death Would not this move any man to bee on Gods side Lastly Honoured and beloved in the Lord let the consideration of your great place and office that God Almighty hath called you to raise up your spirits to endeavour great things for the LORD For my part I am too weak to fathome in my thoughts what the great worke is to which you are called together by God You are met to seeke the good of the Land the good of the Church a greater charge than the salvation of your owne soules is put into your hands It may bee not onely our welfare and peace and Religion but even the welfare of all Christendome under God depends upon your meeting That God that might have left you as I said to bee hewers of Wood and drawers of Water hath called you to bee Repairers of all our breaches and the Prayers and blessings of all GODS people are upon you The eyes of all the Nation next under GOD and our gracious Soveraigne are fixed upon you Oh what a mighty tye doth this put upon the soule of every one of you to lay aside all businesse and pleasures and lusts and ends of his owne and solely to study how to advance CHRISTS cause and appeare where Christ would have him appeare Your work is great our evills are many but be not discouraged onely rememember that God is with you while you are with him As it is in Zech. 4. Who art thou O great Mountaine before my servant Zorobabel thou shalt become a plaine If God be with Zorobabel Mountaines shall become Plaines before him God can make those things that you apprehending as Hydra's and Monsters would tremble to thinke of to fall before you as the leaves of a tree There is a notable storie of Luther when hee first came out against the Pope Albertus Cranzius a Bishop that liked well his project but thought it impossible to bring it to passe wrote to Luther Frater Frater abi in cellam dic miserere mei Deus Frier Frier goe to thy Cloyster and say Lord have mercy upon mee this worke is too hard for thee yet Luther wrought wonders One Luther will doe great things if GOD bee with him One Parliament may doe great things if God bee with them Resolve upon it this day to bee for God make this another blessed seventeenth of November But if through feare treachery cowardise pride or sloth you withdraw your selves from Gods work Deliverance shall come to Gods people another way and you for your part shall not onely lose your share in the comfort but you shall bring all the guilt and sinnes that the Nation groanes under to stand upon your owne score before God Yea you will think it is a great word but I speake it not rashly it may bee more guilty than the very Authors of our mischiefes who have beene firme to their owne principles in the bringing of them in and you contrarie to your light and office doe further them if you not withstand them As hee who solicited an Emperour for a pardon for one that had killed two men and received a denyall upon that very reason that the delinquent had twice imbrued his hands in bloud replyed to the Emperour Nay you killed the second for if hee had beene cut off for the first hee had never killed the other So abundance of evills committed by private men are not the sinnes of the Rulers and Princes at the first but may afterwards through their connivence or want of zeale be truely reckoned and accounted theirs God forbid that you should bring so great a burthen upon your own soules and consciences Vp and be doing and the Lord be with you in his cause Now although your wisedomes best know what is to be done and it may seeme unfit to prescribe such a Colledge of Physitians a way of a Cure Yet give mee leave onely to propound one thing even the same which was prest in the forenoone which I suppose would prove a Catholike remedy for all our evills and the greatest meanes for the lengthning out of our tranquillity and the healing of all our distempers that is the promoting establishing and maintaining a faithfull learned painfull preaching Ministery that every Candlesticke may have a Candle that every Flocke may have a faithfull Shepheard to guide them This is the thing I would propound to you This was the course Iehoshaphat tooke who sent Princes and Levites who taught in Judah and went about through all the Cities and taught the people Blessed be God for the light that shines among us Yet I must tell you that of nine or ten thousand parishes which they say are in England I believe there are many thousands which these eighty yeares have not had the blessing to enjoy at the least any long time a setled faithfull preaching Ministery So that I believe and I speak somewhat from experience that many thousands if not thousands of thousands know not the right hand from the left in the very principles of the Doctrine of Christ What ever bee the cause whether it bee that our Lawes and Constitutions are defective whether the negligence or corruption of our Governours whether the want of a preaching maintenance or whether all these bee the fault Certaine it is there hath beene hitherto a {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} somewhat which hath hindred the spreading of it And it is worth your most diligent enquirie whether the neglect of this hath not beene one maine cause of the ill successe of so many former Parliaments Could you provide mercifully for people in this you would make all safe and England would thanke you as long as it is England To incite you be pleased to consider but these two things First we deserve no further the name of a Christian Nation than this is done nor any further than this is advanced This is the Scepter whereby Christ rules The dwelling of his Word with a people is the greatest proof of their owning him for their Prince and his acknowledging them for his owne Subjects Is any Country esteemed a part of a Princes Dominion that is not ruled by his Lawes Neither can any Land be accounted Chists Kingdome where the preaching of the word which is the Rod of his power is not established And the Lord hath ever esteemed the hinderers of his Word to bee the men that would not have Christ rule over them Secondly if all the good Lawes in the world were made without this they would come to nothing order what you can leave this undone you will never doe the thing you aime at

which may appeare by the odious names hee gives to their sinne calling it sometimes Rebellion as being a denying his Soveraignty Iosh. 22. 16. 22. Sometimes Apostasie Ier. 2. 13. Sometimes Adultery the most unpardonable sinne betwixt man and wife Ezek. 16. And sometimes Blasphemy Isai. 65. 7. Thirdly it is a sinne that hath vengeance and punishment intailed upon it to the Third and fourth generation The Iews say to this day that there was never any calamity betided their Nation since their comming out of Aegypt but there was an ounce of the Golden Calfe in it It is a sinne that GOD failes not to visit upon Children to the third and fourth Generation But now on the other side God will shew mercy to thousands of them that love him and keepe his Commandements How is that The Lord interprets them to love him that purely worship him As a man who finds his wife faithfull in the marriage bed judgeeth that shee loves him and that her heart is one with his what ever other infirmities shee may have Yea they are interpreted to keepe all his Commandements God will trust them for all his Commandements whom he finds faithfull in his worship Yea to a thousand Generations hee will remember them which is longer than this wicked world shall stand The kindnesse and faithfulnesse of them that maintaine and preserve the pure Religion and worship of God shall ever bee in the sight of God for them and their posterity Oh! let mee helpe your reckoning in the day of the LORD intreating you for the Childrens sake of your owne body to lay what I have said to heart that you may provide that the Ordinances of God bee neither taken away nor defiled that GOD may be purely worshipped in his owne way for time to come And that by a Generation of men who seeke onely to glory in our flesh wee bee not jugled our of our Religion nor mis-led in such a way of service as that Gods soule should take no pleasure in us Thirdly and lastly which is the comprehension of all the rest bee on Gods side ingage your selves in every cause which is Gods Owne what God ownes As Christ said You shall not have me alway that is in my person but the poore you shall have alway and when you will you may doe good to them So I say you have not Christ with you in his person but you alwayes have his Cause his Truth his Ordinances his Day his Ministers his Children the Teares of the afflicted all causes of Instice and Righteousnesse these are Gods causes God would have all his friends zealous for him and appeare for him his Church and his Cause And to inflame your hearts to this be pleased to consider these few incouragements First God hath deserved it at your hands that you should appeare for Him Hee hath appeared for you when none could His Sonne Iesus Christ gave his owne soule a ransome for your sinnes or else you had perished in Hell for ever Hee hath made you the Head rather than the Tayle Hee hath heaped upon you Honour Wealth and Friends and you can give no other reason why you are not more miserable than the poorest Vagrant that wants both house and home but onely this that GOD hath beene on your side Doth not hee then deserve to bee owned They say Love is loves Loadstone and loves Whetstone Secondly Gods Cause his Church and Children have few friends and many enemies and those enemies no Babies but Principalities and Powers Cruell Cunning Malicious and unweariable And more now than ever Satan knowes his time is short hee stirres up all his instruments as if one spirit possest them all And is it not a shame that the Lords friends should bee more backward in his cause than the vassalls of Satan are in their Masters I adde thirdly the Lord to punish the Pride Sloath Hypocrisie and Formality of his people hath of late suffered the enemies of the Church to prevaile exceeding farre The face of Christendome this day so miserably rent with Warres Sedition Heresies and Schismes is a most ruthfull spectacle Who can looke upon poore Germany and not even bee compelled to weepe over the Booke of the Lamentations againe And GOD knowes whose Lot is next Little quiet I feare is to bee expected in Christendome till the Beast his Kingdome be ruined Now wee know that the Lord accounts that the most seasonable time for his friends to owne his cause when the enemies are most violent against it then God saith Who is on my side who When the pressures of the Church are greatest the opportunities of appearing for the LORD are most seasonable and great are their Rewards who then sticke to him Every one would gladly embrace a glorified CHRIST but when the whole Councell shall reject him then with Nicodemus to plead for him this is honourable When hanging upon the Crosse his Disciples runne away from him then with Ioseph of Arimathea boldly before Pilate to shew love to him this is acceptable When the Jewes had an exalted Mordecay then the people of the Land would turne Iewes The Samaritanes would helpe to build the Temple when the Persian Emperour is a friend to the Church But our Lord saith let mee have the man that will not bee ashamed of me before a froward and adulterous Generation Marke he doth not say in a gracious Generation then no man will bee ashamed of him but in an adulterous and froward Generation Fourthly when you strike in on the LORDS side on his Churches side on his Causes side you shall not onely strike in with the best side with the best Cause but with the most prevailing with that side which must and shall have the victory at the long runne It would make a man never to be afraid to be ingaged in a quarrell where hee is sure of the Victory The Barke wherein Christ his Church and Cause are may bee tossed but can never bee drowned Populus Romanus saepe praelio victus nunquam bello The Romans lost many Battailes but they were never overcome in a set Warre at the long runne they crushed all their enemies So all the enemies that seeme too hard for Christs cause and his Church must perish Hee must rule till all his enemies be made his footstoole In Zacharie the 12. there are foure or five admirable expressions The Church is compared to a Hearth of Fire in the midst of a Wood Like a Torch of Fire in the middest of a Sheafe Whether the Wood or the Fire the Torch or the Sheafe will have the victory judge yee In verse the second shee is compared to a cup of Poyson that will end them who thinke to devoure it To an heavy Stone that will returne upon those to their ruine who endeavour to carry it away So shall it bee with all Nations that fight against the Church and cause of Christ And if