Selected quad for the lemma: kingdom_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
kingdom_n	bind_v	church_n	key_n	2,078	5	10.0076	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A94070	XXXI. select sermons, preached on special occasions; the titles and several texts, on which they were preached, follow. / By William Strong, that godly, able and faithful minister of Christ, lately of the Abby at Westminster. None of them being before made publique.	Strong, William, d. 1654.	1656 (1656)	Wing S6007_pt1; Thomason E874_1; ESTC R203660	309,248	523

set before other men and exalted above them for in Church societies it is not outward honours or wealth that exalts men men may be great men yet have but mean gifts and of little honour and esteem in the Church of God but also they are called by terms of authority they are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in this place and v. 7. they are your Guides Leaders and Commanders and therefore it is taken from the Master or Pilot in a Ship that turns it about to steer it in its right course and therefore they were of old called The Masters of Assemblies Eccl. 12. and this appears so much the greater if you do consider also that they speak to you in the name of Christ for 1 Thes 5.12 They are over you in the Lord and what they do require by vertue of their office they can do it in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ as an Embassador hath great power because he speaks in the name of the King and they can enjoyn you as you owe obedience to Christ in whose name we speak and whose work we do therfore he that rejecteth you rejecteth me 1 Cor. 5.4 In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ deliver such a man to Satan if they did it in their own name there were little power in it indeed but in the name of Christ there is great authority and there is this the more to be added because as it is a power given them by Christ and Christ is despised in them so it is a power given them by your own consent now for a man to give consent to put power into a mans hand and afterwards he denyes him the exercise of that power which he hath given him it is for a man to Judge and condemn himself in the thing which he himself allows therefore it layes a necessity upon you of subjection to this power both for conscience sake and as a thing that was done by your own free election and consent and so there is not only an authority that commands it but a Law of love also as a woman subjects her self to her husband not only as God hath commanded it and given him authority over her but also from a principle of love because this is the man that I did chuse to my self to obey and to be subject unto all my dayes therefore a double Law is broken in this respect and this still argues the greatness of an Officers power in the Church It s called the power of the keyes which doth note a very great authority and office Isa 22.22 power in the house the ordering of governing of all the affairs in a family shall go through their hands as it is said of Joseph what ever was done in all the land of Egypt he was the doer of it so it is true of them what ever is done in the Church of God it must go through their hands they must also be the doers of it and Math. 16.19 it is the keyes of the Kingdom of Heaven which is meant both of grace and glory a power to bind and loose in the Church by vertue of the Institution of Christ and what they do bind and loose or they remit or retain shall be so done in the world to come in the Kingdom of Heaven so that they shall open Heaven to the Church and if they shut them out heaven shall be shut out if they binde upon their consciences so will the Lord also in the world to come in Heaven and in this respect it is a far greater power then if a man had the keyes of the authority and Government of all the Kingdoms of the Earth Thirdly the subjects of this authority it is not the bodies lives of men or their estates but the authority is spiritual and it relates unto the soul only and this will appear First because it is managed only by spiritual means as the Kingdom of Christ is not of this world the management of things in the Church of Christ are not to be done in the way of the world it is not by any outward power and greatness or by authority and force of arms c. but all is ordered by the word 2 Cor. 10.5 The weapons of our warfare are mighty through God for it is this that is the Scepter of the power of Christ and all the authority that he doth exercise by his Ministers and Officers under him it is by the word only and if they wil not hear the word let such a man be unto thee a Heathen man let him be Anathema Maranatha to the coming of the Lord we must leave him as a man incurable we can do no more to him 1 Cor. 16.22 if the word will not reclaim him we have no way to deal with him but to set before him the Judgement that is written which if he despise then Church-Officers have no more to do but as they when they refused the Gospel did shake off the dust of their feet it will be easier for Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of Judgement they have no power either to imprison or afflict their bodies or seise upon their estates if they obey not they can only leave men to the Judgement of the Lord. Secondly answerable unto the power such are the censures and they are all spiritual they relate unto the soul they can inflict no corporal punishment upon men but the Punishment in Scripture and first a binding of their sins Joh. 20.21 as they pardon sin in the conscience and in regard of their Church-state by receiving them after sinning upon their repentance So there is a binding of sin upon the conscience convincing a man of the guilt of sin and also the putting him out of the society so that the mans sin is bound in his own conscience and before the Church and the Lord saith It shall be bound in heaven and shall not be pardoned to him or if he be godly he shall not have the sense of pardon till by this ordinance of Christ he be again received Secondly they withdraw communion with him 2 Thes 3.14 If any man obey not our word note that man and have no fellowship with him that he may be ashamed all this is in reference to the soul that the man may be reclaimed it is only Mingle not with him that when he shall see all godly men to avoid him as a Pest and his communion as some filthyness he may thereby take shame to himself Thirdly deliver him to Satan 1 Cor. 5.4,5 Ordinances are means to inflict spiritual Judgements as well as to convey spiritual Blessings cast him out by a Judicial act from the Assemblies of the Saints and so being cast out he is in the world where Satan rules he shall have nothing to do with Ordinances more and yet all this is with special respect unto his soul it is for the destruction of the flesh that the soul may be saved in the day of the Lord therefore all power

But what is there in their destruction that is such matter of joy to hear of the shedding of blood and the destruction of many thousands and those many of them poor souls very unfit to dye to see them in garments rouled in blood is this matter of joy a man would rather think you should rather sit down and sigh to the breaking of your loins There are many things in it matter of joy and triumph unto the Saints as first they rejoyce in the Judgements of God Rev. 19 2. True and righteous are thy judgements for thou hast judged the great whore they do taste a sweetness even in the judgements of God as Ezek. 3.1 it was in my belly as honey even that roll which contained nothing but bitter lamentations yet it was very sweet to him the Saints love to see Christ with his sword girt upon his thigh and cloathed with a vesture dipt in blood and treading the wine-press alone travelling in the greatness of his strength Isa 63.1,2 Secondly because God hath appeared for the Churches cause and hath owned their quarrel and hath avenged the blood of his servants at their hands Rev. 19.2 when God doth appear for them and doth not leave them unto the will of their enemies but doth awake as a Giant in the behalf of his people this hath alwaies occasioned songs and rejoycing in his people the Lord hath triumphed gloriously over the horse his rider Exo. 15. not that they do triumph meerly upon the account of their own safety but they triumph because God hath triumphed over his enemies else to see so many drowned in the mercyless grave who would not have pittyed them Thirdly of all the Churches enemies that ever were this is the cruelest enemy the fourth beast is worse then any of the former and in the fourth beast the little horn was more fierce then his fellows they have been alwaies drunk with blood and their endeavour was to weare out the Saints of the most High Fourthly it shall be the last enemy for as soon as they shall be destroyed the seventh Trumpet sounds and then shall the mystery of God be finished it hath been an enemy to the Church of longest continuance of any their oppressions have lain longest upon the Church of God and the longer a burthen doth lie and hath been complained of the greater mercy you would count it to have it taken off if to be 430. years in Egypt and 70. years in Babylon be a long time for the people of God to indure yet this is a bondage that lasts 1260. daies in the greatest tyranny and rage that can be they Tread down the Temple Rev. 11.1,2 Fifthly when this enemy shall be destroyed the cup of her fornication shall be removed by which the men of the earth but specially the Kings of the earth have been made drunken Rev. 18.11 Now there is no man shall be their merchants more they had Chap-men abundantly before but now there shall be a dealing in that trade no more the same God that did cast out Satan in the Pagan way of Idolatry will also cast out Satan in the Antichristian way of Idolatry but they shall not deceive the earth by such sorceries any more for there is by this means a cloud that hath filled the house and no man could enter into the Temple Rev. 15.8 there was no considerable number of menconverted there was such a darkness and a smoake upon the ordinances of God and all his dispensations but all shall be removed Sixthly Lastly from the glorious fruit and consequences that shall follow upon the destruction of Antichrist the people of God will have great cause to rejoyce and praise God I le name only these four First then the Kingdoms of the world shall become the Kingdom of the Lord and of his Christ Rev. 11.15 there shall be multitudes converted unto the Lord. Secondly it shall be the inlet of all the promises now Christ shall be called the word of God he was so before but now he is called so for the accomplishment of it as Exod. 3.6 by the name Jehovah God was not known unto them Thirdly then all persecutions shall cease Rev. 20. Satan shall be bound so that he shall not stir up the world to the persecution of the Saints as he had done in times past Fourthly New Jerusalm shall come down from God out of Heaven there shall be that glory of the Church that the Kingdom and dominion under the whole Heavens shall be given up to it and they shall possess it for ever and ever Dan. 7. the mountain of the Lords house shall be exalted on the top of the mountains there is a triumphant state of the Church that is yet to come in this life when all the glory of the world shall be brought unto the Church and people of God Vse Seeing God hath in a degree accomplished this in this late mercy do you rejoyce with Triumph and say great Babylon is fallen for they are some of the most blind and Jesuited Papists in the world and those that profess o●herwise yet they do enter upon the Popish interest and engage in the same quarrel with them and take heed you be not deceived with vain words we see how not only this but the neighbor Nations do declare against them that seek to promote that cause of tyrannie and oppression which you have hitherto fought against let not your discontents carry you to the quite contrary point of the compass and your zeal against sects and heresies make you to succor their prophaness and to enter upon their interest and thereby to destroy that which you have endeavoured to build and to pluck down with your own hands that which you have so much with your purses and prayers laboured to set up I le only speak briefly to these five particulars to quicken you in this duty of praising God First it is a command that God doth give to all his Saints to rejoyce at Babylons downfal Rev. 18.20 rejoyce over her thou heaven universa sanctorum multitudo all the Saints but specially the Prophets and the Apostles the saithful Preachers of the word of God let not them be last in their joy and praises that had the great hand and were first in praying for it it is your duty and it lies as a command upon you and if you make conscience of other commands do not for fancies dispence with this Secondly they be Romes merchants only that be sad at it let them say Rev. 18.10 Alas alas that great City Babylon that mighty City this doth not befit the Sons of Zion but the merchants of Babylon and truly let me tell you a man may receive the mark of the beast in his right hand and may strongly promote the Popish interest that doth never wear●t by profession in his forehead Thirdly if Babylon shall fall then come out of her my people saith your God when Rome doth fall now is the time