Linguistic DNA - Concept Modelling Demonstrator

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
lord_n	father_n	grace_n	jesus_n	17,723	5	5.9080	4	false

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A17575	An exhortation of the particular kirks of Christ in Scotland to their sister kirk in Edinburgh	Calderwood, David, 1575-1650.	1624 (1624)	STC 4358; ESTC S116199	9,860	24

AN EXHORTATION OF THE PARTICULAR Kirks of Christ in Scotland TO their Sister Kirk in Edinburgh Printed Anno 1624. TO THEIR DEAREST AND WORTHIEST Sister the Kirck of Christ at Edinburgh Grace to you peace from God our father and the Lord Iesus Christ. WE may all of us discern by our unprepared mindes for suffering such evils as are dayly incident to all men as they are men how we are disposed to take up the crosse of Christ and to beate that other sort of afflictions that are proper to Christians as they are professors of the Gospel for albeit that all vices doe crie in our eares that we be woful creatures subjected through sinne to manie miseries albeit the lamentable example of others set the same lesson manie a time before our eyes albeit we doe often feele the sparkles of the fire upon our own bodies and may knowe the warning peeces before the Lords great ordnance yet when tribulation commeth within our doores we think it almost as strange and intertaine it as impatiently as if it had never knocked nor giuen a warning before the loue of the world the secure fruition of present prosperitie naturally so filling the heart that it leaveth no roome for the expectation of adversitie We may finde upon greater reason the like untoward disposition of heart when we are called to suffer for the profession of the gospell for we haue been taught from the beginning that all that will liue godlie in Iesus Christ must suffer persecution that the godlie shall weepe and lament but the world shall rejoyce often hath it been beaten in our eares that we would ere long be put to our triall We might also by the light of the fires of affliction in other Kirks beside us haue discovered our owne dangers and prepared our selues against them and which is more and draweth nearer in the tryall begunne and continued at home amongst our selues we might haue beholden the common case and condition of us all yet no sooner are we assayed a new againe with the smallest threatnings but we are put to such perplexitie as if eyther we of all Christians were excepted from affliction and to us onely Christ should be a Saviour without a crosse or els that for fear of the losse of some worldly dignitie or temporal commoditie we should so much as enter in deliberation whether to change anie part of our holy and comfortable profession Yee are set upon the stage at this time right reverend and dearest sister to act your part we are the beholders al our eyes round about are fixed upon you you are made a spectacle after a speciall maner to the world to angels to men your care must be so to carrie your selues that yâ—â— drawe not on by your sinning against God a greater judgement then man can remoue againe that you commit not that which may be a blot to your profession and either a bleeding wound to your consciences while yee liue or the beginning of an endlesse defection Make not the faces of so manie as behold you and are readie to suffer with you to be ashamed because of you Beware to doe that which will make your friends and the followers of Christ to mourne and your enemies the favourers of Antichrist to rejoice We cannot denye most worthie Sister but both our pastors and professors haue beene watered manie times with that large river of Eden that gladded your citie and haue received both light and heate from your golden Candlesticks You may therefore without offence of anie eÌ„xpect at our hands some thankfull reflexe and Christian reciprocation at this time We must first of al earnestly beseech you by the peace of your soules by the price of your redeÌ„ption that ye chang nothing in the worship of God upon any suddain fear or perturbation of minde with a secret doubting and contradiction from your owne consciences for when the cloude of passion is past over and the light breaketh out again the accusations of conscience shall be more insufferable nor the importunitie of tentation is now the feares of the judgment of God shall be greater then now be the feares of the wrath of the world And when yee haue changed the comfortable worship of God with husks emptie ceremonies that nourish not either yee shal with remorse returne to eat bread in the old maner in your fathers house or els yee shall dolefully goe on from evil to worse your consciences which yee haue greeved perpetually tormenting you and the one fide whom ye haue hardened crying out upon your olde hypocrisie and the other side whome yee haue deserted upon your new apostasie That vvhich your conscience would not suffer you to doe for any pretended church authoritie for all the arguments reasons that haue been multiplied and for the doctrine and example of your own pastors if yee shall now through feare of anie worldly losse suddainly admit what shall al these who have been your witnesses from the beginning of this controversie judge but that yee are a multitude of wilful worldlings that yee haue in your prosperitie counterfeited the voice and caried the opinion of good Christians as the parrat can learne to imitate the voice of man but now when yee are beaten with the parrat yee returne to your own voice and manifestly declare of what kinde you are Secondly when you heare that suggested unto you which is the scope of the worldlings text Ioh. 11. 48. If we let him alone the Romans shall come and take awaie both our place and our nation if yee adhere to the reformation retain Christ as you haue learned him both Session and counsell will be removed and your towne will turne to nothing Remember that which was once taught you upon that place by your owne holie and heauenly preacher M. Rollock in his powerfull manner That the wisedome of the world looketh to the present estate and condition of things if with it Christ and the puritie of religion may subsist then will they embrace Christ religion otherwise they bidde them farewell But the wisedome of God saith he layeth Christ and the puritie of Christian religion for a ground and sinne closeth her eyes to all events whatsoever for Christ and religion should not be servants to policie but policie and this whole world should serue Christ and religion The Iewes preferring their estate to Christ and fearing ruine if Christ should liue they kill him to saue their nation but the same was the cause that in the justice of God the Romans came and destroyed their nation The Lord hath moe waies then your town hath ports to bring in his wrath and for magnifying his owne wisedom and snaring of men in their wisedome manie times judgment entereth by the port that pollicie hath locked fastest They wanted not in those daies their owne pretexts none of them was so shamelesse as to set himself against God as God they had

their owne cunning to colour the matter and pulled forth their eyes least they should see that God against whom they fought as men deale now with Christ and the puritie of religion The more knowledge and the lesse conscience we finde in anie age we may look for the fouler errors and the fairer covers Oppose also to that the Christians text Matth. 16. 26. and with elevation of heart think seriously what hath a man profited if he should gaine the whole world and lose his owne soule or what can a man giue in exchange for his soule 1. the immortal soule of man may be losed 2. the gaining of the world is the ordinarie cause of the losse of the soule 3. it is extreame follie to loose the soule for gaining of the world for first it is an unprofitable gaine what hath a man profited and next it is an unreparable losse what can a man giue in exchange for his soule so that the losse of one soule is the eternall losse of that which is more worth then the whole world 4. he maketh themselues judges and demandeth them for their farther conviction But in this lieth the deceit that while men to their own conviction acknowledge it to be madnesse to loose their soules for the world they obserue not or will not suffer themselues to obserue the secret but sure conjunction betwixt the sinful courses they betake them selues to for gaining the world and betwixt the losse of their soules Purge your affections of this particular feare and quit your selues of such things as woe your flesh and court your carnal senses Covetousnes is the roote of all evil ease savoureth not the things that be of God but those that be of men and whosoever shall be ashamed of Christ and his words in this adulterous and sinfull generation of him also shall the Sonne of man be ashamed when he cometh in the glorie of his father with his holie angels Thirdly when yee haue happilie removed the world and all worldlie tentations from betwixt your eye the cause in hand for your resolution yee neede not to search after curiosities of learning nor wander after uncertainties of opinions but limitting and directing your sight 1 Looke first upward to the glorious majestie of God who is present at his owne worship neither accepteth nor blesseth a worship that is not directed by his own word thinke as in his sight whether yee may looke for a more sensible testification of his comfortable presence in your soules at the celebration of the Lords supper when ye draw neerest to Christs institution or when Christs gesture of sitting is abolished as common profane the Antichrists gesture of kneeling is enforced as more humble and holy the table of the Lord either taken away or turned into a cupboord our eating drinking into a minsed and pinched tasting our conjunct communicating into a confused disputation our sacramental breaking in the time of the action into a formal carving before the action our kindly and christian distribution into a steward like dispensation the enunciatiue words of the institution into an idle petition and repetition and our spirituall exhortations according to Christs example into a comfortlesse deadnes silence Such Churches as never saw better may haue some comfort in this but for you who haue seene the glorie of the first temple in this land and who call to minde with what heauenly meditation liuelie affection large consolation and with what spirituall resolution yee were wonte to be filled It is a wonder when yee see this new ministration with your eyes that your hearts melt not within you that your flesh crieth not out for the living God that yee weepe not with a louder voice then the voice of their joy who shoute now having gotten the arke of the Lord upon a cart that ye prefer not the poorest parish in the land with the libertie of Christs institution to your owne tabernacles and courts that of late were so amiable that your soules longed and fainted for them 2 Looke back and see how the house of God was builded and the headstone put upon it by Gods owne hand to the admiration of the christian world about us what unitie of ministers authoritie of assemblies order of ministrie puritie of external power of internall worship what zeale and indignation against all impietie and iniquitie And againe by what methods and machinations haue succeeded for unitie division for authority anarchie for order hierarchy for puritie of worship antichristian ceremonies for power of godlines superstition profanitie and for zeale and indignation nothing but lukewarmnes and toleration In all these considerations as this nationall kirk was eminent aboue other nations so were yee aboue us all as farre as in civill dignitie And shall we liue to see the day when for the confused feare of an uncertaine losse our Ierusalem shall become Romish our Philadelphia become Laodicea our fountain be turned into a puddle our glorie become our shame our Najoth our beautie turn to be our blemish our lothing our deformitie Looke back also to the course of his blessings upon our reformation the perpetual course of his judgments upoÌ„ our defection We know the power of the Lords particular providence in al the works under the sunne should haue learned against the atheisme of the times to haue referred notable judgments to their own procuring causes The darknes lightning thunder haile rain at the ratificatioÌ„ of these rites that now molest us the inundations the hunger and cold the sicknesses and death since can not yet be worn out of our senses shal be kept in memory by the generations after us Looke again back compare the many reverend assemblies which we haue kept with that one new meeting at Perth trie the spirits The place of the 95 Psal. is impertinent neither can it be a commandement for at sometimes it is not lawfull to kneele before him no man wil say that we are commanded so oft as we worship to kneel The second and third reasons in the act beside other absurdities do charge the Lord Iesus Christ with his disciples al the kirks that haue used Christs gesture after him with an unreverent behaviour in a holy action And whether the memorie of by past or the multiplicatioÌ„ of present superstition which is the fourth pretence in the act might not haue giuen a better narratiue for the contrarie conclusion the times haue given verdict 3 Looke inwards into your owne heart that you may finde the testimonie of a good conscience one sure note whereof is this that in cases coÌ„troverted a good conscience taketh ever the surest and safest side Perjurie is a hainous sin odious to the world Idolatrie is against the first commandements of the first table is no lesse abominable in the sight of the alseeing jealous God then is adulterie to a jealous husband wheÌ„ it is committed

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