Selected quad for the lemma: lord_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
lord_n	love_n	love_v	soul_n	15,334	5	5.6380	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A34988	Charitable advice in a letter to the French Protestants, into whatsoever parts of the world dispers'd, by reason of their present sufferings and persecutions, from the hands of the Roman Catholicks / first written for the use of the French Protestants by Stephen Crisp ... ; and since translated out of the French, for more publick benefit.	Crisp, Stephen, 1628-1692.	1688 (1688)	Wing C6926; ESTC R37689	10,838	17

Regeneration without which all Divine Service all Religious Worship all Confessions and Absolutions all Alms and Prayers are nothing worth For Vnless a man be born again he cannot see the Kingdom of Heaven And you my Dear Friends who at this time are under so great Sufferings dispers'd here and there in several Countreys only because ye could not conform to a Religion which ye judge to be Idolatrous You I say cannot Exercise your Minds to better Purpose than in an exact and faithful View and Examination of your selves and your own Souls to find out what were the Reasons and Motives of such your Refusal Namely whether your Education or worldly Interest or Dependance upon another or some mighty Empire and Authority of others over your Consciences Or lastly whether it was only the Light of the Word and Spirit of Jesus Christ directing your Hearts and guiding your Understandings to perceive the Errors and Idolatries of the People of the Land that so enclin'd your Consciences to obey God and his Grace and Truth and did finally give you Courage rather to abandon the Land of your Nativity and all your Worldly Endearments than defile your Consciences by sinning against that Light and Grace which the Father of Lights had bestowed upon you If there be any among you that know this to be their Case what Consolation have these Men under all Adversities With what Joy must they needs be filled when they feel the Testimony of God in their Consciences bearing them witness that it is only upon this Account that they undergo all these Sufferings and Persecutions O! What Advantage will ye reap as many of you as give up your selves to this way of Conduct in all things In the mean while try search and examine if there be not yet something in your Consciences contrary and repugnant to that Light which shineth in your Hearts if there be not something that is heavy and cumbersome to your Souls and which hinders your Reconciliation with God The more ye set your selves after this manner to sound prove and search your Words and Actions by this Light which shineth in your Hearts the more clearly will ye see the Necessity which ye have to amend and reform your Ways your Manners and your Lives in the sight of God and will also be so far from believing that ye have done enough in obeying the Spirit of God in one particular that you will not cease to go on and persevere in bearing your Crosses all your days until ye have vanquished and surmounted all that stands in Opposition to the Holy Will of God so that in the end ye lose not the Reward of what ye have hitherto done For it is not Faithfulness in one thing only that will be accepted and approved by God but he expects and absolutely wills that we be obedient to him in all Things And thus Moses heretofore Prophesied of Jesus Christ And it shall come to pass saith he that the Soul which heareth him not in all things shall be cut off The most sure Way then to have Peace with God and to be reconciled to him is to follow the Lord intirely as did Joshua without any Reservation or Excuse that is to say Ye ought to forsake quit and abandon all that is Evil in your selves as well as the Idolatry of others who would have you run with them to the same Excess of Riot In the second Place I would advise you to consider what good Effects your present Sufferings have had upon you in Order to your Sanctification for this is the great Care and Concern of a truly Christian-Soul to grow better under what Degree of Afflictions soever God shall think fit to send to Kill and Crucifie in his People whatsoever is contrary to him that they may be like Gold tried in the Furnace of Tribulation It will be not a little advantageous to you to consider now if you seriously set your selves about the Work of MORTIFICATION and to Examine Whether that Vain and Giddy-headed Temper which Reigned so much in you in your own Countrey prompting and perswading you to follow and Embrace all the Modes and Customs of a Corrupted World be not still living in you at this Day And if ye have not too earnest Inclinations to suit and fashion your selves to the Wicked and Degenerate Modes Ways and Manners of the Countries whither ye are scattered O my Friends Had ye a true Sence of your Estate and Condition What Gravity Modesty and Sobriety would ye not express in all your Words and Actions This would easily perswade those among whom ye now live that it was out of a good Principle of Religion and Holiness that ye abhorred the Superstition and Idolatry of your own Countrey and not meerly upon the Account of some Forms and Ceremonies of Religion not agreeing with yours For ye are not ignorant that Religion consists not barely in Forms and Ceremonies since by them one Man is not made better than another Moreover ye cannot but remember that ye have read That the Apostles and Primitive Christians would have no Communication with those Men who though they observ'd the same Rites and Ceremonies would not be obedient to the Power of Godliness And indeed herein lies the Essence and Life of Religion and the Glory and Crown of all Sufferings that one can undergo for the sake of Religion to wit when those who are afflicted feel in their Souls during the time of their Sufferings the Power and Life of him for the Love of whom they bear up manfully under all their Torments and Agonies and do wholly abstain from the defilements and pollutions of the world Thus did the ancient Disciples of Jesus Christ behave themselves who were by Persecutions driven from one Coast to another into Asia Cappadocia and Bithynia but were not content only to undergo great sufferings but were also accompanied with a remarkable savour of life for we read That the Word thereby grew and spread it'self abundantly But what advantage will a Protestant have above a Papist so long as they both continue the Subjects of the Prince of the Air who rules in the hearts of the Children of disobedience of what Religion Profession or Sect soever they be Wherefore I pray and exhort you by all the compassion that the love of God can suggest not to vaunt and boast your selves of the small Reformation already among you but rather to observe and consider what yet there is behind to be reformed and corrected before ye can arrive at that end toward which ye should always direct your aim to wit a life altogether pure and conformable to the blameless life of God himself in whose presence ye hope one day to appear and dwell for ever Now since we cannot attain hereto by good works but only by Grace all those therefore who are subject to the Pure and Free Grace of God are hereby engaged on the one side to renounce all sort of impiety and concupiscence and on the other side to live righteously soberly and godly in this present evil world Tit. 2.11 Try then and examine well your selves and see how your Lives Manners and Coversations answer that Grace and that Light of the Truth which has been communicated to you by Jesus Christ the Fountain of all Grace and Light and according to what I have before told you ye may know by your own souls how to make a true judgement for they will dictate to every one of you in what a condition he is in the sight of God. I have but one thing more to put you in mind of which is to excite you to all humble acknowledgments and thanksgivings to Almighty God that it hath graciously pleased him to open the hearts of many Kings and Princes to entertain and assist you as also of a great part of the world to succour you in your necessities This as ye ought to esteem it a great mercy of God's so ought the serious consideration of so many kindnesses infinitely to oblige you to put your whole trust in the Lord and to serve him Religiously in all places where God shall appoint your Lots in requiting as much as in you lies his love and bounty For his mercies and loving-kindnesses should strongly engage your hearts to love the Lord above all things in the World by which also the hearts of all others who love him will be more and more enlarged to assist you in those things which ye shall have need of both Spiritual and Temporal Truly my dear Friends I have often looked upon you with great sorrow considering you as a people under great afflictions and trials and wishing these sufferings and persecutions would have had better effects upon you than I fear they have produced Upon this account it was that I thought fit to visit you as I do at this time with these few Considerations being moved thereto by the pure love of God and hoping that most of you will accept my Advice with the same love and sincerity that it was indited And I pray God that what I have said may in some measure engage and affect your hearts with a desire of those Spiritual Qualifications which ought constantly to be your aim But if on the contrary any of you shall slight or reject my good Counsels and shall spend his time in cavelling and criticizing either upon my Person or the stile in which I express my self let such a one know he can do me no harm but only his own Soul and I cannot be any way affected thereby unless it be with grief for such a person for I have not said any thing but faithfully to discharge my own Conscience My reward I expect of the Lord only who hath taught me by his Holy Spirit to love all men and do what in me lies for the good of every one for I know full well it is not the will of God that any one should perish but that all should come to repentance and the knowledge of the Truth that they may be saved FINIS

the Sanctification of his Soul and Reconciliation of it to God to have been only a professor of such points of Doctrine though they were never so pure holy and orthodox Because they that have had a bad Education and have been brought up in ways of darkness and full of the errors and corruptions of this World invented by sinful man have also a Conscience though stain'd and defil'd by the aforesaid Darkness and the ill precepts of their Teachers they pride themselves in their Errors and would fain have them pass for so many Truths embracing Darkness instead of Light and walking by the Light of that fire which they themselves have kindled crying aloud Thus did our Forefathers and alleadging Antiquity for a Cloak to cover their Errors and Abominations All which nevertheless is far from justifying them for on the contrary it renders them the more blame-worthy But this is not all these Consciences thus deceived have most commonly this property That they employ their utmost endeavours to make every mans Conscience comply with theirs and when they cannot compass their designs by perswasion nothing is more grievous to them as they also esteem it the greatest piece of Religion to persecute and destroy all who will not be of their perswasion All which is a manifest token that they are the Children of the Destroyer and are about his work of such our Saviour Christ prophesied truely when he said They shall think they do God good service when they kill you And yet even these men will plead their Consciences for what they do but alas they make it appear by their Deeds who has the government and conduct of their Consciences They cannot be so impudent as to say 't is the Lovely and Sweet Spirit of Jesus Christ but must needs confess it to be the force of a corrupted Education nourished and kept up by the continual inspirations of the Devil II. The next thing that is apt to get dominion over the Consciences of men is worldly interest those who are led away by this are such as do not heartily embrace any Religion but take the liberty to form in their imagination such an idea of Conscience as may best suit their Profession and contribute to their Worldly Profits Pleasures and Advantages so that it is plain they are Christians without a Cross and consequently no true Disciples of Jesus Christ who did in express Terms Deny all those to be his Disciples who would not deny themselves and take up their Cross and follow him But alas How difficult is it to such men to make any Scruples of Conscience or to be faithful to their Consciences who if any worldly Loss happen to them or any danger threaten their Gains or Pleasures what earnestness and care will they not make use of to force their Consciences to comply with any Side What Methods will they leave untry'd What Way will they not turn themselves though all their carnal Arguments cannot make them believe otherwise than they do in Effect believe Yea moreover they do oftentimes for Interest-sake force themselves to Profess such things as they do not nor cannot believe which is certainly the highest Abomination in the Eyes of God. Such Men are most commonly Encompassed with the thickest Darkness and Abandoned to a reprobate Spirit because for worldly Ends they preferr'd Darkness before Light and must therefore expect to dwell therein for ever III. The third and last way by which Men's Consciences are deceived is When they give up their Consciences to the Governance and Management of others Such may be said Not to have the free Exercise of their Consciences because they are engaged to another Man besides they ntirely inca●pacitate themselves to receive any Illumination by the Inspiration of the Spirit of God in their Hearts and so continue Vassals and Bondslaves to him whom they have subjected themselves unto and from him they receive their Precepts and Instructions though he may prove to be the most wicked Man in the World. They do not Consider that the Lord heretofore complain'd in this wise The Way which they should walk in to come unto me is taught them by the Precepts of Men from whence it is plain They ought rather to have chosen God himself for their Teacher But Oh! In what a miserable Condition are these poor Souls And with what Uncertainty do they follow that which Abandons them to the Government of another who must order and direct their Thoughts their Faiths their Lives and Actions Not considering that if he fall into a Ditch they must fall also with him But this is not all he who has thus blindly submitted himself to another's Conduct is no more Master of himself nor free in the Lord but Servant to another Man and so we may see that Error Darkness and Blindness are far from that Spirit which Jesus Christ sent according to his Promise To guide his People into all Truth and which he said the World could not receive For we see Men do all they can to hinder themselves from coming and hearkning to the Instructions of his Spirit chusing rather to build their Faith upon a Priest's or Fryar's Sleeve than trust themselves in God's Hands though all the while they do not own these men to be Infallible either in their Doctrines Lives or Actions For every Day one may observe their base Failings and Mistakes their Wicked Life their Cruelty their Hypocrysie and their Pride But how should it be otherwise with them when they will not preserve themselves from and Watch against the Ambushes of Satan who is their principal Director How can any Man be so Blind and void of Understanding as to think he can have Pardon and Remission of his Sins from such an one who is not able to deliver himself but suffers himself dayly to be led away by the Suggestions of the Devil to Evil Lusts and Concupiscences and who has himself as much need of another and he again of another Ghostly Father Ah! Where now is the pure Light of Christ in the Conscience which should govern it in one Man as well as in another to teach them to keep their Consciences void of Offence towards God and towards all Men O! Would to God Men would hearken to and seriously reflect on these things O that they would not forget to deal with the Holy Spirit as God hath appointed them 'T is this that would nourish and fortifie all the good that has been Implanted by a good Education and would moreover cause all the Knowledge we can acquire to flourish in Vertue and good Manners This would chase away and banish all the Evil that has been sown by a bad Education This would teach you to quit all Wordly Interest and give up your selves intirely to the Lord to be taught and directed by the Spirit and Light of Jesus Christ which would so open your Eyes that you would become more Learned and Knowing than your Teachers in the Mystery of