Selected quad for the lemma: lord_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
lord_n	word_n	world_n	wretch_n	71	3	8.9170	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A58146	Blessedness, or, God and the world weighted in the balances of the sanctuary and the world found too light preached in a sermon at Paule, before the Right Honourable the Lord Major, Aldermen, and commonalty of the city of London, on a thanksgiving-day, for the prosperity of our navy in a conflict with the Spaniard, October 17, 1656 / by Francis Raworth ...	Raworth, Francis, d. 1665.	1656 (1656)	Wing R372; ESTC R18645	28,408	72

condition he that loseth that he cares not to enjoy and enjoys that he can't lose And in a spiritual sense he onely is such a man whose God is the Lord Methinks the words are here represented as Antiphanys Dialogue-wise The world begins Happy is he whose Sons grow like Olive plants yea saith David whose God is the Lord the World succeeds Happy is he whose Oxen are strong to labor and that Nation whose streets knows no complaining yea saith David whose God is the Lord still that is the note of a gracious heart as he rescribed back nothing but King of France King of France King of France and why happy such a man above a worldling 1. He that hath outward happiness in the world may not have a title to the Lord but he that hath God to be his Lord hath a title a spiritual title to the World The Corinthians were ready to quarrel about their properties I am of one from Paul saith one I am from Apollo said another tush said a third I care neither for Paul nor Apollo give me Cephas I am for Cephas The Apostle rounds them in the ear what saith he Is Christ divided will you contend for a part All men are gain not onely Paul Apollo Cephas but all things life death things present and things to come But by what tenure Why Because Christ is gain When we lost our Title to God we lost our comfortable title to the Creatures and no wonder the Creature rebels against us since we have rebell'd against the Creator The Creatures may justly say to unregenerate men that hunt after and dig for happiness in them I say Honors Riches Pleasures may say to such as Samuel did to Saul Why come ye to us since God is departed from you He is a Rebel that harboreth him whom the King hath Proclaimed a Traytor And what comfort can that soul have to lay his head in the bosome of any Creature when God himself hath turned his back on him But he that hath a new title to God hath a better title to outward comforts he holds them in capite God hath provided for him a Kingdom and therefore doth not grudge him crums How sweet are those mo●sels of bread that by Faith are dipt in Christs blood not that property comes by Grace but it is cleared up by Grace Many a man hath an Estate and a childe of God enjoys the comfort of it The worldly man may say This house this childe is mine by Creature right a Saint saith These are also mine by Covenant right but you may have all worldly happiness and not be happy Therefore secondly Grace claims a title to all the Ordinances of God Preaching is thy Chariot to bring the Lord down to thee Prayer and Meditation are wings to carry thy soul up to God It is generally believed and without scruple among the judicious that the visible and not the invisible Church is the prime and proper subject for the dispensation of Gospel Seals but his title to them that hath a right to Christ is indisputable He that can say the body and blood of Christ is his may challenge and claim the Bread and Wine that signifie those as his He that hath right to the Pearl hath right to the Casket He that is marryed to the King of Glory ought not upon any pretences whatsoever to be kept out of the Presence Chamber and from prayer while others stand like strangers without doors knocking and speaking to God at a distance as slaves to a master you have freedom to enter into the Palace of Heaven and cry Abba Father The Ordinances are the glory of a Nation and where ever God goes his Ordinances go too and where ere they reside and abide he abides too My Beloved God and his Institutions go and come from and to a Nation together as it s the honor of a Nation to say Jehovah-Nissi The Lord is our Banner in a Military sense for God to fight for us so a greater for others to say of any Nation Jehovah-Shammah The Lord is there in an Ecclesiastical sense The Ordinances are the comfort of the soul they are not as some new Anti-scripturists calumniate the Grave wherein Christ lies but the Throne whereon he sits as King of the Church and we were better lose our evidences for our Lands then part with the seals of the Gospel Is it then a small matter to have liberty to tread in Gods courts to sit under the tree of Life and dew of Heaven to have commerce with Angels to have communion with the Lord of Glory when thou art hungry to have freedom to run to Gods House for Bread when thou art distracted and troubled with doubts of thy Faith thy salvation to have recourse with David to Gods Sanctuary for resolution and that by thy title to the Lord as thy Lord Thirdly Thou hast moreover a propriety in all his Providences his Providences are thine for thy satisfaction if thou wantest enlightning he is thy Sun if defending he is thy shield if a Nation be fearful he is a wall of fire without if fainting he is a well of water within They may be without many things but we have the Broad-Seal of Heaven for it that they shall want no good thing Thou art in trouble and if thy Friend could but see thee How happy God is therefore Omniscient Thou art weak if thy Friend could help thee God is therefore Omnipotent El Shaddai All-sufficient If thou art weak he hath a shoulder to carry thee if feeble a bosom to warm and cherish thee He that hath him that is all hath all Secondly For thy security and that 1. To sustain thee If thou goest into the water I will be with thee if into the fire I le be with thee said God q. d. If thou burn I le burn too if thou drown I le drown too Hence it was that Israel was safe in the Red-sea and the three children secure in the Furnace God may cast his childe down and so his Nation yet not cast them away he often breaks your hearts that he may not break your backs 2. To order all for thee The Devil may turn Cordials into poyson but providence turns those poysons into Cordials again God hath his fairest ends in our foulest ways when temptations have sucked our corrupt blood away those Leeches shall be taken off when you are provoked to storm at God and quarrel with the seeming inequality of his ways are ready to judge his present carriage to your souls inconsistent with the hopes of election past or future glory Let despair vail and murmuring be tongue-tyed and consider the Lord thinks it better rather to bring order out of these spiritual disorders then not to suffer those disorders to be at all It s easier for vain man to wrangle with the Almighty and to set up in his pride an Anti-Providence in the world then rightly to discern what God is a doing we neglect

wicked many times deport themselves so comfortably so chearfully as if they were the children of God and on the contrary the children of God carry themselves so melancholily so despairingly as if they were wicked men and had no interest in God at all they rejoyce when they should mourn and you mourn when you should rejoyce Christians Is the Lord contented with you and is not God sufficient Will not you be contented with him Is the Lord satisfied with a My son give me thy heart and are not thou satisfied with this the Lord hath given me his spirit tolle meum tolle Deum It s remarkable that all the Beatitudes are fixed on unlikely conditions to intimate That the Judgement of this world and the Judgement of Gods children differ about Blessedness Shall that man rejoyce that hath but his Angels of gold to smile on him and wilt thou not rejoyce that hast the Angels of God I the God of Angels to tend on thee Is not he sad that hath onely a claim to the dirty and muddy streams of Peace and outward prosperity and wilt thou be sad that hast a title to the Well-head of Comfort to the Spring and Fountain of Happiness Shall he be merry that can but say This mirous House that Mannor is mine and wilt thou not be glad when thou saist That this God the Landlord of Heaven and Earth is mine Religion is no melancholy thing though the Religious may be often melancholy and what ever worldlings phansie though oft the body be sad yet the heart of a childe of God keeps Holy-day and if he be troubled it is not because he is Religious because the Lord is his God but because he is so carnal and doubts of that claim And surely one great reason why we are not so composedly chearful enough it is because we are not Christians enough Is God thy Father Christ thy Redeemer the Spirit thy Comforter will not this support thee Hast thou sometimes such triumph of heart that thou wouldst not exchange those few sweet minutes for all the World and dost thou live in the longing and thirsting for Death and a Resurrection and after them the sight of Glory and an immutable and immortal state of Heaven and Happiness where thou shalt sigh and sorrow no more And will not these hopes relieve thee Hath the Gospel disappointed thy thoughts Didst thou unadvisedly enter into Covenant with God Is not there that felicity and favor in Gods presence that thou didst promise thy self to finde in him Wilt thou change portions and exchange properties with the world Shall this man have thy pardon of sin and thou his riches that man thy hopes of Glory and thou his Lordship and Honor Speak out what wilt thou take for God what price for thy soul Will Pleasure and Past-time buy it Will Riches or Revenues buy it Are not all these things partial and improportionable to the God of Glory and Centre of all Happiness If the World can't come up to thy price and thou canst not mend thy market for shame be satisfied and be at rest If you would credit Christianity and commend thy God to the lost world get comfort in thy conscience away with unjust scruples against thy entituled peace part not with thy priviledge or thy God till thou canst meet with better If you value not your own peace have an estimation of Gods glory What will carnal men say Would you have us part with all for God when you are ready to part with God for nothing Why do you exclaim against our worldliness and our vain Pleasures when you your selves do seem to count Mortification and Heavenliness a burthen either keep your breath to your selves and reprove us no more or live up to your interest and to honor your God How do you convince us it is worth the while to sell all for the Pearl of price that when we have done so we should think our selves miserable after the bargain It seems rather by the anxiety and perplexity of your mindes that you envy our comforts in the world to which for shame you dare not return and would esteem it a piece of your happiness if we would be miserable with you for company But let the world consider that a Saints want of comfort proceeds not from the insufficiency of his purchase but from his want of faith to claim it And let Believers consider that as their unbelief is uncomfortable to themselves so it reproacheth God Hence many have denyed God and so have turned Atheists because they could not maintain Gods All-sufficiency and live like Epicures Habitual distrust of God is a greater Blasphemy in some sense then a total denyal of God for what greater shame then not to believe him whom we profess cannot deceive us and not to be content with him whom we acknowledge to be All-sufficient Verily the poorest soul in all this Congregation that can but say God is mine is happier then if he could say all the Mines of Gold and Silver in the West-Indies are mine Fifth Inference By way of perswasion to the worldly happy that they would look after the Lord Why will you seek any longer vitam beatam a blessed life in regionem mortis in the Region of death Pearls in the dust and Heaven compararatively in Hell Wilt thou perish for that which shall perish Dost thou love Gold so well as to run into Hell fire to fetch it Thou proclaimest thy happiness because of an healthy Body and wilt thou be less happy in having a sound Conscience How happy wert thou if besides these Rings of gold thou hadst but the inestimable Jewel if in thy Terrestrial and Earthly Paradice thou hadst but in the midst thereof the Tree of Life Jesus Christ You ought not to throw away Christ when you imbrace the world neither need you prodigally throw away the world when you embrace Christ Christ and the werld may dwell both in one house though not in one heart Be as covetous as thou wilt be as ambitious as thou wilt wouldst thou have earth wouldst thou have this World so thou maist and Heaven and the next too As Achsah when her Father gave her a Portion desired a Blessing so do thou at Gods hand and say Lord Thou hast given me the nether springs but I yet want the upper springs thou hast given me the Streams but what are all they without the Fountain As thou art not content with my things without my self so Lord I have thy Gold and Silver thy Comforts and Creatures but these are not thy self all these I may have and yet be poor naked be hopeless in this life and a damn'd wretch to all Eternity As the Father brings in King Ahab sitting in his chair of State with his Nobles attending about him and environed with all outward glory in the three years Famine crying out What avails all this if yet the Heavens continue to be Brass and the earth Iron So