Selected quad for the lemma: love_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
love_n	brother_n	love_v	see_v	10,944	5	5.0158	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A66104	Love's pedigree, or, A discourse shewing the grace of love in a believer to be of a divine original delivered in a sermon preached at a lecture in Boston, Febr. 29 1699/1700 / by S. Willard ...	Willard, Samuel, 1640-1707.	1700 (1700)	Wing W2283; ESTC R39758	12,825	30

Love's Pedigree OR A Discourse shewing the Grace of LOVE in a Believer to be of A Divine Original Delivered in a SERMON Preached at the Lecture in Boston Febr. 29. 1699. 1700 By S. Willard Teacher of a Church there Jam. 1. 17. Every good gift every perfect gift is from above and cometh down from the Father of lights BOSTON in N. E. Printed by B. Green and J. Allen. Sold by Benjamin Eliot at his Shop under the West End of the Town House 1700. Love's Pedigree 1 John IV. 19. We Love him because he first Loved us THE knowledge of our good and safe Estate deriving from an interest in the Everlasting Love of God is a thing which every one who hath right thoughts of the Eternity he is going to will be very sollicitous about There is besides the Testimony of the Spirit of God to this in us which is necessary for our confirmation in the belief of it the witness of our own spirit requisite for our ordinary Assurance about it which must be given to those things in us which are evidential of i● These Evidences are built upon the discovery of such fruits or effects of the love of God wrought in us as a●e proper and distinguishing and these are mainly the Graces of Faith and Repentance and these are put into us by the operation of the Spirit of God in our Effectual Vocation and because there may be something like unto these found in Hypocrites which may cheat them into false and presumptuous hopes of their good estate there is a yet farther trial to be made of them to prove that this Faith is unfeigned and that this Repentance is unto life which must be gathered from those distinguishing fruits of them which are not to be found in the other These fruits are all of them in the Word of God reduced to that common head of love by which Faith is said to Operate Gal. 5. 6. Which Love is distributed according to the next or immediate objects of it into the loving of God and of our brother and because these two are inseparable they are therefore made use of mutually to evidence each the other inasmuch as if we truly love our brother it derives from our love to God as the principle in which it is rooted and if we love God indeed it will unfailingly pr●duce the other love in us So that the grand Case into which our Self Examination must ultimately resolve it self is Whether God loveth us with that love which he bears to his Chosen because if we are but sure of this the inference is infallible viz that we shall certainly at last arrive at Eternal Life how happy then must we needs be and the enquiry on which this conclusion must determine is Whether we do cordially and sincerely love God for though our happy state was secured for us in the former it being appointed and settled in that love of his yet we cannot come at the knowledge of it but by the ●at●er The words of our Text give us a reason of the safety of this way of concluding and shew us why and wherein it amounts to a Demonstration in as much as it leads us from the Effect to the supream cause from whence it must derive It is needless to enquire after the coherence of our Text with the Context the words themselves being an entire proposition and having abundant mattar of profitable instruction in them and the design of them is not only to assert the close connexion that there is between our loving of God and his loving us but also to point us to the reason of this Connexion and shew us the closeness of it and the safety of our inserring his love to us from ours to him and if it be enqui●ed to what kind of reasoning it is to be referred I answer it must needs be to the Efficient Cause It doth not only intimate that there is a Concomitancy but also a Causality for though the word because doth not always refer us to the cause of the thing but may refer to any other head of arguments and is accordingly to be judged of by the nature of that which it refers to yet it must do so in this place inasmuch as we are here given to understand the priority of Gods love to us as that from which we come to love him which can be inferred from no other but the Efficient The word is an Adjective and not an Adverb and that also puts force into the argument he was the first in this love and thence it was that our love followed after Hence DOCTRINE Our Loving of God is the genuine effect of his first Loving of us If we love him in time it it because he first loved us from Eternity I shall not insist on this Doctrine at large but restrain the following Discourse to the resolution of the following Case viz. Quest In what respect Gods love to us is leading to and influential of our loving of him A. That we may take up the right meaning of the Case in order to the better resolution of it There are these two remarks to be made 1. That by Gods love to us we are to understand his Eternal purpose of good will by which he appointed us to Salvation by Christ Love is improperly attributed to God in whom there are no Passions or Affections properly so called inasmuch as they argue imperfection and composition in the subject of them which is incompa●ible with the most absolute first Being But because these are in men the Instruments of the Will by the Ministry whereof it performs its Imperate Actions or they are the various postures of it with respect to its Object according to the resentment that it hath of it hereupon when we see such things done in Gods Works of Efficiency as are wont to be managed by such an Affection we after our manner of conception ascribe it to that Affection because we cannot otherwise express it Now love is an Affection in us which beareth good will to the Object of it and expresseth it self in acts of kindness to it As therefore it is an Humane Affection it is rooted in the heart or will and is on all opportunities discovering it self in the carriage and from this conception of it when God manifesteth his benignity to the Creature we conceive him in his so doing to act as a cause by Counsel and so ascribe it to his Benevolence and call it his love And fr●m this consideration there is a divers love that is assigned to him according to the different effects of his good will discerned in the fruits of his Beneficence to the Subject of it There is a common love attributed to him wherein the good and the bad do promiscuously partake and it appears in that Goodness of his which he confers upon them wherein he gives them large tasts of his bounty and to this love we are pointed in Psal 145. 9. The Lord is good

hath shifted objects and exchanged God for ● Creature Unconverted men are said to Lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God 2 Ti● 3. 4. And hereupon that is one title put up● ungodly men Rom. 1. 30. Haters of God that their first love in respect of the object on which it was placed is turned into hatred 3. This love must be again recovered by the man in order to his being made to enjoy God and to be happy in him It is certain that mans true happiness consists in his enjoying of God who is the only adequate object of felicity no other can make a suitable and sufficient portion for the reasonable Creature to be far from God is to be miserable indeed Psal 73. 27. For lo all that are far from thee shall perish In his favour there is life his loving kindness is better than life it self Now God is a portion for none but those that love him it is by love that we come to have Communion with him which is our blessedness Prov. 8. 17. I love them that love me Hatred keeps the Sinner at a distance from God and there is a fearful Curse out against all such Psal 21. 8. c. Thine hand shall find out all thine Enemies thy right hand shall find out those that hate thee thou shalt make them as a fiery Oven c. Whereas there is a great Blessing in store for such as love him Psal 5. 11 12. Let them that love thy name be joyful in thee for thou Lord wilt bless the righteous with favour wilt thou compass him as a shield It therefore infinitely concerns us all to see that the love of God dwells in us and this is it which the Apostle prays for in their behalf 2 Thes 3. 5. The Lord direct your hearts into the Love of God 4. It utterly exceeds the power of man to recover this Principle and the activity of it Of the Natural mans inability to exert any truly Gracious action the Scripture abundantly informs us Josh 24 19. Ye cannot serve God Rom. 8. 7 8. The Carnal mind is Enmity against God for it is no● subject to the Law of God neither indeed can be So then they that are in the Flesh cannot please God 2 Cor. 3. 5. We are not sufficient of our selves to think any thing as of our selves Now this defect ariseth from the loss of the Image of God on his Heart and his incapacity of getting it again by any Endeavour of his own Because he hath not a root of Grace in him therefore he cannot act Graciously for no● Effect can exceed the Vertue of its Cause And because there is a contrary Principle in him which reigns over every Faculty and Power within him he therefore is not able to withstand it Indeed he cannot so much as desire to Love God much less is he able to restore this Grace to his heart again The Will therefore as well as the Deed must be of his operation in us Phil. 2. 13. It is God who worketh in you to will and to do of his own good pleasure The restoring of lost Grace to fallen man is a work of Omnipotency and therefore none but he who is Almighty is able to do it in us it is therefore compared to a Creation 2 Cor. 4. 6. God who commanded the light to shine out of the darkness hath shined in our hearts c. And to a Resurrection Eph. 2. 1. You hath he quickned who were dead in trespasses and sins Love is a thing that is not to be purchased all that a man would offer for it will be despised Cant. 87. Which may be interpreted as well of our loving God as of his loving us 5. This love is a saving gift and therefore must have God for its Author It is one of those things which we are told do accompany Salvation Heb. 69. and is therefore called a fruit of the Spirit in the fore cited Gal. 5. 22. This love is an effect of the New birth whereof God is the Author 1 John 4. 7. Love is of God and every one that loveth is born of God And indeed it being one of the Graces of Sanctification it must needs proceed from Gods Efficiency for it is he that Sanctifieth us 1 Thes 5. 23. And the wonderful change that is made in the man by it must force us to say of it behold the finger of God To see one who the other day despised God had no desire after him had him to depart from him chose carnal objects lying vanities rather than him ●ay hated his counsels and was full of all prejudices against him now to love him to chuse him to embrace him to forsake all for him to submit to him and delight in his Service is a thing of which no other account can be given but that God hath created him a new in Christ Jesus that he hath given him another and a Ne● heart or otherwise it could never have been 6 There was nothing in us that could move Go● to produce this saving quality in us In all voluntary actions which are done by a Rational Agent we are wont to enquire after the Impulsiv● cause of them or what it was that moved an● engaged him so to do and by such measure as these are we necessitated to conceive of God Works of Efficiency It is a demonstration o● Gods wonderful love to us that he will put principle of Sanctification into us and thereb● restores us from death to life and whence was that he so did or what was it that induce● him hereunto Certainly it could not be fro● any loveliness that he saw in us for there wa● none we had nothing in us that was desir●ble but every thing was hateful the Image God which once was our beauty and orn●ment was gone and the Image of Sin whic● is our shame and vileness was contracted an● by virtue of it we were every way abomin●ble when therefore God speaks of doing suc● things for backslidden Israel he would hav● them to take that humbling remark upon i● Ezek. 36. 22. Thus saith the Lord I do not th● for your sakes Oh house of Israel but for mine holy names sake c. Nor was he moved hereto by our requests and prayers it was not because we in sense of our folly and misery sought relief of him that his bowels earned towards us for he himself saith Isa 65. 1. I am sought of them that asked not for me I am found of them that sought me not and though he hath declared in Ezek. 36. 37. I will yet for this be enquired of by the house of Israel to do it for them Yet his preventing grace produc●th this in us otherwise we should never have thus enquired after him but abode in our distance from him 7. Hence the spring or rise of all this must be from his love or good will to us When we have searched into all the causes of Regeneration in which this