Selected quad for the lemma: mercy_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
mercy_n	anger_n	lord_n	slow_a	2,036	5	9.7827	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A26935	Gods goodness vindicated for the help of such (especially in melancholy) as are tempted to deny it, and think him cruel, because of the present and future misery of mankind, with respect to the doctrine of reprobation and damnation / by Richard Baxter ... ; published and prefaced by a friend at whose desire it was written, and to whom it was committed.	Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691.	1671 (1671)	Wing B1278; ESTC R5256	19,834	110

moreover assert a special Decree and Grace of God which with a chosen number shall antecedently Infallibly secure his Ends in their repentance faith perseverance and salvation Is this any detraction from or diminution of his universal Grace or rather a higher Demonstration of his Godness As it is no wrong to man that God maketh Angels more holy immutable and happy 14. And what if men cannot here tell how to resolve the question Whether any or how many are ever converted and saved by that meer Grace which we call sufficient or rather Necessary and common to those that are not converted and whether mans will ever make a saving determining improvement of it must plain truth be denyed because difficulties cannot easily be solved And yet in due place I doubt not but I have shewed that this question it self is formed upon false suppositions and is capable of a satisfactory solution 15. I conclude in general that nothing is more sure than that God is most Powerful Wise and Good and that All his works to those that truly know them do manifest all these in conjunction and perfect Harmony and that as to his Decrees and Providences he is the Cause of all Good and of no sin in act or habit and that our sin and destruction is of our selves and of him is our Holiness and Salvation And that he attaineth all his ends as certainly as if mans will had no liberty but were acted by Physical necessitation And yet that mans will hath as much natural Liberty as if God had not gone before it with any Decree of the Event and as much moral liberty as we have moral virtue or holiness And these Principles I have laid down in a little room that Tempted persons may see that it is our dark and puzzled braines and our selfish diseased hearts that are the cause of our quarreling with God his Decrees and Providences and as soon as we come to our selves and are cured these odious apprehensions vanish and God appeareth as the unclouded Sun in the Lustre of his Amiable Goodness And when we come to Heaven we shall see to our Joy and his Glory that Heaven Earth and Hell declare him to be all perfectly Good without any mixture of evil in himself or in any of his word or works And we shall find all our sinful suspicions and murmurings turned into a joyful consent to the Angelical praises Psal 136.1.2 26 c. O give thanks unto the Lord for he is Good for his mercy is for ever O give thanks unto the God of Heaven for his mercy is for ever Rom. 4.8 11. Holy Holy Holy Lord God Almighty which was and is and is to come Thou art worthy O Lord to receive Glory and Honour and Power for thou hast Created all things and for thy Pleasure they are and were Created Rev. 7.12 Amen Blessing and Glory and Wisdome and Thanksgiving and Honour and Power and Might unto our God for ever and ever Amen The Lord is Good to all and his tender Mercies are over all his works The Lord is gracious and full of compassion slow to anger and of great Mercy Psal 145.8 9. The Word of the Lord is right and all his works are done in truth He loveth righteousness and judgements the Earth is full of the goodness of the Lord. Psal 33.4.5 O how great is thy Goodness which thou hast laid up for them that fear thee which thou hast wrought for them that trust in thee before the sons of men Psal 31.19 O therefore that men instead of quarrelling with his unknown mysteries would praise the Lord for his Goodness and for his wonderful works to the Children of men Psal 107.8 15 21 31. In the Conclusion I take it to be wholsome advise to those that are under this Temptation 1. That they will oft read over the Psalms of Praise and think when they read them whether David and the ancient Church were not like to know what they said than a self-conceited or a melancholy tempted sinner 2. That they would consider who it is that is the Grand enemy of the Glory of Gods Goodness And they shall soon find that it is no other than the Devil None but he that is most evil can most envy Infinite Goodness his honour And is the Devil fit to be believed against God And that after the warning of our first Parents ruine which befell them for believing Satan when he slandered both Gods Wisdome Truth and Goodness to them 3. That they would bethink them to what end it is that the Tempter and the Enemy of God doth thus deny his Goodness Is it not a plain act of malice against God and us Is it not that he may disgrace God as evil and rob him of his Glory and also that he may hinder man from Loving him and so destroy all piety and virtue and goodness in the World Who can Love him whom he believeth to be bad and so unlovely And what Grace or happiness can there be without the Love of God 4. That they would think what horrid wickedness this sin containeth where Melancholy and involuntariness doth not extenuate it Is it any better than a denying that there is any God As is said before To be God is to be Perfectly Powerful Wise and Good And if be none such there can be no God And then who made the World and all that is Good in it by derivative goodness Yea is it not to represent the most amiable blessed God in Satans Image who is most evil and a Murderer from the beginning Joh. 8.44 that so men may hate him and fly from him as they do from Devils And can you tell how great a crime this is 5. That they would consider how this impious conceit is calculated for the licensing of all manner of villany in the world and to root out all the relicts of goodness from among mankind For who can expect that any man should be better than his Maker and that he should have any Good which denyeth God to be Good 6. That they would labour hard to be better themselves For he that hath a true Created Goodness is thereby prepared to relish and admire Gods primitive uncreated goodness Whereas a wicked or a guilty sinner cannot much value that which he is so unsuitable to and which he thinks will be to him a consuming fire Truly God is good to Israel and to such as are of a clean heart Psal 73.1 But he that liveth in the Love of sin will be doubting of the Love of God and fearful of his wrath and unfit to relish and delightfully perceive his goodness Psal 34.8 Taste and see that the Lord is Good blessed is the man that trusteth in him 7. Study Gods Love as manifested in Christ Then you shall see what man on earth may see But think not falsly narrowly basely of his office his performance or his Covenant 8. Dwell in the believing foresight of the Celestial Glory The reflections of which may wrap up a believing soul on earth into extasies of gratitude and delight 9. Remember what Goodness there is in the Holiness of God which is demonstrated in his severest Justice Yea what mercy it is to forewarn men of the punishment of sin that they may want no necessary means to scape it 10. Remember how unfit the selfish Interest of obstinate despisers of Grace and salvation is to be the measure or index of the Goodness of God And how much more credible the concordant testimony of the Heavenly Host is who Live in the Love of Love it self and are everlastingly delighted in the Praises of the Infinite Greatness Wisdom and Goodness of the most perfect blessed Glorious God FINIS

believe that they are not commanded to do this in vain So that Gods own Providence by a course of such mercies which cannot stand with the execution of the unremedyed violated Law of Innocency together with his obliging all men to Repentance and to the use of a certain course of means in order to their salvation is a promulgation of a Law of Grace according to the first Edition and distinguisheth man from unredeemed Devils And they that say that all the Infidel World have all this Mercy Duty Means and hope without any Redemption or Satisfaction of Christ as the procureing cause are in the way to say next that the Churches Mercies too might have been given without Christ 9. Of a truth God is no respecter of persons but in every Nation he that feareth God and worketh Righteousness is accepted with him Act. 10.34 35. For God will render to every man according to his deeds To them who by patient continuance in well-doing seek for glory and honour and incorruptibility eternal life Rom. 2.6 7. Glory honour and peace to every man that worketh good to the Jew first and also to the Greek v. 10. For there is no respect of persons with God v. 11. For when the Gentiles which have not the Law do by nature the things conained in the Law these having not the Law are a Law unto themselves Which shew the work of the Law written in their Hearts their Consciences also bearing witness and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another v. 14 15. And they shall be Judged according to that Law which they were under Natural or Mosaical even by Jesus Christ v. 12.16 And it is the work of the spirit promised to believers to write the Law of God in their hearts 10. Though a special promise was made to Abraham as an Eminent believer and the Jewish Nation were the peculiar people of God advanced to greater priviledges than any others in the World yet were they not the whole Kingdom of God the Redeemer nor the only people that were in a Covenant of Grace or in a state of Salvation For Sem was alive after Abrahams death who was not like to be less than a King and to have a Kingdom or people Governed according to his Fidelity And Melchizedock was a King of Righteousness and Peace not like to be Sem by the Scituation of his Countrey And a Righteous King would govern in Righteousness Job and his friends are evidences of the same truth And we have no proof or probability that all Abrahams seed by Ishmael and Esau and Keturah were Apostates for they continued Circumcision And what all the rest of the World was we know not save that in general most grew Idolatrous and the Canaanites in special But that they all apostatized from the Covenant of Grace made with Adam and Noah there is no proof We have not the History of any of their Countreys fully so as to determine of such cases In Nineve God ruled by that Law of Grace which called them to repent and spared them upon their Belief and Repentance Because he was a gracious God and merciful slow to anger and of great kindness and repenteth of the Evil Jonah 4.2 And that God dealeth not with mankind now as the meer Judge of the violated Law of Innocency he declareth not only by the full testimony of his Providence or Mercies given to the sinful World but also by the very name which he proclaimeth unto Moses which signifieth his nature and his mind towards others and not what he is to the Jewes alone Exod. 34.6 7. The Lord The Lord God merciful and gracious long suffering and abundant in goodness and truth keeping mercy for Thousands forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin All which is inconsistent with the Relation of God as a Judge of a people only under the Curse of an unremedied violated Law and unredeemed though he add and that will by no means clear the guilty c. that is will neither Judge them innocent that are guilty of the Crime nor Judge them to Life that are guilty of Death according to the tenour of the Law which they are under Purificando non purificabit as the literal version that is will not Judge unjustly by acquitting him that is to be condemned or as the Chaldee Paraphrase hath it not Justifying those that are not converted It is enough for us therefore to know that the visible Chruch hath manifold priviledges above all others Rom. 3.1 2 3. c. And that salvation is more easie sure and plenteous where the Gospel cometh than with any others and that we have therefore great Cause to rejoice with thankfulness for our lot and that the poor World lyeth in wickedness and must be pittyed prayed for and helped to our power and that God is the Saviour of all men but especially of them that believe and that he is good to all and his mercies are over all his works and that he will never damn one soul that loveth him as God But what is in the Hearts of all men in the World and consequently how they shall be used at last he only that searcheth the heart can tell and it is neither our duty nor our interest nor possible to us to know it of all particulars much less to conclude that none among them have such Love who believe him to be infinitely good and to be to them a merciful pardoning God And we know withall that all they that know not Jesus Christ as this determinate person that was Born of the Virgin Mary Suffered under Pontius Pilate was Crucified Dead Bu●ied Rose again c. do yet receive all the foresaid mercies by him and not by any other Name or Mediation nor yet without his purchasing Mediation 13. And if besides all the mercy that God sheweth to others he do antecedently and positively Elect certain persons by an absolute Decree to overcome all their resistances of his spirit and to draw them to Christ and by Christ to himself by such a power and way as shall infallibly convert and save them and not leave the success of his Mercy and his Sons preparations to the bare uncertainty of the mutable Will of depraved man What is there in this that is injurious to any others or that representeth God unmerciful to any but such whose eye is evil because he is good and as a free Benefactour may give more mercy to some than others of equal Demerits If they that hold no Grace but what is universal and left as to the success to the will of man as the determining cause do think that this is well consistent with the mercifulness of God surely they that hold as much universal Grace as the former and that indeed all have so much as bringeth and leaveth the success to mans will and deny to no man any thing which the other give do make God no less merciful tha● they but more if they