Selected quad for the lemma: nature_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
nature_n	father_n	son_n	subsist_v	3,592	5	11.9300	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A87170	Topica sacra: spiritual logick: some brief hints and helps to faith, meditation, and prayer, comfort and holiness. / Communicated at Christ-Church, Dublin, in Ireland. By T.H. minister of the Gospel.	Harrison, Thomas, 1619-1682.	1658 (1658)	Wing H917; Thomason E1769_2; ESTC R202373	72,620	183

out by him Tenthly After the Father whose motion and project this was had wrought of the Son to undertake it did not he then engage to stand by him and to supply him with all necessaries a body to suffer in and a spirit to that body without measure and to bring those into him in time by retail whom he had given to him in the Lump before time was he doth more then invite as saith Arminius he doth effectually draw by an omnipotent sweetness Christ must not scruple to entertain the most Leprous loathsome sinner whom the Father is pleased to bring unto him Ay and the Father must help to keep them also whom he hath brought in Ioh. 10.28 29. a pretious Cordial in Apostatizing times and all this being done according to an antient complot and agreement Socinus cannot from these supplies or dependencies infer the Sons inferiority to the Father and the poor believing sinner may press him with all these engagements 11. Over and aboye all this Did he not put forth his paternal Authority and lay his Commands upon his Son to engage in this great service John 10.18 and 12.9 20. as Pharoah to express a Pleonasm of Love commands Joseph to be kind to his nearest and dearest Relations which one would think little needed Gen. 45.19 Go look God in the face and say as David doth Psal. 71.3 Thou hast given Commandment to save me And to whom To Man or Angels No to me says Christ This Commandment have I received of my Father If Christ fail there is not only breach of Articles but Disobedience too Thou canst not believe that Christ loves thee so well as to lay down his Life for thee But canst thou believe he loves the Father tha 's easie there 's no doubt of that Why says Christ when he was going to die that the world may know how I love the Father as the Father hath given me Commandment even so do I John 14.31 12. Yet again to make all sure least the humane nature of Christ upon its affumption should shrink at the approach of sufferings Doth not the Father engage to reward him plentifully to give him a Royal and an Everlasting Priesthood a name above every Name appoints unto him a Kingdom Luke 22.29 and above all assures him of the Salvation of those he died for according to this agrement Isa. 53. 11. without which nothing could ever have satisfied him so that as the assumption of the humane nature is the highest instance of free mercy so is the rewarding thereof in its state of exaltation the highest instance of remunerative Justice All this needed not to engage Christ to the work so much as to engage us to believe that the Father was first in willing as he is in subsisting the Son second to him therein but not in heartiness of good Will for therein they are both equal they must needs be one in Will who are so in Nature and Being but still the Father is first in Love Joh. 3.16 For God so love the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting Life and 1 John 4. 9 10. In this was manifested the love of God towards us because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world that we might live through him here in is Love not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the Propitiation for our sins and therefore love is laid at his door by the Apostle 2 Cor. ult. The Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and the Love of God and the communion of the Holy Ghost be with you all The Grace of christ makes way for our enjoying the love of God but we had never known the Grace of Christ had it not been first for the love of God who therefore is called our Saviour 1 Tim. 1.1 13. And as ifas all this were not enough Did not the Father seal his Son a Comission to give life to lost sinners John 6.27 and therefore Christ so often mentions the Father as sending him and furnishing him with miracles his letters Credential where ever he came 14. Nay more If suffering for our sakes be a sign of Love as who can deny or doubt it to speak after the manner of men Had not the Father his share of sufferings as well as the Son Was it nothing for him to part with his Son such a Son an only Son the delight of his heart and eyes and that not amongst friends but enemies Who would seek and suck his blood in this sense to spare him and yet in another not to spare him but to bruise him an take pleasure in so doing Is all this nothing He may seem indeed to have an easie part to sit in Heaven and receive satis faction but you see it cost him something too nay more He denies himself and disappears and gives up the immediate management of all affairs into the hands of his Son That part the Son took was sharper but shorter lasted not much above three and thirty years but from the time of Christs resurrection 'T is along aevum before that God come again to be all in all 1 Cor. 15.24 and 28. and he in a manner remains hid till the day of Judgement now Christ is all in all Col. 3.12 The Son transacts all by the Spirit till the last day and the Father worketh now only in and through the Son Thus you see the Father veiling and eclipsing his Glory to make it shine the more hereafter and in the mean time his love that shines forth herein gloriously 15. Hath not the Father as well as Christ an hand in sending the Holy Ghost to make a discovery and application of all these things yea he is called the Promise of the Father which Christ had often hinted to his Disciples as the best news he could bring them from heaven Act. 1.4 which saith he ye have heard of me 16. Lastly Was it not he that wrapt up all this in a glorious Covenant a Covenant of Grace Life and Peace of which I may say as John of the Commandment of Love 1 Ioh. 2.7 8. 'T is both the New and Old Covenant the first and last and everlasting Covenant cal'd a Promise lest the word Covenant should scare us and make us think there 's more required of us by way of restipulation then we can reach unto Tit. 1.2 1 Ioh. 2.25 Covenants of Promise Eph. 2.12 and while we are altogether strangers thereunto we are without Hope The other Covenant was contrived and given forth chiefly to make way and welcome for this and 't is this Covennant the precious things whereof are sealed up unto us in the Sacraments This is that secret of the Lord which is with them that fear him Psal. 25.13 to make them know the Covenant he is ever mindfull of it and therefore sent

holy boldness if he be not willing to be known though he cover himself with darkness but he is too big and too bright for a covering though he make darkness his Pavilion round about him and if so then 2ly Why hath he mad eIntellectual Beings capable of knowing him and eternally miserable if they know him not thy soul is so for certain 3ly Why hath he so many ways issued forth and made out Himself why hath he written such admirable Comments in the things which are seen upon the invisible things of God his eternal power and Godhead Why hath he sparkled forth such glorious Discoveries in the sacied Scriptures in the face of Jesus Christ in the births and breathings the hints and whispers of his Spirit in the wayes and workings of his Providence in the experience of all his Saints yea in thine own heart mind and soul dark and dolesome though it be for the most part so that thou canst not order thy speech by reason of Darkness Fourthyly why hath he so often laid his Commands upon poor sinners to seek him if he mean not to be found shew him his own hand for it thus saith the Lord to the house of Israel Seek ye me and ye shall live Amos 5.4 Seek the Lord and ye shall live ver. 6. and yet again verse 8. Seek him that maketh the seven stars and orion and turneth the shadow of Death into the morning What meaneth all this earnestness if he mean not to be found or saith he these things to Israel only to Israel after the flesh and saith he not the same to all Nations Nay is not his the very end why he giveth to all Life and Breath and all things that they should seek the Lord if haply they might feel after him and find him though he be not far from every one of us Act. 17.27 and he never said to the seed of Iacob who wrestle with him seek ye me in vain Isa. 45. 19. And thou hopest thou art one of them though the weakest of all those spiritual Wrastlers Nay shew him his Warrant directed to those who have plowed wickedness and reaped Iniquity and eaten the fruit of lyes Hos. 10.12 13. why then shouldst thou be excluded Fisthly Ask him if he have nor been found of many a soul that sought him not Did not he prevent them and ofter himself and say Behold me Behold me Isa. 65.1 Is there a soul with him now in Heaven whose name is not sought out Isa. 62.12 And will he now hide himself from one that seeks him 6ly Ask him whence is it that thou hast an heart now to seek him Is it not because he hath found thee and means to be found of thee Ier. 29.12 13 14. c. and he knows that thy whole heart is or would fain be engaged in this work Seventhly Why doth he allow so long a time to seek him in all the time of this life as some think at least till the Decree bring forth till he swear in his wrath till the heart be judicially hardened which yet is not thy case through infinite Mercy thou art not yet free amongst the dead nor bound among the damned 8ly Tell him if thou canst say so truly that it is in order to practise that thou wouldst be aquainted with him not meerly to gratifie a natural itch after knowledge not meerly that thou mightst talk of him but walk with him and love him and fear him and obey him in all thing and even in natural things Manus est causa scientiae the hand contributes more to knowledge then the Brain those things we learn to do we learn by doing them and as to Spirituals Christ hath past his word for it John 7.17 If any man will do his Will he shall know of the Doctrine 9. Lastly Tell him t is not in a pang in a fit in an humour of newfangledness that thou art thus covetous thus ambitious of his acquaintance but though late though too too lite thou begannest this enquiry he knows thou hast been of this mind for many a day thou hast though weakly followed on to know him and now thou expectest that good word of his should be made good unto thy soul Hos. 6.3 Then shall we know if we follow on to know the Lord his going forth is prepared as the morning and he shall come unto us as the rain as the later and former rain unto the earth press these things upon him and his Love and Truth will let him hide no longer Secondly Doth the sense of thy more then ordinary unworthiness oppress thee Doth the horridness and beynousness of thy sins lie as a mountain of lead upon thy soul and stiflle all the movings and mountings of thy Spirit upward Doth this nip all the buddings and bloomings of faith and hope and force thee often to sigh out in secret It is impossible for me to be saved I shall certainly at last prove a Reprobate Is this thy case Go order thy cause before him and sill thy mouth with Arguments in all humility ask him if he did not before the foundations of the world were laid chuse voluntarily absolutely and immutably what company he would have with him to all Eternity sometimes thou thinkest he would never chuse thee there now lies a secret Bar in thy way study the point a little and get it removed He was under no necessity to chuse any no not Christ himself to be the head of the Church for he might have chosen whether ever there should have been such a body yea or no God the Father begets the Son necessarily not arbitrarily that is from his Nature not from his good pleasure but he chooseth him to be the head and root and Representative of the Church arbitrarily not necessarily this is from his good pleasure not from his Nature How free is he then in all his other Elections He chose in deed in Christ but not for Christ as in the natural birth so here first the head comes forth and then the Members Christ is the cause of the Salvation of the Elect but not of Election to Salvation Christ is the meritorious cause of the application of all good not of Gods volition or decreeing that good Election is God himself electing and there can be no cause of God God cannot be an effect Christ indeed was by but had not the naming of the Blect this was the Fathers part and gives him primitively and Originally and interest in them as Christ himself acknowledgeth John 17.6 Thine they were and thou gavest them unto me Christ himself did not propound sollicite for this or that person much less any foreseen qualifications which are the effects but could not be the causes of that Love or choise and if there was none by to move him was there any to manacle him to prescribe Laws and limits to him to say unto him You may not chuse such or such

that though all the world should conspire against him to un-God him yet shall his invincible patience and insuperable good will raise an everlasting piller of witness in thy bosome let who will cast him off he shall be thy God for ever Who is a God like unto thee pardoning iniquities Micah 7.18 is equally true of Father Son and holy Spirit But still thy heart akes and is diquieted to think that what 's said of a man of great wrath Prov. 19.19 is also most true of thee such an one must needs suffer punishment for if thou deliver him yet thou must do it again he 'le ever and anon bring himself into the bryers and this is thy case though the sweet Spirit of God be willing to forgive thee former offences and to fetch thee off from thy imbroylments yet is he likely to have an heavy hand with thee considering thy corruptions and temptations thou art likely to run upon a new score to run into new rebellions and there will be no end of all his labour yet in this case go and order thy cause before God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ and fill thy mouth with Arguments 1. Ask Him Was not this one great end why our nature was taken into personall union with the divine that the diseases of the one might be healed by the infinite vertue an durity and efficacy of the other did Christ come only to cure the sicknesses of the body or were not all these cures the types and representations of those he came to work upon the souls of sinners sure such as touch him by faith shall have their bloody issues stopped and all other inward distempers cured in the dales of his flesh he went about doing good and healing all that were oppressed of the devil Acts 10.38 and lamentable were our loss by his removall to Heaven if from thence his vertue could not reach us and if he were now on earth thou art verily perswaded thou mightst have help from him why not from Heaven 2. Did He not die that sin might die and be destroyed he was not only cloathed with our nature but strip'd by the seperation of soul and body though not of the Godhead from either that sin and our souls might be seperated why doth sin live seeing Christ died 3. Demand even of Justice if Christ hath not fully paid thy ransome why then art thou kept in bonds holden with the cords of thy sin the worst usage which the worst of men in this world are threatned with Prov. 5.22 his own iniquities shall take the wicked himself and he shall be holden with the cords of his sins the vilest dungeon to this without this is a pleasant pallace a delightfull garden as was said by some if the blessed Martyrs of their prisons 4. Complain that these corruptions do wrong defile and outrage that nature which Christ now wears in Heaven and hath exalted far above the brightest Cherub for He and his are all of piece Heb. 2.11 and this is a thousand shames and pities 5. If there be any seed of God any beginning of that everlasting work of sanctification in thee thou art not become A member of his body of his flesh and of his bones Eph. 5.30 for Christ never took any but sanctified upon him and how then can he hide himself from his own flesh he would not have us do so Isa. 58.7 how can he indure to see his own flesh so shamefully abused He who made a Law a man should not hide himself when he saw his enemies beast sink down under his burden the Ass of one who hated him Exod. 23.5 Doth he take care for Oxen and for Asses and can he himself forbear to help up the soul of one that loves him and will he not help with him or if thou art afraid to say thou lovest him because thy heart is so little with him yet to be sure there 's a poor sould down and will he not help it up will he not help it and that against those oppressors which are as well the enemies of his praise and glory as of thy peace and safety And surely these Cananites are left in the Land as it was in the figure To keep down pride Deut. 7.22 To try whether we will follow the Lord or our lusts Judg. 2.23 To reach us war and to exercise our graces Judg. 3.1 To make us to keep more above upon the mountains Judg. 1.34 To become tributaries and do our drudgery 1 King 10.21 God makes our corruptions do us some service which our graces cannot do without them But peradventure thou maist think with thy self that through grace whereunto nothing is impossible thou maist be both pardoned and purified too in time but it will cost thee dear first a world of afflictions must be expected where there hath been such a world of provocations and yet remains such a mass of corruption and these fears of what may come take thee off from enjoying what is present Go with this complaint to thy Judg that these fears may be disarmed and bound over no more to molest thee go fill thy mouth with arguments for who can say his mountain is strong he shall never be moved or who can fore-tell or fore-see the things that may befall him even pardoning mercy it self is no sence against this flail of affliction 1. Tell Him whatever comes 't is thy disire to bear his indignation because thou hast sinned against him Mich 7.9 and that thy stubborn uncircumcised heart may accept of the punishment of thine iniquity because even because thou hast despised his judgments and carried it as if thy soul had abhorred his statutes Lev. 26.43 Nay 2. Tell him that thou hadst rather be under the schooling of his children then the cockering of his castawayes under the severe mercy of his discipline as Augustin speaks of that of the Church then under the impunity of those desperate lost creatures whom God hath thrown up as a lost case and will not be at the cost to bestow another rod upon them even his correcting rod as well as his supporting staff shall be a comfort to thee Psal. 23.4 no punishment like impunity 3. Though it be infinitely more eligible that way to be humbled and reformed then not at all yet tell him if he will be pleased to spare thee 't will be more for his honour to do it in the midst of prosperity because this is more difficult and more unusuall Jer. 22.21 I spake unto thee in thy prosperity but thou saidst I will not hear this hath been thy manner from thy youth that thou obeyedst not my voice Now what a glory will it be to him to bore thine ear in the midst of thy prosperity 4. As this will be more glorious for Him so more usefull to others the examples of such a convert is much more conspicuous and illustrious in miserable ones 't is hard to distinguish