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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
sense_n	wrath_n	write_v	year_n	25	3	7.0609	4	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A49258	A treatise of effectual calling and election In XVI. sermons, on 2 Peter 1.10. Wherein a Christian may discern, whether yet he be effectually called and elected. And what course he ought to take that he may attain the assurance thereof. Preached by that faithfull servant of Christ, Mr. Christopher Love, late minister of Laurence Jury, London.	Love, Christopher, 1618-1651.; Calamy, Edmund, 1600-1666.	1655 (1655)	Wing L3179; ESTC R217684	182,116	237

your Meditations work upon those Promises that hold forth most comfort to a dejected and deserted soule And here I shall name five or six most comforatble Promises in the Word As Isa 57.15 The Lord that dwels in the high and holy places he doth revive the spirit of the humble and of the contrite one So Isa 66.2 The Lord dwels in the Heavens and yet with him also that is of an humble and contrite spirit that trembles at his Word with him will God dwell So Psal 34.18 The Lord is nigh to them that are ●f a broken heart even them that are contrite in spirit So Luke 4.18 Jesus Christ was anointed that is appointed by God the Father to preach the Gospel to the poor to binde up the broken in heart and to comfort them that mourn So Isa 66.10 The Lord will restore comfort to thee and to thy Mourners And Heb. 12.12 The Lord will stre●gthen the weak hands and feeble knees And with that remarkable and most glorious Gospel-promise I shal end Isa 353 4 5 6. Strengthen the weak hands and confirm the feeble knees This saith God to weaken Christians whose legs can hardly carry their bodies and their hands hardly reach to their mouths Say unto the weak Christian in grace comfort and confirm and strengthen them And say unto them that are of a fearful heart Be strong Poor fearfull doubting soules that feare every temptation and feare every corruption and feare they shall lose the recompence of their reward Say unto that fearful heart Be strong and fear not For your God will come with vengeance even God will come with recompence and save you And then the eyes of the blinde shall be open and the eares of the deaf shall be unstopped it is not meant of the bodily eye but those that were blinde and could not see the myste●ies of Christ and could not read their own comforts then their eyes shall be open And the deaf that as Isaiah saith refused to be comforted that would not hearken to comfort but would stop their eares against all comfortable doctrines and onely give way to sorrow their eares shall be unstopped And the lame men shall leap like a Hart the poor halting Christian that halts in his comforts that is now believing anon staggering now rejoycing anon despairing the poor lame man shall leap like a Hart And the tongue of the dumb shall sing the poor man that could not speak one word of his own graces and of his own comforts and touching his own evidence The tongue of the dumb shal sing O Beloved here is your work in case you would be Christians to restore your comforts again set upon the work of Meditation to think upon these precious Promises of the Gospel that hold forth most comfort to a drooping and dejected sinner SERMON XII 2 Pet. 1.10 Wherefore the rather Brethren Give all diligence to make your Calling and Election sure THE Doctrine I am yet upon is this That Christians ought to put forth a great deal of diligence to make this sure to their souls that they are effectually called by Jesus Christ to grace and glory In the prosecution of which I have gone over many particulars There remains now onely one Use more to dispatch about this subject and then I passe to the third point drawn from these words And the Use shall be of Consolation from all that hath been said touching the assurance of our effectual calling I shall only direct my discourse to lay down six or seven Consolatory Conclusions to those Christians who are effectually called yet happily have not a sensible assurance of their own calling First take this for a truth that Assurance is necessary not for the being but for the wel-being of a Christian It is not necessary to his estate but to his comfort It is not necessary as food is to the life but only as Physick is to the body A man cannot live without food a man may live without Physick Assurance is but as a comfortable cordial to the soul Grace is as food to keep the soul alive though you doe want assurance this Cordial to bear you up Secondly that many of Gods dear children they may lie a very long time in the want of this assurance touching their effectual calling Psal 88. It is said of Heman 14 15 16. verses Lord why hast thou cas●●ff my soule and why hast thou hid thy face from me Mark his complaint I am ready to die And was this only a fit of desertion or was it a continued act yes Vers 16. From my youth up I suffer thy terrours I am distracted and thy fierce wrath goes over me Heman lay under the state of desertion from his childhood for here he tels you his estate that he was not troubled for a day or two or three and then his troubles were over but from his youth up he lay under this perplexity that he thought God had cast off his soule and the terrours of God lay upon him And yet this man none questions his goodnesse For he was the man as Ainsworth thinks that made this Psalm and sure God would never honour a wicked man to be a Pen-man of the Scripture The Psalm is called a golden Psalm and it is so called because hereby he would teach afflicted consciences that they may from their youth up lie under great horrour and lie under sad suspence concerning their everlasting estate and yet they may have grace at the root for all this And Heman doth not only expresse it as if he had an ordinary trouble of minde but he expresseth it that he lay under an extraordinary weight of Gods wrath Vers 7. Thou hast laid me in the lowest pit of darkness and in the deep and thy wrath it lies heavy upon me He did even lie and sink in his own thoughts under the sense af Gods wrath upon him This therefor is another comfortable conclusion That godly men may not onely by fits and starts but for a long time for many years together lie under a state of spiritual desertion For some men think of Heman that he was above threescore yeares of age when he wrote this Psalm yet from his youth up till that age he lay under this horror and perplexity Thirdly That many of Gods dear children may be so long plunged under desertion and under the want of Assurance that they may refuse and withstand comforts when God offers it to them in the Gospel and yet may have grace still As a man in a feaver or distracted by some violent disease though you bring him a Cordial that may abate his disease the man in a fit will through the glasse against the wall though it be the only meanes of his remedy It is so with godly men many times they are so accustomed to sadnesse in the want of assurance that they may refuse comforts when God offers them Psal 77.2 It is the speech of Asaph my soule refuseth to be

it will make a heart quake there that there shall not be that calmness and quietnesse and setlednesse of minde which there would be were sin away Hence we read Esa 33. ●6 The sinners in Sion are afraid and fearfullness hath surprised the Hypocrite The sinners are afraid those who had guilt upon them their sins bred terrour and fear and hypocrites that are conscious to themselves of their own guilt fearfulnesse surpr●zeth them but the upright and sincere in heart were not so To note that this is a great enemy to inward peace and to assurance about your everlasting estate if so be you harbour sin upon the conscience unrepented of And it is just with God it should be so because if you keep sin in your hearts that will be ever jarring with Heaven it is just with God to be at oddes with you Fourthly Avoid the easting of your eye in a way of dejection upon others who are more eminent in grace then you and have got a precedency of you in the wayes of godlinesse 'T is true indeed a man that is given to spiritual pride and self-conceitednesse touching his own goodnesse it is fit that he should look upon those that have a precedency before him in grace the more to humble him But for a man that lies under trouble of minde and doubtings touching his everlasting estate that man should not look upon others more eminent then he in grace because it will rather increase discomforts then any way work assurance in you If you look up-the glittering beames of the Sun shinning in its full strength the more you look upon that orient and resplendent body the more it will dazle your eyes that you can behold but dimly things upon the earth It is so with Christians some Christians they shine like so many Suns in the firmament their graces do so shine and sparkle that if you look upon them they will even dazle your eyes and make you blinde that you cannot see those small scantlings and sparks of grace that are in your own hearts In case therefore you would get assurance avoid the casting of your eye too much upon those that have a precedency in grace before you Fifthly Take heed you make not sense and feeling the Touchstone to try your effectual calling by sense and feeling will deceive you in the matters of your calling I may allude ●o ●●a● p●●s●g● in the b●ok of Ge●●sis yo● know old Isaac was ●imm● sig●ed and by reason of his old age he ran into a mis●●●e by ●●eling H● had Jacob by th● hand and by feeling thought it ●ad been E●au Beloved many of us are dimme-sighted in our comforts and in our graces and if we trust to feeling we may be deceived as Isaac was You may think when you have Jacob by the hand I mean grace in the heart that it is but an Esau it is but a reprobate Therefore take heed of making sense and feeling the Touchstone to try your calling by A childe is born yet knows not that it is born lives yet knowes not that it lives but those about it do so a Christian may be born again live the life of grace and yet not be sensible of it Sixtly Give diligence to remove this hinderance to wit Pride in your guifts and dependance upon you graces Pride and dependance they are not onely murderers of comforts but they murder our graces also and if God sees you swell with pride because you abound in grace he will soon prick that swelling bladder It is the observation of a Modern Divine that exaltings of spirit after assurance attained it will inevitably expose a Christian either to great discomforts or to great sins Hence the Scripture makes mention that pride of your gifts is not onely an enemy to the comfort but an enemy to grace not onely an enemy to the comforts from grace but to the very having of grace Hab. 2.4 If a mans heart be exalted his spirit is not upright within him James 4.6 God resists the proud and gives grace to the humble So that pride is not onely an enemy to your comforts but to the very getting of grace likewise when the branches of a Vine grow luxuriant they shall have the pruning hook And thus you have the first sort of helps laid down to you In case you would get assurance you must use diligence to avoid those things that may be a hinderance to you in getting assurance of your call Secondly A second sort of helps in case you would get assurance is to use diligence in the practice of those things that may be helps and furtherances to the obtaining of assurance about your effectual calling And here I shall name onely six or seven particulars First Exalt arguments of faith against presen● feelings If so be that you will once enter the lists to dispute with the devil he will out-cavill you and Non-plus you The devil is a cunning Logician and it is not safe saith Dr. Preston to argue with the devil the devil will out-dispute and out-argue you It is a Christians work to exalt arguments of Faith against present feelings In case you would get assurance you are to do as Abraham the father of the faithful did when he was to believe a thing that sense and reason would tell him should never come to passe It is said of Abraham Rom. 4.18 19. That in hope he believed against hope He would exalt faith against sense And how was it God promised Abraham a childe reason and sense would have told Abraham Abraham thou art a hundred years old thy wife ninety nine her womb is barren and it is not likely you should have children but Abraham would not argue thus but would exalt arguments of faith and apply Gods Promises and Gods Word exalting these Abraham did believe in hope against hope Beloved so must you though you say you have barren womb Grace is not likely to grow in you and though you are old and decrepit and feeble Christians yet advance arguments of faith from Gods love and from Gods power and from Gods Providence and Gods Promises and that 's the way to get your comforts clear and full I may apply what Fox in his Acts and Monuments reports of a good woman that was called before Bonner and the rest in Queen Maries Reign that sate in Judgement about her Religion they see her though a poor and silly woman yet keep firm to her principles and would not deny her Religion At length Bonner sent some learned Doctors to dispute with her and argue the case about some points she held they coming to see her she puts them off with this saying Well you are Scholars and you come to dispute I must needs tell you I cannot dispute but I can burn for my Religion Beloved I would have you answer the devil thus If he comes to outwit and cavill with you about your comforts say you cannot dispute but you can believe you can lay your