Selected quad for the lemma: soul_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
soul_n	bear_v	body_n	sin_n	5,827	5	4.7431	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A93751	A sermon on Phil. IV., 11, 12. For I have learned in whatsoever state I am in therewith to be content I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound; every where, and in all things, I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need.	Stafford, Richard, 1663-1703.	1698 (1698)	Wing S5131A; ESTC R230357	23,094	32

all which will most certainly come upon every one of us one time or another And then if there be amongst ye any prophane Person as Esau who for one morsel of Meat sold his Birth-right who for the Pleasures of Sin for a season for the Reward of Iniquity or the Gains of Unrighteousness hath forfeited his or her share in that Blessing which the Lord hath commanded even Life for evermore Even these very same Persons either when they come to lie in the point or extremity of Death or more certainly because many may remain stupid or ignorant or unbelieving even then afterward that their Souls are gone forth into the invisible World they would fain inherit the Blessing and then they will seek for it carefully with Tears though it will be to no purpose for they will find no place for Repentance because here he gave them a space for Repentance and they repented not Then if such a thing were possible and might be admitted of which yet is not even those very same Persons would give thousands of Rams and ten thousand Rivers of Oyl their first born for their Transgression and the fruit of their Body for the sin of their Soul who now will not make Restitution for one farthing of ill gotten Goods nor yet hardly give a thousand farthings in Alms giving or towards good Works or who will not now give up a Lust or a sinful profit at all the commandments and Requirings of God If any such profane careless and indifferent Souls should hear or read these lines Behold I have told you before I do hereby warn and make known unto such before hand that their Thoughts and Apprehensions will be thus mightily altered and changed as to what they stand so unconcerned and unaffected now for as on the one hand it will be the best contentment and greatest satisfaction I shall be satisfied when I awake with thy likeness Psal 17. 12. to be possessed of and make sure of Heaven So again there will be no discontent so bad as that to miss and come short thereof This will be the gnawing of the Worm which shall never die Of this kind will be that Indignation and Wrath Tribulation and Anguish which shall be upon every Soul of Man that doth evil Rom. 2. 8 9. There shall be weeping and gnashing of Teeth when ye shall see Abraham Isaac and Jacob in the Kingdom of God and ye your selves thrust out Though as to these little vain and fugitive things we may know and be instructed and also bear with how to be full or how to be hungry But as to that fulness or Hunger spoken of in Luke 6. 21. 25. Blessed are ye that hunger now for ye shall be filled Wo unto you that are full for ye shall hunger Here it is Impossible even for the Tongue of Men and Angels to instruct the Creatures or perswade the Souls to be contented and bear therewith The reasonable Creature can never be content to lose Heaven and fall into Hell because of the exceeding greatness of the loss that compleat and absolute Misery this would be to be involved in as also from the very long duration and irreversibleness thereof If God comes to contend for ever in the Punishment and Misery of his Creatures and to be always wroth then the Spirit should fail before me and the Souls which I have made But on the other better hand if one is a Child of God and an Heir of the Kingdom of Heaven then he can very well be contented under all the Evils and Hardships of this present World All one as an Heir of a good Estate doth rub through some little and trivial Inconveniencies in the mean while out of Prospect and Expectation of that Besides the Faith of Great and unseen things which are Eternal a through Knowledge of the littleness of all present and temporal things will soon make us content as to the having or not having them or rather work us into that blessed Temper and Disposition of Paul As having nothing and yet possessing all things His Mind was so qualified with Grace and transformed into the Divine Nature that it was the same as if he possessed all things As to the littleness of all present things consider within your selves What is your Life It is as a Vapour that appeareth for a very little time and then vanisheth away Remember how short my time is Wherefore hast thou made all Men in vain Their Mirth or Divertisements are as the flyings up and down of a Swallow during its appointed time Their heaviness or Misery seems all one as the mourning of a Dove which also is ended Whatever delights or afflicts soon passeth away and we are gone As to our outward sensible good or evil though we would fain have the one and avoid the other yet there is not much more in it then the ticklings of a Feather or to prevent the scratchings of a Pin. Our goings up and down each day appear as the moving of a Shaddow which is lost in darkness And so we might run through or over all the several things of this present Life they are all little fugitive and vain As on the one hand this true consideration is a mighty word of Comfort and Contentment to the Children of Faith the Heirs of Life and Immortality so on the other the more knowing People of this World turn it into a matter of Scepticism as also the more brutish ignorant and ungodly sort of People do hereby harden and confirm themselves in their old wonted manner of Life of Brutishness Ignorance and Ungodliness and they will not easily be brought off from it for like as there are in the last days Scoffers walking after their own ungodly Lusts and saying Where is the promise of his coming For since the Fathers fell asleep all things continue as they were from the beginning of the Creation So they imagine and reason within themselves What need of any words of Comfort or Contentment at all seeing that all things here are so little fugitive and vain All things come alike to all There is one Event to the Righteous and to the Wicked to the good to the clean and to the unclean to him that sacrificeth and to him that sacrificeth not as is the Good so is the Sinner And he that sweareth as he that feareth an Oath The World passeth away and goes on in its course and we will make a shift to rub through it as well as other People and there is an end Here hath been delivered a Discourse concerning Contentment and for all that and all the words in the World concerning it we do perceive that those People live altogether as contented for the Life who do not hear them as those who do hear them As is the knowing Man so is the ignorant Person it seems to come all to one By this Objection Satan works in the Minds of many People especially of the common and poorer sort and

hereby he serves the great Ends of his Kingdom of Darkness in beating People off from God and good things But to answer them in their own familiar way of speaking All is well that ends well It is the same old thredbare Imagination of the People of former Generations which is come down amongst us also and dwells in the Hearts of many People of the present Generation Ye have said it is vain to serve God and what profit is it that we have kept his Ordinances and that we have walked mournfully before the Lord of Hosts Then they that feared the Lord spake often one to another and the Lord hearkened and heard it and a Book of Remembrance was written before him for them that feared the Lord and that thought upon his Name And they shall be mine saith the Lord of Hosts in the day when I make up my Jewels and I will spare them as a Man spareth his own Son that serveth him Then shall ye return and discern between the Righteous and the Wicked between him that serveth God and him that serveth him not Mal. 3. 14 16 17 18. So we refer our Objectors and Unbelievers those ignorant and ungodly Persons that think thus in their Minds over unto the day of Death and of Judgment when they shall see that twofold Distribution of things that is to be made in the after State True indeed the End and Event is to prove all things But whoso suspends his Faith until then his Condition will be without Remedy Then shall they return that is to the proper Understanding of Men and discern what before they might have believed for it was declared and told unto them over and over that there should be a diversity made of Happiness to the one and Misery to the other between the Righteous and the Wicked between him that serveth God and him that serveth him not As to that great doubt and surmise which is in the Thoughts of the Heart of almost every one How that all things happen alike to all and that there is one and the same Event to Godly or Ungodly Righteous or Wicked I have in a printed Sermon on Deut. 8. 2. opened and explained that Mystery wherein I have shewed and assigned the very Reason thereof Why God ordained it so to be Namely That it is to prove the Children of Men To know what is in their Heart whether they will keep his Commandments or no. Indeed if People were not still puzzled and perplexed if they did not alway err in their Heart Heb. 3. 10. whereat his Soul is grieved they would never imagine and talk after that manner That it was the same thing whether they heard or received into their Knowledge words of Comfort or Contentment or not for they may yea and they do think and say the same as to the other words of Grace and Salvation al●o I would ask such vain Imaginers and foolish Reasoners Is it the same thing as to natural ●…ife Whether they do eat and drink or they do not No here they will say It is not for except we eat and drink we must famish and dye Even so it is here in the like manner though they can be hardly made to apprehend this for the natural Man discerneth not the things of the Spirit of God for they are foolish●ess unto him neither can he know them bec●us● they are spiritually discerned As Simeon waited for the Consolation of Israel so the Soul cannot be comforted without the words of Consolation The Soul cannot possibly be saved and happy without the words of Salvation and Happiness As the Body would die for want of Sustenance so the Soul may be indeed held in suspence a little longer time even all the days it is in the Body whereas that cannot be much longer without Food then fourteen days So without the words of Knowledge and Salvation the Soul would die Eternally and fall down into Misery Send Men to Joppa and call for Simon whose Surname is Peter who shall tell thee words whereby thou and thy House shall be saved Acts 11. 13 14. Even so God hath sent unto us Men and Women the reasonable Inhabitants of this Earth Moses and the Prophets Christ and the Apostles who have and do tell us words whereby we and all such as receive and obey the same words shall be saved Christ in an emphatical manner is called the Word John 1. 1. and the word of God For all the words which God made known through Moses and the Prophets the Evangelists and Apostles do all relate unto and meet in him as lines in their Centre And all things were made by him the Word and without him was not any thing made that was made Here the Evangelist hath reference unto John 1. 1. Psal 33. 6. So the certain consequence is That all Men and Women will be saved by him the Word that shall ever be saved For there is no other way under Heaven given unto Men whereby we must be saved And as Moses of old time had even so at this day Christ hath those that Preach him every Sabbath day Therefore see that ye refuse not him that speaketh for if they escaped not who refused him that spake on Earth much more shall not we escape if we turn away from him that speaketh from Heaven Heb. 12. 25. For though Christ is long since ascended on high and sits at the right Hand of God yet he speaks to us even now by his Word and by his Ministers He that rejecteth me and receiveth not my Words hath one that jud●eth him the Word that I have spoken the same shall judge him at the last day John 12. 48. And if we will not hear that Word nor yet his Ministers neither would we be perswaded if Christ should come once again into the World after the same manner as he did But his next coming is unto Judgment I have often mentioned these and the like things to the froward Inhabitants of this my Country and Generation who are Non-Hearers or Non-Readers of the Word where-ever it is faithfully and truly Preached or made known I have warned them often and I do hereby warn them again and I could almost tell them weeping for my Soul hath Grief and Indignation at them for their stubbornness and refusal herein That since that his Word is every Sabbath day or Week day purely truly and faithfully Preached or made known God will require it of them and impute it as Sin to them severally for as often as they have neglected to come to hear it Hereby also may be seen and perceived How much this Ordinance of Preaching the Word doth further and is absolutely necessary unto the Salvation of Mankind and how that such Men and Women who would indeed have their Souls be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus ought and must attend continually upon the Ministry and hearing thereof for this same Preaching of the Word which doth lead direct and help