Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	abide_v	able_a	fall_v	39	3	4.9452	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A03339	The doctrine of fasting and praier, and humiliation for sinne Delivered in sundry sermons at the fast appointed by publique authority, in the yeere 1625. By that late faithfull and worthy minister of Iesus Christ. Arth. Hildersam.	Hildersam, Arthur, 1563-1632.; Hildersam, Samuel, 1593 or 4-1674.	1633 (1633)	STC 13459; ESTC S104100	106,897	227

as appeares by the next words but the righteous sing and rejoyce Ier. 2. 19. Thine owne wickednesse shall correct thee know therefore and see that it is an evill thing and bitter that thou hast forsaken the Lord thy God and that my feare is not in thee Thy sinnes certainly will be bitter to thee one day sooner or later Take this for an undoubted truth thou must either temporally heere or eternally hereafter in hell lament and be waile and weepe for thy sinnes Luc. 13. 28. There shall be weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth when ye shall see Abraham and Isaac and Iacob and all the Prophets in the Kingdome of God and your selves thrust out How much more when they shall see and feele the torments that are prepared in hell for them Now when God as an angry judge strikes and afflicts the soule with sorrow for sinne even in this life ô that sorrow is terrible and intolerable when hee smites the heart he so sets it on as no man is able to abide it Heb. 10. 31. It is a fearefull thing to fall into the hands of the living God Prov. 18. 14. A wounded spirit that is which God in his anger hath wounded who can beare Nah. 1. 6. Who can stand before his indignation and who can abide in the fiercenesse of his anger his fury is powred out like fire and the rocks are throwne down by him And the best way to prevent the Lord from wounding and afflicting our soules is to smite and afflict our owne hearts for our sinnes the way to prevent those intollerable and everlasting sorrowes which God in his fury will bring upon wicked men is to worke our hearts to this godly sorrow our selves and to humble our owne soules this is plaine by that speach of the Apostle 1 Cor. 11. 31. If wee would judge our selves wee should not bee judged of the Lord hee meanes as appeares in the next verse O thinke of this thou merry Greeke that art all for mirth and pleasure thou drunkard and whoremaister that findest such joy and sweetnesse in thy sinne thou pleasant witted fellow that canst so wittily breake jests upon religion and the servants of God that thou canst set all the company on laughing the time will come when thy sinnes which thou canst not abide to thinke of shall be set in order before thine eyes that thou shalt not be able to looke of from them they shall never out of thy thought Psal. 50. 21. Thou that canst not abide to heare of thy sinnes nor to be told of them nor reproved for them by any of Gods servants who are as Elihu speakes Iob 33. 6 7 8. in Gods stead unto thee formed out of the clay aswell as thy selfe whose terror need not make thee affraid shalt one day heare the Lord himselfe reproving thee for them Psal. 50. 21. I will reprove thee saith he and that will be such a kind of reproving as is mentioned Psal. 2. 5. Then shall hee speake to them in his wrath and vex them in his sore displeasure better to have an hundred of Gods poore servants to reprove thee then to have the Lord doe it Thou that canst not abide to let any sadnesse or sorrow for sinne to come neare thy heart but hatest sorrow as the Devill and abandonest it from thee with all thy might doe what thou canst sooner or later it will seize upon thee When Gods servants that have beene much given to mourning for sinne shall sing for joy of heart thou shalt cry for sorrow of heart and howle for vexation of spirit Esay 65. 14. Luke 6. 25. Woe unto you that laugh now for ye shall mourne and weepe Yea 2. thinke of this all you that feare God were it not much better for you to take paines with your owne hearts to humble and afflict them then to leave it to God to doe it in his wrath You have heard hee will certainly doe it if you doe it not and the way to prevent him from doing it is to doe it your selves And these are the motives that may stir up in every one of us a desire to seeke for this grace of an humbled and broken heart It followeth now that I shew you the meanes whereby you may atteine it And these are of two sorts 1. Some such as wherein you must use the helpe of others 2. Some such as wherein you must be the agents your selves Of the first sort I will name to you but two The first is the ministery of the Word If thou wouldst have a soft heart able to mourne for sinne thou must conscionably frequent the faithfull ministery of the Word strive to live under a forcible ministery such as will search thy heart No meanes in the world have ever wrought so mightily to the saving humbling and afflicting of the soule as this hath done By this meanes they that had crucified Christ and were so hardned in their sin that when they saw that wonderfull miracle even the Apostles that were poore Galileans speake in all languages the wonderfull things of God they mocked them and said these men are full of wine Act. 2. 13. were so pricked and wounded in their hearts that they knew not what to doe till the same hand that wounded them had healed them againe as you may read Act. 2. 37 41. And what was it that brought David to such a saving sense of his sinne in numbring of the people that his heart smote him for it and he cryed I have sinned greatly in that I have done I have done very foolishly 2 Sam. 24. 10. Surely God had sent G●d the Prophet unto him as you may see in the next words verse 11. For when David was up in the morning the Word of the Lord came unto the Prophet G●d Davids Seer saying c. and though it be said of Manasses 2 Chron. 33. 12. that when he was in affliction he besought the Lord his God and humbled himselfe greatly before him yet if you looke into the 18. verse of that chap. you shall find he had a mightier and stronger meane to worke that humiliation in his heart then his affliction was the Lord had sent to him Seers and Prophets that spake unto him in the name of the Lord. His affliction was but a subordinate meanes to make him the better able to receive profit by the word the words and ministery of the seers was that that wrought this mighty work There is more force in the ministery of the Word to worke sound and saving humiliation then in all the afflictions in the world Psal. 94. 12. Blessed is the man whom thou chastenest O Lord and teachest him out of thy Law See a notable experiment of this in Rehoboam and the Princes of Iudah 2 Chron. 12. 2 6. When God had for their apostacy sent Shishak King of Egypt with a mighty and invincible army against them and brought them thereby into extreame perill and distresse

find out and reforme the causes of the plague Though Ioshua and all the Elders of Israel should fall upon their faces and cry never so fervently they can doe no good till Achan be found out and punished Iosh. 7. And what hope then can we have to prevaile in our fasts while no care is taken to find out Achan The idolater is an Achan and so is the murtherer and so is the adulterer and so is the bl●sphemer and so is the drunkard And there is power not in Ioshua onely but in every officer among us yea in every man almost to find out our Achans and bring them to punishment Our Achans are not so close as that man was our Achans do not hide their accursed things as he did Iosh. 7. 21. Endeavour every one of you to finde them out and suppresse them or else our fasts will bee of small force with God SERMON IV. Sept. 14. 1625. NOw it followeth that we observe further the inward affection and disposition of Davids heart in this his extraordinary prayer hee humbled or afflicted his soule And heere we must for the opening of the words and phrase see what is meant by the humbling and afflicting of his soule and how that is done for the understanding whereof three things must be observed ●irst That the soule aswell as the body is subject both to prosperity a blessed and comfortable estate and to adversity also a wofull and afflicted state and condition and that not onely in the life to come but even in this life also For the first See 3. Ioh. 2. I wish thou maist prosper and be in health even as thy soule prospereth and for the other See Psal. 31. 7. Thou hast considered my trouble thou hast knowne my soule in adversities Secōdly That as the prosperity happines glory of the soule consisteth in inwardpeace trāquility and joy Rom. 14. 17. The Kingdome of God is righteousnesse and peace and joy of the Holy Ghost so that which humbleth and afflicteth it is sorrow and feare and such like affections which are therefore called the passions and perturbations of the soule Prov. 12. 25. Heavinesse in the heart of man maketh it stoop that is that that humbleth it Yea these affections of sorrow and feare doe afflict the soule and put it to paine even as pricks and wounds and the stinging of a Serpent would doe the body So it is said Act. 2. 37. They were pricked in their hearts when by Peters sermon they were brought to sound griefe of heart for sinne and feare of Gods wrath So Prov. 23. 32. Sinne is said at last to bite like a Serpent and sting like an Adder by reason of the extreame anguish which through sorrow and feare i● puts the soule unto Thirdly That sometimes the Lord himselfe doth thus afflict and humble the soule with sorrow and feare Iob 5. 18. Hee woundeth and his hands make whole and the strokes that hee gives prove usually extreame and intollerable Psal. 51. 8. That the bones that thou hast broken may rejoyce The Lords strokes broke his bones Prov. 18. 14. A wounded spirit who can beare That is when the wound is given by Gods hand Heb. 10. 31. It is a fearefull thing to fall into the hands of the living God and sometimes Gods people for the preventing of this have voluntarily afflicted and humbled their owne soules by provoking themselves to sorrow and feare whereby their soules might bee humbled knowing well 1 Cor. 11. 31. If we would judge our selves we should not be judged of the Lord. And so did David in this place I humbled and afflicted my soule by fasting So saith hee also Psal. 69. 10. I wept and chastned my soule by fasting And this the Apostle in joines the faithfull to doe Iam. 4. 9. Be afflicted he meanes not beare or suffer the afflictions God layeth upon you but afflict your selves as appeares in the next words and mourne and weep let your laughter be turned into mourning and your joy into heavinesse So then if wee would know the reason why David did fast at this time it was to humble and afflict his soule to work his soule to sorrow and griefe And what meant hee in this his extraordinary prayer for these men to afflict his soule thus Surely it was to make his prayer more available with God for them And from this his practise example this Doctrine ariseth for our instruction That the chief use of a religious fast is to humble and afflict the soule with sorrow and grief and a chief thing that makes our prayer effectuall with God is the inward humiliation and sorrow of our soules from whence they do proceed Two branches there be you see of this doctrine and I will handle them distinctly First A religious fast serves chiefly to this end to humble and afflict the soule So Esa. 58. 5. The fast that God hath chosen is called a day for a man to afflict his soule in This is a duty commanded upon the fast day Ioel 2. 13. Rend your hearts and not your garments See how this is injoyned Levit. 23. 29. Whatsoever soule it bee that shall not be afflicted upon that day shall bee cut off from his people So our Saviour gives this for a reason why his Disciples could keep no fasts because they could not mourne while the bridegroom was with them Math. 9. 15. So that no man can keepe a fast well that cannot mourn that hath not an humbled and troubled soule in him on that day Therefore we read that Gods people in their fasts were wont to weep much and that not onely in private and secret fasts as Nehem. 14. I sate downe and wept and mourned certaine dayes and fasted and prayed before the God of Heaven but in publique also Ezr. 10. 1. When Ezra prayed and made confession of sinnes weeping and casting himselfe downe before the house of God there assembled unto him a very great congregation and the people wept very sore Yea God cōmaundeth his people to doe so at such times When God cals us to keepe fasts he cals us to weeping and to mourning Esa 22. 12. So Ioel 2. 12. Turne you to mee with all your heart and with fasting and with weeping and with mourning And for the second branch of the Doctrine A chief thing that makes the prayers of Gods people at a fast or at any other time most powerfull and effectuall with God is the humiliation and sorrow of the soule from which those prayers doe proceed See the proofe of this in the most powerfull fasts that wee read of I●dg 20. 26. In that fast wherein Israel prevailed with God for successe against the Benjamites after two notable foils before there were many teares shed all Israel wept before the Lord yet were there above ten thousand of as valiant men as ever drew sword In the fast that was kept in Samuels time at Mizpeh whereby Israel obtained a marvellous victory against the