Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n
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A27583
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The blessing of Moses on the tribe of Asher opened and applyed in a mystical and spiritual sense, to every saint, and servant of Christ in a sermon on Deut. 33.25 ... / by T. Beverley.
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Beverley, Thomas.
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1693
(1693)
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Wing B2124; ESTC R20407
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18,576
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36
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in their Old Age He was weary of them in their Old Age But they shall flourish like the Palm-tree and they shall be fat and flourishing For the Grace of God is able to run a Line Parallel with the longest of any of our Lives and his Grace shall be sufficient for us even to the very last and in the very end of Days As I have already spoken to you But then there is a Third and Higher sense As thy Days so shall thy strength be Now as his Shooes are of Iron and Brass so his Dayes are to be numbred even in that Kingdom of Jesus Christ and that Kingdom of Eternity There is therefore a strength suitable to that State of Glory of Eternal Glory and Salvation in the Kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ Consider Indeed it is a length of Duration beyond Expression beyond Comprehension The thousand years that the Scripture speaks of that the Kingdom of Christ shall be in visible Glory that is fully taken care for and the state of Eternity after that or the state of Eternity rather comprehending that and one with it Of that Kingdom there shall be no end for as the Day or Days of Eternity so their strength shall be the strength of Eternity So in that vastness of Eternity a Created Being that could not uphold and bear up it self it shall be born up by that Fountain of Life that is in God and by that Great Mediator of Life the Lord Jesus Christ He will take care that even throughout Everlastings of Everlastings there shall not be the least Retraction a retracting a drawing back of the Powers and Spirits of Life As the Days of Eternity so shall be the strength of the Servants of God O! how unspeakable how incomprehensibly Glorious is this that God hath ordained for everlasting every one of our Spirits It is not a Life of fifty sixty eighty or a hundred Years or any such Time to live the Life of Sense and Body It is all nothing how long soever it be We say 't was a wonderful Providence that kept Methuselah so long to so great an Age to reach almost to a thousand Years Alas this is nothing though it be very great yet we should think if we lived hundreds of Years in this Life how should we do for the Supports of it and for the Vigorous of it But now our Days are for the Days of Eternity but as our Days so shall our strength be And God hath assured this to us in the 16th Psalm last Verse Thou wilt shew me the path of life in thy presence is fulness of joy and at thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore So that every way take the Days of the Servants of God how we will as are our Days so shall be our strength I come to the third Thing I Proposed and that was to Argue the Certainty of this I say to argue the certainty of it and it stands upon these two Considerations which I shall very briefly present to you First It arises from that Infinite strength of the Love of God in Jesus Christ made over to his Servants If he rides in his Excellency on the Sky if he will undertake for us if he will be our Refuge whose are the Everlasting Arms if they lye under it is impossible notwithstanding all Enemies we should fall he will thrust them utterly out There shall be no power of Satan there shall be no power of Sin no power of Death but whatsoever it be it shall be shut out for ever in the Lake He 'll say thrust them out and destroy them If he I say undertake how can it be otherwise if he will ride in the Heaven for our sake We should therefore often say to our selves Let us consider in all the Jealousies of our Natures and of our weak Beings in the midst of all these have we not an Eternal God Have we not an Infinite and Omnipotent Being If he take such a Drop of Being as I am this trembling Drop and if he 'll say I 'll enclose this little Drop in my own Omnipotency and set it in the Ocean of my own Immense Being and I 'll take care and secure it every moment How safe are we As we find in that Song God commanded to be sung Isa 27. 2 3. In that day sing ye unto her A Vineyard of red Wine I the Lord do keep it I will water it every moment I will keep it and sustain it from the first to the last from the very beginning of the Creation to Eternity and from Electing Love in Eternity throughout Eternity of Ages I the Lord will keep it I will water it every moment lest any hurt it I will keep it night and day And so it arises from the Infiniteness of God and from that Unchangeableness that he will never fail that he will never take off his Help And therefore God's strength is our strength and God's Eternity is our Security and the certainty of our state of life O! how excellent therefore is that in the 40th of Isaiah 27th Verse Why sayest thou O Jacob and speakest O Israel my way is hid from the Lord and my Judgment is passed over from my God Hast thou not known hast thou not heard that the everlasting God the Lord the Creator of the ends of the Earth fainteth not neither is weary there is no searching of his understanding He giveth power to the faint and to them that have no might he encreaseth strength even the Youths shall faint and he weary and the Young men shall utterly fail But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength they shall mount up with wings as Eagles they shall run and not be weary they shall walk and not faint O! If we could read and meditate and unite and Consolidate such a Scripture as this with our own Hearts with what certainty might we say As our Days so shall our strength be Take them any way as I have now described and Represented them to you Because the Creator of the ends of the Earth fainteth not neither is weary there is no searching of his Understanding He giveth power to the faint c. And then in the second place it arises from that great Interposer betwixt God and us the Lord Jesus Christ into whose hands he hath entrusted strength and laid help upon him because he is mighty I am perswaded we are not able to speak of the great Security that Jesus Christ is between the Eternal God and such Creatures as we are We do not know it we shall know it but we do not yet know it no one is able to express it to us as the thing it self is We are not able to Declare or Express the thing plentifully as the expression is in Job Plentifully as it is it is rather a matter of Profession to us or a matter of Confession of Faith and we cannot tell how to say it otherwise But Oh
in the first Epistle of John 5 Chapter 4 Ver. saith he Whatsoever is born of God overcometh the World and this is the Victory that overcometh the World even our Faith Who is he that overcometh the World but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God Let us therefore lay hold upon the Arguments of the Gospel upon the Strength and Power of Jesus Christ in the Faith of his great undertaking In that Faith let us go out and Conquer let us go out and prevail O! how would it raise us above this World above the fears of it above the delights of it above the pleasures of it if we had but the Power of this Faith if we had but this Victory of Faith in us and upon us In the Third Place it would enable us to tread even upon Death it self upon all the Afflictions that are in our way to Heaven and upon that King of Terrors Death it self For though indeed we apprehend Death to be nothing but a Privation of Life in the General yet we know as we are Christians it is an Inlet into Eternity Even Nature starts at it as it is a Cessation and putting an end to the life and motion and action wherein we are conversant now it looks much more dreadful to us as it opens into Eternity But if we were but shod with Iron and Brass we should find these Shooes of Iron and Brass would carry us through and we should be able to tread even upon the sharpness of Death and the Grave we should find the great Power of Jesus Christ enabling of us because he has overcome Death Even as he has overcome the World so he has overcome Death We should never leave trying and proving this Armour of God upon the Feet of our Souls till we find that we can walk even upon Graves and upon our own Graves among the Tombs and not be affrighted when we find we are carried thrô and thrô and that we master and tread down as we go We should I say not only come and die when we must die but before-hand we should be armed at these very points we should find our Shooes herein to be of Iron and Brass Observe how triumphant David speaks in the 23d Psalm Yea though I walk through the Valley of the shadow of death Where I don't know what may lye in my way what may rise up against me I do not know what are the Secrets what Ambuscades there are in the Valley of Death I don't know what Powers are appointed and prepared to Destroy Yea in the 4th Verse though I walk through the Valley of the shadow of Death I will fear no evil for thou art with me c. This would bear us through and carry us with great Resolution and with undauntedness of Courage For the great expression of our Action you know in Scripture is very much in our feet in our walking Now therefore to have our Feet thus shod it would enable us to get up above these things to be aloft over the things that are so dreadful and terrible to Flesh and Blood Hab. 3. 9. The Lord is my strength and he will make my feet like Hinds feet and he will make me to walk upon mine high places And therefore I can sing I can set a Song to the Chief Singer on my stringed Instruments Because I have such an Assurance such an Elevation and Exultation of Soul in the Lord I will rejoyce in the Lord Ver. 18. and glory in the God of my Salvation although the Fig-tree shall not blossom c. Although there be no outward appearance of Good O how timerous how Cowardly are we how ready to be affrighted at any appearance of Death that in all our Discourse we cannot endure the thing Dying But were our Shooes but of Iron and Brass it would be easie the way would be plain before us we should be able to strike through every thing and to the overcoming of it And then In the Last place Our Shooes being of Iron and Brass we shall be born up even when we have pass'd out of the Body For though indeed we do not know the things that are beyond Death none have come back to give us an Account how it is with Spirits when they have left the Body I say none have come to give us Account only the Word of God that assures us and tells us that we shall be upon Precipices when we go out of the World if we are not apprehended by Christ Though undoubtedly Satan hath way-laid the way of Spirits going out of the Body with all the Incumberances he can possibly As I told you before it was the method of former times in War they took care to lay whatever could incommode their Enemies Feet with Stakes of Iron and Brass that might make the passage very difficult So undoubtedly that lost and undone Spirit that Envious Spirit that great Adversary of Souls does whatever he can do to way-lay Spirits going out of the Body and entering into the State of Eternity and going up to the Throne of God and the Throne of Christ he does whatever he can do but these Shooes of Iron and Brass shall carry us through Jesus Christ himself hath taken care to remove him out of the way so far as is necessary and the great Action of the Spirit of a Saint going upo to Christ and going up to God it shall be sustained and maintained by him and he will arm us wherein soever we lye open to Disadvantage and to Danger There will Christ more peculiarly provide for I make no doubt there is no one single motion of the Spirits of Saints but Christ hath so guarded and so taken care of as that very motion that we read of Eccles 12. 7. The Dust returning to the Earth as it was and the Spirit to God that gave it Now what are as I said before the Ambuscades What are the secret Linings of the way as we speak in Terms of War lining all the Avenues of the way we know not Satan hath lined them all with what may utterly spoil and deterr our motion up to God But Jesus Christ having first armed us with Shooes of Iron and Brass he himself will be found in the way and he 'll sustain our passage and cover our passage and bear up all our motions unto God And so I have opened the first of the great Expressions of the Blessedness that Moses expresses of Asher Thy Shooes shall be Iron and Brass Of which all the Mines that were in the Lot of Asher in that part of his possession they were but Types to set out this Almighty Power this Almighty strength of God unto Salvation And therefore I shall close this Head of Discourse with that in the 4th Chapter of the Epistle to the Philippians 7th Verse saith he The Peace of God which passeth all understanding As he calls him the God of peace Rom. 16. so here The Peace of