Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A Word B Word C Word D Occurrence Frequency Band MI MI Band Prominent
spirit_n dead_a dwell_v quicken_v 6,316 5 11.0324 5 false
View all documents for the selected quad

Text snippets containing the quad

ID Title Author Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) STC Words Pages
A26903 Compassionate counsel to all young men especially I. London apprentices, II. students of divinity, physick, and law, III. the sons of magistrates and rich men / by Richard Baxter. Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691. 1681 (1681) Wing B1229; ESTC R170462 84,953 211

There are 2 snippets containing the selected quad. | View lemmatised text

is to search study and pray for so firm a belief of this unseen Glory as may so resolve engage and comfort us in some good measure as if we had seen it with these eyes O! what men would one hours being in heaven make us or one clear sight of it Faith hath a greater work to do than a dreaming or dead opinion can perform If it be not well grounded first and well exercised upon Gods Love Promise and Glory from day to day you will find cause sadly to lament the weakness of it For this use you have great need of the help of such Books as open clearly the evident proofs of the Christian verity which I have breifly done in the beginning of the 2d part of my Life of Faith and more largely in 2 other Books viz. The unreasonableness of Infidelity and the reasons of the Christian Religion A firm b●lief of the World to come is it that must ●ake us serious Christians and over come the snares of worldly vanity And your Faith being well setled set your selves dayly to use it and live by it dwell in the joyful hopes of the heavenly Glory what is a man that liveth not in the use of Reason And you must know that you have as daily use for your Faith as for your Reason Without reason you can neither safely eat or drink nor converse with men as a man but as a Bedlam not do any business that concerneth you and therefore you must Live by your Reason And without Faith you cannot please God nor obtain Salvation no nor use your Reason for any thing higher than to serve your appetites and purvey for the flesh and therefore you must Live by Faith or live like Beasts and worse than Beasts and cannot otherwise live to God nor live in the hopes of blessedness hereafter O! Consider that the difference between living chiefly upon and for an Earthly fleshly felicity or a heavenly is the great difference between the holy and the unholy and the fore-goer of the difference between those in Heaven and those in Hell IX Still remember that the great Means of all the good that here or hereafter you can expect is the great Mediator the great Teacher Ruler and Intercessor for his people And therefore out of him you can do nothing All duty that you offer to God must be by his Mediation and so must all mercy which you receive from God To come to God by him who is the Way the Truth and the Life must be your daily work of Faith His blood must wash you from all sin past and from the guilt of daily failings and infirmities None but he can effectually teach you to know God and your selves your duty and your everlasting hopes None but he can render your persons praises and actions acceptable to God because you are sinners and unmeet for Gods acceptance without a Mediator All power in heaven and Earth is given him and your Lives and Souls are at his will and it is he that must judge you and with whom you hope to live in Glory Therefore you must so live by the Faith of the Son of God who hath loved you and and given himself for you that you may say it is he that liveth in you Gal. 2.2021 This is the Fountain from whence you must daily fetch your strength and comfort X. And still remember that it is by the operation of the holy Spirit that the Father and the Son do sanctifie Souls and Regenerate and breed them up for Glory It is by the Holy Ghost that God dwelleth in us by Love and Christ by Faith Therefore see that you rest not in corrupted nature and trust not to your selves or to the Flesh. Your souls are dead to God and Holiness and your duties dead till the Spirit of Christ do quicken them You are blind to God and mad in sin till the spirit illuminate you and give you understanding You are like Enemies out of Love with God Heaven and Holiness till this Spirit reconcile you and sanctifie your wills You will have no manlike spiritual holy pleasure till the Holy Spirit renew your hearts and make them fit to delight in God O that men knew the great necessity of the illuminating quickning sanctifying comforting influence of the Spirit of God how far would they be from deriding it as some prophane ones do By this Holy Spirit the sacred Records were written and by miracles of Christ and his Apostles and Evangelists and Prophets sealed and delivered to the Churches And by this Spirit the orders and Government of the Church were setled And by him we are inlightned to understand the Scripture and inclined to Love them and delightfully believe them and obey them Study therefore obediently these Writings of the Holy Ghost and confidently trust them O! be not found among the resisters or neglecters of the Spirits help and motions when proud self-confidence or fleshly lusts do rise against them Christs bodily presence is taken from the Earth he promised instead of it which was but in one place at once to send his Spirit which is to the soul more than the Sun light to the Eye and can shine in all the world at once This is his Agent on Earth by whom in Teachers and Learners he carrieth on his saving work This is his Advocate who pleadeth his cause effectually against unbeleif and fleshly lusts and worldly wisdom This is the well of living water springing up in us to Everlasting life the name the mark of God on Souls the Divine Regenerator the author of Gods Holy Image and the Divine Nature even Divine life and light and love the Conqueror of the World and Flesh the strengthner of the weak the confirmer of the wavering the comforter of the sad and the pledge earnest and first fruits of everlasting life O therefore pray earnestly for the Spirit of Grace and carefully obey him and joyfully praise God in the sence of his holy encouragement and help CHAP. IX Additional Counsel to Youngmen who are bred up to Learning and Publick work especially to the Sacred Ministry in the Vniversities and Schools § 1 IT was the case of the London Apprentices who are nearest me and I have oft to do with which first provoked me to this work and therefore which was chief in my intention But had I as near opportunity to be a Counsellor to others There are three sorts whom I should have preferred for the sake of the Church and Kingdom to which they are of greater signification I. Those in the Schools and Universities who are bred up for the Sacred Ministry II. Those there and in the Inns of Court that are bred up to the knowledge of the Law III. The Sons of Noblemen Knights and others that are bred up for some places of Government in the Kingdom according to their several ranks And of these it is the first that I shall most freely speak to § 2. And first I shall
thing than meerly to take that name upon you and be of that party and to joyn with the right Church and to have the bare words and picture of believers And then consider whether God will be mocked with Shews and Ceremonies and dead Formalities and false Professions and whether the lifeless Carkass or Image of Christianity will be taken by God instead of the life and power of it and will ever save a Soul Yea whether a false counterfeit Christian bred up under Christian Instructions and Examples do not make your guilt far greater and your case more miserable than Americans or Indians that never heard what you have heard And when perhaps you have spoken against Hypocrites your selves whether there be any more notorious Hypocrites than such as you who say you are Christians and yet live to the Flesh in the odious sins which Christ abhorreth Think what a dreadful thing it is to profess a Religion which condemneth you and to say over that Creed which you believe not and those Petitions in the Lords Prayer which you desire not and those Commandments which you break and will condemn you To rebel against God while you say you believe in him To despise Christs Government while you say you trust him for Salvation To ask for his Grace when you would not have it to sanctifie you and save you from your sin To beg Mercy of God and to reject this Mercy and to have no Mercy on your selves O think what a doleful case it is to see distracted sinners such Hypocrites playing with such Contradictions so near Gods Bar and in his sight And to make no better use of Prayers and the name of Christians and the Profession of the Truth than to give the Devil more matter to accuse you and Conscience to torment you and a righteous God to say to you at last Out of thy own mouth will I judge thee thou wicked Rebel Didst thou not confess that Jesus was the Christ and that thou didst believe the Gospel and the Life to come and yet didst live in the wilful disobeying of Christ and the Gospel and base contempt of God and thy Salvation And when you have considered the sad case of Hypocrites that call themselves Christians to their own Condemnation when they are none such then think seriously what the Covenant was which was made for you in your Baptism and you have taken on you to own Think what it is devotedly to trust to God as your reconciled Father and devotedly to trust to Christ as your Saviour your great Teacher Governour and Mediator with the Father what it is devotedly to trust the Holy Spirit to illuminate sanctifie and quicken you in a holy Life and to strenthen and comfort you against and under all your Trials Consider what it is to take the Flesh the World and the Devil as they are against this holy Life and heavenly Hope for your Enemies and to list your selves under Christ in a vowed War to the death against them Think how you have perfidiously broken this Covenant on which all the Hope of your Salvation lieth And then if you dare not utterly renounce all that Hope presently and resolvedly renew this Covenant Lament your violation of it to God Do it not only in a passion but upon serious consideration make that choice and resolution which you dare stand to at a dying hour and on which you may believe that God for Christs sake will accept you and forgive you O think what a Mercy it is to have a Saviour who after all your heinous sins will bring you reconciled as Sons to God for the merits of his Sacrifice and Righteousness and by his powerful Intercession and will send from Heaven the Spirit of God into your hearts to renew those blind dead carnal minds to God's holy Image and will dwell in you and carry on your Sanctification to the end Thankfully and joyfully accept this Covenant and Grace and again give up your selves to God your Father Saviour and Sanctifier but be sure that you do it absolutely without deceitful exceptions and reserves and that you do it resolvedly and not only in a frightened mood and yet that you do it as in the strength of the Grace of Christ not trusting the stedfastness of your own deceitful mutable Hearts And when you can truly say that you unfeignedly consent and renew this Covenant in your hearts then go the next opportunity to the Sacrament of the Lords Supper and there penitently and faithfully renew it openly in the solemn way that Christ hath appointed you thankfully profess your Trust in Christ and receive a sealed Pardon of your sins and Title to everlasting Life and settle your Conversation in the Communion of Saints as you hope to live with such for ever V. Hence forward set your selves as the true Schollars of Christ to learn his Doctrine and as his true Subjects to know his Laws and as those that trust their Souls into his Hand to understand and firmly believe his Promises for this Life and that which is to come And as the blessed man Psal. 1 2 3. To delight in the Law of the Lord and meditate in it day and night As you were wont to steal some hours from God and your Masters to go to the house of Sin and Death so now get such hours as lawfully you can from your other Employments and diversions but especially on the Lords-days and get alone and beg mercy and Grace from God and set your selves to read the Bible and with it read some Catechisms and some sound and serious Treatises of Divinity which are most suitable to your state It is young men that have miscarried and being convinced are willing to turn to God that I am now directing And therefore supposing that you will ask me what Books I would commend to you I will answer you accordingly supposing still that you prefer the Bible 1. For the full resolving of your Hearts to a sound Repentance and a holy life read Ioseph Allenes Book of Conversion Richard Allens Vindication of Godliness and their Book of Covenanting with God and his Victory over the World Mr. Whateleys New birth and some of the old Sermons of Repentance such as Mr. Stocks Mr. Perkins Mr. Dikes Mr. Marburys Bunny's correction of Parsons Book for Resolution Iohn Rogers Doctrine of Faith William Fenners Books Sam. Smith on the first and the fifty first Psalms and his great Assize and on the Eunuchs Conversion Bifields Marrow Mr. How 's blessedness of the Righteous and of Delighting in God And if you would have any of mine read the Call to the Vnconverted or the Treatise of Conversion and the Directions for sound Conversion and Now or Never and a Saint or a Bruit or which of all these Gods Providence shall afford you II. If you would have help to try your hearts lest they be deceived read Alleins foresaid Book of the Covenant and Pinkes Tryal of sincere Love to