Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	faith_n	pray_v	prayer_n	7,073	5	6.7309	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A14927	The cure of a hard-heart First preached in diuers sermons, by Master Welsthed, resident at Bloxford in Dorcetshire. Since digested into questions and answers for the hungrie. Shewing hardnes of hart what it is, with the causes, effect, and remedies.	Welstead, Robert, 1571 or 2-1651.; Hart, John, D.D.	1630 (1630)	STC 25236; ESTC S103299	22,921	94

is safe For Firist When God hath a purpose to giue any thing he giues vs a desire to aske he first prepares our hearts and then bends his eare vnto vs and asking thus according to his will how can hee but heare vs Secondly Christs intercession in heauen the requests of his spirit in our hearts euer goe together and therefore cannot possibly faile of speeding All this I trow is sufficient to put a difference betweene your state and the condition of them that are wholy hardned First You being sensible of your owne estate they altogether sensles Secondly You complaining thereof they rather boasting therein making a mocke and a pastime of sinne Thirdly You praying vsing all meanes to bee freed from your present hardnes they desiring stil to rest sleep therin securely and impatient of any thing that might awaken thē S. But for all my feeling complaining striuing I can finde nothing in my selfe but hardnesse of heart no manner of tendernesse at all and therefore surely you are deceiued in your charitable coniecture M. Feeling complaining striuing and yet no tendernes all hard still This is very strange Why this very striuing complaining feeling is tendernes it selfe or the effect of it Neither is it possible to complaine or pray against infidelitie but by faith against hardnes of heart but by the mollifying spirit of God And grace many times is hardly discerned in the beginning or non-age thereof but by such effects as these S. I but what can you say to this that I cannot at all relish the Word of God haue no heart to priuate Conference meditation prayer or any exercise of Religion but altogether loath and distast them Is it possible thinke you that these things should stand with any tendernes of heart or any sanctified affection M. This were a hard case indeed if it proceeded from a mans habituall disposition not from some extraordinary distemper But considering how far a man may be swayed by occasion of some outward cause and how farre he may be deluded in discerning his owne estate it is not alway safe for one to iudge of himselfe by his present sense and feeling but especially in these three Cases 1. In the time of his first conuersion when grace is as seed newly cast into the earth and a Christian like an Infant for want of exercise and experience it may bee scarse knowing what he hath Then as the land newly sowen little differs from other ground in shew so a Christian seemes little different from other men or as childrens complaints are not euer to be taken for Rules so the complainings of such a one doe not infallibly euince the want which he complaineth of 2. After the committing of some grosse sin or neglect of the meanes of grace lying therein without remorse for a time Then a Christian is as on in a swoune or fast asleepe if his life be in him it scarse appeares at least he perceiues it not himselfe the spirit though not extinguished yet intermitting his worke for a time 3. In some vehement perturbation of the mind either by tentation or melancholy which many times is seconded by tentation too whereby Satan labours to blinde the eyes of a Christian that he may not see and take comfort in his owne happines Then as in Warre the noise of a Cannon stupifies the bodily senses so while Satan is continually buzzing in a mans eares his violent and importunate tentations he is not able to hearken to the gracious promises of God or any thing that might sound to his comfort Nay as it fals out sometimes in naturall melancholy that men haue strange imaginations as to thinke themselues dead to haue no heads c. So and much more then so are men deluded when Satan seconds their melancholy conceits with strong delusions which may well take the deeper impression by how much the things conceiued are lesse subiect vnto and consequently hardlier confuted by sense In such cases as these a man may haue grace and yet not discerne it may perswade himselfe and peremptorily stand to it that he hath none at all S. Yea what say you then to that of the Apostle If our heart condemne vs GOD is greater then our heart M. It is true indeede when the conscience rightly informed doth checke accuse condemne there is no hope of auoyding the sentence of God by any close carriage by which we might thinke to shift and hide our selues and our actions from his eyes Yet this hinders not but that sometimes the conscience may condemne where God doth not For though it alway iudge for God and on his side yet it doth not alway iudge with God and according to his direction but sometimes it may be with Iobs friends it makes a lie for God not purposely indeede but through mis-information or preiudice while it lookes on the wrost that appeares as the qualitie of a sinnefull action past or present indisposition of the heart not on the best which is in part concealed the sincere disposition of the heart generally which how weake soeuer might bee supported with that gracious promise of Christ Not to breake the bruised reed nor quench the smoking flax S. Yet by all this you cannot perswade me that I haue any thing in mee but deadnesse and hardnesse of heart since I feele the effects thereof continually in the dying of all good affections in me and the corrupting of all good duties that proceed from me M. It is euen time then to fall from comforting to chiding of you What Must you needs haue such perfection of holines as God affords not to his Church militant or els will you be vnthankefull and impatient Why you must know that our sanctification here is but begun the accomplishment of it is reserued to the state of glory If we here haue any perfectiō it consists in the imptation of Christs righteousnes God gracious acceptāce of our imperfect obedience in cōparison of others or at most in the perfection of parts and sinceritie of our endeuours It is indeed a commendable care that no iniquitie raigne in vs but intolerable pride to thinke strange that any remaines in vs. What madnes were it to burne the corne because some weeds grow amongst it for an vlcer in the skin to thrust a lancer into the heart in punishing the guiltie mother to destroy the innocent babe in her wombe And is it not as bad falling out with the flesh to wrecke your anger on the spirit through hatred of corrupt nature to offer violence to the new creater in a word to giue oueral take no comfort in any thing because all is not as you would haue it What if God be pleased by this present indisposition to labour the cure of some more dangerous disease in you will you quarrel with your Phisician You may remember perhaps there was a time when you had a vaine conceit of free-will naturall