Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	authority_n	church_n	pillar_n	1,970	5	10.4442	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A11850	Christs counsell to his languishing church of Sardis. Or, The dying or decaying Christian, with the meanes and helpes of his recovery and strengthening. By Obadiah Sedgwicke, B. of D. late preacher to the inhabitants of S. Mildreds Bredstreet, London	Sedgwick, Obadiah, 1600?-1658.	1640 (1640)	STC 22151; ESTC S117037	59,254	284

not bolstered up with high clamours and with artificiall lyes But truth is naked and plaine it is neither of a cruell nature like Caine nor of a subtile spirit with Absalom nor of a lying spirit with Ahabs false Prophets it flatters no man nor beguiles any being truth it is not ashamed of light or triall and it alone can maintain it self against all contrary quarrels a good cause is like a good conscience even a bulwarke to it selfe like the sunne in its light and heat against all clouds c. 5 The duration of them truth like the sunne hath runne down through all ages not that all men have embraced it but that by some it hath still beene embraced some one or more hath still beene at the barre to beare witnesse unto it New men have still risen up and sometimes out of the ashes as it were of the dead to maintaine and either by tongue or pen or bloud to defend the truth but Erroneous doctrines as they want an inward harmony so also an outward consent like a deceitfull brooke they are spent after a while or like commotions in a state Simile though strong or long yet they come to an end at length either some speciall judgements on the ringleaders or the authority of Princes as Alexander against Arius or the prayers of the Saints or the decision of lawfull counsels have still cashiered these meteors but as it is said of divine mercy that it endures for ever the same is affirmed of divine truth it runs from one generation to another till Christ make his Church triumphant the militant Church shall be the pillar of truth 6 The conformity of them to the rule or word Erroneous doctrines like unsound flesh cannot abide handling and Simile like an ill favoured woman would have all glasses broken But truth like sound gold will endure a touch-stone truth will be found truth upon search bring it to the conscience it will worke as truth bring it to the death-bed it will uphold as truth bring it to the scriptures it will hold out as truth 2 When truths upon search are found to be truths then embrace them for the truths sake not upon personall and mutable causes or ends 3 Firme refolution after tryall by which our knowledge comes to be cleare and without doubt there must be now a plain resolution and purpose of heart in cleaving to such faithfully evidenced truths thou must by an immoveable faith as it were root thy very heart in the truths of Christ as Saint Paul though bonds and afflictions though good report or evill though death it selfe abide him for Christ come what will come disputes fancies errors troubles losses I have found the truth and it will I hold for ever 3 Loyall affection then it is loyall when it is inclusive to every truth c. exclusive to nothing but truth this loyall affection will make us to first doe secondly suffer thirdly cleave love truth and then truth will be held I held him and would not let him goe said the Church then in love with Christ Cant. 3. Love is the easiest key to open the heart to Cant. 3. Christ and the strongest locke to keepe sure the truth in our hearts when thou hast experimentally felt the heavenly strength and comfort of Gods truths then wilt thou certainly sticke unto them 4 Ioyne conscience to science O when people have the truths still sounding in their eares and ungodlinesse still stirring and ruling in their lives it cannot be that they should have strong hands who have wicked hearts Hymeneus made shipwracke of faith and of conscience both together 1 Tim 1. 19. Therefore strive to obey the 1 Tim. 1. 19. truths adde to thy faith vertue be a doing Christian as well as a knowing Christian 5 Be watchfull in prayer to God with David to uphold thee with Saint Peter to establish thee still to keepe thee that thou mayest keepe his truths excellent is that speech of Bernard S. Bernard in Psal qui habitat pag. 283. Basil neque enim quae habemus ab eo servare aut tenere possumus sine eo that God by whose light alone we know the truth by his strength alone we keepe it Thus much for the text and now for the occasion and here I cannot be long neither my affections nor yours will admit of large discourse onely a word of you and a word to you Of you so regardfull have you beene to my Ministery so loving to my person so faithfull in your maintenance so cheerefully encouraging generally from you all but chiefly from the chiefest that had it pleased the Lord to have given mee health the which I have scarce enjoyed one whole yeere together since I have beene heere I should not have stirred easily from such a people for the best preferment that could be conveniently offered unto me I speake my heart freely I cannot tell on which side the unwillingnesse is most whether on your part who are left or on my part who am constrained to leave you But to say no more of your goodnesse give mee leave for the close of all to leave a few Legacies with you being all my friends and hearken to my words as the words of a dying man for the Lord knowes how short my daies may be My Legacies are these 1 Lay out more time for your soules the soule is a precious thing the soule is a corrupted thing sinnes are in it much guilt is upon it there is a Christ that it needs holinesse that it must have heaven that it would have thy body is but clay thy soule a spirit the world a vanity thy soule immortall all is well if the soule be wel nothing is well if that be evill I beseech you pray more heare more know more confer more doe more and more for your soules when you come to dye you will then finde it to be all your worke O then whiles health is in you make it thy chiefest worke to seeke the kingdome of heaven and the righteousnesse thereof for your soules feed not the slave and starve the childe 2 Vpon good grounds make sure of a reconciled God live not in an unreconciled condition no enemy like an ill conscience and a good God study the right of thy sinnes and the bloud of Christ repentance from dead workes and faith in the Lord Iesus so shalt thou behold the face of God and live The waies of reconciliation with God and the setling of thy conscience about it may cost thee many prayers and teares and diligent studies but the love of God and heaven will answer and recompense all 3 Wisely improve all heavenly seasons the Lord hitherto hath continued unto you daies of peace and salvation heavenly opportunities publike and private and I beseech him for ever so to doe Now receive not the grace of God in vaine lay hold on these occasions if there be not wisedome to improve them there may be sadnesse for neglecting

and despise them 2 The remembrance must be ingenuous and not preiudiciall though we must sticke to yet not in the truths received our former remembrance must not contract a present or future neglect of any other truths which God shall reveale unto us as when many remember the Sermons of dead men and slight the discoveries of the living 3 There is a threefold remembrance of former truths One is notionall Simile which is like the often looking into a glasse or when a person beholds truths as hee doth pictures gaze on them and that is all Another is verball when a person renues his acquaintance and complements with truth onely his memory onely loades his tongue like a naked Astronomer who knowes heaven and can onely talke of it A third is practicall when the remembrance is like a cloud descending on the plants Simile or like a fire felt as well as seene this kinde of remembrance hath three degrees in it for it is partly Directive when truths remembred are made a compasse for us to sayle by or copies for us to write after still teaching and guiding us how to draw the lines and letters of our conversation Affective when truths remembred are like the conference of Christ rising from the dead burning and inflaming of our hearts with most affectionate love unto them Effective when truths remembred are truths obeyed we often consider former doctrines and still better our present conversations After this practicall forme are wee to remember received truths 4 There is 1 A materiall remembrance which is partly of the things themselves partly of the revelation of them partly of the manner and meanes of revealing them 2 Formall remembrance of For the manner five waies truths received which is rather of the manner how wee our selves did receive them we are often to thinke on truths received not onely as they stand in proposition or revelation but also how they stood with us when wee did receive them for energy or operation and thus I conjecture we are to remember truths received 1 With what estimations and admirations wee did receive them Simile like those people who have the Sunne but halfe the yeere they run after it and are ready to adore it in its approch so when we did receive holy truths at the first we received them as the very oracles of God not as the words of man but as they are indeed the words of God 2 With what subjection of spirit we did receive them wee did not onely admire their excellency but felt their efficacie the word came not in word onely but in power and authority over our very consciences and this power was a full power and an easie power the truths which wee received did command and awe and order our whole man and wee too were most willing to resigne up our selves to the obedience of the Gospell in all things and to be cast into that mould of heavenly doctrine 3 With what affections wee did receive them O then those conflictings of spirit Heb. 10. 32 Heb. 10. 32. those bathes of griefe and heavenly compunction with them Acts 2. 37. those flames Acts 2. 37. of love with those Christians Acts 4. 32. those raptures of joy Acts 4. 32. Acts 16. with Lydia Acts 16. yea those extensions of zeale with the Galathians to Saint Paul Gal. 4. Gal. 4. the word had a surpassing influence upon all our affections to melt and convert to raise and dispose of them 4 With what resolute loyalty so that we did hate and defie all contrary errors and waies and so were our hearts sworne to divine truths and as it were espoused to them that wee once resolved to live and dye in those truths and for those truths wee could not endure any mixture with them nor heare of any divorce from them 5 With what reverence wee did embrace the Ambassadors of heavenly truths they were as the Angels of God to us we were like almost with Cornelius to adore the Peters and Pauls I meane the ministers of God revealing his truths unto us the feet of them who brought unto us the glad tidings of our salvation were beautifull and most acceptable unto us Now here are two questions briefly to be resolved Quest What truths heard and received we are often to consider and remember Sol. To this I answer 1 There must be an endeavour to remember all the truths as Christ said of the fragments gather them up and let none be lost so it must bee said of holy truths on which the soule hath formerly fed gather them up all let none be lost Simile You see that the Goldsmith doth not onely looke after the massie piece of gold but he carefully lookes after every ray and dust of gold and preserves it Every truth of God is precious it is more precious then gold it is excellent and as it is excellent in it selfe so it may be usefull to us Simile there is not a star in heaven but is of some good to the lower world so there is not one truth of God but may be of some good use to a Christian But if either for the multitude of truths or the sublimity of truths or for the obscure manner of discovering these truths or for the impotency and irretentivenesse of an unholding and unclasping memory or for the space of time since truths were delivered and received it so fals out that all heard and once received truths will not stand upon record into which they have beene entred but are in many places defaced and cancelled 2 There must at least bee a faithfull remembrance of the most necessary and chiefe truths namely of those which more immediately and intimately and unauoydably concern our salvation of the which for methods sake I conjecture there may be three heads viz. 1 That vitall truth concerning Christ and faith in him this is the great fundamentall truth Note 2 That vivificall truth concerning repentance in the conversion of the heart from dead workes 3 That practicall truth concerning obedience in ordering the life and course of a converted person As the moralists say of Fame or of a mans good name Omnia si perdas famam servare memento Qua semel amissâ postea nullus eris i whatsoever commodity you lose be sure yet to preserve that iewell of a good name That is so choyce a iewell that whatsoever a man loseth hee must yet take heed and care of that The same may bee said of these forenamed truths though through some defect or frailty or malignity any other historicall or problematicall truths may slip from us yet these must be written in our hearts with the point of a Diamond and as in marble the characters of them are to bee kept fresh and alive and are never to be blotted out Object And why this faithfull and frequent remembrance or renewed consideration of truths heard and received Sol. Reasons thereof many 1 Though sometimes an assent may be

in the judgement we must not admit of a staggering and reeling minde nor of a levity in our judgements to be driven and carried about with every winde of doctrine as the Apostle speakes Ephes 4. 14. Eph. 4. 14. Athanasius knew this well when he held his iudgement fast in the truth of the deity of Christ against the Arians so Saint Austin his iudgement fast in the doctrine of grace against the Pelagians and Cyprian against the Donatists or Novatians or Catharists It is an honour for a man to recant an errour but a perfidious shame for any Christian to suffer any truth to be supplanted by any errour 2 In the will and affection our love must hold the truth fast therefore the Apostle bids us to be glued unto it Rom. 12. 9. it is with truths Simile as with some plants which live and thrive not but in warme climates That ancient desire after truth and delight in it to take counsell from it and strength from it and comfort by it must not decay and dye within us but must remaine and abound though others hate disgrace and endeavour to make voyd the truth yet wee must cleave unto it and love it as David Psal 119. 3 In our profession hence that advice of the Apostle in Phil. 2. 16 to hold forth the word of life even in the midst of a darke and froward generation Christ would have us not onely to beleeve but to confesse him before men Remember that it was no small sinne in Peter when he pretended that he knew not the man Gregory Nazianzen reports in one of his orations against Iulian that some Christian souldiers being cunningly circumvented by him to idolatrous sacrifices perceiving the errour they all ran backe unto him and threw him his money againe and protested they were Christians and in what they did they were circumvented by him Heb. 10. Heb. 10. 23. 23. let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering the Christian must change neither his Master nor his service nor his livery 4 In our conversation wee must still practise truths and keepe our lives answerable unto them Saint Iohn cals this a walking in the truth then a man walkes in the truth when hee holds on his course of holy obedience unto it against all the encouragements and discouragements of the world as the three children in Daniel c. not with the Galathians beginning in the spirit and ending in the flesh or like those Israelites whose righteousnesse was as the morning dew But we must still runne the race set before us and keep stedfast our feet unto the pathes of righteousnesse and waies of truth Quest Why must divine truths heard and received be held fast Sol. Reasons thereof are many I will briefly point out some of them 1 Divine truth is a most precious and excellent thing therefore in Scripture it is compared to gold which of metals is the most precious nay it is more precious then gold or rubies and all the things which thou canst desire are not to be compared unto it see Pro. 3. 14. 15. Pro. 3. 14. 15. It is more excellent then the excellencies of the creatures not then some of them but then all of them and a man if hee were to imagine any excellency or if the utmost of his desires were enlarged yet could they not finde out and pitch upon such an excellency Therefore saith Saint Iohn to the Church of Philadelphia Revel 3. 11. Hold that Revel 3. 11. fast which thou hast that no man take thy crowne the crowne is the top of royalties such a thing is truth let no man take thy crowne Beloved there are two properties which assure us of the excellency of things 1 The more holy they are the Two things intimate an excellency more excellent they are all corruptions are diminutions of excellency the more mixt a thing is the more it is abased as if gold and tinne be mixed and the more pure it is as meere gold the more glorious it is Now the truths of God are holy not as persons are holy which is with mixture and imperfection but as the light at noone day is pure without darkenesse at all 2 The more that God is in any thing the more excellent it is for so much as we partake of him who is excellency it selfe so much more wee rise in our excellency But the great God is altogether seen in this word of truth there is his wisedome there is his power and greatnesse there is his love and mercifulnesse there is his Christ and faithfulnesse therefore it is most excellent and consequently to be held fast by us 2 Divine truths are as it were made over to us under termes of constancy and perpetuity I finde in Scriptures that they are termed sometimes Our heritage estates which are personall if that bee the phrase for possession may be sold as that which a childe buyes with his owne money but estates which are naturall or hereditary such I meane as come to be ours by descent these ought to be kept for posterity God forbid said Naboth that I should sell the inheritance of my fathers divine truths are an heritage to descend from us to our children and therefore wee are neither to dispossesse our selves of them nor to suffer our selves by any to bee dispossessed of them Psal 119. 111. thy testimonies Psal 119 111. have I taken as an heritage for euer Gods trust something wee commit to God something God commits to us 2 Tim. 1. 12. He is able to keepe that which I haue committed unto him we trust God with our soules and God trusts us with his truths which are therefore called that good thing committed to us for to keep 2 Tim. 1. 14. now in matters of trust wee must be faithfull for we must be responsable for the whole wherewith wee are instructed as the servants in the Gospell who had talents committed to their trust they were called to an account for them so if the Lord trust any man with graces or with his truths the man must carefully keepe and preserve them for the Lord will aske him another day for his trust as Saint Iohn did of the Bishop of Jerusalem for his depositum They observe that a trust must be first redelivered secondly wholly thirdly onely to him who committed it to us for trust 3 Not to hold fast the truths is an exceeding and fearefull injury or wrong it is injurious 1 To God for he is the Lord or God of truth truths are ours for the efficacie of them but onely this for the authority of them Simile Should a private person presume of himselfe to sell the Kings Iewels it might bee as much as his life is worth truths are Gods Iewels hee reveales them he ownes them hee hath sealed them with the bloud of Christ and therefore thou doest presumptuously wrong the Lord to put off the things which belong to him 2 To our