Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	heart_n	spirit_n	word_n	8,255	5	4.2520	3	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A01891	The saints interest in God opened in severall sermons, preached anniversarily upon the fifth of November. By John Goodwin pastor of S. Stephens Coleman-street.	Goodwin, John, 1594?-1665.	1640 (1640)	STC 12031; ESTC S117964	75,238	484

such a creature as man is or compell him by a strong hand of power without gaining in his will and affection thereunto to receive and own him for his God Nay secondly the truth is though God be of an omnipotent and irresistible power yet can he not compell any creature whatsoever indued with understanding and will to receive and owne him against their will because it is by an act of the Will that he is and must be received and so long as there remaineth an unwillingnesse in a man to receive or owne him for his God impossible it is that he should be received or owned by him So that now God must finde out a sutable and fitting meanes to worke the heart or will of his creature to a desire or willingnesse of receiving him Thirdly and lastly there was no other way or meanes conceivable at least none so con-naturall proper and sweet for such a purpose but only to propound and offer himselfe in a free and gracious Covenant unto it And so in pleading his owne infinite worth and excellency incomparably above the emptinesse and vanity of other things to fall in with the effectuall working of his Spirit and hereby to awaken quicken raise and strengthen the heart and soule of his creature to a willingnesse of embracing and accepting his offer that is himselfe Thus you see another Ground or Reason of the point The gracious Covenant of God The fourth and last Ground we shall now insist upon is the performance of the condition required in this Covenant by the Church and People of God namely Their faith in God or dependance upon him which is nothing else but their acceptance of him according to his offer for their God This is another thing that makes him theirs in that full and compleate manner that he is He requires upon the matter nothing else of men to make himselfe theirs or to give them the entire propriety we speake of in himselfe but barely that without which it is simply absolutely impossible that he should be theirs God cannot be the God of any man but his that is willing to take him and have him for his God Dagon could not possibly have been the God of the Philistims nor Chemosh the God of the Ammonites c. except they had been willing to acknowledge and have them for their gods All violence and compulsion in the world exercised upon them could not have made these Idols or false gods theirs had they not been willing and consented to have acknowledged and owned them in that relation Now then this willingnesse in men to take owne and acknowledge the true God for their God without which it is simply impossible as hath been said that God should be theirs is all that is required to make him theirs or to give them this speciall and peculiar propriety in him To believe in Christ or rather in God through Christ 1 Pet. 1.21 Iohn 12.44 is nothing else being interpreted but by the meanes or encouragement of the Lord Christ given unto them really and unfainedly to take and acknowledge the great God of heaven and earth for our God and to addresse our selves unto him accordingly as well inwardly with Love Feare Reverence Dependance c. as outwardly in all manner of conversatiō sutable hereunto And all this in the roote and first spring of it in the soule is nothing else but a willingnesse of minde to take and owne him for our God or to trust him and make our dependance upon him This disposition being truly begotten and effectually raised in the soul containes all those other things mentioned in the loines of it Begotten and raised it is by the meanes of Jesus Christ and the word of salvation through him preached unto us which word the Holy Ghost taking as it were in his hand and managing it upon the soule overcommeth the evill of the heart with the goodnesse thereof and smiting the crooked spirit of unbeliefe which is the grand indisposition of the soule to accept of God for our God with the glorious brightnesse and power of the truth of it createth a right spirit of Faith in the stead which is nothing else in the first breaking of it in the soul but an aptnesse and willingnesse to believe that is to accept and entertaine the true God for our God For before there can be a distinct and compleat act of Faith or of accepting God for our God put forth in the soule there must be in the order of Nature an inclination or willingness to such an act going before Otherwise God should forsake his usuall method of proceeding à minus perfectis ad perfectiora from lesse perfection to greater Now as the first and weakest act of Faith or accepting God for our God being a reall performance of the condition required in the Covenant whilest it is yet secret in the hidden man of the heart gives a right and propriety in God according to the tenour thereof so doth the second act or outward testifying to the world a mans faith or dependance upon God draw out the particular and speciall benefits and advantages of this their interest in God This sets God on work to expresse himself freely unto them he cares not now if all the world know that he is theirs This faith of theirs in him openly manifested makes them fit and meet to be beloved I meane openly in the sight of heaven and earth and hell True God loves his Church and People as was said before they believe or else they could never come to believe Thine they were saith Christ and thou hast given them unto me Joh. 17.6 But till they come to believe in him other expressions of affection to them are but ordinary as to other men Though they bee his in some sense yet he will not owne them openly till they be worthy to be reputed his that is make their dependance upon him The first differencing expression of himselfe to be theirs and they his is the giving of faith unto them and when this is given and begins to worke and be active in them he cares not then what or how great blessings he gives them afterward The stumbling block is now removed out of the worlds way all the world cannot but confesse it just and equall that God should bee theirs that trust in him He was but a Heathen man that said it is right and equall that men should come to those gods for help whom they serve And so the Scripture still gives the reason of those speciall and extraordinary favours vouchsafed by God unto his Church to be their faith or dependance upon him Esay 26.3 Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace whose mind is staid on thee because hee trusteth in thee And Chap. 57.13 The winde shall carry them all away vanity shall take them but he that putteth his trust in me shall possesse the Land and shall inherite my holy Mountaine See Joh. 14.21 and Gen. 22.16 17.

we now speake of in that Scripture Heb. 6.13 When God saith the Apostle made the promise to Abraham because he had no greater to sweare by he sware by himselfe Because he had no greater c. if that be the spirit of the words which I conceive neither can I apprehend what other it should be with any tolerable congruity of Reason they are a straine of speech to be heard out of the mouth of an infinite God fearefully high and glorious Because he had no greater to sweare by therefore he sware by himselfe clearely implying that if he had a greater then himselfe he would have sworne by him For this is the reason delivered in plaine and expresse tearmes why he sware by himselfe because he had no greater As if the infinite Al-sufficiency of God himselfe did not give him that satisfaction which he desired for the confirmation of his oath made to the heires of promise in respect of the weaknesse and marvellous backwardnesse of their hearts to beleeve unto perfect establishment and assurance but he would have had a greater if it might have beene and have passed by himself if there had been infinitum infinito infinitius this had been an only choice for him in this case To say that the words imply only this Gods greatnesse above all others makes the sense but cold and waterish For it is not the scope of the Holy Ghost here to declare the greatnesse of God but rather the greatnesse of his desire to satisfie the heires of promise as they are called that is his Church and People with the strongest and mightiest consolations touching the truth and stablenesse of that promise of life by Christ And for this purpose the words in the sense given are as is evident of mighty importance So desirous he was that his children should be filled with faith and the strong consolations of it that if hee had had any greater or more effectuall meanes for the bringing it to passe they had been used and the words thus understood are but an expression and breaking out of the mighty power of that love of his towards his Children which all this while we speake of which moves him to give his owne selfe unto them if he had any greater then himselfe they should have had it but for himselfe they shall be sure of As we heard before of Christs love mentioned by S. Paul Who loved me and gave himselfe for me Like love like bounty like affection like expression Thus you see the love and affection in God towards his Church to be one cause or reason why he gives them this interest and propriety in himselfe which the Doctrine speaketh of A second Ground of the point is The gift or bestowing of Iesus Christ upon the world So God loved the world that hee gave his only begotten Son c. as you heard before Iohn 3. Though the love of God to his Church was the Basis or prime cause of that propriety it now hath in him yet was it not either the only or immediate cause thereof This affection of his notwithstanding they were yet afarre off as S. Paul speakes and lay at as great a distance as is between heaven and earth from being a Church or holy People unto him from having any such peculiar interest or propriety in him Sin had separated and that with a high hand betweene him and them and had fixed a great gulfe betwixt the one and the other moveable only by him that hath power to remove the earth out of his place which kept them asunder from comming one at the other God could not reach or come at his creature with any other expression of his love till this gulfe was removed till sin that hindered was taken out of the way much lesse was it possible for the creature to have made any approach neare unto him to have gained any thing upon him or in him till then Now to fill up this vaste dreadfull and devouring gulfe and so to make the way passable from God to the creature and from the creature back again unto God there was nothing else to be found in heaven or earth of any proportion or any wayes commensurable thereunto but only one that might lawfully count it no robbery to be equall with God being God himselfe blessed for ever The infinitely wise just and righteous God could have found no other consideration of value and weight sufficient to have built a dispensation of that most righteous and just Law of his upon In the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt die the death but only the death of his owne only begotten Had all other creatures in heaven and earth consented together in one to have given out their strength and beeings to the uttermost to have raised a consideration or reason amongst them why God should have passed over those words of his as if they had never beene spoken should have let fall that solemne intermination or threatning of his to the ground never to have executed what he had threatned the wisdome of God doubtlesse and zeale to his glory would have despised it and laughed it to scorne whatsoever possibly it might have amounted unto and would have beene more ready to have fallen upon Mediators and Offenders together with fiery indignation then any wayes relented or stood so much as to consider what he had to doe upon the tender of any such propositions unto him It was no worke no undertaking for creatures to salve the glory of an infinite Wisdome and Majesty in case he should let such words of his goe for nought and vanish into the winde which were uttered with such solemnity upon such just and righteous grounds in the sight of heaven and earth It might justly have been thought that God had prized such words as those at a low and under rate and consequently undervalued himselfe in the bargaine if he had sold them at any such rate or price as the creature could have given But the death and sufferings of his owne Son this was a price that weighed somewhat like in his hand upon consideration hereof it was no waies grievous unto him to dispense with his Law and suspend the execution thereof for ever as far as it concernes those that shall unfainedly acknowledge this inestimable grace of his who hath thus bought them from under so heavy a curse and condemnation It is not the least prejudice or disparagement to the infinite Wisdome or Majesty of God or the least diminishing of the authority of any of his Lawes or threatnings whatsoever to let Lawes and threatnings sleep upon such a Pillow as this is and not to be put into execution upon the intercession of such a consideration as this And thus we see how the gift of Iesus Christ likewise was of absolute necessity to bring about this great and wonderfull thing in the world that sinfull men and women the generation of which the Church of God is made should have this deare