Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	kindness_n	lord_n	love_a	1,686	5	9.5041	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A45113	The balm of Gilead, or, Comforts for the distressed, both morall and divine most fit for these woful times / by Jos. Hall.	Hall, Joseph, 1574-1656.	1650 (1650)	Wing H366; ESTC R14503	102,267	428

Didst thou conceive my son that grace would put thee into a constant and pepetually-invariable condition of soul whiles thou art in this earthly warfare Didst thou ever hear or read of any of Gods prime Saints upon earth that were unchangeable in their holy dispositions whiles they continued in this region of mutability Look upon the man after Gods own heart thou shalt finde him sometimes so courageous as if the spirits of all his Worthies were met in his one bosom How resolutely doth he blow off all dangers trample on all enemies triumph over all cross events Another while thou shalt finde him so dejected as if he were not the man One while The Lord is my Shepherd I shall lack nothing Another while Why art th●● so sad my soul and why art thou so disquieted within me One while I will not be afraid for ten thousands of the people that have set themselves against me round about Another while Hide me under the shadow of thy wings from the wicked that oppress me from my deadly enemies who compass me about One while Thy loving kindness is before mine eyes and I have walked in thy truth Another while Lord where are thy loving kindnesses Yea dost thou not hear him with one breath professing his confidence and lamenting his desertion Lord by thy favour thou hast made my mountain to stand strong Thou didst hide thy face and I was troubled Look upon the chosen vessel the great Apostle of the Gentiles one while thou shalt see him erecting trophies in himself of victory to his God In all these things we are more then conquerours through him that loved us Another while thou shalt finde him bewailing his own sinful condition Oh wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from the body of this death One while thou shalt finde him caught up into the third heaven and there in the Paradise of God another while thou shalt finde him buffeted by the messenger of Satan and sadly complaining to God of the violence of that assault Hear the Spouse of Christ whether the Church in common or the faithful soul bemoaning her self I opened to my Beloved but my Beloved had withdrawn himself and was gone my soul failed when he spake I sought him but I could not finde him I called him but he gave me no answer Thus it will be with thee my Son whiles thou art in this frail flesh the temper of thy soul will be like her partner subject to vicissitudes Shouldst thou continue always in the same state I should more then suspect thee This is the difference betwixt Nature and Grace That Nature is still uniform and like it self Grace varies according to the pleasure of the giver The Spirit breathes when and where it listeth When therefore thou findest the gracious spirations of the holy Ghost within thee be thankful to the infinite munificence of that blessed Spirit and still pray Arise O North and come thou South winde ●blowe upon my garden that the spices thereof may slow out But when thou shalt finde thy soul becalmed and not a leaf stirring in this garden of thine be not too much dejected with an ungrounded opinion of being destituted of thy God neither do thou repine at the seasons or measures of his bounty that most free and infinitely-beneficent agent will not be tied to our terms but will give what and how and when he pleaseth Onely do thou humbly wait upon his goodness and be confident that he who hath begun his good work in thee will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ. § 10. Complaint of unregeneration and deadness in sin answered It is true thou saist if God had begun his good work in me he would at the last for his own glories sake make it up But for me I am a man dead in sins and trespasses neither ever had I any true life of grace in me some shew indeed I have made of a Christian profession but I have onely beguiled the eyes of the world with a meer pretence and have not found in my self the truth and solidity of those heavenly vertues whereof I have made a formal ostentation It were pity my son thou shouldst be so bad as thou makest thy self I have no comfort in store for hypocrisie no disposition can be more odious to the God of truth in so much as when he would express his utmost vengeance against sinners he hath no more fearful terms to set it forth then I will appoint him his portion with the hypocrites Were it thus with thee it were more then high time for thee to resolve thy self into dust and ashes and to put thy self into the hands of thine Almighty Creatour to be moulded anew by his powerful Spirit and never to give thy self peace till thou findest thy self● renewed in the spirit of thy minde But in the mean while take heed lest thou be found guilty of mis-judging thine own soul and mis-prising the work of Gods Spirit in thee God hath been better to thee then thou wilt be acknown of Thou hast true life of grace in thee and for the time perceivest it not It is no heed to take of the doom thou passest upon thy self in the hour of temptation When thy heart was free thou wert in another minde and shalt upon better advice return to thy former thoughts It is with thee as it was with Eu●ychus that fell down from the third loft and was taken up for dead yet for all that his life was in him We have known those who have lien long in trances withovt any perception of life yea some as that subtil Joannes Duns Scotus have been put into their graves for fully dead when as yet their soul hath been in them though unable to exert those faculties which might evince her hidden presence Such thou mayest be at the worst yea wert thou but in charity with thy self thou wouldst be found in a much better condition There is the same reason of the natural life and the spiritual Life where it is is discerned by breathing sense motion Where there is the breath of life there must be a life that sends it forth If then the soul breathes forth holy desires doubtless there is a life whence they proceed Now deny if thou canst that thou hast these spiritual breathings of holy desires within thee Dost thou not many a time sigh for thine own insensateness Is not thine heart troubled with the thoughts of thy want of grace Dost thou not truly desire that God would renew a right spirit within thee Take comfort to thy self this is the work of the inward principle of Gods Spirit within thee as well may a man breathe without life as thou couldst be thus affected without grace Sense is a quick discrier of life pinch or wound a dead man he feels nothing but the living perceiveth the easiest touch When thou hast heard the fearful

I could be ascertained of mine election to life I could be patient so I might be sure But wretched man that I am here here I stick● I see others walk confidently and comfortably as if they were in heaven already whereas I droop under a continual diffidence raising unto my self daily new arguments of my distrust could my heart be setled in this assurance nothing could ever make me other then happie It is true my son that as all other mercies flow from this of our election so the securing of this one involves all other favours that concern the well-being of our souls It is no less true that our election may be assured else the holy Ghost had never laid so deep a charge upon us to do our utmost endeavour to ascertain it and we shall be much wanting to our selves if hearing so excellent a blessing may be attained by our diligence we shall slacken our hand and not stretch it forth to the height to reach that crown which is held out to us But withal it is true that if there were not difficulty more then ordinary in this work the Apostle had not so earnestly called for the utmost of our endeavour to effect it Shortly the truth is in all Christianity there is no path wherein there is more need of treading warily then in this on each side is danger and death Security lies on the one hand Presumption on the other the miscarriage either way is deadly Look about thee and see the miserable examples on both kindes some walk carelesly as if there were no heaven or if there were such a place yet as if it nothing concerned them their hearts are taken up with earth neither care nor wish to be other then this world can make them The god of this world hath blinded their mindes that believe not Some others walk proudly being vainly puft up with their own ungrounded imaginations as if they were already invested with their glory as if being rapt up with the chosen vessel into the third heaven they had there seen their names reco●●ded in the book of life where as this is nothing but an illusion of that lying spirit who knows the way to keep them for ever out of heaven is to make them believe they are there It must be thy main care to walk even in a jus● equidistance from both these extremes and so to compose thy self that thon maist be resolute without presumption and careful without diffidence And first I advise thee to abandon those false Teachers whose trade is to improve their wits for the discomfort of souls in broaching the sad doctrines of uncertainty and distrust Be sure our Saviour had never bidden his disciples to re●joyce that their names are written in heaven if there had not been a particular enrolment of them or if that Record had been alterable or if the same Disciples could never have attained to the notice of such inscription Neither is this a mercy peculiar to his domestick followers alone but universal to all that shall believe through their word even thou and I are spoken to in them so sure as we have names we may know them registred in those eternal Records above Not that we should take an Acesius his Ladder and climb up into heaven and turn over the book of Gods secret counsels and read our selves designed to glory but that as we by experience see that we can by reflections see and read those Letters which directly we cannot So we may do here in this highest of spiritual objects The same Apostle that gives us our charge gives us withal our direction Wherefore saith he brethren give all diligence to make your calling and election sure 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as divers copies read it by good works For if ye do these things ye shall never fall For so an entrance shall be ministred to you abundantly into the everlasting Kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Lo first our Calling then our Election not that we should begin with heaven and thence descend to the earth it is enough for the Angels on that celestial Ladder of Jacob to both descend and ascend but that we should from earth ascend to heaven from our Calling to our Election as knowing that God shews what he hath done for us above by that which he hath wrought in us here belowe Our Calling therefore first not outward and formal but inward and effectual The Spirit of God hath a voice and our soul hath an ear that voice of the Spirit speaks inwardly and effectually to the ear of the soul calling us out of the state of corrupt Nature into the state of Grace out of darkness into his marvellous light By thy calling therefore maist thou judge of thine election God never works in vain neither doth he ●ver cast away his saving graces what ever become of the common But whom he did predestinate them also he called and whom he called them he justified and whom he justified them also he glorified This doubtless thou saist is sure in it self but how is it assured to me Resp. That which the Apostle addes as it is read in some copies By good works if therein we also comprehend the acts of believing and repenting is a notable evidence of our election But not to urge that clause which though read in the vulgar is found wanting in our editions the clear words of the Text evince no less For if ye do these things ye shall never fall here is our negative certainty And for onr positive So an entrance shall be ministred unto you abundantly into the everlasting Kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ Lo if we shall never fall if we shall undoubtedly enter into the Kingdom of Christ what possible scruple can be made of the blessed accomplishment of our election What then are these things which must be done by us Cast your eyes upon that precious chain of graces which you shall finde stringed up in the fore going words If you adde to your faith vertue and to vertue knowledge and to knowledge temperance and to temperance patience and to patience godliness and to godliness brotherly kindness and to brotherly kindness charitie If you would know what God hath written concerning you in heaven look into your own bosom see what graces he hath there wrought in you Truth of grace saith the divine Apostle will make good the certainty of your election Not to instance in the rest of that heavenly combination do but single out the first and the last Faith and Charity For Faith how clear is that of our Saviour He that believeth in him that sent me hath everlasting-life and shall not come into condemnation but hath passed from death to life Lo what access can danger have into heaven All the peril is in the way now the believer is already passed into life This is the grace by which Christ dwells in our hearts and