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
A47013	Maran atha: or Dominus veniet Commentaries upon the articles of the Creed never heretofore printed. Viz. Of Christs session at the right hand of God and exaltation thereby. His being made Lord and Christ: of his coming to judge the quick and the dead. The resurredction of the body; and Life everlasting both in joy and torments. With divers sermons proper attendants upon the precedent tracts, and befitting these present times. By that holy man and profound divine, Thomas Jackson, D.D. President of Corpus Christi Coll. in Oxford.	Jackson, Thomas, 1579-1640.; Oley, Barnabas, 1602-1686.	1657 (1657)	Wing J92; ESTC R216044	660,378	504

good to him because it is from God His soul is good because he knows and as it were feels it to be created by God his health seems good because it springs from him who is The Fountain of Salvation He loves these because they are good But he loves God above all because he is better then all even then the best of all his Blessings These are only Good because they are seasoned with a spice or savor of Gods Goodness Now as it recreates an hungry man to smell meat but much more to tast it so is it a matter to be more desired to tast the Goodness of God as the Psalmist speaks then to enjoy the sweet Savor or Fragrance of him in his Creatures And we best tast the Goodness of God by doing His Will and pleasure as our Saviour saith John 4. 34. My meat is to do the will of him that sent me and to finish his work As we de desire our Spirit at the hour of death should return to God not only because he gave it but because also he is our Blisse so even in this life the sweetest joy that can be found is when we are lifted up in Spirit to behold and tast the Goodness of God when we can say with the Blessed Virgin My soul doth magnifie the Lord. We should never desire Him to do us any Good but with an instant Return of a more earnest desire to be inabled to do what he would have us do to love him above all and all other things for his sake Having our thoughts and desires thus composed although we have not the particular things we desire yet shall we have our Hearts desire because we delight in the Lord who alone can satisfie our hearts otherwise unsatiable Whereas the wicked albeit he get possession of what he most desired yet hath he not his hearts desire because the desire of it was like a good arm as we say cast aw●● being set upon a wrong Object not on the goodness of his God nor on his blessings for his sake but for themselves He setteth his eyes upon that which is nothing Prov. 23. 5. and so cannot satisfie This gives witness to the truth of what the Psalmist saith Psal 37. 16. A small thing that the righteous hath is better then great riches of the ungodly To the godly The loving kindness of the Lord is better not only then all the means of life but then life it self his soul is satisfied as it were which marrow and fatness and his mouth praiseth God with joyful lips As Saint John saith we cannot love God whom we have not seen unlesse we love our brother whom we have seen So neither can we delight in God who is a Spirit unless we first delight purely and aright in his blessings which are sensible and agreeable to nature For it is true in this sense First is that which is natural and then that which is spiritual And the more we delight in them so we duly consider they are his blessings and that as well the continuance of them as of our abilitie to delight in them depends upon His pleasure the more still we delight in Him 10. It is an excellent Rule which Solomon hath given in this case Remember thy Creator in the dayes of thy youth while the evil dayes come not nor the years approach wherein thou shalt say I have no pleasure in them Eccles 12. 1. To be a Creator in Solomons Language imports as much as to be the maker of our Bodies and souls the Sole giver of all things wherein we can delight and sole Author of all the abilities and faculties which make us apt to take delight therein sole disposer of all opportunities that bring about the matters wherein we most delight And To remember our Creator in his Language also is diligently and continually to ponder these things and to be affected or moved with them according to their weight and importance But why doth he charge us to remember God in the dayes of our youth Because in that age we are apt to take greatest delight in our selves or any thing truly delightfull our spirits being then most fresh and lively so that the measure of our delight whether in our selves or in things without us being then truly taken would impell us to a equal delight in Him that was Author and Creator of Both and to correspondent Gratulation whereas deferring of this Remembrance or notice of our Creator till old age come upon us wherein life growes to be a burden and the wonted delights of life either irksom or insipid unpleasant or without all tast or rellish our thankfulness for them will be but faint our gratulation worthless our devotion cold and lumpish The former due estimate of our Creators goodness being planted in youth our delight in him would grow as our bodily abilities for all natural performances did decay we might truely say with the Apostle when I am weak then I am strong and with the Psalmist They shall bring forth more fruit in their Age c. 11. Thus it was with Abraham he had feared God in his youth and obeyed him in his Mature age and though he obtained a son by miraculous means in his old age yet was he not more joyful at his Birth and growth then ready to give him Again to God in his best age He did unto God in this particular as God had done to him nay he did as he desired God should do to him and God did to him above what he could desire because he was so Ready to do what God commanded him He took and offered Isaac his son his only son in whom both he and all the nations of the earth as he hoped should be blessed and God in lieu of this his obedience and thankfulness promiseth and in the fulness of Time sendeth his only son in whom he was well pleased to assume Abrahams seed and to offer himself in sacrifice for the sins of the world a sacrifice for a blessing to all mankind Thus if we shew our selves truly thankful for blessings past God gives us over and above what we could desire do we but what he would have done by us he doth more then we could wish should be done for us As he offered Isaac his only Son whom he loved in hope to receive him again in a Joyful Resurrection so must we offer our dearest affections our chief desires yea our bodies and souls in sacrifice to him in hope to receive them glorified and crowned with immortalitie in the life to come This is to love God with all our heart withall our soul and with all our strength There should be the same mind in us which was in Christ Jesus He laid down his life for us and we should be willing to lay down ours for our Brethren which is the chief and most Transcendent part of the second Table but much more should we be willing to offer our

matter at least to the Prophets foresight of question But that the Lord would repent him of the plagues denounced so they would pray in faith was Iuris liquidi a point whereof he never doubted Nor is it possible our hearts should ever be throughly pierced with the right conceit either of our own or of our Countries sins without this undoubted Perswasion of Gods infinite love towards all and every one of us Impossible it is for us his Embassadors to be armed with such indefatigable Courage and diligence as the times require either for discharge of our duty in denouncing his plagues against the impenitent or in averting men from impenitency and exciting them to true repentance until our souls be firmly possessed with the Prophets Doctrine Of Gods immutable Facility to repent him of such plagues as without our repentance are eternally and immutably decreed against us These Alternations of Gods loving kindness and severitie towards the Same People yea towards the same Individual Persons are as the Tropicks under which the Messengers of Peace must constantly run their contrary courses sometime exhorting with all long-suffering to embrace his mercies otherwhile sharply reproving and powerfully threatning his fearful Judgements Constancy in truly observing and duly entertaining the just occasions of this contrariety in the matter of our message is as the Centre on which our souls being throughly setled the whole Frame of our affections whether of love unto their persons or of hate unto their sins over whom he hath made us over-seers becomes parallel to the Almighties Will who though he punish the impenitent with death temporal and eternal yet doth he not will their impenitencie but useth all meanes possible to bring them unto true repentance 12. It is I confess A matter hard for flesh and blood to conceive so much as may satisfie this desire of knowing the manner how Omnipotency should for many generations be possessed with an eager longing after a peoples safety which in the end must be destroyed How the great Creator of Heaven and Earth which gave Being to all things by his Word and made our souls immortal by his breath should be as it were in a continual childbirth of sinful men seeking to fashion and quicken them with the Spirit of Life and yet they after all this travel prove but abortive and mis-shapen like the untimely fruit of a woman which never saw the Sun never to be seen amongst the living But no marvel if we poor Worms of the earth blind and naked perceive not the force or nature of those burning flames of eternal and unchangeable Love such is the very nature of our God seeing they are seated in that glorious inaccessible light Yet of that eternal and glorious Sun whose brightness no mortal eye may look upon and live we may behold a true and perfect Module in the Ocean of mercy and compassion in the watry eyes of the Son of God with sighs bewailing impoenitent Jerusalems woful Case If thou hadst known even thou at least in this thy day the things that belong unto thy peace but now they are hid from thine eyes Luke 19. 42. And elsewhere O Hierusalem Hierusalem thou that killest the Prophets and stonest them that are sent unto thee how often would I have gathered thy children together even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings and ye would not Matth. 23. 37. If Christ Jesus as truly God as man did thus thirst after Ierusalems peace after Ierusalem thus glutted with the Prophets blood did thirst most eagerly after his farre be it from us to think his loving kindness is utterly estranged from us albeit our sins have made a great separation betwixt him and us Let us not then trifle out the time with Curious Disputes concerning the manner of his Decree but rather seek him with all speed and diligence whilest he may be found laying sure hold on his mercie before the swift approach of his iudgements violently haled down each day more than other by the grievous weight of our sins remove it without the reach of Ordinary Repentance 13. It is a truth most delightful and comfortable to Contemplate That The Immensitie of our God is as full of mercy and compassion as the Sea is of water or the body of the Sun of light But let us withall consider That the more abundant his loving kindness towards us the more sweet and fragrant his invitations have been the more grievously have we provoked his fierce wrath and indignation by our continual wilful refusal to be gathered under the shadow of his wings daily stretcht out in mercy for our safety Be we sure God knows his own as well as we do ours and will not be over-reached by us The longer we deferre the renewing of his wonted favours the dearer we must account it will cost us our suit at death will be more difficult Those prayers those tears those sighs or other attendants or concomitants of true repentance which in times past would have gone for currant will hereafter be esteemed light or counterfeit And yet alas Who is he in Court or Country in the City or in the Village in the Academy or among the Ignorant or illiterate that layes his own or others sins to heart as he should Or poures forth such fervent prayers and supplications unto his God as our Predecessors have done upon lesse signification of his displeasure and fewer fore-warnings of his judgements then we have had continually these divers years past Yea who is he amongst all the Sons of Levi that with Jeremy and Baruch hath utterly disavowed all care or study of his own advancement or contentment that he may entirely consecrate his soul his thoughts and best imployments to his Masters will to take away the precious from the vile to be as Gods mouth to cause others to conform themselves to him not to conform himself to them To set himself as a wall of brass for this rebellious people to fight against whilst he thunders out Gods judgments against great and small without all respect of persons Nay doth not Nobility Gentry and Commonalty Clergy and Laity yea I dare say it as well singula generum as genera singulorum so mightily set their minds on great matters and so stretch their inventions either for getting more or for improving what they have gotten to the utmost value as if we would give God and men to understand that we had no inheritance in that Good Land wherein The Lord placed our Fathers But only a short Remainder of an expiring Estate which we despere to renew or as if we would have it proclaimed in Gath or published in Askalon that the fear of them is already fallen upon the natural Inhabitants of this Land now labouring only to prevent them in gathering up the present commodities or to defeat them of their expected spoil We demean our selves just as the manner is when Enemies more potent then can safely be forthwith

plagues that shed it because never laid unto their charge it may notwithstanding exempt them and their children from hope of mercy or mitigation of punishments due unto them for other sins Or that such as since his death have pined away in their own sins and the sins of their fathers did therefore perish because he had absolutely decreed not to save them or grant them means of repentance God forbid This were more then to say They stumbled that they should fall And in as much as the riches of the world will be much greater by their fulness then by their Fall or diminution the fault is ours as well as theirs that their Conversion is not accomplished Both we and they are liable to a strict account That we would not be gathered when God would have gathered us CHAP. XLIV 2 KINGS 23. 26 27. Notwithstanding the Lord turned not from the fierceness of his great wrath wherewith his anger was kindled against Iudah because of all the provocations that Manasseh had provoked him withal And the Lord said I will remove Judah also out of my sight as I have removed Israel and will cast off this City Jerusalem which I have chosen and the house of which I have said my Name shall be there 1. THe Points to be discussed are Two First How the Lord might justly punish Iudah for Manasseh's sins and sins committed in His time in the dayes of good Josiah and His Sons Secondly In what manner God proceeded to execute this his fierce wrath denounced against Iudah For your better satisfaction in the Former Point You are to consider the Nature and Tenor of Gods General Covenant with this people The miraculous Blessings and extraordinary Curses proposed unto the two several wayes of Life and Death which Moses first had set before this people are sufficiently known being most expresly set down Levit. 26. and Deut. 28. throughout the whole Chapters The like Covenant was renewed with Davids Line in the same Tenor. Psal 89. 29 c His Seed will I make to endure for ever and his Throne as the dayes of Heaven But if his Children forsake my Law and walk not in my judgments If they break my Statutes and keep not my Commandements Then will I visit their transgressions with the rod and their iniquity with stripes Neverthelesse my loving kindness will I not utterly take from him nor suffer my faithfulnesse to fail Or Neither will I falsifie my truth This promise was Absolute for Christ Conditional for the other Sons of David and consists not in their Immunitie from punishments but in the Assurance of their recovery upon their penitencie The Tenor of both Covenants then in brief was Thus. Following the foot-steps of Abraham or David they should be blessed extraordinarily Forsaking their wayes and following the Customs of other Nations they should be punished more severely then other men yet so that if in their distress they did turn again unto the Lord for Abraham's and for David's sake they should be restored to his wonted mercie and favour So saith the Lord Levit. 26. 44 45 And yet for all that he supposeth his plagues denounced had already overtaken them When they be in the land of their enemies I will not cast them away neither will I abhorre them to destroy them utterly and to break my Covenant with them for I am the Lord their God But I will remember them according to the Covenant of old Or I will for their sakes remember the Covenant of their Ancestors whom I brought forth out of the Land of Egypt And in the 42. verse of the same Chapter when they shall confesse their iniquity before him in their distresse He saith He would remember His Covenant with Jacob and also his Covenant with Isaac and with Abraham The same Covenant is more solemnly established at the Dedication of the Temple 2 Chron. 6. by Salomon He supposed this People should be plagued for their sins as others were But yet if they turned to the Lord with all their heart and with all their soul in the Land of their captivity the effect of his Petition is That the Lords eyes should be open and his ears attent unto the prayers which they made towards the Temple which he had built And in this sense is God said to shew mercie unto thousands in such as love Him and keep his Commandements Because for Abraham and for David's sake they still enjoyed the assurance of recovering their ruinate and decayed Estate 2. Yet here we are again to consider that the Covenant was not made In capita as if it were to begin intirely with every particular Man but rather with their whole Successions in their several Generations They stood all joyntly bound to obey the Lord their God So as Posterity must make up the Arrerages of their Fathers ryot by their warie and diligent observance of those Commandements which the other had broken If the Fathers had sinned by Idolatry the Posterity must redeem their sins or break them off by preaching reformation of Religion and restoring the true Worship of God again If the Fathers had caused Gods wrath upon the Land by oppression extortion and cruelty the Children must divert it by mercie bountie and open-handedness towards the Poor and by restitution of goods ill-gotten by their Fathers unto their proper Owners or by restoring goods rightly enjoyed but imployed amiss unto their natural and right use If the Fathers have transgressed all or most of Gods neg Commandments the children are bound to rectifie their errors by practising the affirmative duties of the Law In a word as the Fathers offences have been greater either in multitude magnitude or continuance so must the Vertues and Piety of Posterity abound in Perfection of Parts Intention of Degrees and Duration of time For although it be most true that the Childrens teeth are not set on edge for their Fathers eating sour grapes but the soul that sinneth it shall die Ezek. 18. Yet is not this so to be understood but that the son may be punished for those sins which his Father only did actually commit if so he seek not to rectifie his errors by inclining to the Contrary Duties For not so doing His fathers sins are made his by participation and the Curse becomes hereditary As he that helpeth not when he may doth further or abett the evil done by others and is thereby made Accessary or part-taker of other mens sins So likewise are the Children guilty of their fathers transgressions and liable to Gods wrath caused by them if they seek not to rectifie the same by their zealous prayers speedie repentance and unfeigned turning to the Lord. So is it said Ezek. 18. 14. The Son that seeth all his fathers sins which he hath done and feareth neither doth such like but rather if the father have cruelly oppressed and spoiled his brother by violence he feeds the hungrie and clothes the naked and keeps all Gods Statutes he