Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	peace_n	spirit_n	unity_n	1,812	5	8.9331	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A33947	A second generall epistle to all the saints wherein is unfolded the covenant of grace, as its a law in the spirit, of light, liberty, righteousness, holinesse, power and glory : as likewise as it is a law of peace, love and edification : published for the good of those who love peace and holinesse / written by T. Collier.	Collier, Thomas, fl. 1691.	1649 (1649)	Wing C5297; ESTC R12986	48,646	138

conversation as wel as of the lips there is not onely the fruit of saying but doing If any man doe my will he shall know saith Christ c. Now this doing consists either 1. In doing workes of piety according to the power and liberty received 2. In doing workes of righteous justice and equity not in seeking alone our owne but others good 3. In doing workes of mercy both to the soules and bodies of those who want else you may see the fruits of this spirit Gal. 5. 22. The fruit of the spirit is love joy peace long-suffering gentlenesse goodnesse faith meeknesse temperance against such there is no law These are the fruits of the spirit which being manifest makes God and truth and Saints appeare lovely not onely each to other but to the world likewise they shall fall downe and confesse That God is in you of a truth These fruits of the spirit Peter mindes 1 Pet. 1. 5. Adde to faith virtue to your virtue knowledg to knowledge patience and to patience temperance and to temperance godlinesse and to godlinesse brotherly kindnesse and to brotherly kindnesse charity Thus the true Christian hath a holy conversation holy within and holy without holinesse written upon the horses bridles every pot in Jerusalem appeares to be holy in al manner of holy conversation and godlinesse a universall walking with and conformity to God in spirit soule and body Their conversation is in heaven their hearts there their minde their comfort and communion and it appeares by their walking before men in their word and actions that it is so Chap. VIII Of false or fleshly holinesse AS there is a holinesse in the spirit so likewise there is a holinesse after the flesh so accounted so called though it be indeed but unholinesse for the man of sinne imitates Christ in every particular and I believe that there hath been as great a mistake in the matter of holinesse in taking it to be what it is not as in any one particular therefore I shal minde a word or two briefly in the discovery of this mystery of iniquity 1. This mystery of iniquity the appearance of holinesse when it is nothing but flesh may be considered either First As it workes within and that either 1. Looking upon good purposes and good resolutions to amend and to doe better Or else 2. In a good minde to leave sin but it wants power a good a holy heart though a bad conversation not knowing that good purposes are common to the worst of men and that where there is a bad outside there is a worse inside for if the streames be filthy the fountaine is much more filthy For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh and the outward man acts an ungodly conversation alwaies flowes from an unsanctified soule if the conversation be light vain and foolish the heart is much more light and vain for all prodigality prophanenesse and vanity hath its first rise in the heart therfore it is the Lord saith My son give me thy heart Or 3. Not only in having a minde to leave it but likewise in having some hatred against it and from hence a forsaking of it because it sees an evill a danger in it perhaps it now apprehends that the wages of sin is death and it feares hell and the eternall flames spoken of in Scripture and from hence growes out of liking with it when perhaps else it could be content many times to embrace it thus most men under the name and notion of Christian deceive themselves with a fleshly fancy of holinesse in the heart when indeed and in truth it is nothing more then fleshly delusions and that which is usually found in the hearts of naturall men Secondly There is likewise a most outward appearance of holinesse in the flesh which is indeed but fleshly and this may be discovered either 1. In the more common and carnall sort who account that now and then the performance of a good act is enough to make them holy and that their good acts will weigh downe their evill they thinke that Lord have mercy upon me or now and then a good prayer is enough to make them holy though perhaps they take the more liberty to sinne by meanes thereof a wonderfull delusion in the mindes of men 2. Others come higher perhaps in an outward civility and an externall acting in the use of Ordinances they will goe to Church as they call it and heare Sermons too perhaps have their Infants sprinkled go to the Sacrament as they call it c. And this is a high degree of holinesse in the mindes of most how doe poore creatures blesse themselves in such vaine and empty formes and fashions to their owne undoing For this is that which is sutable to nature to act in these low and formall waies after the doctrines and precepts of men or after the fleshly imaginations of the vaine and deceitful heart and not after Christ 3. Others come higher then this into an universall as they suppose hatred and forsaking of sin to the acting and performing of that which is good and thus it is much in doing and acting looking upon outward actings to be their holinesse and here hath lien a mysterious mystery of iniquity both in Ministers and People the one teaching the other practising such a holinesse Hence is it that Ministers when they would preach people in holinesse and righteousnesse they presse them to forsake sinne to weepe and mourne pray and heare Sermons to be much in duty and this without all peradventure was enough to make them holy never looking after that internall spirit of holinesse which occasions those external actings sutable to such an internall principle Hence it comes to passe that many poore soules being thus mis-led come under a spirit of delusion or else under a spirit of bondage being sensible of its coming short in performance being daily told that if thou canst not mourne and pray and performe such and such duties then thou art no Christian but Satan rules in thee Now the difference betweene the performance of the externall actings lieth principally in these two things the one acts in it as under a taske a burden a bondage and he hath no comfort till the thing is done the other acts in liberty and freedome of spirit God is his portion without any such acting and God is his portion in it he hath communion with God without it and that is it he expects in it 3. The one acts in duty that he might be holy lookes upon himselfe that the more he is in exercising and performing the more holy he is the other acts in externals because he is holy that is made partaker of that spirit of holinesse all true actions flowing from that fountain of light life liberty and love and thus most under severall forms and apprehensions live low and fleshly contenting themselves with a fleshly holinesse a holinesse consisting in formes formes and creature

but in the spirit likewise where this law is in power this is manifest first to God God being love drawes love from soules its true hee workes it first in them and then being possest with love they cannot but love We love God because he loved us first and this love being shed abroad in the heart by this spirit wee love him wee love him most we love him best he hath the heart the soul and it s married to him all other lovers being rejected in comparison of him 2. This spirit of love and grace produceth love to the Saints in whom the image of God holines and true righteousnes appears take this as an undoubted truth That where the love of God is shed abroad by the spirit there will be a sweet harmony in those soules a sweet agreement Love as brethren being al sonnes related to one Father al possest with one spirit which it a spirit of unity al heirs to one inheritance to one Crowne to one Kingdome al made partaker of the same divine nature which is love there is no one thing wherein the visibility of a Saint more appeares then in love for love is of God and every one who loveth is born of God and knoweth God hee that loveth not knoweth not God for God is love 1 Joh. 4. 7 8. and he that loveth not his brother neither knoweth nor loveth God 3. This spirit of love produceth love in Saints to al it makes those in whom it is like unto their Father who is good unto al and his tender mercy is over al his workes as much as in them lieth they doe good to al especially to those who are of the houshold of faith In a word this spirit takes away that selfish disposition of nature in seeking it self and causeth the soule in whom it is not to seeke alone its owne but others good it workes out that peevish perverse and envious disposition and fils the soul with the spirit of love and that not feigned in shew but in deed and in truth ready with a real minde at al times to doe good to any man to any creature that is capable of receiving good Thus my deare Friends as God is love so those who dwel in God dwel in love and it s from the flesh and not from the spirit that those divisions backbitings and reproachings flow who cal themselves by the name of Christians This I must tel you that where the soul is possest with love and grace from the Father it produceth love and grace sutable to such an injoyment for grace and love in God being shed abroad in us works grace and love in us love to God to Saints to al men and hee that hath not this grace this love in him how dwelleth the love of God in him Chap. XV. It s a Law of Edification 3. THis law in the spirit it s likewise a law of edification it answers that exhortation of the Apostle Let all things be done to edification It is this law of grace which seasons the soul with grace the words and communications with salt that it may minister grace to the hearers have salt in your selves and have peace one with another In a word it delivers soules from earthlinesse vanity and folly from carnal and unprofitable discourses and that word of Christ is made good in them John 7. 38. He that beleeveth in me out of his belly shall flow rivers of living waters And this hee spake of the spirit that he would give and this spirit that he would give and this spirit giveth several gifts worketh several operations but it s given to every one to profit withall How might this discover then first the fleshlinesse of those who pretend to be Christians and yet manifest nothing but flesh vanity and unprofitablenesse in their discourses and communicatitions full of earth and flesh but empty of heavenlinesse and spirit 2. This discovers the fleshlinesse of those pretending such Christianity yet delight in vanity I had almost said slight if not scorne any spiritual or heavenly communication which tends to edification and indeed this law of love and edification is much wanting And therfore my exhortation to al you who have tasted how gracious the Lord is to waite upon him for a more ful pouring forth of this spirit of peace love and edification that so you may declare your selves to be a people of peace and love that you may become a blessing a comfort each to other that the peace and love of God shining in you and through you may so conform you to it self and so gather you up into its owne nature that you may shine forth as a people possest indeed with love that is may be made knowne to al men that you are indeed the children of a heavenly Father not of this world being born from above not of mortal but of immortal seed which shal endure for ever so shal you be to the praise of the glory of his grace who hath called you to an immortall crowne an eternal kingdome and glory which never shall have an end FINIS Errata PAg. 9. lin 1. for in righteous reade inlightens p. 16. l. 15. for eyes r. dies