Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	scripture_n	spirit_n	try_v	2,382	5	8.8588	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A44697	A treatise of delighting in God from Psal. xxxvij. 4. Delight thy self also in the Lord, and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart. In two parts. By John Howe, M.A. sometime fellow of Magdalen College, Oxon.	Howe, John, 1630-1705.	1674 (1674)	Wing H3043; ESTC R215977	202,908	389

whole sanctifying-work to bring home the particular Truth whose Impression it would leave on the Soul with application thereof to it in particular which as generally propounded in Scripture men are so apt to wave and neglect for what is every ones concern is commonly thought no ones And what need that its method here should be wholly diverse But in whichsoever of these ways the Spirit of God doth manifest his love it is not to be doubted but that There is such a thing in it self very necessary and to be attained and sought after And that it is highly delectable when he doth vouchsafe it That there is such a thing to be sought after as a communicable priviledg and favour to holy Souls is evident enough from multitudes of Scriptures Those that have been occasionally mentioned in speaking what was thought fit to be said of the way of his doing it need not be repeated unto which we may add what we find is added to those above-recited words Eye hath not seen c. the things which God hath prepared for them that love him viz. But God hath revealed them to us by his Spirit And that Spirit not only gives those lovers of God above-mentioned a clearer view of the things prepared for them so as that the nature of them might be the more distinctly understood as is argued in the latter part of this and in the following verse but also of their own propriety and interest in them Now we have received not the Spirit of the world but the Spirit that is from God that we may know the things that are freely given us of God Whence therefore they are revealed by the Spirit not as pleasing objects in themselves only but as gifts the evidences and issues of Divine Love their own proper portion by the bequest of that Love to whom they are shew'n Nor is this the work of the Spirit only as inditing the Scriptures but it is such a work as helps to the spiritual discerning of these things such as whereto the natural man is not competent who yet is capable of reading the Scriptures as well as other men And what will we make of those words of our Saviour when having told his Disciples he would pray the Father and he should give them another comforter even the Spirit of Truth that he might abide with them for ever Even the Spirit of Truth c. He adds I will not leave you comfortless I will come to you that is as is plain by that Spirit And then shortly after subjoins He that hath my commandments and keepeth them he it is that loveth me and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father and I will love him and will manifest my self to him Here is an express promise of this love-manifestation whereof we speak by the Spirit the Comforter mentioned above not to those particular persons only unto whom he was then directing his speech or to those only of that time and age but to them indefinitely that should love Christ and keep his commandments Which is again repeated in other words of the same import after Judas not Iscariot his wondering expostulation touching that peculiarly of this loving manifestation Jesus answered and said unto him If any man love me he will keep my words and my Father will love him and we will come unto him and make our abode with him So that such a manifestation as is most aptly expressive of love such converse and cohabitation as imports most of kindness and endearedness they have encouragement to expect that do love Christ and keep his words The same thing no doubt with that shedding abroad of the love of God in their hearts by the Holy Ghost given to them mentioned before And whereas we have so plain and repeated mention of the seal the earnest the first-fruits of the Spirit what can these expressions be understood to import and they do not signifie nothing other than confirmation of the love of God or assuring and satisfying evidences and pledges thereof And that there should be such an inward manifestation of divine love superadded to the publique and external declaration of it which is only made indefinitely to persons so and so characteriz'd the exigency of the case did require That is wherein it was necessary his love should be distinctly understood and apprehended it was so far necessary this course should be taken to make it be so A meer external revelation was not sufficent to that end Our own unassisted reasonings therefrom were not sufficient As other Truths have not their due and proper impression meerly by our rational reception be they never so plain without that holy sanctifying influence before insisted on so this Truth also of Gods love to this person in particular hath not its force and weitht its efficacy and fruit answerable to the design of its discovery unless it be app●ied and urged home on the Soul by a communicated influence of the Spirit to this purpose Many times not so far as to overcome and silence tormenting doubts fears and anguish of spirit in reference hereto and where that is done not sufficient to work off deadness drowziness indisposition to the doing of God chearful service not sufficient to excite and stir up love gratitude admiration and praise How many who have learned not to make light of the love of God as the most do who reckon in his favour is life to whom it is not an indifferent thing whether they be accepted or no who cannot be overly in their enquiry nor trifle with matters of everlasting consequence who are not enough Atheists and Scepticks to permit all to a mad hazard nor easie to be satisfy'd walk mournfully from day to day with sunk dejected spirits full of anxiety even unto agonies under the clear external discovery of Gods love to persons of that character whereof they really are such as observe them judg their case plain and every one thinks well of them but themselves yea their mouths are sometimes stopt by such as discourse the matter with them but their hearts are not quieted or if they sometime are in a degree yet the same doubts and fears return with the former importunity the same work is still to be done and 't is but rolling the returning stone And all humane endeavours to apply and bring home the comforts proper and sutable to their case prove fruitless and ineffectual nothing can be fastened upon them they refuse to be comforted while God himself doth not create that which is the fruit of his own lips peace peace while as yet they are not fill'd with joy and peace in believing and made to abound in hope through the power of the Holy Ghost It is plain there needs a more learned tongue than any humane one to speak a word in season to such weary ones How many again have spirits overcome with deadness and sloth under a settled perhaps

needless unwarrantable modesty as to account you are of a lower rank than all that ever became intimately acquainted with the hidden delights of a godly life At least you are as capable of being thought worthy as any for his sake upon whose account all must be accepted Therefore think with your selves Why should I not labour to attain as far in the matter of Religion as this or that Neighbour of mine What should hinder Who restrains or forbids me But you cannot if you consider but have somewhat more to assure you of the delightfulness of it than the meer report of others For your own Reason and Conscience cannot but so pronounce if you go to the particulars that have been instanc't in If you acknowledg a God and consider your self as a reasonable Creature made by him and depending on him you cannot but see it is congruous and fit your spirit should be so framed and affected towards Him towards your fellow-creatures of your own order and all things else that do and shall circumstantiate your present and future state as hath been in some measure though very defectively represented And that it must needs be very pleasant if it were so You can frame in your mind an Idea of a life transacted according to such rectified inclinations And when you have done so do but solemnly appeal to your own judgment whether that were not a very delectable life And thereupon bethink your self what your case is if you cannot actually relish a pleasure in what your own judgment tells you is so highly pleasurable Methinks you should reflect thus What a monstrous creature am I that confess that delightful wherein yet I can take no delight How perverse a nature have I Surely things are much out of order with me I am not what I should be And one would think it should be uneasie to you to be as you are and that your spirit should be restless till you find your temper rectified and that you are in this respect become what you should be And will you dream and slumber all your days How much time have you lost that might have been pleasantly spent in a course of godliness Do you not aim at a life of eternal delights with God If you now begin not to live to God when will you That life which you reckon shall never end with you must yet have a beginning Will you defer till you dye your beginning to live Have you any hope God will deal in a peculiar way with you from all men and make the other world the place of your first heart-change How dismal should it be to you to look in and still find your heart dead towards God and the things of God so that you have no delight in them Think what the beginnings of the Divine life and the present delights of it must be the earnest of to you and make sure the ground betime of so great an hope BUT I forbear here to insist further and pass on to the Discourse of Delighting in God under the other more strict notion of it viz. As the very act of delight hath its direct exercise upon himself So we are to consider this delight not as a thing some way adherent to all other duties of Religion but as a distinct Duty of it self that requires a solemn and direct application of our selves thereunto For though it seems little to be doubted but there is in this Precept a part of Religion put for the whole as having a real influence and conferring with its name a grateful savour and tincture upon the whole it would yet be very unreasonable not to take special notice of that part from whence the intire frame of Religion hath its name And having shewn the nature of this Duty already in the former part what is now to be said must more directly concern the practice of it And will as the case requires fall into two kinds of Discourse viz. Expostulation concerning the omission and disuse of such Practice And Invitation thereunto And in both these kinds it is requisite we apply our selves to two sorts of Persons viz. Such whose spirits are wholly averse and alien to it And Such as though not altogether unpractis'd are very defective in it and neglect it too much 1. Both sorts are to be expostulated with and no doubt the great God hath a just quarrel with mankind whom these two sorts do comprehend upon the one or the other of these accounts wherein it is fit we should plead with men for his sake and their own And 1. With the former sort Them who are altogether disaffected to God alienated and enemies in their minds through wicked works and excepting such as deny his being with whom we shall not here concern our selves at the utmost distance from delighting in him And as to such our Expostulation should aim at their conviction both of The matter of fact That thus the case is with them And of The great iniquity and evil of it First It is needful we endeavour to fasten upon such a conviction That this is the state of their case For while his being is not flatly deny'd men think it generally creditable to be professed Lovers of God and reckon it so odious a thing not to be so that they who are even most deeply guilty are not easily brought to confess enmity to him but flatter themselves in their own eyes till their iniquity be found to be hateful The difficulty of making such apprehend themselves diseased that their minds are under the power of this dreadful distemper that it is not well with spirits in this respect is the great obstruction to their cure But I suppose you to whom I now apply my self to acknowledg the Bible to be Gods Word and that you profess reverence to the Truth and Authority of that Word and will yeild to be tried by it 1. Therefore first you must be supposed such as believe the account true which that book gives of the common state of man That it is a state of Apostacy from God That the Lord looking down from heaven upon the children of men to see if any did understand and seek God finds they are all gone aside i. e. that the return may answer to the meaning of the inquiry gone off from him Every one of them is gone back or revolted as it is expressed in the parallel Psalm There is none that doth good no not one which is quoted by the Apostle to the intent That every mouth may be stopped and the whole world may become guilty before God This is then a common case And as the same Apostle charges it upon the Gentiles that they were haters of God so doth our Saviour as expresly on the Jews who no doubt thought themselves as innocent of this crime as you That they had both seen and hated both Him and his Father And when it is said of men that they were by nature the