Selected quad for the lemma: work_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
work_n	create_v	good_a	workmanship_n	4,350	5	11.8942	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A65694	Eighteen sermons preached upon several texts of Scripture by William Whittaker, late minister of Magdalen Bermondsey, Southwark ; to which is added his funeral sermon preached by Sam. Annesley.	Whittaker, William, 1629-1672.; Annesley, Samuel, 1620?-1696.	1674 (1674)	Wing W1718; ESTC R29271	230,495	446

supplies you and provides for you do you think there is any thing of worth or desert in you that you enjoy so much of health and so many outward comforts it is not upon your own account that God is thus bountiful and yet we find it was so much the folly of the People of Israel that they were ready to attribute all the Kindness of God to something or other in themslves and tehrefore it is that God himself is so often their Remembrancer and Monitour to put them in mind and to correct those mistakes about his choosing them to be his peculiar People whom he owned above all the People in the World Besides they were apt to think that there was something in them that might incline God to this kindness no says God in Deut. 7,7 8. The Lord did not set his love upon you nor chuse you because ye were more in number then any People but because the Lord loved you c. You may delude your selves with these fancies but because the Lord loved you he chose you and he loved you because he loved you His love had no motive but what was from himself no motive but only his own loving kindness and goodness Ezek 36.22.23 Thereofe say unto the House of Israel thus saith the Lord God when he promised great Mercies to them I do not this for your sakes oh House of Israel but for my Holy Names sake c. The kindnessess that God speaks of there are highly great and yet not any of them were upon the account of any thing in them And this it is really with us now as in some few instances 1. Gods electing love which is the first born of all Mercies and the first link of that golden Chain which you have in this very Chapt. 28.29 whom he did foreknow he also did p●edestinat c. This electing love it hath its first rise from the absolute will of God This is not the absolute purchase of Christs merits yet this is through Christ in some sense Eph. 1.4 According as he hath chosen us in him that is in Christ as in the verse before we are chosen in him it is not said for him so that all the kindness that God hath for us even this which seems to be an Act of the highest Freedom and the most eminent expression of Gods rich grace That he should chuse and and pick out some and select them from the common multitude of mankind and to set them apart as special objects of his favour though this was from the absolute will of God was in and through Christ if you ask how I answer we are chosen in him not as the Foundation of our election but because we are chosen in him for his Members as He is our head That this first love of God had some reference to Christ though not as the onely procuring Cause yet as the consummating Cause to accomplish is abundantly evident through the Scripture we are elected in him that is that he should perfect this blessed and gracious decree of God upon us Eph. 3.11 According to the Eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord. What purpose was this it was a purpose to save some to set his Heart and love upon some his electing love was thus far in Christ 2. The love of Conversion is in and through Christ Eph. 2.10 We are his Workmanship created in Christ Jesus unto good works c. And though God is the sufficient Cause of all the grace we partake of yet Christ is the meritorious Cause it is the gift of God and yet withal it is the purpose of Christ it is God alone that bestows grace and it is for the sake of Christ alone that he doth bestow it compare those two places James 1.17 you read that God is the Father of Lights But it comes all from God in and through Christ John 10.10 I am come that they might have Life and that they might have it more abundantly God is willing to give it but it is in and through Christ that he gives it 3. Again to instance in the love of God in Justification it is God alone forgives sin and our Saviour herein appears to be equal with the Father because he hath committed all power into his hand power to forgive sins Now as God onely can forgive sin so it is onely for the sake of his Son that he doth forgive it Eph. 4.32 Even as God for Christs sake hath forgiven you If God hath forgiven you it is not for your own sakes but for the sake of Christ do you forgive one another pass by injuries forgive offences make this your pattern which is the highest pattern that ever was or can be Col. 1.14 In whom we have Redemption through his Blood even the forgiveness of sins We have Redemption and Forgiveness but all come streaming down in the Blood of Christ In a word to sum up all the several Acts of Gods distinguishing love they are all in and through Christ and therefore you read that Doxology Eph. 1.3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who hath blessed us with all Spiritual blessings in Christ He hath blessed us with the choicest blessings but all these are in and through Christ I shall now give you some Arguments to prove it and I shall only mention three First Because God neither can nor does love us as we are in our selves Matt. 3.17 And loe a Voyce from Heaven saying this is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased It is not spoken of Gods love to him in a common respect but of something peculiar to him and there is this double limitation as Interpreters note this is the Son of mine whom I eminently love and this is that Son of mine for whose sake I love the Sons of men all do acknowledge that this love is a confined and limited love that is spoken of here but yet they explain it thus My beloved Son in whom I am well pleased That is in whom I am eminently pleased and for whose sake I am pleased with them whose cause he undertakes As that Oyl that was powered on Aarons head descended to the Skirts of his Garment so that love that God hath to Jesus Christ descends to all his inferiour Members John 17.23 26. I in them and they in me that they may be made perfect in one c. These are high Expressions and such as exceed the capacity of all mortal men that God should love us with the same love wherewith he loved his Son The most sober sense by Interpreters given of these words is this That God in and through Christ loves his People for his sake with the same kind of love though not with the some degree of love Eph. 1.6 We are accepted in the Beloved if God accepts of us or smiles upon us it is in and through Christ Eph. 1.5 6. Having predestinated us to the adoption of Children