Selected quad for the lemma: world_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
world_n	deny_v	live_v	ungodliness_n	2,303	5	11.2667	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A51228	A sermon preached on the 28th of June, at St. Andrew's Holborn by John Moore ...	Moore, John, 1646-1714.	1691 (1691)	Wing M2553; ESTC R9456	14,371	38

behold iniquity i. e. with the least allowance and approbation it having such a contrary tendency to his Infinite Goodness and Purity and Truth that it must ever be an abomination unto him And for the same reason it is affirmed That without holiness no man shall see the Lord For his Justice like fire would swiftly issue forth and devour the impure Sinner The business then of Religion is to restore the Image of God in our souls which was sullied and defaced by our sins for by a thorough conformity to the Divine Precepts we shall arrive at so happy a temper of mind as only to desire what is suitable to the will of our Father which is in Heaven and to hate only those things which he has forbidden and when these holy dispositions are well settled in our souls then the Glorious Image of God will shine brightly upon them and they will be as so many Lights to guide others who in a lower station are striving to come up to our example But were we admitted into the Presence of God before an entire change was wrought in our minds and all our lusts were mortified as we should be odious in the eyes of God so his Holiness and Purity would fright and amaze us and our polluted souls would sink and dye away at the appearance of so much Goodness and Wisdom and Truth and not find within themselves the least capacity to be delighted with those things that are the true causes of all the Glory and Joy that is in Heaven The mighty design I say of all Religion is to make our Nature conformable to the Divine Nature that is To make us become like unto God in all those Perfections of his Nature which can be imitated by Rational Creatures And in nothing can we approach nearer to the Likeness of God than in striving to do the greatest good we can in every capacity to all our Fellow-Creatures this is a God like Temper whereby we shall extremely resemble our Great Maker and become his Deputies upon Earth and perform that very work which otherwise God would have done himself When we shall have banisht out of our Souls all Rancour and Malice and Pride and Envy when we shall have subdued all Covetous and Greedy desires all fleshly and filthy appetites all peevishness and uneasiness of humour then will our Soul become a most fit and suitable place for the holy Spirit to reside in and our God will delight to dwell in us and we shall have foretasts of the Joys of Heaven even while we remain here upon Earth If we relieve the needy and refresh the distressed if we satisfie the doubting confirm the wavering conduct into the right paths those that are gone astray if we do no hurt to the innocent do not crush the weak nor over-reach the ignorant but are helpful to all as far as our power will extend What a mighty deal of good shall we do to the World in the place and stead of God And how evident shall we make it to men that the Divine Providence doth carefully watch over the Righteous and hath a tender regard to all those that love the Lord by our executing and fulfilling so many of his Gracious and Merciful designs And what unconceivable rewards shall they receive in the other World who are the glorious instruments of God's Providence in this and who by their Piety and Goodness and Chariry do help to bring about so many of the wise and kind contrivances of their Master to render his poor creatures Happy Hence it appears that the Religion which pleases God has in all times been the same and the chief end of it is to Glorify God by an imitation of him in the whole course of our lives This was the great Doctrine taught by the Patriarchs before the Law and by the Prophets under the Law and by our Blessed Saviour and his Apostles since Herein the Laws of Nature and Moses and the Prophets and the Gospel of Christ all agree And as they taught so they lived for the Preachers of Righteousness under these several dispensations did with the most unfeigned love and deepest reverence constantly Worship God they carried themselves with punctual Justice and great Compassion towards their brethren they were peaceable and meek and pure and full of Pity in their conversation The sum of all their Doctrines and the design of all their lives being to do justice and love meroy and walk humbly with their God 2. As the Nature of God and our selves so likewise all the Declarations Precepts Promises and Threatnings publish'd in the Scripture do make it most manifest that we must sow to the Spirit if we hope of the Spirit to Reap Everlasting life If we read those Holy Records from one end to the other we shall not meet with so much as one declaration of God made in favour of obdurate Sinners who are resolv'd not to turn from the wickedness they have committed and to do that which is lawful and right But every where we may observe his Aversion to the ungodly and that their works are loathsome in his sight God has prononnced that these men shall have no lot or share in his Kingdom Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God be not deceived neither fornicators nor idolators nor thieves nor covetous nor drunkards nor revilers nor extortioners shall inherit the kingdom of God 1 Cor. 6. 9 10. Although the Supreme Powers should allow the commission of any of these vile sins in their own Countrey and enact no Laws for the Punishment of the persons who were guilty of them and though false Teachers would undertake to perswade you that you might do such things without losing the Love of God yet your poor souls would be wretchedly deceiv'd if you did practice these great Sins upon the Authority of your Teachers or because they were not punisht by the Laws of the Place where you liv'd For how favourably soever some may think and speak of them and how slightly soever others may correct Fornicators Idolaters c. yet God the Righteous Judg of the whole World does hate and detest these Crimes which will extinguish and destroy all the right they had to inherit the Kingdom of his Glory For because of these things cometh the wrath of God upon the Children of disobedience Eph. 5. 6. And certainly words can hardly be found which more clearly and distinctly express God's abhorrence of Men while they abide in an impenitent State than these Moreover if you take a survey of the Divine Precepts you may perceive that they all have a tendency to establish an universal Holiness in our Minds and Practice nothing less than a total change in our Souls will prepare us for Heaven We must put on the new man which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness We must deny ungodliness and worldly lusts and live soberly and righteously and godly in this

present world For without these Heavenly and Divine Qualifications of Mind we shall never be permitted to behold the pure and glorious Face of God and if we were it would confound us and make us miserable Let then Evil Rulers connive at those Vices which do not seem so directly to hazard and undermine their Government Let the prophane cry up their brutish Sensualities as the most exalted Enjoyments of Human Nature let the frequency of some Sins lessen their ugliness and the sense of their danger with unthinking Men yet the fatal Effects of their Wickedness shall overtake them at the last and they shall find every wilful Sin to have Malignity enough in its Nature to ruin them for the great God does behold all their Lewdnesses and Villanies he causes them all to be recorded against the day of Accounts and they will sink away with extremiry of despair when oppressed with such a vast burden of abominable Iniquities they shall be hailed to the Bar of Judgment For the ways of man are before the eyes of the Lord and he pondereth all his goings his own Iniquities shall take the wicked himself and he shall be holden with the Cords of his Sins he shall die without instruction and in the greatness of his folly shall he go astray Prov. 5. 21. 3. Moreover if you consider the Precepts of our Blessed Saviour you will be fully satisfi'd that they were all levell'd at this single Mark to make Men Holy that is to confer the greatest Benefit upon them they were capable to receive For this was to render them acceptable to God to make them agreeable Company for Angels and compleatly to qualifie them to be Citizens of the New Jerusalem In this one Point did all the Promises of the Gospel and the whole design of the Life of Christ center and settle there is not a Promise made to the Malicious or the Unclean or the Revengeful or the Perjur'd or the Lovers of fleshly Pleasure nor the least anger of God manifested any where against the Humble and the Chast and the Merciful and the Righteous Persons but all the Beatitudes and Blessings of Heaven are bestowed upon the Godly and all the Curses and Punishments do light upon the Head of the Sinner And so it is plain that our Religion was enacted and published not to replenish our Heads with fine Notions nor to furnish our Tongues with Eloquent Discourse but to fill our Hearts with Humility Love and Purity and to govern our Lives and Actions by most Holy Rules And therefore under the Christian Dispensation nothing will avail us or stand our Immortal Souls in the least stead but the keeping of the Commandments of God It now only remaineth that I present you with some Directions that I hope will make a just Impression upon your Minds and be of durable advantage to you 1. The first is to keep constant and firm to the Communion of the Church in which you were Baptized and brought up a Church whose Faith is founded upon the Scriptures and whose Worship of all others cometh nearest to the Pattern left us by the Primitive Christians A Church the freest from Error in what it Teaches and from Superstition in what it Practices of any perhaps in the World which as it hath reformed it self from the Corruptions of the Church of Rome that were so destructive of a good Life so it hath only reteined a very few Rites and Ceremonies for the preservation of Order and Decency and Reverence in the Service of God and upon which it doth not lay so great weight and stress as to hold them unalterable but hath publickly declared That upon weighty and important Considerations according to the various exigency of Times and Occasions such Changes and Alterations may be made therein as to those in Place of Authority shall seem either necessary or expedient Now to them that duly weigh things it must appear very dangerous to leave the Communion of a Church so excellently constituted if you reflect either upon the grievous mischiefs of Separation or upon the great obligations Christ has laid upon us to preserve the unity of the Church It is observable that hardly any thing does occasion more bitterness and heat than an unwarrantable departure from a Church which imposes nothing sinful as a term of Communion For Separatists to justifie their departure will be apt to charge great faults how little soever deserved upon the Society they have left and so of course grow more sowr and censorious whereby animosities will encrease and the breach will be continually widen'd by fresh provocations Thus by these needless divisions the charity and good will which our blessed Master so strictly required and of which he was so glorious an Example does wast and consume away and Christians thus unjustifiably split into Parties instead of mutually supporting one another against the Common Enemy which doth thirst after their destruction do bite tear and devour each other and hereby the Band of Love which should hold us together is broken and the several Members of that Body whereof Jesus Christ is the Head are disjoynted and become useless to the holy and merciful purposes for which he did unite them It is much to be lamented that divers of those who have forsaken our Church and which they have not yet proved to have enjoyned any thing unlawful under pretence of greater edification and of joyning in a purer Communion have upon the same ground had others separate from them and these again have left others till at length they have been of no Communion at all and so with their Church have at last also lost their Religion And yet nothing is of more necessity than that the Unity of this Body of Christ the Church should be preserved entire This the Christians are frequently exhorted and strictly commanded to keep whole with the greatest care and upon this union of Members mighty blessings are bestowed there being scarce any promise of our Lord made to particular Christians but with relation to their being parts of his Church We are earnestly required to endeavour to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace with all lowliness and meekness with long suffering forbearing one another And the reason of all this is because there is one body and one spirit one hope of our calling one Lord one faith one baptism one God and Father of all who is above all and through all and in us all St. Paul beseeches the Romans to set a mark upon them who cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which they had learned and to avoid them And most pathetically he beseeches the Corinthians by the name of the Lord Jesus Christ that they all speak the same thing and that there be no divisions among them but that they be perfectly joyned together in the same mind and in the same judgment He also presseth the Philippians to stand fast in one spirit