Selected quad for the lemma: duty_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
duty_n	affection_n	good_a	love_n	1,128	5	5.0684	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A93249	A heavenly conference between Christ and Mary after His resurrection. Wherein the intimate familiarity, and near relation between Christ and a believer is discovered.	Sibbes, Richard, 1577-1635.	1654 (1654)	Wing S3736A; Thomason E1512_1; ESTC R209503	104,104	253

of reverence for it includeth a mixt affection of fear and love And it is an affection of an inferior to a superior He is great therefore we ought to fear him He is good therefore we ought to love him There is with him beams of Majesty and bowels of compassion As there is beams of Majesty we ought to fear him as bowels of compassion we ought to love him so that fear and love mixt together is the affection we owe to God as our Father If we tremble and are afraid to go to him we know not he is loving If we go to him over boldly and sawcily we forget that he is great therefore we must think of his greatness that we forget not his goodness We must so think of his goodness that we forget not his greatness therefore go boldly to him with reverence to the Throne of Christ In the word Father there is more saving power then in ten thousand it toucheth his very bowels when a Child wanteth any thing and is in distress let it but say Father or Mother and the bowels of the Parents yearn upon him If God be our Father go to him boldly but with reverence go with affyance to his bowels Oh it is a perswasive word What cannot we look for from that Majesty that hath condescended to be called Father and to be a Father to us in all our necessities either we shall have what we want and lack or else we shall have that which is better he is a wise Father he answereth not alwayes according to our wills but alwayes according to our good He seeth it is for our good that we are not presently cōforted The Physitian giveth a sharp potion O I cannot indure the Chyrurgion lanceth oh I cannot indure it but the Chyrurgion knoweth it is not healing time even so we would be presently taken off from under crosses but God is a wise Father knoweth how long it is fit for us to continue under the Crosse Come to him boldly therefore under the name of a Father that he may move his bowels and surely will hear us For as in Psalm 27. when all forsook me my Father and Mother forsook me but the Lord took me up Fathers in the flesh and Mothers die but the Lord taketh us up he is an eternal Father and therefore a ground of eternal boldnesse with God and of everlasting comfort He was our Father before we had a Father in the world and he will be our Father when we shall cease to be in the world They be but Instruments under God to bring us into the world God is our true Father Our other Fathers are but under God to give us a being to fit us for Heaven He provideth the best inheritance and paternity for us in Heaven And therefore never be disconsolate but remember I go to my Father and your Father which is a word of eternal comfort He was our Father from eternity in election he will be our Father to eternity in glorification Can a Mother forget her Child yea though she should yet can I not forget thee thou art written in the palm of my hand God hath us alwayes in his eye A mother cannot alwayes think of her Child she sleepeth sometimes but God is a Father that never sleepeth The Keeper of Israel neither slumbereth nor sleepeth And this is our comfort in all times and for eternity And therefore we ought to carry our selves to God reverently and go boldly to him and alwayes make use of him And this we should learn likewise to maintain a sweet frame between God and us shall God open such an advantage to us shall God be our Father and bear the gracious eternal affection of a Father and shall not we by prayer and faith fetch from our Father all we stand in need of As our Saviour saith you that be earthly Fathers when your Children ask such a thing will you deny And have we a Father so rich so loving and shall not we have intercourse with him in all our daily necessities What a Trade is open to us if we know what a comfort is laid up in the sweet relation of a Father Your Father knoweth what we stand in need of and he will give thee the spring of all graces not only a broken heart a spirit of life and vigor in his service but go to God and he will give thee his holy spirit which is the best thing next Christ that can be And therefore be incouraged to make intercourse between thee and God considering we have a Brother in Heaven our nature is there and our spirit is below we have the best things in Heaven next Christ on earth and God hath our flesh in Heaven by Christ and therefore why should we not be much in prayer and much in prayses in all our necessities Beloved it is a comfort of that largeness that I cannot express it I rather leave it to your admiration that you may see what use to make of this sweet relation of Father 1. But we must know that every one cannot say my Father for there are a company of men in the world that may say in some respects our Father but in other respects they cannot As our Saviour Christ saith peremptorily John 8. 44. You be of your Father the Devil They bragged of God their Father and they were of their Father the Devil Therefore consider who is fit to take this name into their mouths My Father mark the disposition of the Scribes and Pharisees and then you shall see who be fit to bragg of God as their Father They be very formal men look to their outward devotion who so devout as they They studied it but what were they for the inside they were malitious men they were satanical men men opposite to the power of Religion arrant Hypocrites painted Sepulchres It is no matter for Complement or formality an Hypocrite may have much of that in the eys of the world yet may be a Child of the Devil for all that and a Pharisee for all that Thou maist be malitious against the truth as the Pharisees sought Christs blood A man may be like Herod seeking the blood of Christ in his Members persecuting Christ as all cruel men do They seek to devour Christ in his professors what they can they disparage and dishearten them they are enemies to the power of Religion and to the Ordinances of God they be the Children of the Devil and therefore have no reason at all to bragg that God is their Father Indeed an inward bitter disposition against the power of Religion though under any formality is a Character of a satanical spirit such cannot say Our Father If they do it is an usurpation for their true Father is the Devil ● Who then can say our Father those that by the spirit of the Father and the Son by the Holy Ghost are ingraffed

Father by vertue of Christs satisfaction to justice and conquest over all our enemies The God of peace saith the holy Apostle Paul in the Epistle to the Hebrews in the conclusion of that excellent Epistle that brought you from death to life through our Lord Jesus Christ How cometh he to be the God of peace to us which brought us from death to life by our Lord Jesus why the Resurrection of Christ makes him the God of peace Who raised him He raised himself But who together with himself The Father raised him And could the Father raise him if he were not reconciled But now he is the God of peace for peace is made by the Crosse and blood of Christ the great peace-maker of heaven and earth now we may conceive of God under the sweet relation of a Father Now this Relation of a Father teacheth us as what we may expect from God so what we ought to return to God again and how we ought to carry our selves one towards another 1. What we may expect from God being a Father We may expect whatsoever a Child may expect from a Father God taketh not upon him empty names He saith he will be a Father not only called a Father but I will be your Father and you shall be my Sonnes 2 Cor. 6. ult All the Fatherhood and all the kindred in heaven and earth that is spiritual the comfort of it cometh from God the Father reconciled to us in Christ The word in the original is so strong that we cannot express it in English Fathers on earth are but poor Fathers and they be but beams of the Fatherly affection that is in God God will let us see by these beams of compassion that is in a Father to a Child what real compassion he beareth to us The true reality of Fatherhood is in God And therefore when we hear of the name of Father think of whatsoever lieth in the bowels of a Father to a Child and that we may expect from God our Father and infinite more It is a great indulgence as a Father pittieth his Child Malac. 3. so God will pitty us Will a Father cast off his Child Indeed he will cleanse the Child So God will take away our abominations and purge us when we defile our selves it is because of an eternal relation he casteth us not off we may expect from him indulgence and it is an indulgence of indulgence God needed no Sonne when he made us Sonnes yet he had his Sonne and angels to praise himself withall Can we pitty and pardon a Child and will not God pardon and pitty us why should we conceive worse of him then of our selves will we give pitty to a Father and not pitty to the Father of all bowels and compassion and therefore think not that God will cast us off God pardons us and healeth our infirmities and pittieth us as a Father pittieth his own Child Psal 103. It is a name under which no man must despair What despair under the name of a Father despair of mercy when we have a Father to go to The poor prodigal when he had spent his patrimony his body his good name had lost all and nothing left yet he had a Father and I will go to him And so when we be at the last cast and have spent all we have a Father therefore go to him What saith the Church Isaiah 63. 64. Doubtlesse thou art our Father when the Church was in a poor condition Though our righteousnesse be as a menstruous Cloth and we be defiled yet thou art our Father we are the Clay thou art the Potter c. So that it is a name of indulgence You have his disposition set down by the Father of the prodigal The Sonne saith he will go to the Father the Father runneth to him and meeteth him when he was coming God runneth to us and is ready to meet us when we begin to repent of sin and are sencible of our faults He is more ready to pardon then we to aske pardon I touch only some principal things that you may remember against the evil day and hour of temptation He taketh not on him the relation of a Father for nought but will fill it up to the uttermost It is no empty Relation 2. It is a name likewise of comfort It is the speech of a natural man a little punishment is enough from a Father he knoweth whereof we are made he remembers we are but dust he knoweth we are not Iron nor steel he knoweth our making and therefore he will deal gently with us when he doth correct us it is as necessary as our daily bread to have gentle correction to wean us from the world yet he doth it gently A little punishment will serve from a gratious Father 3. It is a name likewise of provision that we may expect from God that he will in all our exigencies and necessities provide for us whatsoever shall be needful What saith our Saviour Christ to the poor Disciples doubting of want It is your Fathers good will to give you the Kingdom what then fear not little flock he that will give you a Kingdom will not he give you daily bread viaticum provision for a Journey He that intendeth us Heaven certainly he will provide for us here And therefore in the Lords prayer before all Petitions as a ground of all he putteth in our Father and therefore give us our daily bread our Father And therefore he will give us grace to sanctifie his name and do his will and forgive us our sins Expect all from our Father which is the ground of all Christ had much adoe to perswade his Disciples that they should not want necessaries and therefore he makes whole Sermons to strengthen their faith in this your heavenly Father knoweth what you stand in need of The Sonne cannot aske but the Father can interpret any sigh any groan and knoweth what we would have And therefore being Gods Children we may fetch provision from him in all conditions 4. And with provisions protection likewise and therefore make this use of it In the temptations of Satan lie under the wings of our Father We have a Father to go to make use of him make use of his protection that God would shield us that he would be a Tower as he is a Tower and the righteous man may fly to him Lie under his wings he is a gratious Father and he hath taken this sweet relation on him for this purpose that we may have comfort in all conditions You see then what we may expect from God by this sweet relation he hath taken on him in Christ to be our Father 2. This word it is a word of Relation it bindeth God to us and us to God We are to honour him as our Father This one word is sufficient to expresse our duty to a Father and that is a word