Selected quad for the lemma: hand_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
hand_n	good_a	see_v	time_n	4,869	5	3.3925	3	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A95851	Mercies memorial: or, Israel's thankful remembrance of God in their high estate, for his mercifull remembring of them in their low estate. In a sermon before the Right Honourable the Lord Mayor, the Right Worshipful the Aldermen, and the Companies of the city London, on the 5th. of November, 1656. / By Ralph Venning.	Venning, Ralph, 1621?-1674.	1656 (1656)	Wing V204; Thomason E899_1; ESTC R5095	21,499	40

will cause all my goodness that is my glory that is my Name wherein I glory to pass before thee You have been honourable and why should I not hope you will be honourable still in good works there are poor Children here before your eyes that call upon you saying Remember us in our low estate there are many Hospitals that call for this remember us in our low estate And mark I beseech you what hath the name of pure Religion and what hath the name hath the nature of it Jam. 1.27 Pure Religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction and to keep himself unspotted from the World this is the great spot of the World that it is a cruel World a World without bowels of pitie and compassion a World that remembers not them that are in a low estate Mercy is the Churches Grace and the Churches Glory and therefore I beseech you that you will remember as occasion offers and when you are going out of these doors forget not these words Remember the poor There is nothing more unbecomming a people that have received mercy then to be hard hearted not to have bowels of mercie it is to put a blot on our own enjoyments and to be wanting to that which we proclaim with joy and triumph this day Oh love and pitie them that are in a low estate remembring that you your selves were sometimes low such were some of you Thou shalt saith God Deut. 10.19 Love the stranger for you were strangers in the house of Egypt and ye know the heart of a stranger Exod. 23.9 You have had experience what a sad and disconsolate heart attends a low estate let therefore the brother of a low degree rejoyce that he is exalted Jam. 1.9 yet so as to condiscend to men of low estate Rom. 12.16 we seldome forget God or man in our high estate but it may be said as Ezek. 16.22 in all thine abominations thou hast not remembred the daies of thy youth when thou wast naked and bare in a low estate It was the brand that Gallio lay under when the Saints were persecuted that he cared not for these things O it is a sad brand a very black character when it may be said of men that they do not care for these things But again Thirdly Doth God remember his people in their low estate O then let his People remember him in their high estate he hath set you on high O now remember him in your high estate it is but equal that if God remember us when we are low that we should remember God when we are high To sin against the deliverances of God and a God of deliverance too is double iniquity and yet it is mans great vanity and unhappiness that he is seldome more apt to forget God at any time then then when he hath most cause to remember him when he hath mercy before his eye yet then to forget a God see this Deut. 32.15 Of the rock that begat thee thou art unmindful and hast forgotten God that formed thee This was the sin of Jesurum he grew fat how why God fed him not with course fare not with brown bread and water but with dainties he fed him with Butter of Kine and Milk of Sheep with fat of Lambs and Rams of the breed of Bashan with Goats and with the fat of the Kidneys of Wheat and for his drink he had the pure blood of the grape and what then why then he kicked and forsook the God that made him God fed him and then he forsook him O strange One would think that then he should have rememberd him I but he then forsook God lightly esteemed the rock of his Salvation and so you shall see Hos 13.6 It is there laid to the charge of Ephraim saith he they were filled and as they were filled their hearts were exalted therefore they have forgotten me alas therefore they forgot what because God filled them no but yet then they were exalted and therefore they forgot God who filled their hand with good and their bellies with his hid treasure My beloved you see Times of enjoyment though most desirable to us are most dangerous to us times of fulness though most pleasing to us are too too often made by us most displeasing to God that that should be the day of all daies is strange therefore we have an exhortation given us Deut. 6.10 11 12. And it shall be when the Lord thy God shall have brought thee into the Land which he sware unto thy fathers to Abraham to Isaac and to Jacob to give thee great and goodly Cities which thou buildedst not and houses full of all things which thou filledst not and wells digged which thou diggedst not vineyards and Olive trees which thou plantedst not when thou shalt have eaten and be full then beware lest thou forget the Lord which brought thee forth out of the Land of Egypt from the house of bondage there is not such another time of danger as the full time Hence it was that holy Job was jealous of his children lest they were evil in a good day lest at the time of feasting they should curse God Man seldom turns his back more upon God then when he hath the greatest obligations even before his eyes to keep him close to God O therefore remember this that mercies are not given onely for us to use to our comfort but they are given for us to improve for Gods glory The Greaks have two expressions to set out riches by the one 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 things had or things in possession the other 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 things used or things improved now 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they account the best which is things used it is the improvement of mercy that makes mercy a mercy indeed Hath God delivered us out of the hands of our enemies that we should commit abomination no but that we should serve him with holinesse all the daies of our lives if not what can we expect but that he should take away our mercies from us and remember us no more O therefore take heed that you do not while you are eating and drinking in remembrance of God that you do not forget God It is but too common that eating and drinking takes away mens stomachs as to spiritual things T is very sad that mercies which are given us to indear God to us that we might love him the more and serve him the better should be so abused by us as to love him the less and serve him the worse that we should take the corn and the wine and the oyle the silver and gold which God gives us and prepare them for Baal as they did Hos 2.8 and they Ezek. 16 17-21 But now what will you have us to doe you will say Why First Take notice not onely of the mercies of God but of God in the mercies not only of the deliverance

that enough Oh no But to doe good and to communicate forget not for with such sacrifices God is well pleased as much as to say the fruit of the lips without the fruit of the hand and of the life it is nothing Pray remember it this day and for ever herein saith Christ is my father glorified when you bring forth much fruit a little fruit serves not to give glory to God herein is my father glorified when you bring forth much fruit a little is as none my father is glorified when you bring forth much And so Phil. 1.11 Be ye filled with the fruits of righteousnesse which are by Jesus Christ unto the glory and praise of God observe it not onely righteousness and fruit of righteousness but fruits of righteousness and filled with them too so that you see it is not a little that will doe it Pray remember this that your good works may so shine before men that you that doe them may glorifie God also by your lips he hath but single but by your works he hath double glory for you that doe them glorifie God and they that see them done will glorifie God O therefor give a glorious example But let me add a few things more I beseech you that your obedience may be qualified towards God as your mercy hath been qualified from God towards you how that is I will tell you presently onely this of the present mercy It was a preventing mercy to be prevented with the blessing of good is the greatest kind of mercy deliverance from evil is good but to be delivered so as not to be in evil is much more good Who will not reckon it a greater mercy alwaies to be in health then to be delivered from sickness though both are mercies in this mercy we know not a mysterie in others we have this is not like peace the joyful daughter of a sorrowful mother this is not like health after a Pestilence but this prevents all these so much the greater mercy it took away no good from us it brought no evil upon us and how great was this mercy If this mercy had not been for ought that I know many of us had not had a being or else which is worse a being not worth the having But now to the qualifications of your obedience The first qualification of your mercy was this it was free mercy it came not upon constraint it was not forc't nor wrested out of the hands of God freely you have received freely give God loves to give cheerfully and the same God loves a cheerful giver Secondly Your mercy was according to your own heart every way grateful and acceptable to you let your obedience be so to God be like David men after Gods own heart Thirdly It was seasonable mercy it was in our low estate it was when you knew not what to doe for you knew not the danger you were in So let your obedience be seasonable then 't is beautiful Fourthly It was a signal mercy digitus Dethic the finger of God was here the enemy being judge signal mercies call for signal obedience therefore be you sure to doe some singular and signal things for God to return to the Lord according to the benefits received Oh say What What answerable thing shall I return the Lord for all his benefits But again Fifthly It is a continued mercy we enjoy our mercies from that mercy to this day it is not one mercy and not more but a chain of mercy not the mercy of a day or a year but the mercy of Ages well then let us be continual in obedience let us be Christians not for a day or for a fit but Christians throughout every day in the year not onely Christians here at Church but at home in the Closet and in the shop And then again Lastly Sixthly We have superadded to this multitudes of other mercies heap upon heap he loadeth us with his benefits every day yea many a time many a time we may now say hath he saved us he is the God of all our Salvations and his mercy endureth for ever Let us then multiply obedience and be alwaies abounding in the work of the Lord Shall mercies encrease and obedience decrease God forbid Take a few provoking considerations and I have done I might draw considerations from the Author of the mercy God a God that was offended by us a God that needed us not and a God that gaines nothing by us and yet this God remembred us in our low estate that should engage us I might also draw obligations from the Objects and that is us that were not only an undeserving but an ill-deserving and are not a suteable returning People I might draw Arguments from the mercy that God remembred us in all the senses spoken of before and I might draw arguments from the season in our low estate and from the excellency of the duty of thanksgiving 't is a comely thing it makes us like the Angels whose whole employment and liturgy is to give and live praise to God And from this also I might enlarge the discoveries of the obligation that his mercy endureth for ever But onely take these four Arguments 1. It is dangerous sinning after mercy received and the greater the mercy the more danger in the sinning the greater the mercy hath been the greater the danger of sinning will be God was angry with Solomon that he turned his heart from the Lord God of Israel I but what was it that heightned this why it was this that God had appeared to him twice So saith Ezra shall we again sin after such a mercy as this such a deliverance as this What could we then expect but that God should be angry with us till he had consumed us and there should be no remnant nor escaping Ezra 9.14 O sin no more least a worse thing come unto us God knows how to fetch all his pennyworths out of us he hath Plagues yet seven times more in store if he give them vent Woe to us See Judges 10.11 14. And the Lord said unto the Children of Israel did not I deliver you from the Egyptians and from the Amorites from the Children of Ammon and from the Philistins yet ye have forsaken me and served other Gods Wherefore I will deliver you no more go and cry unto the gods which you have chosen let them save you in the time of your tribulation O this this is a sad case I will deliver you no more If we forsake God and forget God after such remarkable Salvation let me tell you that we incur this that God should say I will deliver you no more 2. Our Mercies unless we make this answerable return to God our mercies are not compleat our mercies are long a compleating a mercy is never compleat to us till we have returned the glory of it to God mercies are not perfect mercies till praises are perfect praises See that in the 40 Psalm and the beginning