Selected quad for the lemma: heaven_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
heaven_n	enter_v	kingdom_n	lord_n	7,476	5	4.1420	3	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A23660	The danger of enthusiasm discovered in an epistle to the Quakers : in which 'tis endeavoured, to convince them of being guilty of changing God's method of bringing men to salvation / by one who is no more an enemy to their opinions, than their opinions are enemies to them themselves.	Allen, William, d. 1686.	1674 (1674)	Wing A1058; ESTC R13150	64,102	137

condemning the same for an error or delusion How often have those of your number thought they have been sent by God on messages who after have found themselves deluded By these and other like instances you may be convinced that if you do not make the Doctrine of Christ in the Scriptures the Adequate Rule of the motions and inclinations of your minds and the actions of your lives whereby to know when they are of God and when not you have then no certain Rule to go by but are continually liable to most horrible mistakes and to think that to be a teaching or command from God which is indeed a delusion from the Devil Nor without this Rule in Scripture which lies open to all have you any way to satisfy others that what you say or do is from God You have no miracles amongst you by which God was wont to bear witness to his servants when he sent them on messages new to the World And have you indeed such an opinion of your selves as to think men ought to believe only because you say it Our Saviour said if I bear witness of my self my witness is not true John 5. 31. and is your credit better than his And I pray you what have you to bear witness for you in what you say if the Scriptures cannot To the Law then and to the Testimony of Christ in the Doctrine of the Scriptures if you speak not according to this Word it is because there is no Light in you § 21. There is one thing more which I would admonish you to beware of and that is a high opinion of your selves and a low and despicable opinion of all others that differ from you a thing which I fear hath betrayed you into that desperate error which I have been detecting together with many others For when men by reason of their New Mystical notions of plain Scriptures and familiar points of Doctrine and of their new-minted phrases answerable thereto do fancy themselves to be spiritual and all the rest that still stick to the plainness and simplicity of the Gospel to be but carnal and formal professors though in their tempers and lives better than themselves they then begin to think that they are nearer and dearer to God than they and consequently that God will reveal himself after a more intimate way and manner to themselves than he doth to such And when they are intoxicated and grown giddy with such conceits then they are drawn by degrees to imagine themselves to be brought into some kind of equality with the Apostles themselves that now they do not need to be taught by such whom they esteem so much below themselves but that they shall be now taught of God immediately And when they are thus transported and exaltted with these dreams fancies and high conceits then they conclude that all those Scriptures which speak of mens being taught of God led by the Spirit and anointed with the Unction of the Holy One that teacheth all things and the like do speak directly to their case and represent the happy state and condition into which they are now brought And now they look down upon all others with a kind of compassionating contempt as men in the dark sticking in the form and imitation and the Letter and guided by carnal reason and fleshly Wisdome to whom the things of the Kingdome of God are altogether a Mystery And by this time they fancy themselves to be in the Resurrection to have attained to the perfect state and are came so for as to be in the judgment and to sit in judgment upon the World And thus through the abundance of revelations not which they have had but which they fancy to have had they are exalted above measure And doth not your Conscience witness that this comes home to you and represents your Case or the Case of many of you I confess Pride especially Pride of this kind is not so easily discerned by them that are infected with it as it is by by-standers as a Feaver when come to its height sometimes is not by them that are in it And no doubt but you rather fancy your selves to be the humblest and most self-denying people of all others nay to be the only humble people for you have thrown off and cryed down the bravery and Pride of the World which others retain But do you not know that a voluntary humility and a being vainly puft up with a fleshly mind do often keep company If you do not then read Col. 2. 18. And do you not remember that false Prophets are wont to come in sheeps clothing and to wear a rough Garment to deceive who yet inwardly are ravening Wolves not sparing the Flock but preying upon them Zach. 13. 4. Be perswaded them to enter into a serious and impartial examination of your selves and of your own hearts and feel the Pulse of your Spirits and try whether things have not been so and so with you as I have said And remember what our Saviour said to those Disciples who were ambitious of being greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven and of sitting the one at his right hand and the other at his left except ye be converted said he to them and become as little Children ye shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven Mat. 18. Remember who hath said if any man think that he knoweth any thing he knoweth nothing yet as he ought to know 1 Cor. 8. 2. Remember again that if he which is but a Novice come to be lifted up with Pride it s many to one that he falls into the condemnation of the Devil 1. Tim. 3. 6. for God resisteth the proud and knoweth them afar off He is far enough from being familiar with them or communicating his mind and Counsels to them in any extraordinary way it is the humble he will teach and the meek he will guide in judgment Psalm 25. Therefore take the Apostles Counsel who said see that no man among you think of himself more highly than he ought to think but to think soberly according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of Faith Rom. 12. 3. Learn rather to esteem others better than your selves as knowing your own weakness better than you do theirs and not to lift up your selves in your own conceits above all others that are not of your way how worthy soever they are as your manner hath been remembering who hath said he that exalteth himself shall be brought low Do not flatter your selves with an opinion that you are nearer and dearer to God than all others or that he hath anointed you with the oyl of gladness above your fellows or that he will teach you more immediately himself than he hath taught others before you Think it not below you to be taught by the Scripture or by the ministry of man no though you were indeed so highly in God's favour as you suppose your selves to be The Churches of Smirna

your notions and opinions and then apply them to your purpose and then are confident the Holy Spirit hath guided you therein When-as alas you do not understand the intent or design of the Writer in the places where such expressions are no nor as is to be feared do you make it your business to understand it but think your business is rather to sit still and to expect the immediate teachings of the Spirit and then conclude your conceptions which first offer themselves to you to be his teachings And on the other hand conclude all rational opposition that is made against you by such as have taken pains to consider the scope and coherence of Scripture to be the issues of fleshly wisdom and carnal reason So that I know not which is more to be pitied your ignorance or your confidence but certain it is that you are to be pittied for both It is observable that when Solomon a man wiser in his generation than any of you are in yours had a promise from God of being made wise above all that were before him did not therefore think himself unconcerned in labour and diligent search to attain it but said I gave my heart to seek and search out by wisdome concerning all things that are done under heaven this sore travel saith he hath God given to the Sons of men to be exercised therewith Eccles 1. 13. And as he saith the blessing of the Lord maketh rich in one place so he saith the diligent hand maketh rich in another from which may fairly be collected that the blessing of God in the diligent use of due means is the way to prosper in the world And it is as true in the course of attaining to spiritual riches in understanding and grace as it is in temporals And therefore he saith again in reference to that if thou cryest after knowledge and liftest up thy voice for understanding if thou seekest her as silver and searchest for her as for hid Treasures then shalt thou understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God for the Lord giueth wisdome out of his mouth proceedeth knowledge and understanding that is he gives such wisdome unto men usually upon those terms forementioned Prov. 2 3 4 5 6. But your rare notions like Jacobs Venison are usually too soon too easily come by to be right § 17. But because I would not be too tedious I shall I think in reference to the business in hand consider but one or two places of Scripture more at which you stumble unless others fall in upon occasion of discussing those And one of them is Rom. 8. 14. As many as are led by the Spirit of God they are the Sons of God And you suppose this comports with your wild notion of mens being guided by the internal teachings of the Spirit without outward teaching But why I pray you without outward teaching Do you not know that the whole Gospel preached by Christ and his Apostles and afterwards written is the Issue or product of the Spirit Is not all the Holy Scripture given by inspiration of God Did not the holy men of old the Prophets speak and write as they were moved by the Holy Ghost and do not you your selves say that the Scriptures cannot be understood but by the same Spirit that gave them forth by which you suppose and grant that they were given forth by the Spirit And for what end did the Holy Spirit inspire the Apostles first to preach and after that to write the Holy Doctrine of the Gospel but to teach men thereby what to beleive and how to live that they might be saved And if so are not all those who are led and guided by this Gospel which is the Doctrine of the Holy Spirit led by the Spirit of God There 's no doubt but that the Spirit by its inward operations upon the minds of men doth concur with that teaching of his which is from without by the Scriptures and by men from the Scriptures But methinks it 's wonderful I mean wonderfully absurd that you should divide the Spirits teaching and leading and oppose his inward to his outward teaching Whereas the Lord hath declared expresly that his word outwardly and Spirit shall be so conjoyned in carrying on his design of grace towards the world under the Gospel as that they shall never be separated Isa 59. 21. As for me this is my Covenant with them saith the Lord my Spirit that is upon thee and my words which I have put in thy mouth shall not depart out of thy mouth nor out of the mouth of thy Seed nor out of the of mouth thy Seeds Seed saith the Lord from hence forth and for ever Prov. 123. By which and by other Scriptures I know assuredly that whatever inward teaching by the Spirit you pretend to yet the Holy Spirit never taught you to believe or to say that the Spirits inward teaching only without any outward teaching by the Scriptures or by men is the rule of Faith and Practice whatever other Spirit it is that taught it you the which it concerns you more than me to examine For the Spirit having said thus much by this holy man of God in this Place for he as all other Prophets spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost I am sure he hath said nothing to the contrary in any other for the word that proceeds from the Spirit of truth is not yea and nay When St. Paul said Gal. 5. 18. if ye are led by the Spirit ye are not under the Law he did not mean if they were led by the inward guidance of the Spirit without the outward conduct of the Gospel but under the word Spirit here he opposeth the Gospel to the Law And his meaning was that if they gave up themselves to the conduct of the Spirit by the Gospel they should not need to make conscience still of the Ceremonies of Moses's Law as Circumcision or the like as some among them did from which he had been dehorting them in the begining of this Chapter This Gospel is called the Law of the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus which frees those that walk after it and not after the Flesh from the Law of Sin and Death Rom. 8. 1 2. And where this Gospel is received into the heart so as that it is predominant there there Christ dwells and the Spirit dwells by that word of the Gospel And thus Christ is in men the hope of Glory and thus Christ dwells in the heart by Faith by Faith in his word and those live and walk in the Light that live and walk according to this word and thus they abide in Christ that have his word abiding in them and those that abide in the Doctrine of Christ have both the Father and the Son and they are spiritually minded whose minds are powerfully influenced by the Gospel and they resist the Holy Ghost who resist that word which hath been declared