Selected quad for the lemma: kingdom_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
kingdom_n	heaven_n	way_n	word_n	1,834	5	3.9597	3	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A62962	A plea for the life of dying religion from the word of the Lord in a sermon preached to the General Assembly of the colony of the Massachusets at Boston in New-England, May 16, 1683, being the day of the election there / by Mr. Samuel Torrey ...	Torrey, Samuel, 1632-1707.	1683 (1683)	Wing T1918; ESTC W27667	39,643	58

confounding shame and scandal unto this Generation of New-England Christians before the World If having had Religion transmitted to us by our Fathers who through the grace of God upheld it in so much of the power and purity of it while they lived and being still priviledged with all Religious interests and injoyments as the highest advantages and incouragements to preserve the life of Religion we should notwithstanding through our carelessness slothfulness unfaithfulness suffer to decay languish and dye away yea and by our own declensions therein give it a mortal wound Surely if Religion die Christians will in this respect be more inexcusably guilty of the death of it than others O let this be considered and laid to heart The general Exhortation speaks also to Churches as such Religion in the most proper sence of the Text and Doctrine is most properly the life of Churches it is that which gives them being and which is the great end of their being God hath constituted Churches both by Religion and for Religion therefore it is the great design and ought to be the great work of Churches to propagate and preserve the life of it that is recovering and maintaining Holiness Purity in Ecclesiastical constitution union communion administrations both of Doctrine and Worship by religious fear reverence sincerity and solemnity in all Religious Assemblies Attendancies Performances and Churches transactions in the Name of Christ by Zeal Courage Faithfulness in the whole work of Christ and in the management of all the Affairs and the whole interest of Religion Let him that hath an ear hear what the spirit saith to the Churches The Exhortation speaketh also unto Families Parents Masters Heads of Families to move you to keep Religion alive in your Families by being truly Religious your selves in all your Family converses by training up your Children and Servants Religiously unto and for Religion by exercising and upholding the Worship of God in all the wayes of it and in the Life Spirit and Power of it in your Families hereby Religion shall live in Families Thus Abram Gen. 18 19. I know him that he will command his Children and Houshold after him and they shall keep the way of the Lord. The Exhortation speaketh to all who are the Children of the Covenant and of the Promise though you may at present have no saving Knowledge and Experience of or Interest in Religion and therefore no hearts ingagement to it or hearty care or concernment for it but are in your present state and way Enemies unto it Yet O Remember that Religion is your life also you have been born and bred up under the visible dispensation of the Covenant and Kingdom of God in the House of God for Beligion and therefore if you have any care of your Souls or hope of Salvation if you would not be cast off for ever as a Reprobate Generation a Generation of Gods wrath O apply your selves to Religion approve your selves Religions labour by all means to make Religion your own in a saving work of Conversion prepare your selves to undertake and uphold a pure and sincere Profession and Practice of it that you may not only keep it your selves but transmit it to succeeding Generations then Religion shall be your life also Then the Lord your God will be with you as he was with your Fathers he will not leave you nor forsake you 1 King 8.57 And now O that all who do understand and believe any thing either concerning God or their own Souls concerning good or evil life or death Heaven or Hell may at lest so far take notice of and bare this Exhortation as to suffer themselves to be moved thereby no more to slight or set light by Religion but to have high and appreciating thoughts of Religion most seriously and solemnly to consider of the eternal concernment of your own immortal Souls therein in the Being Life and Continuance of it as that whereby you may live spiritually live eternally and without which you will most certainly perish inevitably utterly and everlastingly May we not ought we not all in the conclusion to reinforce this Exhortation upon our Souls by that vehement contestation whereby Moses doth in a most solemn and awful manner as it were conjure that People unto Faith and Obedience Deut. 30.19 I call Heaven and Earth to Record against you this day that I have set before you life and death blessing and cursing therefore chuse life that both thou and thy Seed may live that thou love the Lord thy God and obey his voice and cleave to him for he is thy life When God doth thus set life and death before his Covenant People and put them to their full Trial as to final choice O then it is their most important Duty and Interest to chuse life that both they and their Seed may live May we not with fear and trembling apprehend our selves even these Churches and this whole People New-England as it were standing before God upon our great Trial for Life and Death O that we understood that the great case of Life and Death is now depending between God and New-England what reason have we to take heed as for our lives how we approve our selves upon this great trial that God hath set Life and Death before us all the World is witness Heaven Earth may be called to record against us that he hath done it God hath set Life before us by setting the whole way of Life before us his Law his Gospel his Covenant his Kingdom all both Temporal Spiritual and Eternal good he hath set Religion before us and exhibited himself unto us through his Son as our life God hath also set Death and Cursing before us by setting all our whole way of Sin and Apostasie before us the whole way of Death and Destruction which we have been walking in as also by setting both Temporal and Eternal Judgement before us in those Threatnings which have been denounced against us This proposal of Life and Death hath been made in an extraordinary way and manner by the concurrent voice and cry of the Ministry more especially by such of the Servants of God whom he had made eminently able and faithful who have finished their Testimony and are removed God hath also made this Discovery and Proposal of Life and Death general to all Sorts Orders and Degrees to all the Churches to all the People in all the Congregations and God continueth thus to set Life and Death before us by all seasons and opportunities but more plainly expresly fully and generally upon such occasions and in such General Assemblies as these and that with extraordinary Solemnity It hath been Gods great work of late to set Life and Death Blessing and Cursing before us by the Ministry of his Word and he is so doing unto this day wherein God is yet in infinite Mercy crying unto us Chuse life that both you and your Seed may live By this Word God is once more calling

any more from thy filthiness until I have caused my fury to rest upon thee I the Lord have spoken it I will do it I will not go back neither will I spare neither will I repent If a People will not be healed and saved they must be they shall be destroyed O that we understood how much we are concerned to discern know and improve the present time lest the Harvest should be past and the Summer ended and the things of our peace of our temporal spiritual and eternal welfare should be hidden from our eyes 3. That we do wait earnestly upon God in an extraordinary way of Humiliation and Supplication under the Administration of his Word and Worship for the dispensation of his Spirit and of Converting Grace No hope no possibility of the Resurrection of Religion otherwise than by such a dispensation of the Spirit and Grace of God until God shall pour out his Spirit from on High Isai 32.15 Vntil the Spirit be poured upon us from on High and the Wilderness be a fruitful Field that De structions and Desolations were to remain upon them until God should work a general work of Conversion and the Resurrection of Religion thereby They were to remain dead and buried in their Graves until God should accomplish that great Fundam ental Covenant Promise Ezek. 36.26 27. A new heart will I give you and a new spirit will I put within you and I will put my Spirit within you So Ezek. 37.13 14. When I have opened your Graves and brought you up out of your Graves and shall put my Spirit in you and ye shall live Therefore it is high time for us to seek the Lord until he rain Righteousness Hos 10.12 Of if God shall please to pour out his Spirit upon our Seed and his Blessing upon our Off-spring then there will be a glorious Resurrection of Religion with the rising Generation They shall spring up as amongst the Grass and as Willows by the Water-courses Isai 44.34 O that we could approve our selves an Humble Penitential Prayerful People prepared for such a dispensation of the Spirit and waiting upon God under the promise of it 4. That we strengthen the things which remain that are ready to die This is our Lord Jesus his Direction in terms Rev. 3.2 keep alive and cherish that of the life of Religion which is left the remains of it O Christians let dying Religion have a Reviving and a Resurrection in your hearts and lives live it up to life again there is there can be nothing more of the life of Religion kept in the World than what is preserved and upheld in the heart of a few and they are comparatively but a very few living and lively Christians there never hath been nor ever is but a little of Religion in the life spirit and power of it in this lower World it is a very choice rare thing in the best of times but there is never less of it than when sincere Christians are fallen into a frame and way of Declension nothing more deadly to Religion than the declension of Christians which strikes at the very heart and life of it so much the more should you labour to rise to the utmost height of attainment in Grace and Holiness even unto a conspicuous eminency therein that Religion may not only live but shine in all your Converses throughout your whole Conversations that you may shine as Lights in the World Phil. 2.15 16. Christians if you do not thus revive and raise Religion in your hearts and lives before you die you may not expect that it will long survive you though Religion cannot die so long as you live yet if you suffer Religion to live a dying Life in you you may fear that though it cannot die in you it may notwithstanding die with you 5. That we set our hearts unto and upon Religion Make it our highest our dearest even our heart-interest our whole our all as to Interest and Injoyment in this World that which we live for that which we live by that which is our Life viz. because it is that whereby we live to with and upon God in Christ let our Souls therefore be drawn forth after and ingaged unto Religion in esteem love zeal desire delight that our minds may be so exercised unto the Doctrinal Practical and experimental Knowledge of it as that we may be raised to real spiritual discoveries and apprehensions of the excellency glory and perfection of it with a transcendency above all the glories and perfections of this lower World That we may account all Worldly Interests and Injoyments but loss for the excellency of the Knowledge of it as the Holy Apostle did Phil. 3.8 And may by Faith also apprehend our own Interest in it with most certain assurance that it is ours our own and that nothing is so or so much ours our own as our Religion that is our God our Christ and our Religion as it is and because it is our life O if we could thus devote our selves to Religion become true real Votaries to Religion Religion would then revive and live 6. That we set our selves in whatsoever we have are or can do in a full and direct Subserviency to the Propagation and advancement of Religion Lay out our selves improve all time strength and gifts grace and estate power Authority interest influence unto our utmost capacity and possibility for Religion and that with utmost Care Conscience Zeal Courage Faithfulness in a way of stedfast perseverance through all incounters and conflicts to the last making of it our main design our whole work and business in all our transactions both with God and Man That we therefore labour servently and instantly with God in Prayer That for Zions sake we do not hold our peace and for Jerusalems sake we do not rest that we never hold our peace day nor night give him no rest until he establish and make Jerusalem a praise in the Earth Isai 62.1 6 7. That we henceforth transact with God and one with another with religious sincerity in truth and faithfulness in and about that great and most important business of Reformation in suppressing all the great and general Sins and performing the great and general Duties of the times that we trifle dissemble falsifie no more therein as heretofore we have too much done and as the People of old did to their own ruin and destruction Jer. 3.10 Nothing hastned their utter defection and destruction more than their formal hypocritical Reformations That we also labour to retrieve and raise the visible Interest of Religion and advance it above the head of our chief joy Psal 137.6 That we do cleave by an Heart-Engagement to the Word Worship Ordinances Administrations Ministry Order Rule and Government of Christ in his Church to the whole Cause Interest and Kingdom of Christ That we keep the Word of his Patience and do not deny His Name but hold fast that which we