Selected quad for the lemma: life_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
life_n	believe_v	jesus_n	lord_n	8,211	5	3.8236	3	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A56305	The church of Christ in Bristol recovering her vail out of the hands of them that have smitten and wounded her, and taken it away. Being, a just and necessary vindication, from a false and scandalous imputation cast upon her by Dennis Hollister, formerly a member of her, but now an apostate from, and an opposer of those waies, truths, and people, which once he seemed zealous for. As appears by a late pamphlet put forth by him, called, The skirts of the whore discovered. With some particular words, from some particular persons whom he hath by name abused and reproached. Likewise a word by Thomas Ewen, unto what concerns him in the said pamphlet, and also to the later part of another book, called, Satan enthroned in his chair of pestilence.	Purnell, Robert, d. 1666. aut	1657 (1657)	Wing P4232; ESTC R213966	65,602	90

and were troubled until they understood what you and your company meant by such things and that it was because I would not joyn with you and your new Religion and with the people that call themselves Quakers Again Was this the ground upon which you did so often cry out against Judases in the Church a little before you left us but blessed be the Lord we can now rejoice that the innocencie of the upright is cleared and the Judases are discovered c. and whether I or you have betraied and crucified the Lord Jesus in his Saints in his waies in his name and in his truth I shall humbly leave c. I do not boast but desire with all humilitie and reverence to acknowledge and admire the power grace mercy and goodness of him by whom I a poor worm have been preserved whilst such a Cedar or Star as you were taken to be is so sadlie fallen but it is no more than what some have thought and said long ago That pride and arrogancie would have a fall as Prov. 29. 23. But let him that thinketh he stands take heed lest he fall c. 1 Cor. 10. 12. But now you say I openly oppose the appearance of Christ where it is found in life and power c. What because I said of that poor deluded Creature It were fitter she were sent to Bridwel O poor deceived man that you should be a professor of Religion so long and now come to publish such a piece of folly to the world as to call the Since this I have been three times disturbed for which one is now imprisoned fierce raylings c. of these people the appearances of Christ in life and power and my speaking that one word to her once an opposing of Christ c. whereas she had no hurt done her not a word spoken to any Magistrate against her nay though she and others of your way have 16 or 17 times opposed me and rayled at me yet never but one and that but once was questioned or imprisoned for it and yet I am cried out against in word and writing by you and your companie as the great persecutor which now you tell the world you have been warned by invisible lights some months past to beware of me But how can you call Sarah Latchet the Servants of God and Witnesses of Jesus in the plural number whereas it was but to she only and that but once I spake those words though she rayled at me many times but ask your own heart whether your Design were not to draw out my supposed Offence to the world and then consider whether instead thereof you have not let out your own folly envie and hypocrisi But where is that meekness and bearing that some of you boast of that you would not return evil for evil but being cursed you bless c. poor-creatures it is an easie thing to flatter your selves and speak words c. but let any one touch you though but in a word and they shall find you as rough both in rayling and writing as any But what would you have done unto me if I should have come into your Meetings and disturbed you and railed at you c. as she and others have done at me you would have sent me not to Bridwel but to the bottomless pit if words could have done it You close your Letter with many seeming expressions of love and pity as 1. That I might see the sandiness of my foundation 2. Know the things that belong to my peace 3. Escape the pit 4. Not shut up the kingdom of Heaven against my self and others c. 1. As for my foundation I know no other nor preach no other than that foundation and Corner stone which is laid in Sion even Jesus Christ the Son of God and Son of man in one person upon whom through grace I have cast my soul for eternity and other foundations I look not for c. 2. As to my knowing the things that belong to my peace c. I bless the Lord it is the groaning of my soul to him for that blessed Spirit of revelation in the knowledge of the Mysterie of God and of the Father and of Christ that I may believe more love more and obey more c. 3. As for my escaping the Pit I desire the like for you and in order to that I have consented to and helped on the Admonitions that have been sent by the Church to you and the other poor souls that are with you c. 4. But fourthly As for my shutting up the kingdom against my self and others c. I can say through grace it hath been and is daily my great care and work to preach the kingdom of God freely to sinners and to set forth the Lord Jesus Christ as the way to that kingdom and to invite and encourage all poor souls to come into that kingdom by Jesus Christ the true door or way and by the strait gate of believing which the Scribes and Pharisees by putting men upon working for life did shut up against themselves and others and who doth so now but those that bid all men turn to a Light within them and so take them off from believing on the person of Jesus Christ or looking to be saved by what he hath done and suffered wrought and accomplished for man c. But I suppose your meaning is That I should give over preaching and come to you and your way I know this hath been the longing desire of many of you a great while for these were the words of one of your way the last time I was in your house That I kept many from receiving or embracing the Light but I desire to bless the Lord that through the riches of his grace to my soul I have been hitherto preserved and I have seen my Call to and Work in this City clearer since you left us than ever I did before both as to this poor desolate Church and likewise to many precious souls in Bristol among both of which I trust I may say with humility and comfort that God hath made me of some use though I be as nothing c. And truly I do hope that God who chuseth the things that are not to confound the things that are c. wil yet use me as an instrument for good unto his people in this City and the rather because both you with them of your way and others that are of other waies do so violently and causelesly set against me which makes me sometimes take up the complaint of the Prophet Jeremiah Jer. 15. 10. Wo is me c. I have neither lent upon usury nor have men lent me upon usury and yet every one of them doth curse me or speak evil upon me as some translations read it but blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ that yet my lamp is not gone forth in obscure darkness c. And thus I have

nor false accusers but we must turn that back again upon your self professing to all the World that you have wronged us in what you have written against us As for the other part of your Letter wherein you sometimes flatter your self and commend your self about your righteousness faithfulness diligence and deserving as likewise how freely you had served us and been a keeper of our Vineyard and that now it is time to look to your own Vineyard and to mind your eternal habitation c. We answer first as Prov. 27. 2. Let another man praise thee and not thine own mouth a stranger and not thine own lips But we never did blame you nor admonish you for any good you did among us but for your departing from that which was good Jehu was not blamed for the good he did but because he took no heed to walk in the Law of the Lord God of Israel with all his heart neither was Amaziah blamed for any good he did but because he did it not with a perfect or upright heart and as for your gift of discerning c. most of us know it was a thing you did much pretend to and boast of c. though we could observe your gross mistake therein c. And for your now looking to your own Vineyard and minding your eternal habitation c. truly we hoped you had done that when you were among us and that your care and diligence which now you speak of had been as well about your own soul as others but if it were not we wish you may make better use of your present time than you have done of that which is past As for any manifestations of truth breaking forth in you as you say page 20. at which some of our hearts burned and others were offended c. We know not any one Truth that ever you spake in the Church but it was readily assented to and seconded by those that sate by whether you did press to believing or holy walking but for other things which were not according to Scripture nor did not tend to faith or holiness c. some of us did sometimes manifest our dissent from you yet with all tenderness as knowing your spirit and the spirits of some others now with you we were not willing to offend you or them And as for that which you so often asserted in the Church and now mention page 20 21. That you did not know Christ and that that knowledge we had of him should profit us nothing and that our habitation is in deceit and through it we refuse to know the Lord c. First we did not violently oppose you in that thing as thinking that it arose from a sight and sense of the want of the Spirit of Christ to open and reveal the glory of his person virtues Offices and Mysteries more clearly unto you according to what is written Ephes 1. 17 18. Col. 2. 2. John 16. 14 15. and herein we could and did joyn with you in complaining of the littleness or smalness of our knowledg of Christ yet some of us did often tell you that our comfort stood not so much in a speculative knowing as in a believing acknowledgment of Christ to be that which he is said to be in the Scriptures and so to own him believe on him love him and obey him and therefore we did then and have since and do now declare that we owned no other Christ but that one annointed glorious person who was born of the Virgin and who is made both Lord and Christ who died rose and ascended and is now sitting at the right hand of God and is the Mediator between God and man who shall one day come again according to the Scriptures Secondly we do own no other knowing of Christ but that which is according to the Scripture namely understandingly to know him in his person without us and experimentally to know him in his Virtues or by his Spirit within us and so through grace we do know him in our measure and are waiting and praying daily for a further and clearer knowledge of him in his Virtues and powers by the revelation of his glorious Spirit according to the Scripture in the mean time we desire to acknowledge him believe on him love and reverence him as our Lord and King and do submit to his Laws and Commands lest in his Word but we did little think that your meaning had been as now you declare both in your Book and by your practice that you and we should take up that kind of notion of Christ as to call that light that is in every man both Heathens and others Christ and so to slight and nullifie that glorious person now in heaven from being the object of Faith c. as many of your way do and have done to some of our faces scoffing and jeering at us for speaking of the person of Christ and for thinking to be saved by the blood of him that died at Jerusalem and as you your self did jeeringly ask one of this Congregation to this effect whether we did believe Christ to be an old man sitting in a chair in heaven c. You further tell us page 21. That many who desired to see Christs first Appearance in the flesh became his betrayers and murderers so now in his second Appearances in life power and spirit would be found the greatest enemies to him and that some of us would betray him and then appeal to all that have any discerning to judge how sadly this is already fulfilled in us c. We grant that many did stumble at Christ when he came in the flesh and that many in all ages have stumbled at the truth and waies of Christ as likewise many do now at his person his Gospel his waies and his Ordinances c. which might put you to consider two things First whether you be not one that do so and secondly whether you be not one that have caused many to do so c. But you seem to beg the question and take it for granted that Christ is now come in life power and spirit in you and your party but truly you must give better demonstrations of it before we or any other judicious Christians will believe you for we have read much and know something by experience through grace what the sweet gentle dove-like spirit of Christ is we have seen and known by sad experience how unlike your spirit is to that Secondly how can you call this a murdering and betraying of Christ namely our sending brethren three times in love and pitie to enquire after and admonish you and the rest that departed from us we shall leave this to the Lord to determine c. As for those strange and unchristian expressions page 21. of our sporting our selves and making a wide mouth and drawing out the tongue and the hand against you c. and then calling us children of transgression a seed of falshood

a Christian but as for your ends in so publishing I shall leave to him by whom Actions and Spirits are weighed who will preserve the faithful and plentifully reward the proud doer I shall therefore with all plainness soberness and faithfulness declare both unto your self and also to the world upon what grounds and in what sense I have sometimes denied to be called Minister though I never denied my self a Preacher of the Gospel But the first ground upon which I denied the title of Minister was this When you with many others as I shall farther shew had prevailed with me to come to Bristol I gave it under my Hand to the Mayor Aldermen and Commissioners That I should not come as a Parish Minister to take any Parochial Charge upon me but rather as a Publike Preacher of the Gospel in the City by way of Lecture and so I have sometimes by word sometimes by writing as I had occasion denied my self to be a Minister of any Parish in Bristol so that I never did nor I hope never shall own my self a Minister of any Parish c. so that this is the first ground and this you know in your Conscience to be true and that I did it in tenderness of Conscience though now you make it matter of reproach Secondly I have sometimes as it is like in your hearing and some others denied my self a Minister in Office I having not then been Called Constituted or Ordained to any Office in any Church otherwise than by the unanimous Consent Approbation and Request of this Church of Bristol to serve them in the Lord as that other godly man who left the City at my coming hither had done before me I alwayes distinguishing between a Person sent forth to preach the Gospel to the World and a Person Called set apart and Ordained to Office in a Church whether this distinction were right or no I shall not now dispute but this was your judgement then and therefore in this you deal unworthily in publishing this to the world to my reproach whereas you know in your Conscience that I never denied my self to be a Preacher of the Gospel nor a Minister or Servant to this Church but only that I was not a Minister by Office at least by an actual and solemn Ordination Thirdly There is yet another ground as the Lord only who is the searcher of hearts knows upon which I have often put off that honour and dignity when you and others have put that stile or title upon me my heart hath secretly answered What am I that I should be called so I being a poor inconsiderable worm the least in my fathers house which have often brought those words to my mind Amos 7. 14 I was no Prophet neither the Son of a Prophet c. and this did arise from the sense I had of the honour and dignity weight and excellency of that high Calling and the great unworthiness and unfitness that I saw in my self of so glorious an employment and this also I am perswaded you know in your Conscience that I have often hinted unto you in private discourse and when you have spoken of me and to me more indeed than was fit for any wise man to speak to the face of any Christian namely what God had done in Bristol by me since I came hither c. But that I have been and am through the grace of Christ though the unworthiest upon earth yet a Preacher and publisher of the glorious Gospel of the grace of God both in Wales and now in Bristol I have no need to seek a proof of you nor of any other man I having had First The approbation and recommendation of a Church of judicious Saints in London where I had been for some time a Member and unto whom my Principles as to matters of Religion my Gift as to the work of Preaching and my manner of life was well known Secondly I having been solemnly sent forth by a Church of Christ in Wales with Prayer and Supplication recommending me to the Work and Grace of God appointing me to Preach the Gospel in Wales where though I was accompanied with manifold weaknesses and temptations yet the Lord was pleased to give me some Seal of my Ministry the lawfulness of which Call and sending forth to my work of Preaching I could sufficiently prove both from Scripture and from the practises of the Churches of Christ but of that more hereafter Now having continued Preaching in Wales about the space of three years it came to pass that some Overtures were made by the people of this City for my coming hither and your self with a Minister then of this City came as Messengers to treat with the Church of Lannachas in Wales to spare me to this place which though at first they denied yet the importunity of many here and as some have said the incessancy of Prayer prevailed so that that Church did consent that I should come and ordered that a Letter should be written to acquaint the City and Commissioners That if they could prevail with me I should come unto them c. Whereupon as you know there was two Letters sent unto me the one from the City signed by the then Major some Aldermen one of which was then a Parliament man with divers others of the Council and Commissioners of the City of Bristol your self being then one Some of the words of which Letter I shall here insert c. We being met together to consider and advise of able and godly men to Preach the Gospel in Bristol and having experience and much assurance of your faithfulness and sufficiency for that Work do desire you Sir that you will please to come unto us And they adding farther their care of my maintainance c. Another large Letter I then received from divers godly people the inhabitants of the City some of which words I shall also here insert Dearly beloved since after much waiting upon the Lord the hearts of the People generally throughout the City is so much set upon you desiring to enjoy you in the service of the Gospel c. And since our Motion formerly made by our Messengers hath been so much prospered by the Lord in the hearts of our Brethren there c. We do therefore earnestly and very seriously beseech you in the Name of our Lord Jesus that you will with all convenient speed come to Bristol and help us c. Upon the receipt of which two Letters and some advise had with godly friends I resolved in the strength and garce of Christ That I would come though I had much fear and trembling in my own heart from the apprehension I had of the greatness of the Work of Christ in Bristol and the insufficiency I saw in my self so that it was not Riches nor Honours that drew me hither but meer Conscience and Obedience to that Call which I judged was of and from the Lord the thing having never been