Selected quad for the lemma: love_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
love_n	aaron_n	descend_v	run_v	19	3	6.0975	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A65694	Eighteen sermons preached upon several texts of Scripture by William Whittaker, late minister of Magdalen Bermondsey, Southwark ; to which is added his funeral sermon preached by Sam. Annesley.	Whittaker, William, 1629-1672.; Annesley, Samuel, 1620?-1696.	1674 (1674)	Wing W1718; ESTC R29271	230,495	446

supplies you and provides for you do you think there is any thing of worth or desert in you that you enjoy so much of health and so many outward comforts it is not upon your own account that God is thus bountiful and yet we find it was so much the folly of the People of Israel that they were ready to attribute all the Kindness of God to something or other in themslves and tehrefore it is that God himself is so often their Remembrancer and Monitour to put them in mind and to correct those mistakes about his choosing them to be his peculiar People whom he owned above all the People in the World Besides they were apt to think that there was something in them that might incline God to this kindness no says God in Deut. 7,7 8. The Lord did not set his love upon you nor chuse you because ye were more in number then any People but because the Lord loved you c. You may delude your selves with these fancies but because the Lord loved you he chose you and he loved you because he loved you His love had no motive but what was from himself no motive but only his own loving kindness and goodness Ezek 36.22.23 Thereofe say unto the House of Israel thus saith the Lord God when he promised great Mercies to them I do not this for your sakes oh House of Israel but for my Holy Names sake c. The kindnessess that God speaks of there are highly great and yet not any of them were upon the account of any thing in them And this it is really with us now as in some few instances 1. Gods electing love which is the first born of all Mercies and the first link of that golden Chain which you have in this very Chapt. 28.29 whom he did foreknow he also did p●edestinat c. This electing love it hath its first rise from the absolute will of God This is not the absolute purchase of Christs merits yet this is through Christ in some sense Eph. 1.4 According as he hath chosen us in him that is in Christ as in the verse before we are chosen in him it is not said for him so that all the kindness that God hath for us even this which seems to be an Act of the highest Freedom and the most eminent expression of Gods rich grace That he should chuse and and pick out some and select them from the common multitude of mankind and to set them apart as special objects of his favour though this was from the absolute will of God was in and through Christ if you ask how I answer we are chosen in him not as the Foundation of our election but because we are chosen in him for his Members as He is our head That this first love of God had some reference to Christ though not as the onely procuring Cause yet as the consummating Cause to accomplish is abundantly evident through the Scripture we are elected in him that is that he should perfect this blessed and gracious decree of God upon us Eph. 3.11 According to the Eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord. What purpose was this it was a purpose to save some to set his Heart and love upon some his electing love was thus far in Christ 2. The love of Conversion is in and through Christ Eph. 2.10 We are his Workmanship created in Christ Jesus unto good works c. And though God is the sufficient Cause of all the grace we partake of yet Christ is the meritorious Cause it is the gift of God and yet withal it is the purpose of Christ it is God alone that bestows grace and it is for the sake of Christ alone that he doth bestow it compare those two places James 1.17 you read that God is the Father of Lights But it comes all from God in and through Christ John 10.10 I am come that they might have Life and that they might have it more abundantly God is willing to give it but it is in and through Christ that he gives it 3. Again to instance in the love of God in Justification it is God alone forgives sin and our Saviour herein appears to be equal with the Father because he hath committed all power into his hand power to forgive sins Now as God onely can forgive sin so it is onely for the sake of his Son that he doth forgive it Eph. 4.32 Even as God for Christs sake hath forgiven you If God hath forgiven you it is not for your own sakes but for the sake of Christ do you forgive one another pass by injuries forgive offences make this your pattern which is the highest pattern that ever was or can be Col. 1.14 In whom we have Redemption through his Blood even the forgiveness of sins We have Redemption and Forgiveness but all come streaming down in the Blood of Christ In a word to sum up all the several Acts of Gods distinguishing love they are all in and through Christ and therefore you read that Doxology Eph. 1.3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who hath blessed us with all Spiritual blessings in Christ He hath blessed us with the choicest blessings but all these are in and through Christ I shall now give you some Arguments to prove it and I shall only mention three First Because God neither can nor does love us as we are in our selves Matt. 3.17 And loe a Voyce from Heaven saying this is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased It is not spoken of Gods love to him in a common respect but of something peculiar to him and there is this double limitation as Interpreters note this is the Son of mine whom I eminently love and this is that Son of mine for whose sake I love the Sons of men all do acknowledge that this love is a confined and limited love that is spoken of here but yet they explain it thus My beloved Son in whom I am well pleased That is in whom I am eminently pleased and for whose sake I am pleased with them whose cause he undertakes As that Oyl that was powered on Aarons head descended to the Skirts of his Garment so that love that God hath to Jesus Christ descends to all his inferiour Members John 17.23 26. I in them and they in me that they may be made perfect in one c. These are high Expressions and such as exceed the capacity of all mortal men that God should love us with the same love wherewith he loved his Son The most sober sense by Interpreters given of these words is this That God in and through Christ loves his People for his sake with the same kind of love though not with the some degree of love Eph. 1.6 We are accepted in the Beloved if God accepts of us or smiles upon us it is in and through Christ Eph. 1.5 6. Having predestinated us to the adoption of Children

say therefore may sharply reprove all careless Professors that lay aside their watch and do not always stand upon their guard to keep off every thing of sin You know how much Christ hath deserved from us shall I little minde you in two or three hints Consider how much he hath done and suffered for all that belong to him he thought no blessings too great to leave even such blessings as none but himself was ever capable of for no Creature could be capable of those high and eminent priviledges that he left that he might become our Redeemer and as there was no mercy that he thought too great to leave so there was no misery that he thought too sharp to undergo that the wrath of God his Father whose love to him was more worth than millions of worlds might be appeased and in order to the Redemption of poor lost Creatures he was willing to bear it Lo I came in the Volitinne of thy will Oh my God yea thy Law is within my heart Thus do but consider what the Glory was that he left and what that misery was he underwent that chearfulness with which he did both his design in all these which was only to redeem poor lost Creatures as for him self he could be no gainer as appears by what he said John 17.4 Father Glorifie thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was and certainly it cannot but command of thee the greatest exactness and circumspection of thy life Doest thou name the Name of Christ Doest thou own these condescentions of Christ and canst thou allow thy self in any kind of iniquity it was iniquity that was the Judas that betrayed him the Pilate that condemned him it was not those instruments but our sins and will you yet harbour those sins is this an ingenious requital of so much love all the malice of Hell and all the rage of adversaries here upon earth all the contrivances of the Jews with their great ones together could never have brought those sufferings upon Christ had it not been for his love that he bore to his people and will you for all this after he hath done and suffered so much trample on his blood and slight his kindness and resolve on your own ruine and in spite of such mercies and kindness will you go on to your own destruction is not this sad what shame shold be to all professing Christians that do not stand upon their watch and do what they can and make it in good earnest their business to keep themselves form all iniquity The next Use and the only Use which I shall add further is by way of exhortation that all that hath been said may prevail thus far with you to get your hearts at as great a distance from sin as possibly you are able never think that you are too strange to it nor at a distance enough from it your professions oblige you your engagements oblige you consider should you allow your selves in any sin you thereby despise the richest mercy that ever was vouchsafed to poor Creatures you that profess the Name of Christ you that know what design Christ came into the world follow the example of those worthies Hebr. 11.37 38. they were stoned they were sawn asunder c. and it s said ver 35. they accepted not of deliverance You see how shie they were of sin and at how great a distance they kept from it and what was their thoughts of it Oh! let it be your practice Heb. 10.28 29. He that despised Moses Law died without mercy under two or three witnesses of how much sorer punishment suppose ye shall he be thought worthy who hath trodden under foot the Son of God c. It is a common thing to slight it and to scorn it but what doth the Apostle say to such ver 30. We know him that hath said Vengeance belongeth unto me I will recompence saith the Lord and again the Lord shall judge his people They that profess themselves his people must be all brought to the test and tryal Do you think it nothing to despise the very patience of God to despise the choisest mercy of God take it Friends for a sad truth I speak it only to awaken both my self and you there is no sinner like unto a Gospel sinner to them that go on in sin under those means that should recover them from sin and therefore in the day of account you read that no sinner shall have such tremblings and astonishings upon them as sinners Sinners in Sion shall be afraid and fearfulness sahll surprise the hypecrite Sion sinners Sabbath-days Sacrament-sinners they that live under all those opportunities and advantages as their sins bring greater dishonour to God bring greater damage to their own Souls than other sins do these of all persons are the farthest off from being renewed again by repentance Pro. 8. last it is said in general of all kind of sinners He that sins against me wrongs his own Soul he cannot wrong God he does indeed what in him lies and God may account himself wronged by his sin really injure God he cannot our services and sins reach not him God is infinitely above both but he wrongs himself he may wrong others by his bad example but especially he wrongs himself not only in respect of worldly things but he wrongs himself in the highest degrees as Solomon there expresseth it he wrongs his own Soul he doth not only wrong himself as to outward comforts but as to his great concernments as to his everlasting welfare Alas how many be the Judgments God hath to meet with all the contemners of his mercy in this world Outward Judgments and spiritual Judgments and then consider the Judgments of God in another world and certainly of all persons those that profess the Name of Christ shall have the forest it shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the day of Judgment than for Jerusalem that had the Gospel and Ordinances of God and such priviledges and means and helps Let all that hath been said perswade you to a strickt examination of your hearts and lives that what hath been amiss may be both speedily and throughly reformed If you do not depart from all iniquity how sad a thing will it be to you when once Jesus Christ riseth up in Judgment against you what will you plead for your selves when that once Christ shall plead against you even you that have despised his mercy and refused Salvation and have chosen death and those things that tend thereunto SERMON X. Romans 8. last verse Nor heighth nor depth nor any other Creature shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. The whole Paragraph runs thus For I am perswaded that neither death nor life c. ver 38 39. THese words are a part of St. Pauls Triumph and the evils over which he triumphs are no