Selected quad for the lemma: love_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
love_n	believe_v	faith_n	heart_n	5,328	5	5.2153	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A93709	Sparkles of glory, or Some beams of the morning-star. Wherein are many discoveries as to truth, and peace. To the establishment, and pure enlargement of a Christian in spirit and truth. / By John Saltmarsh. Preacher of the Gospell.	Saltmarsh, John, d. 1647.	1647 (1647)	Wing S504; Thomason E1114_1; ESTC R208461	88,386	372

Arguments for Liberty of conscience and thus far it hath been wel in order to the peace of those whose consciences in outward things runs cross contrary and destructive to others both in rule and practise so as when Christians are under several forms and administrations and these diametrical or opposite to each other and mutually contradicting and expelling each other here can be no Peace nor Preservation of all but from an indulgency or liberty in all and this is such a liberty as men may give to men this is the liberty of the outward man and is upon the old legal and first Gospel or New Testament-account as in the meer letter as in those Scriptures but this is yet below the true Christian Liberty and a mystery unwritten which is originally from the Spirit of God and is meerly spiritual and works from a pure enlargement of Spirit and a true spiritual Prospect of all outward things which is an image of that liberty which is in God who appears under his several forms of Creation pure and holy in himself or his own nature But this is a mystery yet and a land of peace and purity not yet clearly discovered nor the right inhabitants of it but to some and this liberty wil further appear as the Lord Jesus is more and more revealed in the Saints judging the world in Spirit and raigning over the tyranny and power of men in a glory of Spirit which shal judg and torment their adversaries while they shal triumph over all the practises in the flesh against them A Discovery of the highest attainment of the Protestants generally in the mystery of salvation ADam was the first man created after Gods own image he was a publick person and he sinning sin entred upon all and death by sin the Law was afterwards revealed by God to Moses wherein was a copy of that first image or righteousness from whence man fell and under the condemnation of which all mankind were by nature or as born of their first Parents The way of life or salvation which was revealed to be a way our of this condemnation and death was by Iesus Christ the Son of God born of a Virgin in the fulness of time made under the Law and fulfilling the Law bearing our sins crucified dead buried and risen ascended and entred into glory and sitting at the right hand of God making intercession for us and by the Preaching of this Iesus Christ in the Ministry of the Word which he hath set in his Church a true and lively faith is begotten in the hearts of men such as are elect or chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world were layd not from any works foreseen but of Gods meer grace and by this faith so begotten they apply Iesus Christ and all his merits to righteousness and justification and through this and the sanctified use of all other ordinances of God as Preaching Prayer Sacraments the regenerate are more and more sanctified and so built up in graces of faith repentance love new obedience and made to persevere through the power of God unto salvation Nor is the Ministry of the Law useless in this the Law being a part of this Ministry to bring men to Christ or to make them seek out for mercy they discerning their misery by the preaching of the Law it being Gods usual method in Scriptures not to offer the Gospel without this preparatory of humiliation and contrition and men so humbled and wounded by the Law are only fit for the mercy of the Gospel or of Jesus Christ This Iesus Christ they beleeve to be one ascended according to that body he appeared in and sitting at the right hand of God and in the figure of glorified flesh according to which all the Saints shal be glorified in their souls and bodies and in Jesus Christ thus glorified in flesh and entred thus into his Fathers glory they beleeve and to the Lord Jesus in this figure and form of glory without them they are carried out in faith and through Jesus Christ thus they believe that they are justified and through the Spirit of God in this Iesus Christ they are sanctified Of Faith FAith they say is a grace wrought by the Spirit of God whereby a beleever rests upon Jesus Christ for justification and this they cal faith of adherence and when this faith works through love obedience self-denial and other fruits they call it faith of assurance for they say assurance is obtained through the Spirit of God bearing witness in promises and good works as wel as by it self and faith working thus is sanctification too or holiness wrought by graces A further Discovery as to Free-Grace THey beleeve Iesus Christ ascended in the body accordingly and glorified in flesh and through Iesus Christ thus ascended and sitting on the right hand of God in this figure and bodily form they accordingly conceive all graces of Spirit to flow forth into the Saints in faith love obedience c. But they look not on justification as flowing from Christ acted upon by the faith of a beleever first and so a consequent of beleeving or of faith but an antecedent or going before faith they hold Jesus Christ to be righteousness and justification to a sinner and that all are justified before they beleeve or repent and faith repentance are fruits of righteousness or justification Christ being given to open the eyes of the blind and to bring the prisoners out of prison c. and that all such righteousness and justification clothes the sinner so compleatly through Gods imputation that all sin is done away like a thick cloud and none imputed to beleevers Christ hath taken away all sin by his offering up one sacrifice once for all and that faith in the beleever doth nothing no not instrumentally as to justification but as by way of revelation and manifestation of that justification Hence it is that they affirm no beleever ought to pray for pardon of sin being a righteous person at once in Christ and wholy pardoned but all this righteousness and justification they take upon the account meerly of Gods imputation of Christ without us or in heaven who calleth things that are not as if they were and they look upon all works and duties c. as works flowing from love and from justification or righteousness not directed to justification or in any order to it we beleeve repent love and obey say they not that we may be saved but because we are saved and any other way of beleeving obeying c. they look upon as legal and not so purely Evangelical and they hold forth all the work of justification and righteousness to be of meer grace and that all Gospel-promises are free and Christ is freely offered to sin●ers as sinners in the Ministry of the Word So as their highest attainment is this that God

and a rain-bow round about the Throne which rain-bow is a glory of many colours or a figure of the glory of Jesus Christ in many appearances of things below 3. The law of nature and grace THe Christian is one who should live in an higher region then flesh or nature and when God saith come up hither he shal live there even in Spirit with him so as though grace destroys not nature yet it perfects and glorifies nature and leads it out into higher and more excellent attainments then it can find in it self nature lives by this law preserve thy self thy life thy lands thy rights and priviledges avenge thy self an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth and love only thy neighbor Grace lives by this law deny thy self forsake lands life houses take up the Cross if he take thy cloak let him have thy coat also love thy enemies bless them that curse thee when thou art reviled revile not again when thou suffer'st threaten not 4. The Gospel method of victory SUfferings are ways of victory in another method and form he that conquers under persecution receives in the enmity wrath and opposition of his enemies into himself and there quenches it and destroys it in Spirit for the Christian being one with the Lord Jesus flesh of his flesh and bone of his bone is partaker of that power and glory which was in Christ and through him who hath overcome the world we are more then conquerors and this is our victory even our faith and the strength and life of Christ is shed abroad through all his People so as death hath no sting for them and the grave no victory over them the violence of fire is quenched mouthes of lyons stopped kingdoms subdued 5. How Resistings in some are of flesh and of the law of nature in others REsistings are ever from want of conformity to the will of God and though God order and dispose all the ways of man and act them to his own purpose and glory yet the weakness and self-ish courses of man are no way excusable because of that for man acts from a principle of his own and of flesh contrary to that revealed and manifested providence that God held forth to him and in that he originally and naturally departs from God and becomes a god unto himself judging good and evil for himself which is the tasting of the forbidden tree and seeks out many inventions Thus it is in some yet in others it is from that very law of nature and self-preservation under which they live and are acted 6. The advantage Christians have of bondage THere are times of bondage which God hath for his and through which they must pass into more spiritual liberty and enjoyments of Jesus Christ for God hath this design to encrease his Gospel by scattering such as profess it amongst other people that the earth may be filled with knowledge and to make his own fulness the portion of his people and to carry them through some conformity to the flesh of Iesus Christ even the fellowship of his sufferings and death which is most spiritual as it is most inward and in Spirit or sinful flesh but as it is more outward and carnal as in persecution so it is a figure or image of the more spiritual and further the bondage of Gods people according to this account I speak on is in the type of the Iews bondage when the Caldeans were to take Ierusalem Ieremiah told them he that goeth forth to the Caldeans shal live and shal have his life for a prey and go forth says he to the King of Babylons Princes and live but if ye stay in the City ye shal be consumed which is a figure or shadow of abiding longer in any dispensation or way then God is clearly in it and his presence appears upon it 7. Vpon what account the purest and freest outward liberty is THe People of God shal receive their best and purest outward liberty upon another account then their own strength design and activity and that is by these wayes The glory of Christ and the light of God shining more in their faces and outward man the nations shal bring their glory unto them and shal take hold of the Skirt of him that is a Jew and say we heare that God is in you The meekness peace love and righteousness that shall appear from them as beams from the Sun shall much prevail upon the world which are those only graces that the world can love and be enamoured on in Gods people for they are graces that go out to the blessing and prosperity and preservation of the world and in such a dispensation as this it is that all men love God because he appears to them in things of their own nature his Sun shining upon the unjust and his rain upon the wicked and in such a dispensation it is that men shall love the people of God while they shine upon them in such things as they can bear and love though stil according to another Revelation of them or manifestation of God in them they shall be hated as they do God himself And the other way for liberty is the power of God upon the hearts of Princes and nations of which Cyrus and Darius were figures and the King of Babylon lifting up the head of Iehoiakin And that other way is the Spirituallity of Gods people raising them from the love of worldly Interests and Ingagements save only for righteousness sake and the good of nations in administration of judgment and peace and when Christians appear to the world more disingageed from the love of power Dominion Riches earthly glory and the nations find them not in their own ways nor desiring to live with them in their borders and fruitfull plains nor seeking their vineyards nor plucking apples from their trees their jelousy revenge enmity in part and persecution shal cease towards them the other way is God shal make Ierusalem a burthensom stone and a cup of trembling to all nations they shall be weary of afflicting them because of the affliction that shal come upon them where they are carried away captive and the Philistines were a type of this when they found the Ark of God plaguing them with Emrods and they were to send it away with an offering 8. A word concerning Heresie and Schism SOme books have been writ against me and I have been silent and was rather willing to sit under the shadow of anothers contradiction and reproach then to reply till God by his Spirit in the hearts of such as did oppose might bring forth my righteousness as the noon day and then we who had been enemies through the several measures of light we see by and judging each other rather in flesh then Spirit might rejoyce and embrace as brethren in the unity of the same faith and I saw further that in books of controversie

Moses it being first delivered or preached by the Ministry of Angels or dispensation of Angels the Lord Jesus himself and the Apostles were clearer and more spiritual Ministers of it The Law as it is in letter and in the Ministry of Moses and the Prophets and Christ c. is a witness and image to the more excellent Law that of the Spirit of life in Jesus Christ The Law in meer letter and legal ministry works bondage and brings forth the spirit of bondage in those who are under the Law working convictions and testimonies of good and evil whereby the law of nature is awakened and strengthned to accuse sinful flesh The Law as it is a figure or shadow or image of Spirit or spiritual righteousness may be a Ministry of preparation or witness as John was prepare ye the way and the Baptism of water to an outward purification or washing as the letter or Ministry of the Law is and this is a Ministry of Gods first appearance to a sinner Men may work very high as to God and duties and works by the Ministry of the law or letter without and the law within and the letter of Scriptures interpreted by no higher a light then that of the law and yet all such righteousness is but to bondage compared with the higher law or Spirit of life The Law cur●eth all unrighteousnessas to the fleshor man sinning and it is thatstanding condemnation offlesh or sin the Law was revealed because of transgression and cursed is every one that continueth not in all things that are written in the Law All the repentance and reformation which the Law or meer ministry of the letter works is not spiritual but legal and yet if in order to a more spiritual or to Christ in Spirit it is of the nature of Johns Ministry a preparatory and figure of more glory and truth in substance The spiritual man who lives in the Spirit is not under the meer law of the letter but it is according to its spirituality the principle and spirituall life of him so as such are not under the Law but under Grace and not in bondage and feare but love perfect love casting out feare They that are true spirituall comprehensive Christians know in what order and subserviency to place the law as it is in a ministery of letter when as the Infant Christian in the first discovery of Christ or Free Grace looks upon all Ministrations below him as legall and so is carried out to oppose them too disorderly A Discovery of duties and works SOme say that duties and works are fruits of faith and of the habits of grace in us and are the conformity of a Christian to the Commandments and Laws of God revealed in Scriptures and that duties are to be done because commanded and that they are such ways and means as God hath appointed a Christian to walk in to salvation and that according as these are performed more or less strictly a Christian ought to judge himself or approve himself and that Christians are to wait upon God in duties for the Spirit and for all other discoveries of himself thus the Protestant in general Others say that the duties and works of a Christian flow from the Spirit of God of love and of adoption else they are but the performances and obedience of servants not of sons and such as are born of God That the meer Commandments or letter of Scripture is not a law to a Christian why he should walk in duties but the law written in our hearts the law of life and this is the difference of duties and performances under the meer Old-Testament-dispensation and the New or pure Gospel or new Covenant the one or that of Moses was a Ministery from without that of Christ from within and that duties in the letter are but Images and figures of what the spirituall man doth act from that life of Christ in him not as things commanded him nor in relation to heaven and hell because such obedience and actings are of service and acted as first from without and mercenary or of price and for salvation A Discovery of outward Ordinances SOme say outward Ordinances are Commands of Christ and therefore to be done because they are Commands and that they are sanctified by God and his Spirit and that we are to waite on God in the use of means and that spirituall things are conveighed by Ordinances into the souls of men thus says the Protestant generally Others say That outward Ordinances as in the letter are the Old Testament Ministration or a Legal ministration of Johns ministry or Christ under the Law or in flesh and that such Ordinances as the Lord Jesus commanded while he was in the Ministery of the Law made under the Law a minister of circumcision and not commands of Christ as in meer glory and spirit nor a ministration of his as in that more excellent condition and the not distinguishing Christ as in flesh and so teaching and commanding and as in Spirit and so ministring in pure spiritual light and glory is the reason of all such legal doctrine and use of ordinances in bondage as is this day in the letter Other of Baptism c. or Church-fellowship c. That the new Covenant or God revealed in his and teaching his is not by any outward way or ministry or means but by the inward or unction and anointing ye are all taught of God no man shal teach his neighbor or brother any more saying know the Lord and all conference and discoveries in letter or speech is but meer witnessing to the Lord and the discoveries of God of what we are taught not any ministry as formerly for teaching No outward ordinance or ministration of the creature or of letter can convey or confer or bring in pure spiritual things there is a great mistake in that and they are but signs and shadows of spiritual things and they are to the Spirit in the New Testament as the shadows of the Old were to the flesh of Christ figures and perishing things and to be fulfilled in Spirit and in the coming of Spirit They are that which are called the beholding God as in a glass the seeing darkly and in part the heavens and earth which are to be rolled up as a garment A discovery of the Jews and their conversion SOme say they are those who are of the seed of Abraham and have Abraham to their Father and are Jews by fleshly birth and such as live yet in the Old Testament Laws and Priviledges as circumcision and have the vail upon their hearts un-taken away opposing Christ come in the flesh and expecting the Messiah yet in a more carnall glory they shall be converted and called in before the coming of Christ in Judgement Others say That the Jews were but a figure