Selected quad for the lemma: mercy_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
mercy_n	hand_n	let_v	lord_n	8,430	5	4.2823	3	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A44523	Gods providence in the midst of confusion set out in a sermon preach'd at the Savoy, January the 30, 1681, being the anniversary of the martyrdom of King Charles I / by Anthony Horneck.	Horneck, Anthony, 1641-1697.	1682 (1682)	Wing H2832; ESTC R13705	32,946	55

reserved the Crown Righteousness in Heaven Men may prejudice his Body but they cannot hurt his Soul They may rob him of his Goods but they cannot take away his Graces They may imprison him but they cannot keep God out of his Heart They may beat him but they cannot ruine him They may make this World bitter to him but they cannot hinder him from feeding on the sweet Promises of the Gospel God is thy Shepherd Christian therefore thou shalt not want He will anoint thy Head with Oyl and spread a Table for thee in the midst of thy Enemies nay thy Cup shall run over Goodness and Mercy shall follow thee all the days of thy life and thou shalt dwell at last in the House of God for ever even in that House made without hands Eternal in the Heavens 4. The Lord reigneth Let 's chearfully submit therefore to his Government Shall we pretend to be his ●ubjects and not be Ruled by him Shall we call him our King and follow our own Imaginations Shall he only have the name of our Ruler while we are resolved to be guided by the Flesh and by the World This were to call him King in jest as the Jews did our Saviour and to bow the Knee before him while we buffet him or run our Sword into his Bowels Kings on Earth though they can give Protection to their Subjects yet they cannot give them being nor keep their Souls in life nor protect them from outward and inward troubles God who is your King not only can do all this but actually doth it and consequently the Motives to be ruled and governed by him are far greater I will not launch out here into the vast Sea of his Mercies what he hath done for our Souls and Bodies how he hath been with us when we have gone through the Waters and with us when we have passed through the Fire how he hath loved us in Christ Jesus and what pains he takes with our Immortal Souls to make them happy What a bountiful what a charitable what a condescending Prince he hath been to us upon all occasions what benefits we reap by his Government and how every moment he gives us instances of his kindness It 's enough to put you in mind that you acknowledge him to be your King and that word imports obedience to his Laws else he is either no King to you or you are Rebels and Apostates But while I exhort you to be Ruled and Governed by him I must not forget to tell you the measures you are to observe in your Submission to his Government and they are these following 1. Take heed of thinking that you please the great King of Heaven by disobeying your King here on Earth in things lawful and not contrary to the Word of God It 's impossible you can believe the truth of the Thirteenth Chapter of St. Pauls Epistle to the Romans and think so Obeying God and being subject to the higher Powers are not contrary but subordinate Duties To think you are Saints when you have courage to control the Orders of your Superiors is a sign of a graceless heart and to fancy it 's Religion to laugh at what the Supream Magistrate Commands is to exclude your selves from the Kingdom of Heaven Such Divinity was never heard of in the World till Vice and Hypocrisie had debaucht it and had such Doctrines been broacht in the Primitive Church they would have called them Rebellion and Heresie The Primitive Saints never contradicted the Laws of their Superiors but where God gave an express Command to the contrary and they look't upon 't as pride and peevishness to shew disrespect to that Order of Men which God intended as his Vice-gerents It was not the wickedness of their Prince made them neglect their Duty to his Person nor could the Injuries he did them tempt them to forget their Obedience They remembred what Authority there was in the Country they lived in it was of God and because it was so thought themselves obliged to be subject not so much for Terrour as for Conscience sake That Dominion is founded in Grace was a Principle the Apostles had never taught them and they justly found fault with those that tore the Orders of the Magistrate which were given for their Persecution and Banishment where they could not comply they suffered and thought it a greater piece of Devotion to be Patient under Affronts and Oppositions than to be their own Carvers by repelling Force by Violence Christ had taught them not to resist Evil and they Rationally believed they were no Christians except they did whatsoever he did Command them The Wisdom which is from above is without Partiality and he that assents to what God saith in one thing but not in another shews that the love of the Father is not in him Where the Conscience suspects the Magistrates Command as unlawful it must suffer it self to be informed not only by persons that serve an Interest but Impartial Men and care must be taken that what we call Conscience is not unwillingness to cross our Pride or Humour Conscience is too often pretended when we have hardened our selves into Prejudice and therefore the best Rule to go by in such cases is to lay by Interest and hearken to the clear dictates of unbyassed Reason When the Magistrate Commands a thing that 's doubtful it 's safer to keep our selves to a known Duty which is submission to their Orders than to be obstinate in an uncertain conclusion and that Christian is likest to have the greatest peace that walks on the surest side of the Hedge 2. Then you submit to him when you reign over your inordinate desires and passions When you curb your anger restrain your lusts moderate your joys bid your grief and sorrow break forth into Tears for your Sins watch over your Sensual Delights and keep them within bounds mortifie your hatred to your fellow Christians grow eminent in the Love of God and advance in charity to your Neighbours kill your Covetousness and give flame to your Desires after Grace and Mercy This government in your little World is that which pleases the King of Heaven and you then live like his Subjects when you Reign and Triumph thus over your Lusts and force your Hearts into such religious and reasonable Services He serves not God but himself that lets his evil Desires reign over him and is so far from being submissive to the King of Heaven that he makes himself a Vassal of the Devil This is the mighty priviledge of all the Loyal Subjects of the King of Heaven Their being so makes them Kings and their inordinate Passions are the Slaves on which they exercise Dominion and Authority Over these God gives them power and it hath been acknowledged by all Wise Men that he that conquers these Rebels is a greater Commander than he that lays whole Cities and Countreys waste for in wasting these he acts according to his Brutish Desires but

how careless and negligent Christian Princes are grown as to the enlarging of Christs Kingdom and those that have made some attempts that way have gone about it with sinister designs how others had rather spend their time at home in picking and feeding Quarrels in the Church than advance the Unity of the Faith abroad and how the generality of Christians have learn'd to mind the World more than Heaven and are become lovers of Pleasures more than lovers of God and the Religion that is left among them is either mixt with Idolatry or gross Superstitions or some other notorious Abuses and is become a Carnal rather than a Spiritual Worship and a Formal rather than a Rational Service and how many of the Heathens and Mahometans exceed Christians in Vertue and Morality and how that Charity Love and Peace which was once the great Character of Christs Disciples is banished and the Seamless Coat of Christ torn in a thousand pieces and those Dissentions cherish'd maintained encouraged and how Religion is become a meer Politick thing I say he that shall consider all this will not wonder so much that there are no more Christians in the World as admire there are so many and that the greatest part of them are not consumed or led into Captivity when they abuse and so grosly abuse the best the noblest and the most excellent Religion and reproach and dishonour that God who sent his Son into the World to Reveal it thinking Surely they will reverence my Son It was Self-denial contempt of the World and invincible Patience under Injuries Stupendous Charity and very great strictness of Life that first spread the Christian Religion and the Apostles having shewn us the way we should have trod in their steps and if we had we should without all peradventure have had the same success for God works by Means and those having been the Means in the beginning of Christianity they may justly be supposed to be the genuine Means at this day and where those are neglected it 's part of VVisdom to punish Men for their wilful neglect of those Means by suffering Heathenism and Mahometanism not only to continue unmolested but to grow and advance every day more and more to the weakening of the Christian Interest for no wounds provoke so much as those which are given God in the House of his Friends as we see by Gods proceedings with the Jews both in their first and second Captivity So that notwithstanding this seeming inequality of Providence Gods VVisdom continues unspotted and we have reason to give it the highest Encomiums and Celebrations 3. The Lord reigneth Let 's not despair when either Publick or Private Calamities fall upon us God is our Refuge a present help in the time of trouble therefore will we not fear though the Earth be moved and though the Mountains be carried into the midst of the Sea though the VVaters thereof roar and be troubled though the Mountains shake with the swelling thereof Ps. 46. 1. with this Psalm Pachomius is said to have chased away a Legion of Devils from his Cell and I see no reason but it may serve to support the Soul in the greatest dangers However things go God is still good to Israel to them that are of a clean heart what ever Tumults arise Go tell the Righteous saith God it shall be well with him What comfort must this be to a serious Christian though every thing goes contrary to his wishes and expectations yet he may be cofident that from those contrarieties of Providence his Soul shall be refresh'd The Prophet therefore had reason to cry Es. 50. 10. Who is among you that feareth the Lord that obeyeth the voice of his Servant that walks in darkness and hath no light let him trust in the name of the Lord and stay upon his God From such a chearful Confidence we may promise our selves great matters for God looks upon himself as concerned to reward our extraordinary Faith with an extraordinary Providence as we see in the poor VVidow of Sarepta who had the courage to give the remainder of the Meal and Oyl she had to the man of God and was therefore miraculously supplied in the time of Famine Christ could do no mighty works in his own Countrey because of the Peoples unbelief Mark 6. 5 6. it 's our diffidence in the time of danger that makes God stay his hand and our unbelief keeps the former and latter rain of his favour from us To trust God when the Figg-Tree doth not blossom and to rely upon his goodness when the labour of the Olive doth fail is the way to see Miracles and a preparative for the richest Mercies Let come what will come upon us nothing can come but by the order and Providence of God infinitely Good and infinitely VVise And what is there that can come amiss if it come from these two Fountains If Infinite Goodness sends that which the VVorld calls Misery upon me most certainly there can be no hurt in it and if Infinite VVisdom sends it most certainly it must be best for me for if Infinite VVisdom thinks it so my shallow Understanding hath reason to submit to its most solid Judgment God denies me what I would have because he would fain give me what I should have That which he takes away may be I do not want and that Grace I stand in need of may be I cannot have without the other be taken away A Temporal Blessing sometimes stands in the way of a Spiritual one and if the lesser be taken away to make room for the greater it 's no more but what mine own VVisdom would approve of in more trivial concerns God would have me follow him not for the Loaves but for the Miracles of his Love and if to make me enamoured with him he sees it necessary to take away the Loaves it 's no more than what a VVise Physician doth to a Patient from whose Lips he takes away the pleasant Draught to make way for a more wholsom Potion The Lord reigneth Rejoyce Christian Let Israel rejoyce in him that made him and let the Children of Zion be joyful in their King Fear not thou Worm Jacob when affliction when trouble when anguish comes when the VVaves and Billows of the VVaters of Marah rise Thy God reigneth thy King watches over thee the All-sufficient God is thy refuge and thy hiding place Surely he shall deliver thee from the Snare of the Fowler and from the noisom Pestilence He shall cover thee with his Feathers and under his Wings shalt thou trust his Truth shall be thy Shield and Buckler Thou shalt not be afraid for the Terrour by Night nor for the Arrow that flieth by Day nor for the Pestilence that walks in Darkness nor for the Destruction that wasteth at Noon-day a thousand shall fall at thy side and ten thousand at thy Right hand but it shall not come nigh thee Nothing can hurt a good Christian for whom is