Selected quad for the lemma: mercy_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
mercy_n	let_v	lord_n	prayer_n	9,235	5	6.5766	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A94047	A discovery of peace: or, The thoughts of the Almighty for the ending of his peoples calamities. Intimated in a sermon at Christ-church London, before the Right Honourable, the Lord Mayor, the right worshipfull the Aldermen; together with the worshipfull companies of the said city, upon the 24th of April, 1644. Being the solemn day of their publike Humiliation and monethly fast. By John Strickland, B.D. pastor of the church at St. Edmunds, in the city of New Sarum; a member of the Assembly of Divines.	Strickland, John, 1600 or 1601-1670.	1644 (1644)	Wing S5969; Thomason E48_5; ESTC R14414	39,755	53

you have any love to God any to the Religion we professe and to the cause of Christ labour to draw out these divine bowels God would readily open his bowels toward England Oh shrink them not up let us not harden Gods heart against us by hardening ours against him and against his judgements now abroad in the world Directions to draw forth Gods bowels toward us The better to instruct us how to draw out these bowels toward us and to prepare us that God may extend and exercise his compassions toward us in our present affliction which hee carries toward his people when his hand is upon them I shall present you three Directions viz. First see that we cast away all carnall confidences God will harden his heart against us if we trust in the arme of flesh as he did against his people formerly in the like case as we see Isai 31.1 Woe to them that goe down to Egypt for help and stay on horses and trust in Chariots because they are many and in Horsemen because they are very strong And Isai 30.2 3. That walke to goe downe into Egypt and have not asked at my mouth to strengthen themselves in the strength of Pharaoh and to trust in the shadow of Egypt Isaiah 31.1 Therefore shall the strength of Pharaoh be your shame and the trust in the shadow of Egypt your confusion The Lord withdrew himselfe from his peoples help even for their trusting in lying vanities and turned that which they trusted in into their shame and protested he would deliver them no more if they should continue to withdraw their trust from him as hee had delivered Israel when oppressed by the Zidonians and the Amalekites and the Maonites Judg. 10.13 14. Ye have forsaken mee Judg. 10.13 14. and served other Gods wherefore I will deliver you no more goe and cry unto the Gods which ye have chosen let them deliver you in the time of your trouble We have been going downe to Egypt also too much riding on horses and trusting in the strength of men we have had our confidences in our Armies and wise men and gallant spirits and the Lord hath hardened his heart against us hitherto But if wee place our whole affiance in the Lord renouncing all creature-confidence his heart wil melt towards us and his bowels yearn upon us as they did upon Israel when they renounced Ashur Hos 14.3 4. Hosea 14.3 4. Ashur shall not save us we will not ride upon horses he answeres I will heale their back-slidings I will love them freely for mine anger is turned away The second means how to draw out these bowels of Gods compassion toward us will be that we hold on in the duty of soul humiliation of seeking unto God by fasting and praying repenting of our sins and turning from our evill wayes for it is thereupon that the Lord promiseth to return and be mercifull 1. Zachariah 3. nor let any perswade you that this duty of confession and godly sorrow for sinne is an antiquated duty or now out of date since Christ came in the flesh it is a duty continued still It is a Gospel-duty and not only required under the Law Jame● 4.10 1 Pet. 5.6 see 4. James 10. and in 1 Peter 5.6 it is required of Believers and charged upon them that are in Christ as having still need to humble themselves under the mighty hand of God that he may raise them up Hold on therefore to seek the Lord while hee may be found to call upon him while he is neer Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts and let him return unto the Lord and hee will have mercy upon him and to our God for bee will abundantly pardon Isaiah 55.6 7. Isa 55.6 Thirdly Prayer openeth the bowels of the Lord towards his Church and People especially when it followeth upon humiliation If they humble themselves and pray 2 Chron. 7.14 2 Chron. 7.14 Then I will hear in heaven forgive their sins and heal their land if they humble themselves and pray prayer in this posture is that that will provoke the Lord to return and be mercifull when otherwise he is resolved to sit still Hos 5.15 As you see Hosea 5.15 I will go and return to my place till they acknowledge their offence and seek my face Vse 2 Seeing that God is full of bowels and compassion toward his people even in the midst of those heavie afflictions that he brings on them with what comfort my beloved Brethren may we not only heare but also feele this truth made good unto us this day in the midst of our miseries and calamities God is pleased to remember mercy in the midst of judgements and to give us a little reviving in our bondage together with some sweet experiences of his power and faithfulness we should be exceedingly rais●d up in our confidence toward God when wee consider how the Lord hath made good unto us that promise anciently made to his Church Zech. 8.19 Zech. 8.19 Thus saith the Lord of Hoast The fast of the fourth Moneth and the fast of the fifth and the fast of the seventh and the fast of the tenth Dayes of publike thanksgiving appointed for victories God had given the Parliament forces in Hampshire Yorkeshire and Wales shall be to the house of Judah joy and gladness and cheerfull feasts therefore love the truth and peace The fastings of our former moneths have they not of late been if not turned into yet at least mingled with feastings of joy and dayes of Thanksgiving Since we have such experience not only that there are such bowels of love in God but also that they yearn toward us in our misery let us indeavour to improve them so as that Gods thoughts of peace may be carryed on toward that expected end which God hath purposed concerning his peoples calamities and the rather seeing God is now going out before us and hath put himself into a posture of deliverance let us go about to improve our deliverances that God hath been pleased to bestow upon us It is said of Hanibal that he knew how to conquer but he knew not how to improve his victories in like manner Hannibal God is pleased to give us victories but we know not how to improve them as we might We love to heare the good newes of successes against the enemies of God and his Cause we delight to heare of deliverance but when through Gods goodness we hear thereof we sit still and deliverance leaveth us where it findeth us we are never the more improved nor a whit inlarged toward God nor more capable of a finall deliverance thereby let us learn at length how we may carry on our deliverance Directions to improve particular deliverances and improve every victory toward the full deliverance of the Church of God for which purpose I shall set before you some few following directions First when

were here as much as Gods will revealed in his word or Gods promises that he had made to his people concerning their deliverance and you shall see that the promise which God calleth here his thoughts J●●em 25 12. is recorded 25. Jer. 12. And it shall come to passe when seventie yeares are ●ccomplished that I will punish the King of Babylon and that Nation saith the Lord for their iniquity and the Land of the Ch●ldeans and will make it perpetuall desolations And I will bring you back again to your own Land This was the promise and the word that God here calleth his thoughts I know my thoughts In the mean time these thoughts are carried somewhat secretly mysteriously and in a hidden way and therefore though be mean his promises and will concerning this matter which are revealed yet are they called thoughts which you know are most out of sight yea they are called the thoughts of God the more unsearchable and lesse to be known they are thoughts known to God You know something of God it may be but his wayes much more his thoughts are past finding out that is to say in what manner or when he will perform his promise though the promise it selfe may perhaps be known So that here is the first thing intended in the secret carriage of his thoughts * Opposition to your thoughts I know them that is to say they are things known to me but they are not known to you My thoughts concerning your deliverance are unlike your thoughts you think of your deliverance two yeares hence but I have no such thoughts saith God my thoughts are otherwise and therfore be saith I know my thoughts your thoughts are that you shall suddenly be brought out of bondage and back to Jerusalem but saith God my thoughts are otherwise whereby he intendeth to set forth a secret Antithesis or opposition between Gods thoughts and the thoughts of the Jewes in this time of their captivitie and bondage From whence the point is Doctrine Gods thoughts are not as mans thoughts in the passages of his providence towards the Church I shall not follow this point in the full extent and latitude of it but only as it is before you in the Text concerning the Churches afflictions and deliverance out of trouble God hath other thoughts then man hath concerning her afflictions and deliverances A Patient you know under the hand of a Physitian when he hath suffered a great deale of Physick and is much weakned in body crieth out Oh I have Physick enough it is high time I were comforted up again by cordialls but the wise Phisician may be hath other thoughts that he must yet evacuate more and bring him lower before he can recover him God is the Phisician and the Church is his patient and she is apt to think Oh now wee are weak enough and brought very low now it is time for God to deliver yet it may be God may determine and that not without cause that the Church shall be brought lower yet the Church hath such thoughts as th●se if you observe Psal 74. wherein she complains as if God had forgotten her Psalm 74.1 and his covenant and his enemies as if God had over-slipped the time of her deliverance the like wee finde of mens thoughts when God is begun to proceed against sinners in his wrath they think he will never be reconciled more he will utterly consume and cast off his covenant shall be broken and there shall be an end of all To such thoughts God answers 55. Isaiah 7.8 9. Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts Isay 57.7.8 9 and let him return unto the Lord and he will have mercy upon him and to God for hee will abundantly pardon as if God had said a corrupt man thinks thus of God because his corrupt heart has not bowels to pardon another man if he shall so provoke him so measuring God by himself but he incourageth them notwithstanding to come unto him for pardon after they have so provoked him for my thoughts are not your thoughts nor my wayes your ways for as the heavens are higher then the earth so are my wayes highter then your ways and my thoughts then your thoughts Alas mans thoughts are led by outward probability judging of things according to the event of things Gods thoughts are antecedent to all things his counsels are from everlasting our thoughts and desires are many times after a carnall deliverance of the Church that wee might have peace and plenty again but Gods thoughts are more taken up with the spirituall deliverance of his Church and people he cares not though he leave his people afflicted and poore so that he leave them faithfull th●t will trust in the name of the Lord and a holy people that will do no iniquity 3 Zeph. 12. In the 3. of Ezra 12. compared with 2. of Hag. 7 8 9. verses Zeph. 3 12 13. Ezra 3.12 there is an observeable passage concerning the building when the foundation of the later Temple was laid there was a great deal of shouting and joy but the old Levits that had seen the former Temple the largeness and greatness of that Edifice fell a weeping because they saw that the Temple that was then in building the second Temple was not like to be so great and so glorious as the former Temple had been this was mans thought but God saith Hag. 2.7 8 9 2. Hagai 7 8 9 v. I will fill this house with glory and the later house shall be greater then the glory of the former house as if he should have said you think that I am wanting to my house because I build not so great and outwardly glorious a Temple as I did before that 's nothing saith God my thoughts are not on the outward Temple but I mean to make this later Temple a great deal more glorious and honourable then the former because I will make it glorious with a spirituall glory the former Temple how goodly soever it was in building never had Christ in it but this later Temple shall have Christ in it that shall make it more honourable and more glorious then the other Temple was even so it is here many times our thoughts are carnall thoughts concerning the Churches deliverance and affliction they are carryed to outward things we would faine be as we were trading as it was plenty as it was these are the things we look on whereas God hath other thoughts it may be he would have us a more honourable people another way he would have us more zealous and holy then ever we were to honour us with more of the Kingdom of Christ then before to make us richer in the work of Reformation and in spirtuall things then we were before in temporall things Reason 1 First because he would have the Churches deliverance to be brought in unto her in a way of faith above humane probability which