Selected quad for the lemma: mercy_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
mercy_n	wise_a	work_n	year_n	15	3	5.0178	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A43796	The providence of God in sudden death ordinary and extraordinary vindicated and improved in a funeral sermon for Mrs. Mary Reve, wife to Mr. Nicholas Reve, merchant : first preached to the English Church in Rotterdam, January 14, 1685, and since enlarged / by Joseph Hill.	Hill, Joseph, 1625-1707.	1685 (1685)	Wing H2002; ESTC R12820	47,318	58

it and want them most That God the Author of life and death and all other mercies and miseries doth deprive his best servants as well as others indifferently of their greatest earthly comforts is most apparent by this and other Scriptures Eccless 8 14. 9 2. And that he doth this sometimes with most imbittering circumstances not only suddenly but unexspectedly allso which makes the providence more grievous especially at present as the sudden death of younger friends not exspected is hardlier borne than that of aged having been exspected long and at such times as these comforts are most wanted whereby their loss becoms a continued affliction and matter of constant grief afterwards is allso most evident by this history and many others I need not mention seeing the experience of all ages attest it For what Saint alive then or now so deare to God as Jacob what Relation so neare as a wife and what wife so beloved of a husband as Rachel for whom he served a 7 years apprenteship and how hard soever it was they seemd to him but a few days for the love he had to her Gen. 29 20. Yet notwithstanding God takes away from him this desire of his eyes with a sudden and unexspected stroke as he did after from the prophet Ezekiel c. 24. v. 16. For she had not gon her ful time with child as may be gatherd from their removal from Bethel and traveling towards their father Isaac's house in Hebron which in common prudence they would not have done if they had expected her coming in labor before they could have reached thither And was in a place of no accommodation being in the way nigh Ephrath before they could reach it surprisd with her pangs and must stay there whether in house or tent is not mentioned then which for a woman of her quality and estate nothing could be less exspected Moreover this being her second child it might be hoped in reason had she gon her full time she might with as much or more safety bring forth this than her former son in regard the first birth is usually the most dangerous and the fruit of the womb like that of the trees is easily gatherd when com to maturity Yet God that hath all persons times and places in his power brings her presently here not only to pas through the valley of the shaddow of death as all women doe in travail but allso through the gates of death it selfe dashing all their hopes of her safety and good Jacob thô very sorrowful no doubt is silent at it not once complaning the least that we read of because he knew it was his heavenly father's pleasure Thô it was allso at such a time as made his wound the deeper this befalling him when he had most need of her for his present solace in his afflictions from his childrens miscarriage and other crosses and future comfort in his old age his elder children being ready to marry and leave him and for the helping him in the education of Joseph and especially Benjamin now borne to them For as no earthly comforts are so great as those of man and wife or more alleviate their troubles from others so no nurse for a husband like his wife nor for children like their own mother I have been the larger in these circumstances because they set out history to the life and correspond most of them to the occasion our deceased Sister having come in travail before her time died of her second son c. and to my designe of speaking to such a death as is in the text suitable to the example before us Reasons of these kind of providences are many which I shall now proceed to handle taking it for granted all along amongst Christians that it is God that doth all these things by his over-ruling providence as Scripture every where declares But shall pas over most of the Efficient causes that are well known the Principal as God's being our soveraign Lord and therfore may so deale with any of us sinners and his will and pleasure which is so to deale with som as we see as also because he is infinitly wise knowing what things most conduce to his glory and our good and how by his Power to use them as well as work them for these ends and J●st or righteous in all his ways and Holy in all his works and Good allso yea very Mercifull his tender mercies are over all his works Ps 145 9. and 17. Every of which and much more all of them serve to silence us and teach us submission tho we know not how to reconcile these concurring causes in many particular occurrences And the Instrumental causes as Angels men and other creatures imployed by God herein actively commanding them or permissively suffering them to execute his pleasure allways powerfully limiting ordering and over-ruling them so that he is to be eyed and owned in all that befalls us Job 1. And shall only speak of the Impulsive causes wherein the maine difficulty lies and afterwards of the Final I. The meritorious cause of these and all other punishments is sin for which the Justice of God inflicts them Sin being the transgression of Gods law and death the punishment threatned on all mankind for the same every death must needs be a punishment seeing it is the execution of the threatning and the destruction of the sinner And much more that which is sudden this circumstance being an aggravation thereof as appears by its being as such denounced Deutr. 7 4. 1 Sam. 2 31. Is. 29 5. and 30 13. Prov. 6 15. and 29 1. executed Job 22 16 and 36 14. Ps 37 2. Eccles 7 17. 1 Thes 5 3. bewailed Jer. 4 20 and 6 26. imprecated Ps 55 16 and deprecated as such Ps 102 25. The Pelagians indeed of old as the Socinians of late denyed mans mortality to be the effect of his sin affirming it to arise from his natural constitution at the first but were generally opposed therein and refuted by the Orthodox as Councels Fathers and Histories both general and of them particularly written by many * Alvarez Latius Vossius Jansenius Norris do declare It having been the constant opinion both of the ancient Jews and Christians that every kind of death was the punishment of sin as the learned Grotius de satisfactione assures us I confess many of our Divines writing against the Popish opinion of humane satisfaction to divine justice by sufferings in this life and purgatory afterwards granting death to be a punishment per se naturâ suâ * Dallaeus de poenis do yet deny it to be properly so to those whose sins are pardond through Christ distinguishing the afflictions of this life and death allso into chastissements of the righteous and punishments of the wicked But Scripture is not so nice calling those that befall the righteous punishments somtimes Ezra 9 13. Ier. 30 11. and 46 28. Lament 3 39. Amos 3 2. and somtimes those

meet him to awaken all for it s said they all slumbred and slept the wise virgins slumbred and the foolish slept so that none in the visible church but have need of wakening Math. 25. For as in nature troubles either feared or felt both awaken us out of our sleep and keep us from sleeping so in grace there being few Christians to be found that either the fears of death and judgements by som warnings of them or some inward or outward troubles have not awakend and kept watching We are naturally so sensual and immerst in the things of this life so regardles of God his word and our eternal concernments and so apt to put the evil day far from us that God is mercifully pleased by examples as wel as precepts and threats to rouse us up to consider our latter end that we may not run heedlesly on to our eternal destruction As it is usual with God to forewarne both nations and cities before he smites them as all histories both sacred and prosane testify we never reading of judgements but for mercies abused so allso particular persons there being none of years but have warning in this kind and may every where see graves shorter than their own For as security shakes off the feare of sin and misery and makes us look on death and judgement at a distance so the feare of them makes them seem neer us and to reflect upon our selves and the desert of our sins and consider our later end thereby becomming instrumental to make us serious which is the first step in religion and to turn our sloth into diligence our indifferency into earnestnes and our inconstancy into stablenes and resolution Lastly To bring us to repentance As this is the end of God's threatnings that he may not punish if we will repent so it s allso of his executing them that others may take warning all his providences being a fulfilling of som threat or promis in his word This even the Ninivites understood as appears by their practise upon Jonah's denunciation of their destruction and thus our Savior expounds these providences which are rich in sense as well as the word howbeit we seldom fully comprehend it Who preaching in Galilee was interrupted by some News-mongers from Jerusalem that told him of the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices in Jerusalem for Pilate had no jurisdiction but Herod over the Galileans supposing they were some extraordinary sinners because they suffered such things Luke 13. Christ according to his great wisdom neither taxes Pilat's fact of cruelty as they might possibly suppose nor approves it nor denies those Galileans to be sinners and suffer justly but only that they were greater sinners than all the rest shewing that they were not to be judged as such because of their suffering and adds the like concerning those 18 on whom the tower in Siloam fell and slew declaring from both these examples the general use the living should make of the sudden death of others which is to repent this being the end of Gods sparing us to give us time and space for repentance and his taking away others to stir us up to make use of our time accordingly And the more to awaken them to this duty shews the more especial use of these to them in a prophetical commination from the manner of their perishing making it a type or emblem to the living of their future destruction as Samuel did by Sauls rending his mantle of God's rending the Kingdom from him saying except ye repent ye shall all likewise perish Denoting that as those Galileans were slain by Pilat the Roman governor and his soldjers so the Galileans should after by the Roman army and as the 18 in Jerusalem were slain by the fall of the tower in Siloam so the dwellers in Jerusalem should be by the fall of their other towers and walls Which they not repenting was accordingly accomplisht in both For the Romans first fel upon Galilee and destroyd great numbers of them and the rest flying to Jerusalem at the time of the passover were with other Jews slain in such abundance that the altar for sacrifices swimd with blood and multitudes of the inhabitants of Jerusalem it being besieged and taken by the Romans were slain by the battering of their walls and buried in the ruins of their city So dangerous is it to neglect repenting from the warnings given us and especially for those more immediatly concernd So great wisdom and safety is there in true repentance which will certainly save our souls from eternal and is the only way to save our persons also and estates from publick calamities and temporal destruction But oh the blindnes and stupidity of most part of men that when God's hand is lifted up they will not see it when he hedges up their sinfull ways with thorns will needs run through them when he smites som on their right hand and others on their left regard it not that can go and com from funerals without a serious thought of their own Common providences are but litle observed by us and therfore do but litle move and affect us but when we meet with unexspected occurrences or interruption of the ordinary course of time and nature in the death of any this is apt to startle us and make us bethink our selves more than usually and where grace sets in with it becoms a means to better and reform us Thus God often makes use of the sudden death of som to bring others first to themselves by consideration and afterwards to himself by repentance and especially those in the like condition when one is taken and another left som destroyd and others saved this making both a deeper and lastinger impression and those more neerly concernd in or related to the deceased For as we often think this or that occasiond their death and these or those things might have prevented it the thoughts whereof frequently trouble us afterwards so our former carriage towards them and theirs to us coms now afresh to our remembrance feeds our sorrow and lays the foundation of our repentance These and those things saith conscience thou shouldst have done and so and so thou shouldst have carried towards them and didst not and this and that thou shouldst not have done nor carried in this or that manner to them and didst thou might have got much good by them and hast not and done more good to them and wouldst not thou matterdst not what became of their souls and knowest thou what will becom of thine Then thinks the sinner what if their case had been mine where had I now been if I had been so hurried to judgment my conscience tells me I am not fit to die I cannot say my sins are pardond and my peace made with God whom I have so greatly offended he hath now warnd me to flee from the wrath to com and should I not take it shall I still except my self and say this