Selected quad for the lemma: nature_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
nature_n	aaron_n	duty_n	moses_n	26	3	6.2674	4	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
B08803	Several discourses concerning the actual Providence of God. Divided into three parts. The first, treating concerning the notion of it, establshing the doctrine of it, opening the principal acts of it, preservation and government of created beings. With the particular acts, by which it so preserveth and governeth them. The second, concerning the specialities of it, the unseachable things of it, and several observable things in its motions. The third, concerning the dysnoēta, or hard chapters of it, in which an attempt is made to solve several appearances of difficulty in the motions of Providence, and to vindicate the justice, wisdom, and holiness of God, with the reasonableness of his dealing in such motions. / By John Collinges ...	Collinges, John, 1623-1690.	1678 (1678)	Wing C5335; ESTC R233164	689,844	860

1. A silence from passion mourning within our selves fretting vexing c. a man breaketh this silence when he is overborn with fear or grief or anger These three ways the Soul is disturb'd and maketh a noise under the dispensations of God which breaketh this Religious silence 1. By Anger fretting fuming and vexing himself at Gods dispensations This was Moses and Aarons failing at the waters of Meribah and Jonas his error when the Gourd failed him as to its shelter But of this I have spoken fully already when I handled the Negative part of a Christians duty under Gods dispensations of nature 2. Fear Immoderate fear is another passion that spoileth this silence of the Soul fear maketh an Earthquake within us and causeth great unquietness in our Spirits The Soul that is overborn with fears never keepeth silence 3. A third passion is immoderate grief this also breaketh the Souls silence and quiet Psal 42. Why art thou cast down O my soul why art thou disquieted within me So as that Soul that under Gods dispensations of this nature either fumeth vexeth or fretteth at God because of them or is overwhelmed with immoderate or unreasonable fears or is overwhelmed or drowned in immoderate grief that Soul doth not keep silence but that Soul only keepeth a due silence to God which under such Providences abideth in a calm and quiet temper neither shaken with fear nor overcome with immoderate grief or sorrow This is now silentium animae the silence of the Soul before and unto God 2. But there is also a silence of the Tongue this is a piece of this Religious silence this is opposed to murmuring cursing and blaspheming of God to speaking hardly of God as if he were an hard Master and did not deal justly or equally with us to any speaking which is derogatory to the honour and glory of God all this now falleth under the first general duty by which I open a silent waiting for God which I call a free and voluntary submission to the good will and pleasure of God without any disturbance of passion or any sinful expressions of our Tongues 2. A Second thing wherein this duty lyeth is A steady dependance upon God for the fulfilling of his Promises made to his people in such a condition he that hath nothing to depend upon or trust to will not wait so as there can be no patient waiting where there is no secret trust and dependance This is indeed the proper exercise of Faith I have spoken fully to it when I opened the life of Faith in such a time 3. A Third thing in which this duty lies is in the Souls expectation and looking out for God Early in the morning saith David Psal 5.3 I will direct my prayer unto thee and will look up Thus when Habakkuk in the first Chapter of his Prophecy had put up his Prayer to God he saith Chap. 2. that he would go up to his watch-Tower A man goeth up to a Tower or to some high place to see whether a friend or an enemy be coming yea or no It is a piece of our duty in our waiting upon God under his dark dispensations of Providence while we are waiting to be also looking up and living in the expectation of the fulfilling of those promises which we have discerned and fixed our souls by Faith upon and which we have been praying for Our hearts should not be dead we must take heed of saying I look for no good the heart is dead when it comes to that The Soul that waits upon God under dark Providences must be looking for good and confident in its expectations of it from God 4. Lastly This waiting must be in the use of such means as God hath appointed us for the obtaining of the mercy design'd and promised and therefore Psal 37. v. 34. they are put together wait upon the Lord and keep his way Now you have this duty of silent waiting upon God opened to you The Sum of it is this It is the duty of a child of God under these Providences to keep his Soul from being overmuch shaken and overcome with fears or drowned in grief from fretting fuming and vexing at Gods dealings to keep his tongue from all murmuring all foolish and unadvised speaking with his lips to keep his Soul in a quiet dependance upon God for the fulfilling of his word daily looking up for him after the use of such means as he by the Law of Nature or in his revealed will hath appointed for the obtaining of the mercy or good thing which is the matter of our desires and he hath made the Subject of his Promise and consequently the Object of our Faith You have heard your duty Now give me leave to plead with all you that hear me this day for the Practice of it I have in this Discourse been exhorting to several duties of a child of God under dark dispensations of Providence when wicked men have been set up high increased in riches honour every way prospered and the people of God are kept in low despised afflicted states and conditions I remember the Apostle calls to us to add to our faith knowledg to both vertue to vertue temperance c. Do you also add to your not fretting not being angry and envious a steady exercise of Faith and dependance on God to your dependance on God and trusting in him an universal departing from evil and doing that which is good and to that a patient quiet waiting for God I shall in order to your better performance of this offer some counsel and then press it with some arguments and so shut up this Discourse 1. In the first place There are three things which in order to your fulfilling this point of duty I shall commend to you to get a through acquaintance with 1. Be acquainted with Gods name It is David's expression Psal 52.9 I will wait upon thy name for it is good before thy Saints It is the Name of God which we wait upon now it is reasonable in order to our waiting upon his name that we should know his name for as the Psalmist saith They that know thy name will put their trust in thee and truly they that do not know the Lords name will never wait upon him Well you will say What is his name I answer whatsoever he hath revealed and made himself known by or to be that is his name I might instance in many particulars His name is God allsufficient Gen. 17.1 I am the Almighty God His name is I am the unchangeable God His name is Jehovah the soveraign Lord God and therefore we ought to wait upon him His name is The Lord the Lord Gracious Merciful c. they that know the Lords name that are throughly acquainted with the nature of God as he hath in his word made himself known to us they will wait upon God they will see it a reasonable thing that they should wait upon God 2. In the

God made us any promise that he will convert and Eternally save all our Children on whose behalf we labour and wrestle with God but as Hannah obtained her Child by Prayer upon which account it was that she named him Samuel Beg'd of God so I doubt not but that there are many good Parents that by Prayer have from God obtained the Conversion and Regeneration of their Children and that early that the Lord might as it were shew them that he gave in the Souls of their Children to their prayers and their godly instructions exhortations reproofs catechizing c. If we should never see grace appearing in tender years we should conclude it in vain during those years to use any means with them tending to such an end The Apostle telleth Timothy 2 Tim. 3.15 That from a Child he had known the Scriptures and 2 Tim. 1.5 He mentioneth an unfained faith that was both in his Grandmother Lois and in his Mother Eunice and he was perswaded in him also in him doubtless in great measure by their means God honouring their labours with the conversion of Timothy 2. Secondly Possibly God doth intend some elect vessels of his no long time in the World God intended Abijam the Son Jeroboam but a short time in the World and therefore there was early found in him some good thing I observed that amongst all the Patriarchs which are reckoned up Gen. 5. He of them who before Enos lived the shortest time lived 895 years the rest lived longer only Enoch lived but 365 about a third part of the time of the other It is said He walked with God and was not for God took-him and we see this of times in our experience God taketh away those in their youth whom he calleth in their Childhood and youth You have an observation that beautiful Children or Children of composed serious countenances when very young or such as being very young are very toward and fond of their Books seldome live long how true that is I cannot say but you shall I believe more certainly observe it of such who earlily have their hearts changed and are converted unto God God setteth those to work young to whom he hath not appointed long time to work of all whom God hath given unto Christ he must lose none and though Infants elect are saved upon the Covenant of grace before it appeareth to the World that they have laid hold upon it or are in a capacity in order to it to exercise their reason yet that is not Gods usual way where he alloweth to any a longer life till they come to exercise their reason he expecteth they should keep the ordinary road to Heaven by repentance and faith and in order to this he worketh upon their hearts betimes giving them repentance unto life and faith to lay hold upon the Lord Jesus Christ 3. Thirdly Possibly God doth intend some a longer time in the World but hath designed them for some great and eminent service in it such the Lord useth to call betimes I will shew it you in two or three eminent instances The first is that of Samuel Samuel was to be a great Prophet yea and a Judge in Israel God accordingly betimes took him unto his more special tutorage he was designed by his Mother and from the very time of his weaning by her dedicated unto the Lord and the Lord while he was yet a Child eminently communicated his mind to him as you read in the story 1 Sam. 2.3 chap. Josiah was a Second God had designed him for a great and eminent service he was Prophesied of many years before he was born and that by name as who should work a great and eminent Reformation and he did do that God earlily prepares him for it he was but 8 years old when he began to reign and he began to seek the Lord God of his Fathers and when was but 16 years of age he began a work of Reformation of a long and most grosly corrupted state Timothy is a third God had designed him for an Evangelist to have a great hand in settling the Gospel-Church God called him very young from a Child he knew the Holy Scriptures which are able to make the man of God wise unto Salvation To these I may add an instance of an eminent Prince in our own Nation King Edward the Sixth who laid the first Principles of our reformation King Henry the 8th did little and what he did seemed rather to be out of interest so biassing him than otherwise God was pleased in his very young and tender years to seize upon his heart He had intended him as the event proved but a short life and he had laid out for him a very great work to purge such an Augean Stable as the Popish rabble had left Two observations I have made upon reading the Scripture 1. That when God had long kept some women his servants barren they ordinarily proved the Mothers of very eminent Children Rachel Manoahs wife Hanna and Elizabeth are instances of that 2. That God very often when he designed Persons for some eminent work prepared them for it by an early seizing upon their hearts and sanctifying them from the Womb unto himself And this will appear to you very reasonable upon a double account 1. Those which do a great deal of work for God must have a great deal of time to do it in All humane actions you know require time and a proportion of time according to the work 2. Those who are to excel in work must not be much blotted in their previous conversation Jacob in his blessing of Reuben Gen. 49. v. 4. hath this expression Reuben shall not excel because he went up unto his Fathers bed he went up unto my Couch God seldome alloweth any one eminently to excel whose youth hath been stained with many eminent and notorious blots they may come to Heaven upon their conversion but they shall not excel in the world I can think but of one instance in Scripture to the contrary which is that of Saul he was a persecutor himself telleth us and a blasphemer yet received to mercy but he saith it was because he did it ignorantly St. Paul's persecution was not rooted in a malice against godliness and holiness but in an error of judgment he saith of himself that he verily thought that he ought to do many things against Jesus of Nazareth There is a great deal of difference betwixt scandalous sinners one man is prophane and a persecutor only by a mistake another man is so by principle St. Paul was of the former sort 't is true he was a prophane and mischievous persecutor a prophane blasphemer but it was by a mistake not that he had any prejudice or ill Opinion of the ways of holiness which Christs Doctrine led to for he was never that we read of scandalous in those things which the light of Nature Reason or the Law of Moses required or forbad but only as