A09990:116
The new covenantThe nevv covenant
The new covenant, or the saints portion A treatise unfolding the all-sufficiency of God, and mans uprightness, and the covenant of grace. delivered in fourteen sermons upon Gen. 17. 1. 2. Whereunto are adjoined four sermons upon Eccles. 9.1. 2. 11. 12. By the late faithful and worthy minister of Jesus Christ John Preston. Dr. in Divinity, chaplain in ordinary to his Majesty, master of Emmanuel College in Cambridge, and sometimes preacher of Lincolns Inn.The nevv covenant, or the saints portion A treatise vnfolding the all-sufficiencie of God, and mans uprightnes, and the covenant of grace. delivered in fourteene sermons vpon Gen. 17. 1. 2. Wherevnto are adioyned foure sermons vpon Eccles. 9.1. 2. 11. 12. By the late faithfull and worthie minister of Iesus Christ Iohn Preston. Dr. in Divinitie, chaplaine in ordinary to his Maiestie, maister of Emmanuel Colledge in Cambridge, and sometimes preacher of Lincolnes Inne.
London: printed by I. Dawson for Nicolas Bourne, 1629
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
Beloved; 1It is this to thy comfort; If thou loose all,2 make use of that in Mark. 10. If thou loose father, and mother, or brethren, or sisters, or lands, and houses, and all that you have, you shall find all these in him: for, if all these comforts be in him, if thou hast him alone, thou shalt find all these comforts communicated to thee. That is; Thou shalt find the comfort of them in a greater measure, in a more excellent manner, than thou shouldst in the things themselves: why else should he say, You shall have an hundred fold with persecution? And mark the instance; for you shall find the promise repeated again, and he names them every one; I say to you, there is no man that forsakes father, or ⟨p. 75⟩mother, wife, and children, brother, or sister, or lands, and houses, for my sake, and the Gospels, but he shall receive an hundred fold in this world, and in the world to come eternal life. That is, you shall find comfort in God alone; if thou be shut up alone, and yet conversest with God, and hast communion with him, and seest no creature in the world besides him, thou shalt have abundance of sweet comfort: take all those varieties of comforts that these give; as, lands give one kind of comfort, and Parents another, and wives another; thou shalt find all these varieties of comforts in him, he will fill thy soul with all these, for they are in him alone. Mark that reason that the Lord used to Moses, when he complained of his tongue, that he was not able to speak; Send, saith he, by whom thou shouldest send; (saith the Lord) who made the tongue? who made the dumb, and the deaf, and the hearing,3 and the seeing? Is it not I the Lord? As if he should say; Moses, sure I am the maker of all these, though I have not the things in me (the Lord hath no tongue, he hath no eye) yet, saith he, thou shalt find them all in me. That is; His comfort is this, I will be with thee; when Moses might have made this objection; Though thou be with me, yet I shall want a tongue to speak, what will that help? Saith he, I, who made that, I have a power in me, and if I be with thee, it shall be sufficient. I will find out a way for thee, that shall be as good as if thou hadst the most eloquent tongue in the world. The same may I say of all other comforts in the world; who made them? who made