A27017:323
The Saints' Everlasting Rest
The saints everlasting rest, or, A treatise of the blessed state of the saints in their enjoyment of God in glory wherein is showed its excellency and certainty, the misery of those that lose it, the way to attain it, and assurance of it, and how to live in the continual delightful forecasts of it and now published by Richard Baxter ...The saints everlasting rest, or, A treatise of the blessed state of the saints in their enjoyment of God in glory wherein is shewed its excellency and certainty, the misery of those that lose it, the way to attain it, and assurance of it, and how to live in the continual delightful forecasts of it and now published by Richard Baxter ...
London: printed by Rob. White for Thomas Underhil and Francis Tyton, 1650
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.
Such a Nature hath God in these days suffered to discover it self in the very Godly; that if he did not graciously and powerfully restrain, they would shed the blood of one another; and no thanks to us if it be not done. But I hope his design is but to humble and shame us by the discovery, and then to prevent the breaking forth.
Object. But is it possible such should be truly Godly? Then what sin will denominate a man ungodly?
Answ. Or else I must believe the doctrine of the Saints Apostasy; or believe there are scarce any godly in the world. O what a wound of dishonour hath this given, not only to the stricter profession of holiness, but even to the very Christian name? Were there a possibility of hiding it, I durst not thus mention it. O Christian, If thou who readest this be guilty, I charge thee before the living God, That thou sadly consider, how far is this unlike thy Copy? Suppose thou hadst seen the Lord Jesus, girded to the service, stooping to the Earth, washing his Disciples dirty feet, and wiping them, and saying to them, This I have done to give ⟨p. 120⟩you an example, That if I your Lord and Master have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's: Would not this make thee ashamed and tremble? Shall the Lord wipe the feet, and the fellow-servant be ready to cut the throat? would not thy proud heart scorn to stoop to thy Masters work? Look to thy self; it is not the name of a professor, nor the zeal for thy opinions, that will prove thee a Christian, or secure thee from the heat of the consuming fire.1 If thou love not thine enemy, much more thy Christian friend, thou canst not be Christs Disciple. It is the common mark whereby his Disciples are known to all men,