A30211:410
A treatise of the fear of God showing what it is, and how distinguished…A treatise of the fear of God shewing what it is, and how distinguished…
A treatise of the fear of God showing what it is, and how distinguished from that what is not so : also whence it comes, who has it, what are the effects, and what the privileges of those that have it in their hearts / by John Bunyan.A treatise of the fear of God shewing what it is, and how distinguished from that what is not so : also whence it comes, who has it, what are the effects, and what the priviledges of those that have it in their hearts / by John Bunyan.
London: printed for N. Ponder, 1679
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.
Besides, This godly fear, carrieth in it Self-evidence that the state of the sinner is happy because possessed with this happy grace. Therefore, as John saith We know we are passed from death to life, because we love the Brethren 1 John 3.14. So here The Lord takes pleasure in them that fear him, in them that hope in his mercy. If I fear God, and if my fearing of him is a thing in which he taketh such pleasure, then may I boldly venture to roll my self eternal life into the Bosom of his mercy, which is Christ.
Thus fear also produceth hope; if therefore, poor sinner, thou knowest thy self to be one that is possessed with this fear of God, suffer thy self to be persuaded therefore to hope in the mercy of God for salvation, for the Lord takes pleasure in thee. And it delights him to see thee hope in his mercy.
Thus fear also produceth hope; if therefore, poor sinner, thou knowest thy self to be one that is possessed with this fear of God, suffer thy self to be perswaded therefore to hope in the mercy of God for salvation, for the Lord takes pleasure in thee. And it delights him to see thee hope in his mercy.
Twelfthly, There floweth from this godly fear of God, An honest and conscientious use of all those means which God hath ordained, that we should be conversant in for our attaining salvation. Faith and hope in Gods mercy is that which secureth our justification and hope, and as you have heard they do flow from this fear. But now, besides faith and hope, there is a course of life in those things in which God hath ordained us to have our conversation, without which there is no eternal life. You have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life, and again without holiness no man shall see the Lord Not that faith and hope are deficient, if they be right, but they are both of them counterfeit when not attended with a reverent use of all the means: upon the reverent use of which the soul is put, by this grace of fear. Wherefore beloved, said Paul, as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in mine absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling,