A30574:344
An exposition with practical observations continued upon the eighth, ninth, & tenth chapters of…
An exposition with practical observations continued upon the eighth, ninth, & tenth chapters of the prophesy of Hosea being first delivered in several lectures at Michaels Cornhill, London / by Jeremiah Burroughs ; being the seventh book published by Thomas Goodwin ... [et al.]An exposition with practical observations continued upon the eighth, ninth, & tenth chapters of the prophesy of Hosea being first delivered in several lectures at Michaels Cornhil, London / by Jeremiah Burroughs ; being the seventh book published by Thomas Goodwin ... [et al.]
London: printed by Peter Cole, 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.
The Note is this,1 We must take heed to make any distance of time from the Commandment given, or the Threatening denounced to make us to fear the breach of the Commandment less: They were afraid of the breach of the Commandment soon after it was given; but when there was a distance of time from the Commandment, and when they were settled in a way of prosperity, then they ventured: so that (I say) from hence our Note is, That we must take heed that the distance of time, or our settling in a prosperous condition doth not make us to fear the commandment less than we did fear it at first when we were not in such a settled way. And for this you have a most excellent Scripture in Deut. 4. 25. saith the text there,2 When thou shalt beget children, and children's children, and shalt have remained long in the Land, and shall corrupt your selves, and make a graven image, or the likeness of any thing, and shall do evil in the sight of the Lord thy God to provoke him to anger. When thou shalt beget children, and children's children, and shalt remain long in the Land, then thou shalt make graven images: There was not so much fear that when they came first into the Land, that they should make graven images when they first were delivered out of their bondage, and God had made known his glorious Word unto them, their hearts were a little warm, but after they had lived long in the Land, then they began to forget God and make graven images. Just so it is with us for all the world, when we are newly come out of afflictions, then our hearts are kept a little warm, and then we would serve God according to his own way;3 but after we have continued long in the Land, and been a while in a prosperous condition and pretty well nestled, and find all things pretty well about us, Oh! then we begin to be cool and for get the Lord in his way. It hath been always so, and it is so, not only in particular persons ⟨p. 81⟩and Nations, but Churches too, ordinarily when people are delivered from superstitious vanities and come to worship God in his own way, at first when they come to enjoy the Ordinances of God in the purity of them, Oh! how glad are they, and they bless God, and their hearts are warmed and enlarged, and their hearts do close one with another, and what sweet union is there together at first!