A39682:119
A Saint Indeed
A saint indeed: or The great work of a Christian, opened and pressed; from Prov. 4. 23 Being a seasonable and proper expedient for the recovery of the much decayed power of godliness, among the professors of these times. By John Flavell M. of the Gospel.
London: printed by W.R., 1668
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.
4. Help. God respects you as much in a low, as in a high condition; and therefore it need not so much trouble you to be made low; nay, to speak home, he manifests more ⟨p. 51⟩of his love, grace, and tenderness, in the time of affliction than prosperity: as God did not at first choose you because you were high, so he will not forsake you because you are low: men may look shy upon you, and alter their respects as your condition is altered: when providence hath blasted your estates, your summer friends may grow strange, as fearing you may be troublesome to them, but will God do so? No, no, I will never leave thee nor forsake thee, Heb. 13. 5. indeed if adversity and poverty could bar you from access to God, it were a sad condition; but you may go to God as freely as ever, my God (saith the Church) will hear me, Micah 7. poor David, when stripped out of all earthly comforts, could yet encourage himself in the Lord his God, and why cannot you? Suppose your husband or child had lost all at Sea, and should come to you in rags; could you deny the relation? or refuse to entertain him? if you would not; much less will God: Why then are you so troubled? though your condition be changed, your fathers love and respects are not changed.
4. Help. God respects you as much in a low, as in a high condition; and therefore it need not so much trouble you to be made low; nay, to speak home, he manifests more ⟨p. 51⟩of his love, grace, and tenderness, in the time of affliction than prosperity: as God did not at first chuse you because you were high, so he will not forsake you because you are low: men may look shie upon you, and alter their respects as your condition is altered: when providence hath blasted your estates, your summer friends may grow strange, as fearing you may be troublesom to them, but will God doe so? No, no, I will never leave thee nor forsake thee, Heb. 13. 5. indeed if adversity and poverty could bar you from access to God, it were a sad condition; but you may go to God as freely as ever, my God (saith the Church) will hear me,