A39696:831
Two treatises the first of fear, from Isa. 8, v. 12, 13, and part…
Two treatises the first of fear, from Isa. 8, v. 12, 13, and part of the 14 : the second, The righteous man's refuge in the evil day, from Isaiah 26, verse 20 / by John Flavell.
London: printed by H.H. for Robert Boulter, 1682
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.
2. Yield not up thy claim and title to the love of God, because he sometimes hides away his face ⟨p. 258⟩from thee; thou knowest the sun is up, and going on in its regular course, in the darkest and closest day. My God, my God, saith Christ himself, Why hast thou forsaken me? believe he is still thy God, and his love immutable, when the sense and manifestations thereof do fail.
3. Call not the Love of God into question, because of thy great vileness and unworthiness; say not when thou most loathest thy self, God must needs loath thee too; he can love where thou loathest. Return, return, O Shulamite, return, return, that we may look upon thee: what will ye see in the Shulamite? as it were the company of two armies. The Spouse was exceeding beautiful in the eyes of others, when most base and vile in her own: What would you see in the Shulamite? alas, there is nothing in me, at the best, but Conflicts, and Wars, betwixt Grace and Corruption, as it were betwixt two Armies, Cant. 6. 13.
4. Quit not thy claim to the Love of God, because he seems to shut out thy Prayers, and delays to answer the long continued desires and importunities of thy soul in some cases. David would neither censure his God, no nor call in question his interest in him, because of such a delay and silence, Psal. 22. 1, 2. My God, my God. The claim is doubled, ver. 1. and yet in the next breath he saith, I cry in the day time, but thou hearest not, and in the night season, and am not silent.