A44344:920
A comment upon Christ's last prayer in the seventeenth of John wherein is opened…
A comment upon Christ's last prayer in the seventeenth of John wherein is opened the union believers have with God and Christ, and the glorious privileges thereof ... / by that faithful and known servant of Christ, Mr. Thomas Hooker ... ; printed from the authors own papers written with his own hand, and attested to be such in an epistle by Thomas Goodwin and Philip Nigh.A comment upon Christ's last prayer in the seventeenth of John wherein is opened the union beleevers have with God and Christ, and the glorious priviledges thereof ... / by that faithful and known servant of Christ, Mr. Thomas Hooker ... ; printed from the authors own papers written with his own hand, and attested to be such in an epistle by Thomas Goodwin and Philip Nye.
London: printed by Peter Cole, 1656
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.
USE, 2. Of Exhortation.
To persuade the Saints, that they should labour to know this Love, that so they may know their own honour and happiness. It's part of their Privilege, their Propriety, a note of Christs Sheep, They know me, and are known of me. If the Lord will have the wicked acknowledge thee, who only see it; how much more doth it concern them that have it? It they who are but Spectators, much more they who are the Possessors, and do enjoy the same: how would this support in all wants? It's but to diet and physic us, not to hurt us; it's out of Love: How would it sweeten all our Sorrows and Corrections, even the sharpest? It's out of love to purge us, and to fit us for himself; nay, solace our souls in Death? ⟨p. 193⟩it's out of Love, it's to take down our Bodies, not to destroy them; to take out of the World, because he loves us, to take us nearer to himself. How should this settle us, and establish us in all Change? There is an end of all things, and an end of all Perfections; but whom God loves, he loves to the end. He loved our Saviour, when he brought him to the Grave, that he might bring him to Glory: And so with us; when we are parted from all things, when we shall be separated one from another; Wife from the Husband, Child from the Father, nay, our Bodies separated from our Souls; so that they are not, or if they were, they cannot live: There is an end of all those Relations, no marrying in Heaven, no trading in Heaven; yet nothing shall be able to separate us from the Love of God in Christ.
To perswade the Saints, that they should labor to know this Love, that so they may know their own honor and happiness. It's part of their Priviledg, their Propriety, a note of Christs Sheep, They know me, and are known of me. If the Lord wil have the wicked acknowledg thee, who only see it; how much more doth it concern them that have it? It they who are but Spectators, much more they who are the Possessors, and do enjoy the same: how would this support in al wants? It's but to diet and physick us, not to hurt us; it's out of Love: How would it sweeten al our Sorrows and Corrections, even the sharpest? It's out of love to purge us, and to fit us for himself; nay, solace our souls in Death?