A49262:22
The zealous Christian taking heavenThe zealovs Christian taking heaven
The zealous Christian taking heaven by holy violence in several sermons, tending to direct men how to hear with zeal, [how] to pray with importunity / preached by ... Mr. Christopher Love ...The zealovs Christian taking heaven by holy violence in severall sermons, tending to direct men how to hear with zeal, [how] to pray with importunity / preached by ... Mr. Christopher Love ...
London: printed by R. and W. Leybourn for John Rothwell, 1653
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.
Suffereth violence] Violence is not to be taken as it is in our days of opposition, and as in the days of persecution; as it is in our days in opposition to right and justice, and as it was at the first coming in of the Gospel, when the wicked men of the world ⟨p. 4⟩did go about to oppose and obstruct the publishing of the Gospel, but it is an holy violence whereby men press forward to obtain the grace of this Kingdom. And so it is generally taken to be an holy violence of affection, or a gracious disposition that was implanted and wrought in the hearts of many men in John Baptists days.
Suffereth violence] Violence is not to be taken as it is in our dayes of opposition, and as in the dayes of persecution; as it is in our dayes in opposition to right and justice, and as it was at the first comming in of the Gospel, when the wicked men of the world ⟨p. 4⟩did go about to oppose and obstruct the publishing of the Gospel, but it is an holy violence whereby men presse forward to obtain the grace of this Kingdome. And so it is generally taken to be an holy violence of affection, or a gracious disposition that was implanted and wrought in the hearts of many men in John Baptists dayes.
Violence is here opposed to lukewarmness and moderation in Religion, to that coldness and frozenness that is in the hearts of men under the preaching of the Word. It is called an holy violence, to distinguish between them that were Christians indeed and other men; to distinguish them from the Scribes and Pharisees that were cold and frozen under the Ministry of the Cospel. They were so earnest after Christ in the Gospel, that no difficulties or discouragements could take them off from 1their pursuits after Christ. 'They were so greedy of Christ, that no force could pluck them away, but they would rather die then be drawn away from the Gospel. It is a metaphor taken from warriors, who force their passage into a City, and take it by storm, and divide the spoil. The parallel phrase is,