A59035:1449
The bowels of tender mercy sealed in the everlasting covenant wherein is set forth…
The bowels of tender mercy sealed in the everlasting covenant wherein is set forth the nature, conditions and excellencies of it, and how a sinner should do to enter into it, and the danger of refusing this covenant-relation : also the treasures of grace, blessings, comforts, promises and privileges that are comprised in the covenant of Gods free and rich mercy made in Jesus Christ with believers / by that faithful and reverend divine, Mr Obadiah Sedgwick ... ; perfected and intended for the press, therefore corrected and lately revised by himself, and published by his own manuscript ...The bowels of tender mercy sealed in the everlasting covenant wherein is set forth the nature, conditions and excellencies of it, and how a sinner should do to enter into it, and the danger of refusing this covenant-relation : also the treasures of grace, blessings, comforts, promises and priviledges that are comprized in the covenant of Gods free and rich mercy made in Jesus Christ with believers / by that faithful and reverend divine, Mr Obadiah Sedgwick ... ; perfected and intended for the press, therefore corrected and lately revised by himself, and published by his own manuscript ...
London: printed by Edward Mottershed for Adoniram Byfield, 1661
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 I now proceed to a second Use from this adjunct or property of the Covenant. Is the Covenant which God makes with his people an everlasting Covenant? Then 1happy are the people who are in this Covenant.
- 1Then happy are the people who are in this Covenant.
Beloved, It is everlastingness which makes hell to be hell, and heaven to be heaven: As the misery of misery lies in the lastingness, and everlastingness of it, (and it will be thus dreadful, and it will be thus for ever and ever) so the happiness of happiness lies in the everlastingness of it. This God is our God for ever and ever. This makes the enjoyment of God to be a most happy enjoyment: His mercy endures for ever, he loves us with an everlasting love; O what happiness is this to be the children of love, and to be the people of mercy for ever? Jesus Christ yesterday, and to day, and the same for ever; this is happiness indeed, that Jesus Christ ⟨p. 162⟩is ours, and that we are his for everlasting! everlastingness doth include in it three 1things.
- 1Everlastingness includes in it A privation of a contrary estate and relation for ever.
1. One is a privation of a contrary estate, and of a contrary Relation for ever: For if the estate or relation be changed, it cannot be everlasting: and this shows the singular comfort and happiness of the people of God, that their estate and relation shall never fall into a contrary estate and relation. They are in the estate of life, and they shall never fall into the estate of death; They are in the estate of salvation, and they shall never fall into the estate of condemnation. They are the children of God, and the members of Christ, and they shall never pass into a relation contrary to this: Because every everlasting estate and relation is a perpetual absence or privation of a contrary estate.