A64642:251
Eighteen sermons preached in Oxford 1640 of conversion, unto God. Of redemption, & justification,…
Eighteen sermons preached in Oxford 1640 of conversion, unto God. Of redemption, & justification, by Christ. By the Right Reverend James Usher, late Arch-bishop of Armagh in Ireland. Published by Jos: Crab. Will: Ball. Tho: Lye. ministers of the Gospel, who writ them from his mouth, and compared their copies together. With a preface concerning the life of the pious author, by the Reverend Stanley Gower, sometime chaplain to the said bishop.Eighteen sermons preached in Oxford 1640 of conversion, unto God. Of redemption, & justification, by Christ. By the Right Reverend James Usher, late Arch-bishop of Armagh in Ireland. Published by Jos: Crabb. Will: Ball. Tho: Lye. ministers of the Gospel, who writ them from his mouth, and compared their copies together. With a preface concerning the life of the pious author, by the Reverend Stanly Gower, sometime chaplain to the said bishop.
London: printed by S. Griffin for Will, 1660
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.
But this is not all: There must be something in thine own disposition too, that it may be completely filled: Though there be wind and tide, yet if the ship be a slug, it will not make that haste that another light ship will: Therefore here is the flesh too, and the fulfilling the desires thereof, which is a quick and nimble vessel, and this makes up the matter. So that if we consider the wind and tide, and lightness of the ship, it will appear how the room is filled: And how woeful must the state of that man be? It is a fearful thing to be delivered up unto Satan, but not so fearful as to be delivered up to ones own lusts. But by the way observe this for a ground: God never gives us up, God never forsakes us till we first forsake him. He is still before hand with us in doing us good; but in point of hurt we our selves are first. In the point of forsaking we are always before hand with God. If it should be proposed to thee, whether thou wilt forsake God or the Devil, and thou dost forsake God, and choosest the Devil, thou deservest that he should take possession in thee. When a man shall obstinately renew his gross sins, doth he not deserve to be given up? Observe the case in our first Parents. God told the woman one thing, the Devil persuades her another; she hearkens to the Devil, and believes him rather then God; and when we ⟨p. 109⟩shall desire to serve the Devil rather then God, the God that made us, and that made heaven for us, do we not deserve to be given up to him? For his servants we are whom we obey. And thus we see how fearful a thing it is to be delivered up to our selves, and to the Devil, Psal. 81.11. First they forsake God: God comes and offers himself unto them, I will be thy God, thy Father, thou shalt want nothing: yet notwithstanding Israel would not hear, they would have none of me. And then, if thou wil• have none of me, I will have none of thee, saith God. Then see what follows, v. 12. God commits the prisoner to himself: I gave them up to their own hearts lusis, &c. And there's no case so desperate as this, when God shall say, If thou wilt be thine own Maste•, be thine own Master. Thus to be given up to a mans self, is worse then to be given up unto Satan: To be given up unto Satan may be for thy safety; but there's not a mountain of Gods wrath greater, then to give a man up unto himself. We would fain go over the hedges;