A64978:54
Christ the best husband
Christ the best husband: or An invitation of young women unto Christ Delivered in a sermon to young women. By Thomas Vincent, minister sometime of Maudlins Milkstreet, London.
London: printed for George Calvert and Samuel Sprint, 1672
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.
1. Christs invitations of you to be his Spouse are Real; the thing is real, that there ir an espousal between Christ and his people; It is no fancy, which hath no ground or foundation, but in the fond mind and imagination of some fancy full men, as some may deem it to be; for there is a clear foundation for it in the Scriptures, 2 Cor. 11. 1. I have espoused you unto one Husband, that I may present you as a chaste Virgin unto Christ. 1 Cor. 6. 17. He that is joined unto the Lord, is one spirit. And as the thing is real, so you are really invited unto it; the Lord ⟨p. 24⟩doth not mock and dissemble with you, as some pretending Lovers, who dissemble love unto Virgins, until they have gained their affections, and then falsely and basely relinquith them, never really intending either to espouse or marry them: But the Lord doth really intend the thing, in his invitations of you; He is repulsed by many, unto whom he maketh suit for their affections; but he never did cast off any whose consent and affections he had gained.
1. Christs invitations of you to be his Spouse are Real; the thing is real, that there ir an espousal between Christ and his people; It is no fancy, which hath no ground or foundation, but in the fond mind and imagination of some fancy full men, as some may deem it to be; for there is a clear foundation for it in the Scriptures, 2 Cor. 11. 1. I have espoused you unto one Husband, that I may present you as a chaste Virgin unto Christ. 1 Cor. 6. 17. He that is joyned unto the Lord, is one spirit. And as the thing is real, so you are really invited unto it; the Lord ⟨p. 24⟩doth not mock and dissemble with you, as some pretending Lovers, who dissemble love unto Virgins, until they have gained their affections, and then falsly and basely relinquith them, never really intending either to espouse or marry them: But the Lord doth really intend the thing, in his invitations of you; He is repulsed by many, unto whom he maketh suit for their affections; but he never did cast off any whose consent and affections he had gained.