A69449:83
The doctrine & directions but more especially the practice and behaviour of a man…The doctrine & directions but more especially the practice and behavior of a man…
The doctrine & directions but more especially the practice and behaviour of a man in the act of the new birth A treatise by way of appendix to the former. By Isaac Ambrose, minister of Christ at Preston in Amounderness in Lancashire.The doctrine & directions but more especially the practice and behavior of a man in the act of the nevv birth A treatise by way of appendix to the former. By Isaac Ambrose, minister of Christ at Preston in Amounderness in Lancashire.
London: printed by J.F. for Nathanael Webb and William Grantham, 1650
Title page typeset from the transcription.
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.
The sinner by this time having his eyes so far opened, that he beholds his Sins; he begins then to consider, That God hath him in chase: And this sense of Divine Wrath discovers it self in these two particulars:
THe sinner by this time having his eyes so far opened, that he beholds his Sins; he begins then to consider, That God hath him in chase: And this sense of Divine Wrath discovers it self in these two particulars:
1. It works a fear of some evil to come. 2. It possesseth the soul with a feeling of this evil.
First, the soul considers, That the punishment which God hath threatened shall be executed on him sooner or later: he cries therefore, What if God should damn me? God may do it: And what if God should execute his vengeance upon me? Thus the soul fears, that the evil discovered will fall upon him: This is the reason of those phrases of Scripture, We have not received ⟨p. 22⟩1the spirit of bondage to fear again; the Spirit shows our bondage, and thence comes this fear: Again, God hath not given us the spirit 2of fear; that is, the spirit of bondage that works fear. It is with a soul in this fear, as it was with Belshazzar, when he commanded the Cups to be brought out of the House of the Lord; An hand-writing came against him on the wall, and when he saw it, his thoughts troubled him, and his face began 3to gather paleness, and his knees knocked against one another; as if he should say, Surely there is some strange evil appointed for me; and with that his heart began to tremble and shake: just so it is with this fear, he that runs riot in the way of wickedness, and thinks to despise Gods Spirit, and to hate the Lord Almighty, and to resist the work of his Grace: now it may be there comes this fear and hand-writing against him, and then he cries, These are my sins, and these are the Plagues and Judgements threatened against them, and therefore why may not I be damned? why may not I be plagued?