A77608:29
Heaven on Earth
Heaven on earth or a serious discourse touching a well-grounded assurance of mens everlasting happiness and blessedness. Discovering the nature of assurance, the possibility of attaining it, the causes, springs, and degrees of it, with the resolution of several weighty questions. By Thomas Brooks, preacher of the Gospel at Margarets Fishstreet-Hill.Heaven on earth or a serious discourse touching a wel-grounded assurance of mens everlasting happiness and blessedness. Discovering the nature of assurance, the possibility of attaining it, the causes, springs, and degrees of it, with the resolution of several weighty questions. By Thomas Brooks, preacher of the Gospel at Margarets Fishstreet-Hill.
London: printed by R.I. for John Hancock, 1654
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.
First, Get and keep Communion1 with God; your strength to stand, and your strength to withstand all assaults, is from your Communion with God. Communion with God is that that will make you stand fast and triumph over all enemies, difficulties, dangers, and deaths. While Sampson kept his Communion with God, no enemy could stand before him, he goes on conquering and to conquer, he lays heaps upon heaps; but when he was fallen in his Communion with God, he falls presently, easily, and sadly before his enemies. So long as David kept up his Communion with God, no enemies could stand before him; but when he was fallen in his Communion with God, he flies before the son of his ⟨image 7⟩bowels. Job keeps up his Communion with God, & conquers Satan upon the Dunghill; Adam loses his Communion with God, and falls before Satan in Paradise. Communion is the result of Union, Communion is a reciprocal exchange between Christ and a gracious Soul; Communion is Jacobs Ladder, where you have Christ sweetly descending down into the Soul, and the soul by divine influences sweetly ascending up to Christ; Communion with God is a Shield upon Land, and an Anchor at Sea; it is a sword to defend you, and a staff to support you; it is balm to heal you, and a cordial to strengthen you; high Communion with Christ will yield you two heavens, a heaven upon earth, and a heaven after death; He enjoys nothing that wants Communion with God, he wants nothing that enjoys communion with God; therefore above all gettings get Communion with Christ, and above all keepings keep Communion with Christ; all other losses are not comparable to the loss of Communion with Christ; he that hath lost his Communion hath lost his Comfort, his strength, his all, ⟨image 7⟩and it will not be long before the Philistines take him and put out his eyes, and bind him with fetters of brass, and make him grind in a prison, as they did Sampson, Judg. 16. 20, 21.
First, Get and keep Communion1 with God; your strength to stand, and your strength to withstand all assaults, is from your Communion with God. Communion with God is that that will make you stand fast and triumph over all enemies, difficulties, dangers, and deaths. While Sampson kept his Communion with God, no enemy could stand before him, he goes on conquering and to conquer, he laies heapes upon heaps; but when he was fallen in his Communion with God, he fals presently, easily, and sadly before his enemies. So long as David kept up his Communion with God, no enemies could stand before him; but when he was fallen in his Communion with God, he flies before the son of his