A90269:130
God's work in founding Zion, and his peoples duty thereupon. A sermon preached in…
God's work in founding Zion, and his peoples duty thereupon. A sermon preached in the Abby Church at Westminster, at the opening of the Parliament Septemb. 17th 1656. / By John Owen: a servant of Jesus Christ in the work of the Gospel.God's work in founding Zion, and his peoples duty thereupon. A sermon preached in the Abby Church at Westminster, at the opening of the Parliament Septemb. 17th 1656. / By John Owen: a servant of Jesus Christ in the work of the Gospell.
Oxford: printed by Leon for Tho, 1656
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.
1. Secure your Spirits, that in sincerity you seek the public good of the Nations, and the prosperity of the good people therein, who have adhered to the good cause of Liberty, and Religion; if this be in your eye, as that which is principally intended, as you may pray in faith, for the presence of God with you, and have a comfortable expectation of his protection and favour; so if in the pursuit of it, through humane frailty you should err, or mistake in the choice of means, paths, ways tending to that end, God will guide you, and lead you, and not leave you until he hath made strait paths for your feet: But if at the bottom, there lie secret animosities, self-will, desire of obtaining greatness or Power, on the one hand, or other; if every such thing be not on all hands subdued unto public good, Prayers will be weakened, carnal wisdom increased, the Counsel of God rejected, and you will wander in all your ways without success.
1. Secure your Spirits, that in sincerity you seek the publick good of the Nations, and the prosperity of the good people therein, who have adhered to the good cause of Liberty, and Religion; if this be in your eye, as that which is principally intended, as you may pray in faith, for the presence of God with you, and have a comfortable expectation of his protection and favour; so if in the pursuit of it, through humane frailty you should erre, or mistake in the choise of meanes, paths, ways tending to that end, God will guide you, and lead you, and not leave you untill he hath made straite pathes for your feet: But if at the bottome, there ly secret animosities, selfe-will, desire of obtaining greatnesse or Power, on the one hand, or other; if every such thing be not on all hands subdued unto publick good, Prayers will be weakned, carnall wisdome increased, the Counsell of God rejected, and you will wander in all your ways without successe.
2. Keep alive this principle, (which whether any will hear, or whether any will forbear, I know not; but this I am sure of, in the latter end it will be found to be ⟨p. 48⟩true:) according as you regard, cleave to, promote, protect, on the one side, or despise, contemn, and oppose on the other, the common interest of Zion, the people of God before laid down, so will your affairs either flourish, prosper, and succeed on the one hand; or wither, decay, and be fruitless, on the other. In all other things that shall fall under your consideration, that relate to the civil government of the Nations, prudence, conjecture, probability, consideration of circumstances, and the present posture of things may take place. This is capable of no framing to the one hand or other, upon any pretence what ever.