Secondly, It is an Awful Fellowship and full of dread, It impresseth the Soul with a deep, yet kindly veneration of the Glorious Majesty of the great and Holy God, Who (as it is said, Psal. 89. vers. 7.) Is greatly to be feared in the assemblies of his Saints (where they are admitted to fellowship with him) and to be had in reverence by all that are about him; When Jacob was admitted to very near Communion with him, Gen. 28. He saith, vers. 16. Surely the Lord is in this place, and I was not aware: and vers. 17. It is said of him, that he was afraid, and said, how dreadful is this Place, this is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of Heaven: Familiarity here breeds no contempt, nor is it waited with any neglect or forgetfulness to keep due distance. Thirdly, It is a deeply humbling and Holily Self debasing Fellowship, as appears in Abraham, Gen. 18. who being, as Gods special friend, admitted to talk with him at an unusual and extraordinary rate of Familiarity, Yet interlines, (as it were) his discourse, almost in every period of it, with deeply self debasing acknowledgements of his being but dust and ashes, and deprecatings of Gods anger for his taking upon him to speak to Him, betwixt whom and himself there was so infinitely vast a disproportion: so the Prophet Isaiah, when he hath that Glorious Vision of the ⟨image 7⟩Majesty of God, Chap. 6. and hears the Seraphims, those purely intellectual Creatures, having their faces covered with their wings, as not being able to behold the Brightness of the Glory of the most absolutely perfect Holiness of God, crying, in a transport of admiration, each to another. Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord God of Hosts, the Earth is full of his Glory, he saith, Woe's me for I am undone, Because I am a man of unclean lips, and dwell in the midst of a People of Polluted lips, for mine eyes have seen the King the Lord of Hosts: So also Job, non-such in his time, according to Divine testimony, when he is admitted to unusual nearness to God, saith Chap. 42. I have heard of Thee by the hearing of the Ear, but now mine Eye seeth Thee, wherefore I abhor my self and repent in dust and ashes: The nearest approaches to that light wherein there is no darkness at all, make the clearest discoveries of the most eminent Saints their unworthiness, nothingness, and vileness.
Secondly, It is an Awfull Fellowship and full of dread, It impresseth the Soul with a deep, yet kindly veneration of the Glorious Majesty of the great and Holy God, Who (as it is said, Psal. 89. vers. 7.) Is greatly to be feared in the assemblies of his Saints (where they are admitted to fellowship with him) and to be had in reverence by all that are about him; When Jacob was admitted to very near Communion with him, Gen. 28. He saith, vers. 16. Surely the Lord is in this place, and I was not aware: and vers. 17. It is said of him, that he was afraid, and said, how dreadfull is this Place, this is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of Heaven: Familiarity here breeds no contempt, nor is it waited with any neglect or forgetfulness to keep due distance. Thirdly, It is a deeply humbling and Holily Self debasing Fellowship, as appears in Abraham, Gen. 18. who being, as Gods speciall friend, admitted to talk with him at an unusuall and extraordinary rate of Familiaritie, Yet interlines, (as it were) his discourse, almost in every period of it, with deeply self debasing acknowledgements of his being but dust and ashes, and deprecatings of Gods anger for his taking upon him to speak to Him, betwixt whom and himself there was so infinitly vast a disproportion: so the Prophet Isaiah, when he hath that Glorious Vision of the ⟨image 7⟩Majestie of God, Chap. 6. and hears the Seraphims, those purely intellectuall Creatures, having their faces covered with their wings, as not being able to behold the Brightness of the Glory of the most absolutely perfect Holiness of God, crying, in a transport of admiration, each to another. Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord God of Hosts, the Earth is full of his Glory, he saith, Wo's me for I am undone, Because I am a man of unclean lips, and dwel in the midst of a People of Polluted lips, for mine eyes have seen the King the Lord of Hosts: So also Job, non-such in his time, according to Divine testimony, when he is admitted to unusual nearness to God, saith Chap. 42. I have heard of Thee by the hearing of the Ear, but now mine Eye seeth Thee, wherefore I abhore my self and repent in dust and ashes: The nearest approaches to that light wherein there is no darkness at all, make the clearest discoveries of the most eminent Saints their unworthiness, nothingness, and vileness.
