B36604:72
Preparation for sufferings. Or The best work in the worst times Wherein the necessity,…
Preparation for sufferings. Or The best work in the worst times Wherein the necessity, excellency, and means of our readiness for sufferings are evinced and prescribed; our call to suffering cleared, and the great unreadiness of many professors bewailed. By John Flavel minister of Christ in Devon.Preparation for sufferings. Or The best work in the worst times Wherein the necessity, excellency, and means of our readiness for sufferings are evinced and prescribed; our call to suffering cleared, and the great unreadiness of many profesours bewailed. By John Flavel minister of Christ in Devon.
London: printed for Robert Boulter, 1681
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.
Fifthly, The removal of godly and useful men by death in more than ordinary hast, was to them a sign of desolation at hand, Isa. 57.1. The righteous perisheth, and no man layeth it to heart, and merciful men are taken away, none considering that the righteous is taken away from the evil to come. In this case God acts towards his people, as the Husbandman in a catching Harvest doth by his Corn, he hurries it with a shuffling hast into the Barn, when he sees a Storm coming; or as a careful Father with his Sons that are abroad at School, who sends his horses to fetch them home speedily when he hears the Plague is begun in the place: upon this ground the Prophet Amos bewails himself, Amos 7.1. Woe is me, for I am as when they have gathered the Summer fruits, as the Grape gleanings of the Vintage, there is no Cluster to eat: my Soul desired the first ripe fruit; q. d. Alas, alas, what miserable days are at hand! what miseries must I expect to see! the pleasant Clusters (i. e.) the Societies of the Saints are gathered away by the hand of death; there are but few that remain, here and there a single Saint, like Grapes after the Vintage is done, two or three upon the outmost branches.
Fifthly, The removal of godly and useful men by death in more than ordinary hast, was to them a sign of desolation at hand, Isa. 57.1. The righteous perisheth, and no man layeth it to heart, and merciful men are taken away, none considering that the righteous is taken away from the evil to come. In this case God acts towards his people, as the Husbandman in a catching Harvest doth by his Corn, he hurries it with a shuffling hast into the Barn, when he sees a Storm coming; or as a careful Father with his Sons that are abroad at School, who sends his horses to setch them home speedily when he hears the Plague is begun in the place: upon this ground the Prophet Amos bewails himself, Amos 7.1. Woe is me, for I am as when they have gathered the Summer fruits, as the Grape gleanings of the Vintage, there is no Cluster to eat: my Soul desired the first ripe fruit; q. d. Alas, alas, what miserable days are at hand! what miseries must I expect to see! the pleasant Clusters (i. e.) the Societies of the Saints are gathered away by the hand of death; there are but few that remain, here and there a single Saint, like Grapes after the Vintage is done, two or three upon the outmost branches.