N00129:440
Useful instructions for a professing people in times of great security and degeneracy
Useful instructions for a professing people in times of great security and degeneracy: delivered in several sermons on solemn occasions: / by Mr. Samuel Willard Pastor of the Church of Christ at Groton. ; [Eight lines of Scripture texts]
printed by Samuel Green, 1673
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. Reform thy […] by due discipline towards it, here then canst not be too strict […]; let the search be thorough, and the reformation universal: mortify thy lusts and corruptions, ransack and cleanse every corner of thy heart, let none of thy Idols remain, but put them all away; resolve with Ephraim, that thou wilt have no more to do with them, Hos. 14.8. and beg of God grace that thou mayest stand to thy resolutions.
1. Reform thy 〈…〉 by due discipline towards it, here then canst not be too strict 〈…〉; let the search be thorough, and the reformation universal: mortifie thy lusts and corruptions, ransack and cleanse every corner of thy heart, let none of thy Idols remain, but put them all away; resolve with Ephraim, that thou wilt have no more to do with them, Hos. 14.8. and beg of God grace that thou mayest stand to thy resolutions.
2. Reform others that are under thy charge, as far as thou canst do thy best; say to thy Children, as Jacob to his sons, Put away every one from among you his strange gods; Joshua, you know, could undertake not only for himself, but for his too, I and my house will serve the Lord: be sure to reform them as to the outward man; you can indeed do no more, but be sure do that. Content not your selves to give them some slighty reproofs for their sins, that was Eli's sin, which removed his family from the Priesthood, but make use of that authority which God hath put into your hands, as occasion may require, and then commend the success to God.
2. Reform others that are under thy charge, as far as thou canst do thy best; say to thy Children, as Jacob to his sons, Put away every one from among you his strange gods; Joshua, you know, could undertake not onely for himself, but for his too, I and my house will serve the Lord: be sure to reform them as to the outward man; you can indeed do no more, but be sure do that. Content not your selves to give them some slighty reproofs for their sins, that was Eli's sin, which removed his family from the Priesthood, but make use of that authority which God hath put into your hands, as occasion may require, and then commend the success to God.