N00213:35
A call from heaven to the present and succeeding generations or A discourse wherein…A call from heaven to the present and succeeding generations or A discourse wherin…
A call from heaven to the present and succeeding generations or A discourse wherein is showed, I. That the children of godly parents are under special advantages and encouragements to seek the Lord. : II. The exceeding danger of apostasy, especially as to those that are the children and posterity of such as have been eminent for God in their generation. : III. That young men ought to remember God their creator. / By Increase Mather, teacher of a church in Boston in New-England. ; [Nine lines of quotations]A call from heaven to the present and succeeding generations or A discourse wherin is shewed, I. That the children of godly parents are under special advantages and encouragements to seek the Lord. : II. The exceeding danger of apostasie, especially as to those that are the children and posterity of such as have been eminent for God in their generation. : III. That young men ought to remember God their creator. / By Increase Mather, teacher of a church in Boston in New-England. ; [Nine lines of quotations]
Boston: printed by John Foster, 1679
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.
2. Seeking the Lord doth imply a sense of this lost condition. Sense of want puts men upon seeking. The Prodigal was hunger-bitten before he would seek to be reconciled to his Father, when he saw that he was feign to live upon husks, and that there was no way but he must perish with hunger, except he sought unto his Father for a supply, he would do so. If a man hath lost a thing, except he know that he hath lost it, he will not seek after it. Hence in the Parable concerning the lost piece of silver, it is said, what woman if she lose a piece of silver, doth not light a candle, and sweep the house, and seek diligently till she find it, Luk. 15. 8. So that there must be sense of loss before there will be seeking or finding. Nor will men seek the Lord, except they be by his Spirit made sensible, that they have lost his favour, and are through sin and the fall become miserable.
3. This seeking doth imply earnest desire to find God. That which a man seeketh after he would be glad to find. When Job sought after Communion with God, he maketh enquiry, where shall I find him, Job. 23. 3. No one will seek after that which is not an Object of his desires, Psal. 27. 4. One thing have I desired, that will I seek after. If thou seek him, that is to say, if thou earnestly desire to find the Lord, then so it shall be. If God be the chief Object of thy desires, if the desire of thy Soul be towards the remembrance of his Name, then he will be found of thee. As it was with David himself, Psal. 63. 1. O God thou ⟨p. 4⟩[…], […] will I seek thee; my Soul thirsteth so thee, my flesh longeth for thee, in a dry and thirsty Land Where […] is. How are the desires and affections on a thirsty man carried out after water, in a thirsty Land where no water is a when the desires of the Soul are in like manner carried out after God, that is seeking him.