A sermon wherein is showed that the church of God is sometimes a subject…A sermon wherein is shewed that the church of God is sometimes a subject…

2. Labour for Assurance. In the Primitive Times, Assurance was not so rare a thing among Christians, as now it is: for those were suffering Times; and believers did need Assurance; that so they might be, at a Minutes warning, ready to be called forth to die, and to suffer for the Truth. If a man be called to part with his Estate; and he has no assurance of that which is better: how sad, and miserable will he be? When otherwise, he might be as joyful as they in Heb. 10. 34. Where there is Sincerity, there will be constancy in sufferings: but Assurance is necessary, in order unto comfort in sufferings. It will tend much to the honour of Christ, when his servants are exceeding Joyful in all their Tribulation: For which cause, He doth sometimes bestow the grace of Assurance upon them at the Time when they are called to suffer for his Name; though before that, they had it not. One of our English Martyrs, that suffered in those Days when Popery sat in the Throne, as He was going to burn & die at the Stake, cried out in an Ecstasy of Joy, O the Comforter is come, He is come, He is come into my soul. O then Labour for this Grace. They that know in themselves, that they shall be rewarded in Heaven, if they be persecuted on ⟨p. 22⟩Earth; will not be much Troubled, though they be deprived of their Estates, Liberties, Lives, & All, in the Cause of Christ or for the Gospel's sake.

2. Labour for Assurance. In the Primitive Times, Assurance was not so rare a thing among Christians, as now it is: for those were suffering Times; and believers did need Assurance; that so they might be, at a Minutes warning, ready to be called forth to die, and to suffer for the Truth. If a man be called to part with his Estate; and he has no assurance of that which is better: how sad, and miserable will he be? When otherwise, he might be as joyful as they in Heb. 10. 34. Where there is Sincerity, there will be constancy in sufferings: but Assurance is necessary, in order unto comfort in sufferings. It will tend much to the honour of Christ, when his servants are exceeding Joyful in all their Tribulation: For which cause, He doth sometimes bestow the grace of Assurance upon them at the Time when they are called to suffer for his Name; though before that, they had it not. One of our English Martyrs, that suffered in those Dayes when Pópery sat in the Throne, as He was going to burn & die at the Stake, cryed out in an Extasy of Joy, O the Comforter is come, He is come, He is come into my soul. O then Labour for this Grace. They that know in themselves, that they shall be rewarded in Heaven, if they be persecuted on