Gurnall - BV4500 .G87 1655

13 4 That ye may be able tofiand children, and then labours to make him qneltion his fpirituale. Bare and fonfhip : his wife would have him entertain hard thoughts ofGod, (laying, Curfe God and die,) and hi friends as hard thoughts of himfelf, (as if he were an hypocrite) and both upon the fame mifl-ake, as if fuch an afflifted condition and agracious fate were inconfitlent. Now(Chriftian)keep the Plaines, and neither from this charge God foolifhly for thine e- nemy, nor thy felf as his. Reade the faddefl Providence with the Comment of the Word, and thou canft not make fuch an harfh interpretation. As God can make a ftreight line with a crooked flick, be righteous when he nieth wicked infiruments; fo alfo gracious when he difpenierh harfh Providences. ?ofepb kept his love, when he fpake roughly to his brethren. I do not wonder that the wicked think they have Gods bleffing, becaufe they are in the warmeSun: Alas, they are (rangers to Gods counfels, void of his Spirit, and feninal, judging ofGod and his Providence, by the report their prefent feelingmakes of them; like little children, who think every one loves them that gives them plums. But 'tis flrange, that a Saint fhould be at a tole for his afflicted fiate, when he bath a Key to decipher Gods charaeter : Chriftian, bath not God fecretly inffrufted thee by his Spirit from the Word, how to reade the fhort-hand of his Providence doeft not thou know that the Saints aftlitliOns flan(' for bleffings ? Every fon *horn he love.% he correeD ; and profperiry in a wicked fate, mull it not be read a curfe ? doth not God damne fuch to be rich, honourable, viftorious in this world, as well as to be tormented in another world ? God gives them more of thefe then they feem to defire fometirnes, and all tobinde them falter up in a deep fleep offecurity, as 7ael ferved Sifera, he (hall have milk, though he asked but water, that the might naile him the furer to the ground. Milk having a property (as fomewrite) to encline to (Jeep. 4. SECT. IV. Fourthly, be careful to keep thy old receits which thou haft had from God for thepardon of thy fins. There are fome gaudy dayes,

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