The Covenants And The Covenanters: Covenants, Sermons, and Documents of the Covenanted Reformation
Religion
The Covenants And The Covenanters: Covenants, Sermons, and Documents of the Covenanted Reformation
Covenanters -- Scotland -- History -- Sources; Presbyterian Church -- Scotland -- History -- Sources
"From the womb of the morning thou hast the dew of thy youth." That is,
as the dew is multiplied upon the earth, so sall thy people be. This is
are ordinar phrase in Scripture. Hushai says to Absalom, "Convene the
people from Dan to Beersheba, and then we sall light upon David as the
dew lighteth upon the ground; and then there sall not be left of him and
of all the men that are with him so much as one." And this phrase is
well set down, Is. liv., "Rejoice, O barren, and thou that didst not
bear, break forth into singing and cry aloud, thou that didst not
travail with child; for more are the children of the desolate than the
married wife." And therefore He uses this form of speech, v. 2, "Enlarge
thy tents, and let them stretch the curtains of thy habitations;
lengthen thy cords, and strengthen thy stakes." And all these things are
requisite to be done when the people of God are multiplied thus.
Let us observe here, if the Word of God continue in this land, in the
purity thereof, and the sacraments be rightly administrate, the people
of God will then multiply exceedingly here. The chiefest city in this
land, they are forced to marvel where the people has been in former
times that are in it now, so that they cannot get kirks to contain them.
And they think, if the gospel continue in the purity thereof, all the
kirks that they are building, with the rest, sall have enough ado to
contain them. And it is a marvel to consider how the Lord has
multiplied His people, at this time. This is not that we are to glory in
multitudes, but to let you see the great work of God, Who has multiplied
His people thus. And as it was at the beginning of the plantation of the
Christian religion, there was three thousand converted at one preaching
of the apostle, I will not say that there has been three thousand
converted at a preaching here, but I may say this, that at one preaching
there has been some thousands wakened up, who had not been so for a long
time before. And will it not be a hard matter, seeing that it is so,
that Saint Andrews sall be as Gideon's fleece; that all the kingdom
about it sall be wet with the dew of heaven, and it sall only be dry?
Even so, will it not be a shame, that all others sall be stirred up, and
ye not a whit stirred up in this day more than if there were not such a
thing? And, therefore, beloved, I would have you to join yourselves with
the rest of the people of God in this cause.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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