The Shepherd of Israel / Doctrine of Providence -- Obadiah Sedgwick

[VirginiaHuguenot]

The shepherd of Israel; or, God's pastoral care over His people. Delivered in divers sermons on the whole twenty-third Psalm. Together with the doctrine of providence, practically handled on Matth. 10, 29, 30, 31. by Obadiah Sedgwick is available online here.

 

[VirginiaHuguenot]

Providence Handled Practically by Obadiah Sedgwick is now available at Reformation Heritage Books. Thanks, Rev. Winzer!

 

[MW]

Providence Handled Practically by Obadiah Sedgwick is now available at Reformation Heritage Books. Thanks, Rev. Winzer!

All the credit goes to the good folk at RHB, without whom all that hard work wouldn't have seen the light of day. I thank the Lord for their diligence and faithfulness in distributing wholesome reformed literature.

 

[VirginiaHuguenot]

I thank the Lord for their diligence and faithfulness in distributing wholesome reformed literature.

 

[VirginiaHuguenot]

Providence Handled Practically by Obadiah Sedgwick is now available at Reformation Heritage Books. Thanks, Rev. Winzer!

My copy arrived today. Excellent introduction, very well written. Sweet reading!

 

[VirginiaHuguenot]

I particularly like this quote from the introduction (pp. 2-3) by Matthew Winzer and Joel Beeke, relevant to the above-linked thread:

Many Puritan writers traced the providential hand of God in history. Stories of sea-deliverances and other significant occurences were recorded to make Christians aware that history is not aimless happenstance. A prime example is Increase Mather's A History of God's Remarkable Providences in Colonial New England. Modern readers look disparagingly upon works like this, surmising that the Puritans read too much into events; yet, regardless of one's assessment of the Puritan interpretation of providential occurrences, we must admit that we err on the other side by disregarding the divine hand at work around us.

 

[VirginiaHuguenot]

Obadiah Sedgwick, Providence Handled Practically, pp. 93-94:

The gold is never purer than in the fire; the wheat is never cleaner than in a wind; and the water is never clearer than when it runs among the stones and rocks; the sheep never keep together so orderly in their pastures as when the wolves are about to worry them; the musical instrument never sounds so sweet as when you strike it with your fingers. So it is with the church -- the times of its calamity are the times of its beauty; their hearts are never more humbled, their ways never more reformed and purified, their graces and heavenly opportunities never more improved, their fellowship never more kindled, and their prayers and dependencies never more doubled and quickened than when the bondage of Pharaoh, the threatening of Herod, or the rod of the wicked does rest on the backs of the righteous. If wicked men tear their bodies, yet God will preserve their souls; if they deform their beauty, yet God will reform their hearts; if they waste their estates, yet God will make up their comforts; if they take away their lives, yet God will give them heaven. There is no calamity which befalls the church that shall not be either a medicine to heal, a lash to quicken, or a trial to discover. It shall be an advantage to the gospel, an enlargement of the stock, and a step to glory.