Yea though they bring forth, yet will 1 slay even the beloved fruit of their Womb

Yea though they bring forth, yet will I slay even the beloved fruit of their womb.

The word translated beloved fruit, it is Desirable, the desires of their womb; children are the desires of the womb, that is, women are very strong in their desires after them, Give me children or else I die (says Rachel:) Indeed harlots are not, they care only for their lust, and would have no fruit of their womb. It's an excellent emblem for the expression of the vanity of many preachers that care for nothing but to satisfy their lusts, and shew their wit and parts, but care not for any fruit at all, care not for begetting any children to God; like harlots they desire not the fruit of the womb, but wives that are faithful to their husbands, they do desire it. And the same word that is here for desires, and translated beloved, it is likewise in other Scriptures translated beloved, that in (Daniel 9:23) Oh man, greatly beloved — Oh man of desires. And so in Daniel 10, where the Angel says, great beloved, it is a man of desire. And so in (Proverbs 31:2) What, my son! and what, the son of my womb! and what, the son of my vows! You may see how Solomon's mother speaks with a great deal of affection, Oh my son! the son of my womb, and the son of my desires. But indeed the word signifies properly, the son of my vows, Oh! I made vows to God, if God would give you me, and since I have given you up to God, and by vows dedicated you to God, what, the son of my vows! Women therefore they should look upon their children as the children of their vows, and shew forth their love to them in the right way that God would have them. It is a strange place that we have in Titus, where aged women are commanded to teach the young women to love their husbands; and to love their children; it is a strange thing that a mother must be taught to love her children. Your child is the beloved fruit of your womb, but yet you must be taught by God, taught by his people, taught by his word to love your children, to love them in a right and holy way. Take heed of loving them so as to provoke God to take them from you, take heed that they be not slain for your sakes; many mothers have slain the fruit of their womb by loving them too much. Do not honor your children above God as Eli did, when you look upon their natural comeliness consider they have that in them, and that by your means that except they have another birth will make them objects of God's eternal hatred. They are the beloved fruit of your wombs, and you look upon them and see them sweet babes and very comely, yes, but think withal that you are the cause to bring them into that that if they have not another birth, though they be objects of your mirth by being born to you, yet they will be objects of God's hatred by being born in sin by you. You may look upon them as objects of your delight, but God may look upon them as those that he has appointed to slay. Alas those poor sweet babes, what hurt have they done? God sees enough in them that in his justice he may slay them. But in this that he says he will slay the beloved fruit of their womb, or the desirable fruit, take but this one note:

If God's honor, and his ordinances, and his saints that are dear to him, be not dear to you, even the very fruit of your womb shall not be regarded by him. That's the scope of the threatening: says he, Oh here's a people that my honor, my ordinances, my saints are not dear to them, therefore even the desirable things of their womb, the very beloved fruit of their womb, that that goes more to their hearts than any thing in the world, that that is the dearest to them I will slay them in mine anger. If you would have what's dear to you be dear to God, let that that is dear to God be dear to you.

And then it follows in the last verse.