Selected quad for the lemma: act_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
act_n	believe_v	faith_n	habit_n	3,078	5	10.3510	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A81720	A boundary to the Holy Mount, or a barre against free admission to the Lords Supper. In answer to an humble vindication of free admission to the Lords Supper. Published by Mr. Humphrey minister of Froome in Somersetshire. Which humble vindication, though it profess much of piety and conscience, yet upon due triall and examination, is found worthy of suspension, if not of a greater censure. By Roger Drake minister of Peters Cheap London.	R. D. (Roger Drake), 1608-1669.	1653 (1653)	Wing D2129; Thomason E1314_2; ESTC R209198	85,461	218

there avouches an Vniversall right to every Ordinance they being duties of worship which is of universall command for proof he quotes Isa 66.23 Answ If all be bound to come without exception then why doth himself exclude children and distracted persons Secondly All Christians have a mediate but only prepared Christians an immediate right to the Sacrament as all Israel had a mediate but only purified persons an immediate right to the Passeover Numb 9.10 Thirdly All are obliged to every part of worship but 1. Not at all times since affirmative precepts binde not ad semper 2. Not in all cases as an unconverted person is not bound to praise God for his conversion c. which he hath not To apply the distinction The time of every Sacrament is not a fit season for every person whether it be by his own default or by divine providence 2. In case of present incapacity receiving though an act of worship is not sinfully omitted unlesse that omission be joyned with contempt of the Ordinance His quotation is rather a prediction then a command and supposing it be both yet it must be understood with the forementioned limitations Fourthly In a strict sense Actual receiving is not an act of worship no more then preaching consecrating and distributing the Elements is And if it be not properly an act of worship then his argument falls of it self or if it be in a large sense as the other acts forementioned yet by them its apparent that all persons are not obliged to all acts of worship since only Ministers may preach baptize consecrate and give the Elements which yet in some respect are acts of worship What he adds in the same Paragraph about a poor souls doubting of his right to the Sacrament yet resolved to give up himself to Christ makes little for his purpose the Question is Whether any not resolving to give up himself to Christ ought to receive and whether upon his visible refusall to give up himself to Christ the Minister is bound to give unto him the symbole of Christ Object 6 The Sacrament is not a converting but a confirming Ordinance Ergo. Answ This indeed is one of our grand arguments against free admission and if it be not Cannon-proof our cause must needs be in a great deal of hazard it concerns us therefore to make it good against all M. H. his battery Now for overthrow of this Argument he pretends that our Divines look at Baptisme as converting the Lords Supper as edifying pag. 53. The former he willingly assents to c. The Question is not what some Divines hold but what they should hold For our parts we beleeve no Sacrament understand it as received is a means of Regeneration but only of confirmation and edification and supposing Baptisme be called the Laver of Regeneration Titus 3.5 which yet the place proves not it s only so by way of signification and obsignation not by way of causality In regeneration and conversion the Word is writ in our hearts but can any man either Scripturally or rationally make the seal the cause of the writing Is it not evident that Baptisme doth not cause but presuppose conversion Acts 2.42 yea and profession too in adult is Acts 8.37 and is called by Divines the Seal of Initiation not as it initiates us into a state of saving grace but into the body of the visible Church and as it may seal the truth and benefit of Regeneration to persons converted but not work Regeneration where it is wanting Passing therefore his flourish of denomination à parte eminentiori let us see how he proves the Sacrament to be converting His main Argument is Pag. 55. Because the Sacrament is a visible word holding forth Christ and the Covenant to the sight as the Gospel doth to the hearing And pag. 56. The Sacrament shews forth Christs death 1 Cor. 11.20 Therefore as it doth so it is undoubtedly converting Answ Doth not M. H. know that at the Sacrament there is a mixture of severall Ordinances as prayer preaching or opening the words of institution amp c. And that those may be effectuall means of conversion we deny not upon which account we judge it fitting that whoever will may be present at the Lords Supper as well as at Baptisme But the great Question is Whether actuall receiving be a converting Ordinance And here we challenge the challenger to give any one instance of a person converted by receiving the Lords Supper or to make proof that the act of receiving doth convert The Sacrament indeed is food to nourish but where is it called an immortall seed to beget any to Christ For his glosse page 56. There is in the Sacrament a Take for conversion and an Eat for nourishment It is gratis dictum and would make against the conversion of the Apostles who were commanded to take as well as to eat yet I hope they were not in an unconverted condition 2. Taking and eating do both imply and call for acts of faith but the act of faith must needs presuppose the habit of faith and so conversion He that sayes Take eat supposes a man hath an hand to receive and a mouth to feed on which no uncoverted person hath Object Why may not the command of taking Christ in the Sacrament be an instrument of Conversion as well as the same command is in the word preached Acts 16.31 Answ Because we have neither promise nor president of blessing the command of taking in the Sacrament as we have of blessing the word preached in order to conversion The Word is both seed and food not so the Sacrament which indeed may be food or physick but not a seed of regeneration nor is any where so called in Scripture And to attribute that to an Ordinance which God hath not put in it or to expect that from an Ordinance which God hath not promised to it is will worship an humane invention and a breach of the second Commandment I dare appeal to M. Humphry his conscience upon this account Suppose an unconverted person comes to the Sacrament in his pride and presumption stouts it still against Christ laid before him as crucified in and before the consecration of the Elements by the Ministers explication and exhortation what evidence doth the Scripture give that this man shall be converted by that one word Take uttered by the Minister at the delivery of the Elements I doubt not of Gods power but we must look to his revealed will The Papists say Hoc est corpus meum converts the Elements M. H. sayes Accipite converts the receiver we desire a clear proof of both before we can give credit to either But suppose the word Take as a short and virtual Sermon might convert yet what thinks he of that person who stands out against that word also can he be converted by actuall receiving Then that rule of the Apostle 1 Cor. 11.29 cannot be universally true He that cats unworthily eats judgement to

one that doubts groundedly and hath no grace at all 1. It cannot convert him understand me still of actuall receiving as hath been formerly shewed 2. It cannot confirm him unless it be in sin by sealing judgement to him For can he be confirmed in grace who hath no grace at all 2. Where he saies The Receiver seals not necessarily to the condition in esse but in fieri I answer He seals as necessarily in point of duty to the condition in esse or de praesenti as in fieri or de futuro and that man who ingages not to believe at present plaies the hypocrite in ingaging to believe hereafter It is not with elicit as with imperate acts in the former he that truly wills them doth in part perform them whence Divines make a true desire of faith one degree of faith and he that in truth desires and resolves to beleeve hereafter may as well act that resolution now since faith it self as well as the resolution of faith is an act of the will And this M. H. would speak in those words Page 86. If he resolve now for the time to come without procrastination to walk according to the Covenant Is not faith the first step of this walk He that resolves in truth to beleeve cannot but desire to beleeve and the true desire of faith is both Scripturally and by the consent of Divines one degree of faith Thirdly By the very act of receiving he seals to faith in esse or de praesenti in point of profession the very language of his receiving the Elements is I receive Christ signified and offered to me in particular by them and therefore he that receives the Elements and doth not act faith at the same instant he playes the hypocrite wofully mocks God and Christ and as the mockers of Christ were guilty of his death so is every unworthy receiver Pag. 86. He proceeds The faith therefore that is absolutely requisite to a beleever is not assurance but consists I take it of these two things only 1. An historicall assent to the Gospel c. 2. A resolution to submit to the Government of Christ c. Let a man then but believe his Creed and resolve to go on in no known sin that is the main c. pag. 87. Answ 1. I easily grant assurance is not absolutely requisite as a means but only in point of duty namely that every one is bound to labour after it and in order unto our benè esse or comfort 2. Against every Sacrament a Christian is bound in an especiall manner by soul-searching examination to make out his evidence and if he have truth of grace and take pains to search he will by Gods grace finde so much truth in himself as may bring him to some assent about his good estate though usually this assent be much assaulted and weakned with doubting for removing whereof the Sacrament is an especiall help But 3. Whereas M. H. professeth to know no other kindes or ingredients of saving or justifying faith but only an historicall assent and a good purpose or resolution 1. I must tell him he is very defective on the one hand as omitting the speciall act of justifying faith namely adherence or leaning upon Christ for justifycation and salvation which is an act of the will not of the understanding nor will his historicall faith for kinde go beyond the faith of hypocrites yea of devils Iam. 2.19 and will aggravate a mans damnation if the faith of adherence follow not upon it 2. I must also tell him he is as excessive on the other in mistaking a good resolution for a constitutive part of faith which is either an antecedent or a consequent and effect of faith antecedent if it be a Legall consequent if an evangelicall resolution I wish M. H. would study fundamentalls better before he come to be so criticall about superstructures By his following discourse pag. 89. its apparent he speaks very confusedly about the spirituall estate of a Christian For 1. He supposeth a man hath not saving grace and yet that at the same time he is willing to accept of Christ to leave sin and yeeld to Christs termes all which are most precious saving graces Afterwards he compares these graces to a little gold mixed with much drosse in a lump of Ore yet at last concludes God can make grace of these least beginnings as if at present they were not grace till God does as it were transubstantiate them and turn our water into wine By all which its apparent the man doth not sibi constare and no wonder then if he bring his Reader into a labyrinth Object 9 The Ordinance is polluted if all be admitted Pag. 76. The summe of his Answer is That the Ordinance is defiled only to the unworthy receiver not to the admitters or joyners Answ Though we place no great confidence in this Argument nor believe the presence or actuall receiving of a wicked person doth simply defile either the Sacrament or the communicants as had an unclean man eaten of the Passeover supposing he neither touched any clean person nor any part of the Passeover but that he ate that Ordinance had been Levitically polluted only to himself yet connivance both in the admitters and joyners contracts morall pollution as he that suffers another to sin where he may and ought to hinder him or at least do his endeavour in order thereunto is partaker of his sin Lev. 19.17 1 Tim. 5.22 His application of Mark. 7.15 and of Peters vision to the Sacrament is ridiculous pag. 77. For do we hold that any either person or meat is Levitically unclean Contra dares he deny that any person yea any meat may be morally unclean namely as defiled with sin or occasions of sin Tit. 1.15 That which enters into the mouth defiles not a man Levitically but morally it may defile him and that either by his intemperance or irreligious receiving of it as eating the forbidden fruit defiled our first parents and he who when he may hinders not these sins is himself defiled by sinfull tolleration We believe as well as himself pag. 79. That the unworthinesse of another should not make the true beleever separate from the Sacrament Yet if I know another grosly ignorant or prophane and do not either endeavour to reform or discover him his unworthy receiving shall be set upon my score alone without any prejudice to the other communicants If it be a priviledge of the Gospel to have free Ordinances and to account no man unclean in the use of them ib. How dares M. H. set a spirituall rayl as he calls it about the communion Table and thereby refine and spiritualize old superstition to use his own termes by keeping from the Sacrament Children and distracted persons who have a better right to it then many prophane ones that his charity can admit and yet in one breath accuse and condemn us for doing the like to that he allowes in himself

himself c. for he that is converted by actuall receiving doth not eat judgement but mercy 2. Suppose a man should be converted by that short exhortation take since that may be done by presence at the Sacrament without actuall receiving how will it follow that all must receive because some may be converted by the exhortation to receive any more then that all must be assured of their salvation because some are comforted by the exhortation to assurance which is not immediatly the duty nor at all the priviledge of unconverted persons in statu quo Page 66. For further proof He supposes a morall unregenerate man doth his best to prepare himself thence he infers Do we think now to such a man the Ordinance is necessarily fruitlesse c. then God help us Shall not his examination prayers c. conduce more to convert him then the bare preaching of a Sermon especially considering the Word doth but precede and is a part of the Sacrament Accedit verbum ad Elementum c. Answ 1. No naturall man ever doth his best to prepare himself 2. Notwithstanding all his preparatory acts he hath still the unworthinesse of person he coming as is supposed unconverted to the Sacrament 3. Therefore he comes to the feast without the wedding garment and whether conversion or confusion be the portion of such a guest let the text judge supposing as M. H. would have it the marriage feast be the Lords Supper We believe no Ordinance is the feast but rather the dish wherein the feast is served 4. I wonder M. H. should attribute more to a few dead acts of a naturall man then to the Word preached which is the great Ordinance set apart for the conversion of souls Acts 26.16 18. Rom. 10.14 17. as if he designed to advance nature and free-will above grace 5. Because he adds I but the word accompanies the Sacrament what followes thence but that any one may be present to hear and see but only worthy communicants are to receive and unlesse he can make out that actuall receiving of the Elements is a converting Ordinance Actuall receiving is neither a word nor an act of God but meerly an act of the creature and an outward act too and therefore hath not a cōverting power in it all he pleads from the antecedaneous acts will not conclude his free admission since the fruit of the visible and audible word or of Christs death declared may be attained by presence at the Sacrament though a person do not actually receive I would not here be mistaken as if I pleaded for a Sacrament without receivers which is a contradiction in adjecto but I see no warrant in the word why the whole Congregation should not stay at the administration of the Lords Supper and that with much profit as well as at the administration of Baptism though all do not partake nor can I look at their ancient Ite missa est as a divine precept but as an humane tradition For his instance pag. 57. Of a poor humbled soul hoping to meet Christ at the Sacrament c. I answer 1. If his humiliation and hope be right he is a worthy receiver and already converted and so not a fit instance or medium to prove M. H. his conclusion If his hope and humiliation be not right then he is in the condition of the former and by his hypocrisie drawes further guilt upon himself 2. This poor soul if rightly humbled hungers after Christ rouls upon him and adheres to him which are proper acts of saving and justifying faith though he cannot rise up to faith of evidence nor can any man avoid despair unlesse he lean upon Christ or somewhat else All which clearly prove this person to be converted and that therfore the Sacrament is to him only a means of edification and comfort His third instance pag. 58. of the Disciples of Emaus is to as little purpose as the two former unlesse he can prove 1. That then they were in the state of nature 2. That that breaking of bread was the Sacrament Luk. 24.30 3. That they were converted by that breaking of bread Dictates so absurd that the very naming of them may be a sufficient confutation Although a man may be converted at Rep. Pag. 58. it is not by the Sacrament it is occasionally but not intentionally a converting Ordinance Here before I proceed any further I must tell M. H. he frames an Objection for us very unhandsomely A converting Ordinance occasionally not intentionally little better then a contradiction the very notion of an Ordinance implying divine ordination or appointment of any thing by his revealed will as a means of conversion edification comfort and benefit to the creature and how this can be properly called a not intentionally converting Ordinance is to me a paradox Let him prove actuall receiving to be a converting Ordinance and we shall not doubt but it is so intentionally To the Reply M. H. answers That it being granted the matter is upon the point yeelded partly because none are expresly forbidden to come and partly because all occasions must be taken for our salvation Answ 1. The cause is not yeelded unlesse it be proved that actuall receiving is a converting Ordinance since the end of conversion may be attained by presence at the Sacrament without receiving but the danger of eating and drinking unworthily cannot be incurred without receiving 1. Cor. 11.27 29. which yet hath no influence in order to conversion By presence much benefit may be gained without danger of unworthy receiving by receiving much guilt may be contracted without hopes of benefit to the unconverted Secondly If receiving be a converting Ordinance how dares M. H. exclude either Children distracted or excommunicated persons from it especially since these have most need of it and those are best taught by sense who have not so free an exercise of reason Yea why should Heathen be denied the Lords Supper more then the word preached if it be a converting Ordinance Are not they also bound to use all means and take all occasions of conversion to use M. H. his own words But if all hath been said will not take with us M. H. at last hath found out a way wholly to root out this subtilty which he thinks the spirit of errour hath insinuated into the hearts of many godly men by three things he hath more to say c. Answ By the way observe this mans presumption and censoriousnesse 1. In charging so many godly persons to be acted with a spirit of errour in this particular 2. In his confident undertaking wholly to root it out by what he hath to say which though mountains in his own conceit yet when they come to be scanned we hope by Gods assistance to make appear they scarce deserve the name of molehills and with a sling and stone of Gods making fear not to incounter with this great and vaunting Goliah who by big words bids defiance to

the whole hoast of Gods Israel His first grand Argument pag. 59. is this That the Sacraments and all Ordinances are primarily and properly means of grace and but in a remote sense means of conversion or confirmation for this grace we receive in the use of them converts some and strengthens others and this grace received in the Sacrament works in the unregenerate for their conversion Answ Is not here prime stuff worthy of a Doctor in Cathedrâ but to answer distinctly I must first premise that here he speaks not of relative but absolute not of externall but internall or inherent grace for otherwise the Ordinances are means of justification and adoption as well as of holinesse of which last yet he must be understood This premised I answer 1. That if the Ordinances be primarily means of grace they must needs be primarily means of conversion and confirmation since primary conversion is nothing else but grace at first infused and primary confirmation is degrees of the same grace superadded For further cleering whereof and that all the world may see how M. H. instead of informing would blinde and baffle the incautelous or injudicious Reader we must understand there is a two-fold conversion one primary when God converts and changes the heart by creating grace therein and so making it a new and soft heart Ezek. 36.26 turning the Wolf into a Lamb c. The other secondary when by vertue of grace inherent assisted by grace externall we turn our selves from sin to God Ezek. 18.31 32. Now since there is no inherent grace but it s formally and not only efficiently converting or confirming its impossible initiall grace should be wrought but conversion which is a change of principles must needs be wrought immediatly also and it s as impossible degrees of grace should be superadded but thereby formally confirmation must be wrought Is not the change from death to life greater then from a principle of life to an act of life Now the first infusion of grace is a change from death to life and is solely Gods act wherein the creature is meerly passive 2 Cor. 4.6 as the dark Chaos was to the light Gen. 1.2 3. And this is Gods converting of us or habituall conversion Our converting of our selves which is M. Humphry his sole conversion is nothing but a reflecting of the beam upon the Sonne of righteousnesse and in a manner nothing to the former work of divine conversion this we call actuall conversion as habituall sanctification is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 actuall sanctification 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 His assertion then is false That the Ordinances are remotely means of conversion for if the Ordinances be primarily means of converting grace they must needs be primarily means of conversion since grace infused is primary conversion but grace acting is secondary conversion The same I might say of confirmation also in proportion Secondly It cannot be proved that actuall receiving is either primarily or secondarily a means of converting grace and therefore will certainly prejudice but cannot benefit an unconverted person Thirdly How absurd is the last clause This grace received in the Sacrament works in the unregenerate for their conversion For 1. How is he unregenerate who hath received grace which formally regenerates him 2. How can a man be regenerate and yet at the same instant unconverted yet if Mr. Humphrey his Doctrine be true this will follow since a man is regenerated by the habits of grace infused which not only in order of nature but also in order of time may precede the acts of grace it being not necessary that grace present should act immediately or at all times Now since Mr. H. his conversion is nothing but the acting of grace and the habit of grace infused may in time precede the act and there is no conversion before the act of grace doth it not hence necessarily follow that a man may be regenerated and yet at the same instant of time unconverted that is at the same time in a state of nature as unconverted and yet in a state of grace as regenerated But how absurd and dissonant is this to true Divinity His second grand Argument is drawn from a distinction of conversion which he makes double 1. Outward from Heathenism to the profession of Christianity He will not say the Sacrament is such a converting Ordinance 2. An effectuall conversion from profession to the truth of grace and thus the Sacrament as a visible Word doth convert instrumentally as well as the Word preached the Spirit being the principall cause of conversion in both Ordinances c. And in the close of pag. 60. he appeals to experience for the converting power of the Sacrament This is the substance of that Paragraph Answ It s sooner said then proved that the Sacrament hath converted any 2. Though it should be granted that some parts of it did convert what is M. H. his cause the better unless he prove that actuall receiving doth convert 3. That the Sacrament should convert onely to truth of grace and yet not convert to outward profession is as absurd as that the Word preached should convert only to outward profession and not to truth of grace Let Mr. H. shew me one Scripture 1. Why Heathen may not be present at the Sacrament as well as at the Word preached 2. Why the visible Word may not convert to the form as well as to the power of godliness why it should do the greater and not the lesser We expect not dictates but proof and Argument to convince us of this new Light In the third place he descants though to little purpose about the Sacraments converting not intentionally but occasionally c. To which we briefly answer That whatever other parts of the Sacrament may do yet actuall receiving converts neither occasionally nor intentionally and therefore unconverted persons ought not to receive because this Sacramentall action cannot benefit but prejudice them Rep. Unregenerate men are dead in sin and bread must not be given to dead men c. This Mr. H. makes to he a fancy 2. Opposes that if any bread could recover life that bread might be given to a dead man and such is the bread in the Sacrament c. 3. That if we may give Aqua vitae to dying men then we may give Calix vitae to dead Christians c. Answ 1. It s no wonder if strong fancies metamorphize what they please into a fancy 2. Sacramentall receiving in the Lords Supper notes a vitall act which a dead man cannot put forth and be the bread never so quickning upon Mr. H. his supposition if a dead man cannot receive it it will not quicken him as the best Physick will not cure if a living man will not or cannot receive it Taking and eating in the Sacrament note not a passive but an active receiving and therefore do not beget but presuppose life which life grant it may be wrought by other Sacramentall actions proves only