Selected quad for the lemma: christian_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
christian_n	baptize_v	church_n	infant_n	1,299	5	9.4082	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A41329	The plea of the children of believing-parents for their interest in Abraham's covenant, their right to church-member-ship with their parents, and consequently their title to baptism. The cause of publishing this discourse after so many learned men have laboured in this province, is declared in the preface to the reader. By Giles Firmin.	Firmin, Giles, 1614-1697.	1683 (1683)	Wing F960; ESTC R216413	52,287	130

by these I will never believe it God is gracious God is faithful what ever we think of him in our dark hours I will rather believe they did not follow close their improvement of these for I meet but with very few even good Christians tho' they hate Anabaptism that do improve them as they ought No wonder then tho' Men cry out Abrahams Covenant is Null and Infant-Baptism Null when they never improved them so found no good by them and now turn Anabaptists I know Christians that lie under some Temptations may and do expect more from the Covenant Promise and Sacraments than God intended or the Scripture holds forth they would make one Scripture contradict another If God gives in but a little and will suffer us to lie under our Temptations but yet will supply us with so much from his Covenant that we are able to hold up our hands in the day of Battel that our Hearts are kept close to him and do not in the least depart from him If we cannot get the fatted Calf and Musick c. Luke 15.23 which some Christians have if we can but get a Kid and have a Father to own us at last 't is worth our Beleiving Praying and Writing What it was that Woman a noted Midwife I knew expected to find at the Lords Supper I know not but it seems she found it not whereupon she forsooke the Lords Table with this blasphemous Speech A Man may find as much good by a Loaf in the Bakers Shop as by the Bread in the Lords Supper for she had been often there and could find no good Hearing of this Speech I inquired after her by those who had been long acquainted with her I know not whether I saw her after I heard it they took her alwaies for a civil Woman but did not think she was acquainted with the work of Regeneration but that made me to wonder the more for such persons commonly take up their Priest in the work done in above partaking of the Ordinance If Christians be at this Point we expect so much from Promises so much from Ordinances or we have nothing then we may do as she did throw off all Ordinances and Promises too Tho' I am far from attaining what I have sought and desired yet I bless God so much I have attained from my understanding and improving of Abrahams Covenant and my Infant-Baptism that I have but a light esteem of all the Anabaptists Books against them they signifie nothing with me but of this more hereafter Disputing without experiencing signifies little in Divinity to a tempted Soul But this I doubt not to affirm Did Christians set in earnest to their work and labour to improve Abrahams Covenant and their Infant-Baptism they should find as much profit advantage and support to their Souls as any Anabaptists do by their Dipping when Adult But if Ordinances be not improved how can Men expect any good by them When God made that Covenant with Abraham to be the God of him and his Seed and appointed the seal of his Covenant to be Administred to the Infant on the eigth day Might not ought not all the Jews and did not many of them when they came to years of discretion and were taught the meaning of them improve them to their Souls advantage why then may not we as well improve the same Covenant and our Infant-Baptism when we are come to years of discretion to our Spititual advantage when we understand them by our Pastors and Parents teaching If there be such an advantage in Adult-Baptism over there is in Infant-Baptism what is the matter that some of them could say they found no such good by it and I do believe them by their Conversation but especially what is the reason that so many hundreds of them cast off both Infant and Adult-Baptism and deny Baptism altogether for which they were sometime so zealous if there had been such advantage in it they would not have done so wickedly to cast away such an Institution of Christ Secondly A second thing which might occasion this is That so many Children of Godly Parents who were Dedicated to God in Baptism in their Infancy and Parents have bestowed great pains in their Education yet prove wicked The deeper the wounds of such Parents and the sorer the damnation of such Children without Repentance But first We may observe the greatest number of visible yea true Christians in the visible Church consist of the Children of such Parents Since the Flood of Iniquity of late years brake in upon this Nation it hath risen so high that it hath flown into the Houses of Godly Parents more than ever it did since England knew the Gospel This is a Lamentation Secondly Was it not so in Isaac's Family where but two and one naught Thridly We never understood that when God made that Covenant with our Father Abraham and his Seed that he intended to make all his Seed Godly but we understand such a Priviledge in it that neither Parents nor Children who have their Eyes opened will part with it let the Anabaptists write what they please against it Fourthly But do this Disping None deny that Regenerate persons are the subjects of Baptism he must say only else he opposed not us Christins Scrip. pract of Int. c. p. 147 148. and Re-Baptising of Adult persons help it are they all Godly If the Elect and Regenerate be the only Subjects of Babtism as my Author tells me I am sure they are not of Anabaptism to my knowledge unless drunkenness and uncleanness be Notes of Regeneration we shall not need to go to Germany to inquire England will afford proof enough Mr. Baxter hath given us a sad account of some of them enough to make a serious Christian afraid of the Opinion By a serious Christian who came from New-England we are informed That a Sea-man as I remember one being Baptised how long the Baptist held him under Water I know not but so soon as his Head was above Water he wrapt out an Oath so I heard it what do you make account to drown me Thirdly Another is this The great Adversary of Christ and his Church seeing how earnestly the Spirits of good Christians were set for the Reformation of the Church in all Points according to the Holy Scriptures which we profess to hinder this work by dividing of Christians and raising Animosities one against another used this for one Engine Baptising of Infants of Beleiving Parents being the Opinion and Practise of such Christians they must now be thrown by because in the Scriptures we can no where read that Christ gave command to his Apostles to Baptise Infants While I was answering this Book word was sent me That there was one who would Dispute with me in the Congregation expecting his coming and knowing he had thrown away Water-Baptism for an Introduction to my work I laid down Ten Arguments to prove that Water-Baptism was still an Institution of

Christ obliging all that professed Faith in him to practise to hear what he would say to them judging it a silly act in him to come to oppose me in Infant-Baptism who had renounced Water-Baptism altogether but that day which he said he would come he did not About three Weeks after he did and this was all he had against me what concerned others I regard not Where did Christ give command to Baptise Infants To this I had spoken several times before that this was no New thing to the Congregation There was no such express command in those words I granted but there was a command to Baptise Infants implyed included in that command of Christ to his Apostles to Baptise Disciples Matth. 28.19 I framed my Argument but the Man could not tell which Proposition to deny but after some words little to the purpose civilly departed They who desire the Reformation of the Church do not say every thing must be expresly set down in Scripture but if it be contained in the Scripture and by necessary consequence deducted from thence we are bound to believe or practise it Our Lord taught us this in proving the Resurrection against the Sadduces A Point of infinite more consequence then the Baptising of an Infant For if there be no Resurrection to what purpose is our Religion But according to the Anabaptists Argument that Call for an express command to baptise Infants and therefore reject it our Lord did not prove the Resurrection I will personate a Sadduce and take their Argument the Question is Shall there be a Resurrection of the Dead The Sadduce denies it our Lord affirms it and proves it from Exod. 3.6 I am the God of Abraham c. Matth. 22.29.31 v. But what is this to the proof of the Question Doth God say expresly to Moses there shall be a Resurrection of the Dead if so then we will believe it else not Thus the Anabaptist Doth Christ expresly command the Apostles to Ba●tise Infants then we will Practise it else we Condemn it But tho' God did not expresly say there shall be a Resurrection yet he said that which by necessary Consequence will force it For tho' Jacob who died last of the three had been dead two hundred years when God spake those words yet he saith he is their God but he is not the God of the dead but of the living Mark 12.28 The people said He answer'd them well and 22 Matth. 33. They were astonished at it Yet I may say the necessity of this Consequence from that Antecedent is nothing so obvious and clear to many even good Christians as the Consequence of Infants of Believing-Parents being under Abrahams Covenant and Church-Members with their Parents But what mischief this Principle and Practice hath done and how it hath served the Devils Design we are sad Witnesses Fourthly Tho' I do not put so much stress upon this because the Argument of the Anabaptist cast out all the Posterity of the soundest Believers and holy Men as well as the most wicked out of the Church yet I believe this hath helped on with the rest to see what ignorant and debauched persons because it is the Mode of the Nation require Baptism for their Children and it is Administred to them The Anabaptists Principle is That Regenerate Persons are the only Subject of Baptism but how far is this Practice from their Principle This doth a little confirm me in it because that Man whom I mentioned in my first Page with whom we held Communion when those who are esteemed godly and he did think so had Children to be baptized he desired he might know it and would be present at the Administration though he was not clear for Infant-Baptism This I will say I had rather baptize the Children of some Heathen than of many who are called Christians their Ignorance is not more nor Conversations worse and yet these Christians have lived long under Gospel-light Had they but the knowledge required in the Catechism in the Common-Prayer-book and Conversations as civil as some Indians I have known it were tolerable but when men are asked Quest What is God Ans A good old man Qu. What is Jesus Christ Ans A courteous young Gentleman Quest How many Gods are there Ans Ten. Qu. How many Commandments are there Ans Two Qu. Which is the first Ans Salvation What the second was he forgot that stood by and shewed the three last Questions the first two were another person 's and professed to my Father-in-law when he came to have his Child baptized That he answered him as well as he could For want of Catechising and good Discipline in Church and State Into what a miserable condition is this Nation fallen That this hath helped on among these who are godly Anabaptists I do not much doubt Fifthly I cannot exclude the holy and just government of God When people come to be glutted with the precious Gospel-truths the life of a Christian these are stale and common new things would be welcome I doubt not to say God may permit some of his own dear people to fall into some Errour which in them he overlooks and pardons when others shall take up that Errour and bear up themselves in it because such godly men were of that Opinion and that Errour to them shall be an inlet to other Errours and so fall from one to another filling their heads with notions and spending time in dispute about slight matters and ruine their Souls at last I thought it was a smart and terrible speech of Tertullian Nec periclitor dicere c. Nor do I think it any danger to say The very Scriptures themselves to be so ordered or disposed by the will of God that they should minister matter to Hereticks when I read there must be Heresie 1 Cor. 11.19 which without the Scriptures could not be De prescrip adv Haeret. p. 86. And here I cannot but observe the judgment of God I can call it no other That two great Corporations I know where there were great Assemblies of Anabaptists It is the same in many other places in England the greatest number of them turned Quakers the Anabaptists Society dwindle almost to nothing Thus they who threw off Infant-Baptism throw off the Ordinance of Baptism it self the Lord's Supper and the great Gospel-truth setting up Self and a Heathenish morality being now fallen into the Mare mortuum from which few or none return Sixthly Another thing which hath prevailed to draw away some honest meaning persons not able to judge have been the great stress and absolute necessity the Anabaptists put upon Baptism and their Baptism for so they style themselves the Baptized Congregations and none baptized but themselves which strikes divers good Christians with fear and what great good things they may expect who do come into their way being Rebaptized from Mark 16. This Text Peter de Bruis a Waldensian in great esteem with my Author for his judgment against