Selected quad for the lemma: church_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
church_n	according_a	time_n	year_n	3,085	5	4.5391	3	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A63011	The Almighty his gracious token of love to his friend Abraham, or, A sermon preached in the Cathedral Church of Bristol, January 3, 1674 by Rich. Towgood ...	Towgood, Richard, 1595?-1683.	1676 (1676)	Wing T1975; ESTC R10564	17,548	33

THE ALMIGHTY His Gracious Token of Love TO HIS Friend Abraham OR A SERMON Preached in the Cathedral Church of BRISTOL January 3. 1674. By RICH. TOWGOOD B.D. now Dean of Bristol and when time was Chaplain in Ordinary to His late Sacred Majesty King CHARLES the First of most blessed and most renowned memory In Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth any thing nor uncircumcision but a new creature Gal. 6.15 LONDON Printed by H.C. for H. Brome at the Gun at the West-end of St. Panls and are to be sold by Humfrey Dixon Bookseller in Wine-street Bristol 1676. To the Right Reverend Father in God GUIDO by Divine Providence Lord Bishop of Bristol Right Reverend Father in God and my much honoured Lord YOur Desire I dare not deny it is unto me instead of a Command but I fear whatsoever it was that your Lordship approved of at the hearing will not seem so approvable at the reading Horace his Verse I may crave leave a little to change and say Soepius instibant animum dimissa per aurem Quam quae sunt oculis subjecta fidelibus That which may pass current out of a popular Pulpit may not perhaps relish so well out of a publick Press However that which may serve to edifie a hundred may serve also to edifie a thousand And the world I hope may hereby see that our ordinary labours in Bristol which intend to sound no further than the walls of the Church in which they are delivered are not so extremely contemptible that our Hearers had need to keep up to themselves a company of Schismatical Teachers fetch'd from far to supply our defects For I dare assure your Lordship there are many Sermons frequently preached by my Brethren in Bristol which may challenge the light rather than this now presented to your Lordship and yet I reckon this may pass without offence having received the approbation of your Lordships judicious ear and that it hath made bold to prefix before it your Reverend Name I humbly beg and hope you will be pleased as being the occasion of it your self favourably to vouchsafe a pardon to Your Lordships most obliged and most humble Servant Rich. Towgood A SERMON PREACHED In the Cathedral Church of BRISTOL Januar. 3. 1674 5. ACT. vij 8. former part And he gave him the Covenant of Circumcision THESE words are part of a Sermon preached by St. Stephen the Protomartyr before the Sanhedrim or Council at Jerusalem not long after our Saviours Ascension What St. Stephens scope is in this Sermon contained in this Chapter or what he aims at in this particular passage I shall not now stand to inquire I shall at present look upon the Words as bearing full and perfect sence in themselves without any reference to the occasion or coherence further then doth concern the two Relatives or Persons here spoken of He and Him Only that ye may not stumble at the choice of this Text concerning an antiquated Ceremony ye may be pleased to consider that according to the order appointed by the Church the anniversary Commemoration of our Saviours Circumcision is not quite over as doth appear by the Epistle Gospel and Collect for this present Day and therefore a Text concerning Circumcision is not unseasonable Besides from this time we reckon the beginning of the New year and Circumcision was a sign of a New-heart and of newness of Life And lastly the beginning of this moneth is the time wherein friends of the chief account do usually gratifie one another with gifts of kindness and tokens of love And here the Text tells us of a special Gift that the Almighty God vouchsafed unto Abraham his friend for these two are the He and the Him here spoken of as is plain by the Verses foregoing He gave Him that is God gave Abraham the Covenant of Circumcumcision so that though I cannot say here is a New-years Gift yet here is no small token of Gods love to Abraham And concerning this Token of Love to come now to the Words themselves we have four things observable in the Text. 1. What it was 2. Of what worth it was 3. Who gave it 4. To whom it was given Of these by Gods gracious assistance and your Christian patience in their order and first of the first what it was It was the Ordinance of Circumcision God commanded Abraham this service and what kind of service this was and by whom to be observed and at what time to be performed is fully declared by the Holy Ghost himself and cannot better be expressed than in his own Words as we find them Gen. 17. from the tenth to the twelfth This is my Covenant saith the Lord to Abraham which ye shall keep between me and you and thy seed after thee every manchild among you shall be circumcised And ye shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskin and it shall be a token of the Covenant between me and you And he that is eight days old shall be circumcised among you every manchild in your generations he that is born in the house or bought with mony of any stranger which is not of thy seed This was the service that God commanded him and all his posterity And a hard service it was as appeared in that when the Sechemites were by deceit perswaded by the sons of Jacob to be circumcised their whole City by reason of their soreness after they were circumcised was not able to defend themselves against two men For it came to pass on the third day when they were sore that two of the sons of Jacob Symeon and Levi Dinahs brethren took each man his sword and came upon the City boldly and slew all the Males Gen. 34.25 So likewise it is said of the Children of Israel when they were all circumcised at their entrance into the Land of Canaan because they had not been circumcised by the way That they abode in their places in the Camp till they were whole Josh 5.7 8. But yet more fully doth the hardship of this service appear by that of Zipporah who when she was enforced to circumcise her Son said thus unto Moses her Husband not without bitterness A bloody husband art thou to me and doubled it A bloody husband because of the circumcision Exod. 4.25 26. A hard service it was and yet to be laid upon their Infants when they were but eight days old Surely we may justly take up the words of the Apostle which were uttered by him in another case Heb. 11.40 God hath provided some better thing for us Instead of that hard service for abrogated now it is Gal. 5.2 God hath appointed unto us the Sacrament of Baptism which as for the use is more perspicuous so for the quality is far less painful and yet see the fond tenderness of Parents and the foolish niceness of people now-a-days is such that they can scarce suffer a little cold water to be sprinkled on their Children nay a few drops more than ordinary shall