point for it the first day of the weeke were the Lords day when Sermons and prayer and communicating in the Sacrament were made and received It follows that the Church had changed the Sabbath day from the seventh day unto the eight and so we are to resolve our selves against these innovators how this might be done for assure your selves although we be well resolved in the thing and long experience hath taught us to be quiet and to settle our selves in the authoritie of the Church yet there is nothing that is of weaker authoritie then the change of the Sabbath and if these new Hereticks can prevaile with us in other things it is no marvell if they prevaile in this for there is nothing that is left upon so weake a foundation that hath so slender proofe as this which makes them to get ground upon unstable soules that are their hearers being a multitude of men where there is varietie of affections and imbecillitie of judgement and every man is carried away with every blast of doctrine as children to and fro no marvell if they have sowne such seeds of pestilent schisme by these contrary blasts which are every where studied Therefore you shall understand that the holy Apostles presently after our Lords ascention into heaven The Sabbath changed by the Apostles they did ordaine that the meetings of Christians for the Sabbath that those exercises should be upon the eight day of the weeke I meane upon the eight day from the creation upon the Iews Munday which now is called Sunday or our Lords day and those feasts that formerly were wont to fall upon any day of the weeke as Easter day which was kept according to the course of the Moone and if it fell upon a Wednesday or a Thursday or the like still it was Easter day the Passeover day the feast of sweet bread when the paschall Lambe was offered But the Apostles changed it that it should alwayes be on the Sunday upon the day of our Lords resurrection and Whitsuntide which followes after Easter being a moveable Feast and as Easter was still that was to be referred to it now the feast of Pentecost was referred by the Apostles to the Lords day the day of our Lords resurrection our Sunday And this was not the devise of Pius Pius the first Pope or Dicta the first Pope as some have imagined which was many yeares after our Lords ascention but it is certaine it was the ordinance of the Apostles themselves as we may see in two famous places for we have but two as Beza Beza saith well in Acts 20.10 Act. 20 10. and in this place In these two places we observe that liberty that the Lord gave to his Church 1 Cor. 16.2 to change the seventh day to the eighth And whereupon upon what ground did they take this liberty for we have no direct word from the mouth of our Saviour for it but they did it onely upon the revelation of the spirit of God and they had such firme arguments and reasons as might sway them against the common tenents of the Iewish slavery and bondage whereby they were tyed and bound to the observation of their Sabbath The first maine reason that the Church had for the changing of the Sabbath 1 To shew the prerogative of Christ it was to shew the prerogative of the Sonne of God which saith of himself The sonne of man is Lord of the Sabbath also he is Lord even of the Sabbath Mark 3. Mark 3. Now therefore if he were Lord of the Sabbath then it lay in his power to change the time of the Sabbath the morall action he changed not that alway continueth we must have a day to worship God in we should worship God alway but the publique worship of God is the proper end and office of the Sabbath I but for the time why it should be upon the seventh day or on the eight day this was left in the Lordship of Christ being the Lord of the Sabbath which therefore could tell what he did when hee would rejourne the Sabbath to some other time where it might be a figure of some better signification therefore to shew the glory of the sonne of man the Church thought good to change the time of the Sabbath to another time 2 In remembrance of the work of redemption Secondly there was another reason as Athanasius Athanasius observeth upon those words of Christ All things are given to me of my Father he extends it thus far even to the change of the Ceremonies of Moses Law now saith he there are two great workes of God which are to be considered in their substance and in their ceremony The first is the worke of creation And the second is the worke of redemption wherin the world was recreated and made anew For the first the worke of creation the old Sabbath was instituted and ordained of God in remembrance of his worke for God rested the seventh day from all the worke that he had wrought and created in the sixe dayes before he rested the seventh day and blessed it and hallowed it for man to remember the workes he had created in the sixe working dayes and that man should also worke in sixe dayes as he had done and rest upon the seventh day for as the Lord had wrought sixe dayes so he saith sixe dayes shalt thou labour for all the life of man must be conformed to the example of Almighty God so now there being these two great workes the one of creation the other of redemption wee are to consider whether of these two are the greater and surely we shall finde the worke of redemption is a greater matter then the worke of creation When the Lord created the world by his omnipotent power he did but speake the word and it was done The Lord did but say let there be light and there was light Let there be a firmament and there was a firmament Let there be sea and land and there was presently sea and land and every thing else necessary But when he wrought redemption it was not done by a word but it cost the bloud it drew the bloud from the heart of his deare Sonne for it could not be done by way of omnipotency because it must be done by way of justice the justice of God must be satisfied which could not be satisfied but the sinner must loose his life which he had forfeited to God and God himselfe must doe it the person of God must take upon him the nature of man to suffer death for sinfull man that had deserved death everlasting this is the worke of recreation and redemption Now saith Athanasius these workes had their severall ages the worke of the creation was to be remembred untill Christ came to worke the worke of redemption and when he was come then the age of that was to passe away it was determined and terminate in Christ And now
you must doe it much more as being more blessed of God As I have ordained in the Churches of Galatia so doe ye where we are to understand three things First the antiquity of the Church of Galatia Three things 1 The antiquity 2 Apostolicall authorâ—ty Secondly that the Apostle had ordained it hee commands it he counselleth them not to doe it but by his power Apostolicall he enjoynes them 3 The power of the Church Thirdly and lastly what is the force and power of this argument which is drawne from the authority of the Church what is the nature of it and how farre it must prevaile with all the followers of Christ For thus he argueth The Churches of Galatia doe this and if you doe it not you are in great fault and in danger of damnation for you must follow the example of elder Churches but they have done thus therefore you must doe so much more having greater meanes and better ability then they that is one motive Another incentive is this that he himselfe will come and that he will see to these things and that he will receive it at their hands and that hee will make a convoy for it to the place where it should be surely delivered which is a great argument for a man is very willing to part with his money if he be sure that it shall not be interverted that there shall be no falshood but that it may come to the hands of those for whom it is intended upon these termes it may be he will be reasonable willing to part with it Therefore for this he tels them that he will take an order and that order that shall be best liking to themselves for when he comes they shall appoint and choose certaine fit men that they may trust with money and indeed he that a man may trust with money he may trust him with any thing almost therefore they shall choose such men not as may be their owne carvers not such as shall seek to make themselves rich of other mens goods much lesse out of the poore mans stocke but such as shall be true and faithfull dispensers of that which is offered by them and these shall bee chosen by themselves because he was a stranger to them and they were strangers to him and not onely so but they shall commend them to the brethren at Ierusalem by their Epistle and if need were he himselfe would helpe to convoy it he would helpe to passe their blessing The last motive that he useth is this that he saith they shall carry your grace to Ierusalem 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 calling that almes that they should give a grace as making them gracious before God and men as proceeding from the grace and good spirit of God as comming from meere grace not of constraint Every man desires to be gracious and to be reputed gracious the tythe of grace is the most honourable and the greatest thing that can be in the world especially of divine grace and such a thing is this almes deeds he calls it not almes he cals it not benevolence or a collection but he cals it grace They shall carry your grace to Ierusalem that is that gracious gift which the Spirit of God shall worke you to And the summe of all is this that he would have this done before he come lest they should be found too tardy if they should then fall a gathering when they should be a presenting and offering their gift for tardinesse and unreadinesse is a base fault in any man but most in Christians and in Christian duties most of all It was the fault of the foolish virgins which were tardy and lost the kingdome for it things must be done in season in due time so saith the Apostle lest it be to be made when I come I pray make it before as he saith in 2. Corinth 9. If the Macedonians that I shall bring with me when they come shall finde you making your collection you and I shall be both ashamed to see your unreadinesse in this point of Religion and devotion whereunto you should go with the formost I take this to be the summe and substance of the words read that upon the Lords day every man should repose and lay by himselfe of that which it had pleased God to give him and that he is pleased to give againe to the Church to lay by that he can spare and to do it upon consideration that other Churches have done it before him and that all the members of Christ are bound one to another and also because it was a precept and command upon the Church left by Apostolicall power and chiefly because the whole managing of the businesse was certaine to be conveyed by men of most knowne fame and experienced goodnesse and honesty Such as should be chosen by themselves such as should be confirmed by their letters commendatorie and all this the Apostle instances lest they themselves should not be found so ready and chearfull in the worke lest they should be lagging in their gift which should bee ready and willing to keep their credit especially in so good an action Of these things briefly and in order and but a word because I will not extend your patience beyond the time 1 The time of the collection First for the day the Apostle would have this done upon the first day of the weeke wee may take it for granted that it was the Lords day we will prove it afterward we will have it granted now The first day of the weeke the first of the Sabbath for all the dayes of the weeke were among the Iewes reckoned for Sabbaths so Sunday was the first and Munday the second and Tuesday the third Sabbath and so forth And according to this reckoning they all computed their time their moneths and their weeks among the Iews In which sence the Pharisee is to be understood when he saith I fast twice in the Sabbath that is twice in the weeke For the Sabbath being the great day and the principall of the seven it gives the denomination to all the rest and they be called the first and second and third according as they have their distance from that day So this first of the weeke it was the Iews Munday as it were it is our Lords day which immediately succeeded the day of the Passeover wherein our Lord Iesus lay in the grave and which was the first day of his resurrection and therefore is remembred throughout all Christian generations This was the time that the Apostle thought fittest for Christian men to lay aside their charitie to lay it up for the common treasure for the common stocke of the Saints for the poore Saints at Ierusalem It teacheth us that as all the works of mercie become the Lords day so especially this of almes giving it is a worke proper to the Lords day For therein we have both rest from labour representing unto us our eternall rest
upon the weeke day for so indeed God directly said Doe it upon the 14. day of the first moneth c. But the Westerne Churches they thought that although the full Moone fell upon the Munday or the Tuesday yet they would not keep the feast of Pentecost upon that day but they would stay till the Lords day till the Sunday after because at the first institution they fell both together for the same day that was the Pentecost of the Iews the same day was the comming down of the holy Ghost sent froÌ„ the Son of God Now therefore sometimes they met together although sometimes they varied here was then the summe Whensoever the 14. day lighted upon the Lords day then the Iewes the Christians celebrated their Pentecost both at one time there was no difference between the Eastern Western Churches thâ—â— did all accord but when it fell out that the day differed the Churches of God in the West did think it convenient to reserve that honorable feast to an honorable time that is to the Lords day for they thought that God had truly cast all honor upon that day So I conclude this point that Paul when he speaks here of Pentecost he means the Pentecost of the Christians and I am not moved with any argument that they bring to the contrary for indeed they be childish and frivolous as that which neutaries novalists have devised as how there should come to be a falling out betweene the Churches if they certainly knew the day I gave you the reason before that the Iews alway kept it upon that day it fell and the Easterne Churches but the Western Churches reserved it to the glorious day the day of the Lord the Lords day I have troubled you too long in these thorny discourses but those that be of the best understanding they know that in these things also there is great profit and very great necessity the Scripture is not written for us to understand by piece-meale to take here a patch there another as the coÌ„mon fashion of men now is and as many of the ancient Writers in former time have done but if we read the Scriptures we must understand all or else wee must account our selves exceeding falling for the whole booke of God must be known in the parcels of time place and in all the circumstances as wel in the substance of it that this is the true meaning that it was the Christian Pentecost the Fathers make mention Justin Martyr Iustin Martyr in his 105 question he asks the reason Why doe we not kneele saith he at Pentecost as we doe at other times of the yeare and he answers againe Because saith he of the glorious descending of the holy Ghost wherein we shew forth the joy and comfort that the Comforter brought unto us therefore kneeling being an abasing of the body and an argument of mourning and humiliation but we must at that time shew forth joy and comfort therfore we kneele not so that the feast of Pentecost was kept in his time which was 104 yeares after Christ Tertullian Tertul. saith he this noble feast of Pentecost it is more noble then all the feasts of the Gentiles And in the Writings of Ignatius Ignatius and Polycarpus Polycarpus it is mentioned In the time of Victor Victor when it came to be a matter of controversie In the time of Anicetus Anycetus of Pius Pius this feast of Pentecost was observed and commanded to be observed all the Fathers that lived for three or foure hundred yeares after they still made Sermons of it Nazienzen Nazienzen Leo Leo Ierome S. Jerom. Austin S. Aug. Chrysostome Chrysost Ambrose Ambrose there is nothing more obvious wee see still their discourses and Sermons upon the feast of Pentecost which plainly proves that it is no new thing but that it was founded from the first and that Christians have as great reason to keepe a feast in remembrance of the comming downe of the holy Ghost which is the greatest blessing that ever was as the Iews have for the offering up of their corn and when their loaves of bread were brought into the Sanctuarie Now we come to the causes inducements wherfore the Apostle determined to be at Ephesus Part 3. The inducements of Pauls stay at Ephesus if it be Gods wil that he may be there till he may have convenient time to goe to Ierusalem and be there at the feast of Pentecost for saith he A doore is opened to me This similitude of a doore Doore what is very frequent in the Scripture it signifieth a plaine and easie way an easie path or oportunity where a man may suffer no impediment but goe on his way as the Lord Iesus saith Ioh. 10. Ioh. 10. I am the true Shepheard of the Sheepe hee that comes in by the doore comes in the true way hee is a true Shepheard but he that climbes up another way is a thiefe his meaning is if he come in at the doore it is an easie matter no man resists or hinders him but hee hath the way made plaine before his face Quest But how can this be when there were many adversarâ—es he saith there were many adversaries and yet a doore is opened to him Answ For this you must understand as afterward it appeares that the Lord opens a doore to men through the middest of danger and all the adversaries in the world cannot shut that doore which God hath once opened The Lord beares the keyes he shuts and no man opens he opens and no man shuts This doore the Apostle speakes of to the Colossians I beseech you saith hee pray for us that to mee may be given a doore of utterance to speake as I ought to speake Now the opening of this doore hee speakes of it in the passive voyce It is opened to mee a doore is opened to mee that is an occasion is ministred to mee hee doth not attribute it to himselfe to say I have made my selfe a way and by my preaching I have opened a doore that was shut to me before but hee referres it to God whose property alone it is It is opened to my hand by the mighty hand of the Almighty which hath the ruling of mens hearts and which flowes into their affections and guides and turnes them as it pleaseth him There is a doore opened to mee It is therefore God that openeth the door as it is the devils malice still to shut the door that there may be no passage betweene God and man and that Christ may knock at the doore and never be admitted nor heard as he saith Rev. 3. Rev. 3. Behold I stand at the doore and knock if any man open unto me I will come in and dwell with him c. So I say wee should still leave the praise where it is due and attribute the honour and glory of the fact to
DOOMES-DAY OR A TREATISE OF THE RESURRECTION of the BODY Delivered in 22. Sermons on 1. Cor. 15. Whereunto are added 7. other Sermons on 1. Cor. 16. BY The late Learned and Iudicious Divine MARTIN DAY Doctor in Divinity Chaplaine in Ordinarie to his Majestie and sometimes Rector of S. Faiths LONDON Matth. 22.31 Have you not read what God hath spoken to you touching the Resurrection of the Dead LONDON Printed by T. H. and M. F. for Nathanael Butter and are to be sold at the signe of the Pide Bull neere Saint Austins gate 1636. To the Right Reverend Father in God and his most Ho. Lord JOSEPH By the Divine Providence Lord Bishop of EXCESTER MY LORD REligious spirits are usually Indulgent Patrons to Orphanes They imitate in this Act him who sayd I will bee a Father to the Fatherlesse I doubt not but that I shall finde your Honour of this generous disposition to these printed Posthumes of Doctor Dayes licensed by Authority and now seeking to your Lordship for protection I have adventured to present these papers comming to my hands to your Honour hoping the childe wil be wel liked for his Fathers sake who was wel known unto and entirely beloved of your Hon. in his primitive time in Cambridge as also while hee was our Pastor heere continued it towards him in his charge in your Lo. Diocesse even untill his dissolution however I have done this to shew my readines upon any occasion of service to your Lordship Thus craving your favour to shelter and fence this worke from open depravers and to continue your love to the Authors memory I humbly take leave being Your Lordships Servant NATH BUTTER To the Readers YOu cannot expect that these Sermons should have such exact politenesse and neat dressing as if the Authour had lived to revise them Yet you may discover Dr Dayes spirit expression method and matter to speake in all of them praesentemque refert concio quaeque patrem I would wish you then to read them without any prejudicate opinion as thâ—y are exercises whose Authour was famous in his time and which cannot chuse but yeeld you matter of counsell and comfort You have but few Authours in English upon this Epistle and fewer upon these subjects Lose by reading of them you cannot gaine you may I doubt not but they will proove beneficiall to the whole Church for whose sake I have published them Thus wishing you to gather hony out of these where it may be had I rest Yours N. B. 1 COR. 15.29 What shall they doe that are baptised over the dead if the dead rise not at all Why therefore are they baptised over the dead THis gratious Apostle the blessed organ and instrument of the holy Ghost doth so wondrously dispute his cause and contrive his arguments for the maintaining of this holy article of our faith the resurrection of the body that as Saint Chrysostome saith Chrysost in locum he leaves nothing unfetched either from God or men for in five or sixe verses before the text he disputes from the omnipotencie of God in raising Christ his Sonne He hath discoursed also of Christs kingdome and of the delivery of the kingdome of his mediation and of the end of all things the perfect consummation of all that God may governe and be all in all Now he descends to a lower kinde of sphere to arguments taken from the actions of men and presidents here below upon the earth And he saith that there were certaine men in the world that were baptised for dead that is they are baptised in a certaine hope of the resurrection of the dead whose labour is lost and their faith frustrate and to no purpose if they have not the end of that whereof they now make profession here So some expound it But that is to bring us backe into the same labyrinth we were in before Verse 14. for he saith before that our hope is vaine and our Preaching vaine if there be no resurrection Therefore waving that opinion I take it that the Apostle speakes of some other more peculiar and particular cause that is concerning the state of the Church of God in persecution wherin men despairing of helpe in this world despairing of any life or contentment they did come and offer themselves in a voluntary martyrdome and tooke the baptisme of death that is they were baptised to this purpose being willing to offer themselves as dead men to persecution for the Gospell sake which they would not have done unlesse they had beene certainly assured of the resurrection of the body Other sences there be but I must proceed in order from one to another and labour to finde out the likeliest for in truth there are innumerable many and the place is very difficult Onely two things we are most sure of in this argument and discourse here set downe to our hand First that whatsoever this baptising over the dead was and therein is all the difficultie yet it was a thing that was publike notorious and knowne to the Corinthians it was a matter that was not obscure to them although it be to us For the Apostle speakes not to them in clouds but by way of familiar and evident example thereby to winne their judgements to this conclusion concerning the bodies resurrection Secondly another thing is that whatsoever this baptisme was yet certainly it was a thing of much force it was a great argument to prove that which the Apostle intended For it is not his manner to deale weakely in proving and disputing but he useth all the strength of the holy Ghost as Chrysostome saith Chrysost that is as much strength and demonstration and evidence of the spirit as a man can be capable of And so upon this ground we must gather that that opinion is most likely and to be imbraced that maketh most for the resurrection of the body And if there be any sence of more force then other or any sence more pertinent than other to prove that maine conclusion certainely that is the sence which the Apostle intends For all those that be of lesser weight and smaller moment they are besides the Apostles purpose Questionlesse if there be any vigour or power in any more than another we must imagine that that is it the Apostle aymed at and that he would have us to ayme at All the doubt comes out of the ambiguitie of this one word Baptisme While some take this baptisme for the sacramentall washing others againe take it for a ceremoniall washing either such as were in the Law among the legall ceremonies or such as were knowne in the common course of life the washing of the bodies and corpes of the dead when they were layd forth for the Coffin Concerning these words for the dead there is also some doubt some expounding it for sinne some for sinners and some for them that are naturally dead that is when the spirit in the common course of nature is
into all the parts of Christs mysticall body in all the parts of the world The communion of Saints is taught us here Christ is alike to every one Our reioycing mine in Asia yours in Europe mine in Ephesus yours in Corinth mine on this side the sea yours beyond the sea My reioycing or our reioycing in our common Lord and Saviour It is ours because Christ is ours because he is the Lilly of the field Cant. 2.1 and the Lilly of the valley he is the Lilly of the field not of the garden a garden is a private place reserved for the particular owner of it but he is the flowre of the field that all passengers may take him up and smell to his sweetnesse He is the Lilly of the valley who conveyes grace and sweetnesse and beauty and maiesty to all that approach him He rules in the midst of the seven golden Candlestickes because his vertue may be equally diffused as lines from the center to the circumference all concurring together in the center So all nations and people in the world have seene the salvation of God because they have met together in the center our Lord Iesus Christ By our reioycing in Christ Iesus our Lord. 3 The ground of this reioycing Here is the ground and foundation Christ Iesus our Lord. Christ is that fountaine from whence all streames If the old man worke death the new man shall worke life and we have put off the old man that we may put on the new that is that wee might be more invested with the one and lesse with the other By our reioycing in the Lord Iesus This common sunne which is the ioy of the world is sometimes ours and sometimes not ours When it riseth to us it sets in another place to another world of people The Antipodes have not the sunne when we have it and againe when they have it we want it because of day and night and intercourse of times For the sunne compassing the globe of the earth must of necessity by interposing the shadow make this difference so that the Sunne is not alway ours although it be the light of the world But the Sunne of righteousnesse is alway ours he is alway above our horizon alway beneath our horizon to the Antipodes as well as to us and to as many as the Lord shall call that Lord is the same he is the bright morning starre that was yesterday to day and for ever the same Heb. 13.8 Apoc. 1.8 He is Alpha and Omega By the reioycing that I have in Christ Iesus our Lord. And herein wee are to observe the causes of this joy for first he is Iesus and then he is Christ and then he is our Lord all this makes up the fulnesse of our joy If he were not Iesus he could not worke this miracle in our frayle tabernacles For as he is God he is called Iesus as he is man he is called Christ He is called Iesus because hee is a Saviour now man cannot save He is called Christ because he was annoynted and God cannot be annoynted It is the property of a man to receive annoynting from a higher thing This makes the fulnesse of our ioy for being Iesus he is able to conferre upon us streames of joy being the omnipotent fountaine of life all that we receive being from him from him we receive grace for grace as it is Ioh. 1. Ioh. 1.16 he being the fulnesse of joy from God the Father at whose birth the Angels sang Glory to God on high ioy on earth to men good will Luke 2.14 It followes therefore that hee is able to worke joy in the spirits of men that he can give light in darkenesse There is nothing difficult to him but his spirit can make all things lightsome he can make a man reioyce in tribulation and affliction as he is Iesus And then Christ that is annoynted Psal 45.7 for hee is annoynted with the oyle of gladnesse above his fellowes And what is that annoynting but the oyle of ioy and gladnesse that is that great fulnesse of ioy wherewith he is annoynted that it should not stay upon the head of Aaron or his beard Psal 133.2 but should runne downe to the skirts of his cloathing that all the body of the Priest should be filled with joy As our Saviour saith to his Disciples that when they came to a house Luke 10.5 they were to salute it and to say Peace be to this house When Christ comes once to a man hee brings joy he is that annoynted one he takes of that oyle of gladnesse and gives it to his fellowes that is to the followers of his salvation Lastly he is our Lord. Therefore he is a good Master and wisheth well to his servants he hath a horne of oyle and he poures it out that Amalthean horne of ioy and comfort and consolation for all the elect of God And hee is willing to doe it for us because we acknowledge him to be our Lord. Therefore we must examine our selves by this whom wee acknowledge to be our Lord. And we shall soone see the reason why we want this joy if a man be under the divell and acknowledge him to be his Lord he hath nothing to give him but misery and terrour and discomfort sorrow and distresse a man can receive nothing else there because he serves a bad Master but if thy Master be Christ the annoynted of God he shall bring thee ioy and peace of conscience and then certainly it will manifest it selfe It will appeare in thy countenance in thy words in thy patience in suffering with Gods Saints it will appeare in all the passages of a mans life that men may perceive that the oyle of grace is poured out upon him and is infused into him and it opens it selfe plainely and manifestly in every thing that passeth from him that is indued with the spirit of God Let us therefore labour which is the last poynt of the Text to preserve the force of this argument 4 The force of the Aâ—gument that we may be sure of our salvation and of our reioycing in Christ And if need be to protest and sweare it to lay it to pledge as a man doth his lands and estate When he would make a thing certaine he infeoffes a man in those things that are most neare and deare to him the best things that he hath So the best thing that the Apostle had it was his reioycing in Christ his comfort of conscience the peace of God which farre transcended his passions and sweetned his afflictions and made him reioyce in tribulation that comfort of Christ that hee had within in his spirit and from abroad by the proficiency of his Schollars to see them grow up in the feare of God in the knowledge of Christ in the profession of the faith this is the reioycing the Apostle speakes of I would that we all had this reioycing espeeially those that stand
in the Apostles place that they would Vse 1 follow his steps to have their reioycing in this one Lord and master to have no ioy in the world or in men in goods and profits in pleasures honours or in preferments which the world usually buyes and sels To have no reioycing in these but as they bee men that belong to God so let them reioyce onely in God And there is all the poynt of gloriation Therefore let not the rich man boast in his riches Ier. 9.23 or the strong man in his strength but let him that reioyceth reioyce in the Lord for it is he that executes iudgement and iustice and that sheweth mercy to those that reioyce in him as the Lord speakes Vse 2 Againe this must teach us to mingle these two together as the holy Apostle doth Reioycing and death we must labour by the study of pleasing Almighty God to keepe this sweet temper in us Wee are sure of the one but we must labour for the other I wonder not when I heare thee say as the Apostle doth here I dye daily for every man doth so there is not the most sensuall man but he hath a touch of death every day eyther by sensible misery or by the touch of conscience by bringing of his sinnes to his view That is incident to nature and a consequent of sinne to dye But what is thy reioycing what comfort hast thou in Christ This is that we should desire and call upon God continually for even to make this temper and mixture in us for the one is as necessarie as the other and God is as ready to give the one as our nature is ready to draw the other upon it selfe And this must be by this one meanes the making Iesus Christ thy Lord knowing no other Lord besides him no nor none against him nor none with him but that he may have the preheminence and be all in all as he is to his children in the world and shall be for ever in another world So thou must make him all thy ayme all that thou desirest all thy gloriation because thou must or canst desire nothing but it is seated in him To conclude with the time here is a modell of a christian mans estate death and life sorrow and ioy he is composed of such strange differences as the understanding of man cannot attaine unto But yet assuredly the Lord is never so heavy to him in iudgment but he is withall rich in mercy sorrow of heart shall never so surround him but he shall have the ioy of the holy Ghost to survive him As Saint Augustine Augustine saith upon that place of Paul Redeeme the time because the dayes are evill I saith he it is true the time in this world is evill but all the dayes that are in Christ are good dayes all the dayes of the Lord are good all the dayes of sinne are evill Let us sell them then he that redeemes parts with one thing to get another Let us sell these evill dayes in this world that we may get those good dayes in the grace of Christ And as Saint Gregory Gregory saith Good Iesus hee that hath thee looseth nothing and though he be in the midst of death yet he shall be recompenced with life although hee be in the midst and swallowed up with sorrow and deepe pangs of conscience yet thy spirit is there to remove that sorrow for though sorrow indureth for a night yet ioy commeth in the morning Psal 30. Psal 30.5 And in thy light wee shall see light thy wrath indures for the twinckling of an eye but in thy pleasure there is life for evermore This is the blessed state that every Christian is called unto and the Lord make it every one of our portions for Iesus Christs sake Amen FINIS 1 COR. 15.32 If I have fought with beasts at Ephesus after the manner of men what doth it availe me if there be no resurrection from the dead THis is now the conclusion of that argument which Saint Paul draws from his owne person For drawing his principall argument from the sufferings of the Church to prove the resurrection of the dead he begins first with the generall and then he descends to the particular and last of all he comes to the personall First the generall was verse 29. What shall they doe that are baptised for the dead Then in the next verse he comes to the Colledge of the Apostles and saith We also are in ieopardy every day And for his owne particular he protests he dyes daily in the verse before the Text. And now he comes to explaine this how it should be taken saith he If I have fought with beasts at Ephesus after the manner of men Because he had spoken of a thing unlikely and unusuall and unwonted and therefore it might be offensive to Atticke eares such as were at Corinth to say that he lived and yet was dead therefore now he tempers his speech and mitigates it by this exposition when he saith He received the sentence of death against himselfe for hee was cast to beasts to fight with them eyther indeed according to the letter as it was a kinde of punishment and torment that the Pagan persecutors assigned the Christians unto or by way of metaphore as many and most of the Fathers of the Church interpret it But how ever the force of the argument is all one For whether he were cast to beasts and suffered to take his weapons and to defend himselfe and so by the mercy of God to escape without hurt from them or whether he meane by fighting with beasts beastly minded men as the phrase of Scripture often insinuates the strength of the argument is all one For often times a man were better bee cast unto beasts then to men there being more mercy and lesse fury in the pawes of the very beasts than in the working braines of men and the malicious conveyances that they have in the world So whether wee take it for beasts literally or for men that were beasts metaphorically the force of the argument is equall For saith he if there were no hope of the Resurrection then I would doe as the world doth and I would say as they say I would accommodate my selfe to all mens humours I would be so farre from casting my selfe into such dangers as to sight with beasts or with beastly men as that I would seeke to recover my owne which I had once being a Pharisie I would live a quiet and peaceable life among my brethren as I did then when I was rather ready to doe others hurt than to suffer any I would much rather choose that state of life than thus to be plagued and plunged and drowned in misery if there were not a hope of a Resurrection but the vigour and life of that hope duls all the pangs in this world and sweetens the cup of affliction which else would eate out my very intrayles If
cast among them to strive and struggle with them to see whether God would favour his cause or no whether he were of a magnanimous spirit or whether he would yeeld and shrinke when he saw the beast come neare him from his faith or no. We cannot imagine that Saint Paul did this seeking to please the people to make himselfe a barbarous spectacle to them or that he did it to tempt God by offering his life to the beasts but he was throwne unto them and compelled to it And it was no disgrace for him then to yeeld to it being forced by the superiour powers So Calvin Luther and Beza are indifferent But many of the Ancients directly expound it according to the letter as that these beasts must be understood to be some kinde of Tygers Leopards or Lyons such things Saint Paul was exposed unto to try the constancy of his faith to try his prowesse and valour to see whether God would deliver him or no. I confesse the number of the Authors are so great and their authority and gifts so excellent as that I cannot deny but that this may be the true sence of this place But yet I rather incline to the other which Saint Chrysostome Saint Augustine Saint Cyrill Tertullian and divers other Fathers doe warrant to us as the best and most proper sence Namely that Paul fought with beasts at Ephesus that is with beastly men men of beastly conditions And there is but one thing difficult in it that is that the Apostle should forget that lenity of spirit in which he useth to speake and that Christ teacheth all men that they should not give an ill or a rayling word Whereas there cannot be a worse word given to a man than to call him beast Our Lord and Saviour Christ saith that he that cals his brother Racha Math 5.22 he that cals his brother foole shall be in danger of hell fire Now he that cals a man foole speakes farre more moderately and modestly than he that cals a man a beast For to call a man foole is still to call him man for there is nothing can be a foole but man or woman for it fals not within the compasse of beasts to bee wise or foolish but still when one is called foole hee is kept in the condition of a man but when a man cals a man beast he is out of the element and latitude of men and compared to a more base and degenerate creature But for this we must understand that our Lord Christ speakes there of the common talke and discourse among Christians and not of that Apostolicall authority not of that magisteriall reproofe that is in the Church and must be to the worlds end For every man may not speake alike a private man must not speake as the Magistrate doth nor every man must not speake as the Minister may speake in reprooving sinne and revealing the will of God And here we must conceive that this that the Apostle speaks it was by Gods spirit dictating it unto him he was the Prophet of God put in that place he spake it not from himselfe but from a greater Therefore to pitch upon this exposition If I have fought with beasts at Ephesus That is with men that had the faces of men but the condition of beasts For this is the common phrase and language of people when a man transcends others in bruitishnesse and cruelty in a base conversation they say he hath put on the beast he hath left humanity and is turned beast For it is mens carriage and conditions that distinguisheth them from beasts So we see the Scripture hath this peculiar phrase when the Prophet speakes Isa 56.10 Isa 56. of Prophets that would not Preach or that preached for gaine he cals them dumb dogs Phil. 3.2 and the Apostle Paul saith Beware of dogges whereby is meant such kinde of men as are prophane as Esau those that returne to their vomit of sinne to their former concupiscence and contemne and scorne all holy things Math. 7.6 yea and our Lord Christ saith Give not holy things to dogges that is to doggish men so the Prophet David often prayes unto God to deliver his soule from the Lyon from the Vnicorne from the Dogge from the Wolfe And so Saint Paul calleth Nero 2 Tim. 4.17 Lyon 2 Tim. 4. The Lord hath delivered me from the mouth of the Lyon that is from the Emperour Nero Luke 13.32 so our Lord Christ called Herod Foxe Tell that Foxe saith he I worke to day and to morrow and the third day I shall be perfect There is nothing more usuall in the Scriptures than this therefore I will not insist to prove or illustrate it any further It is an excellent thing which Chrysologus Chrysologus saith The Scriptures of God make no more account of a man to be a man after he fals to bruitish conditions but reputes him in his ranke among beasts as he is a beast of the field a beast for the slaughter The Scripture cals them divels in the fashion and habite and outward forme of men so our Saviour Christ tels us Iohn 8. Ioh. 8. of a generation of Vipers of a genealogy of divels Ye are of your father the divell saith he which wee know is not to be understood according to the letter but is to be referred to the absurd conditions of men Of which also the Apostle speakes 2 Thes 3.2 2 Thes 3.2 Pray to God for us saith the Apostle for what purpose That we may be delivered from absurd men men that have no nature in them that have no common straine of humanity in them but are altogether degenerated and metamorphosed into beasts pray for us to be delivered from them So that place being compared with this it is cleere If I have fought with beasts at Ephesus that is with men of bruitish natures men that cannot be contampred with at all men of no society but are given over to their fury and madnesse that have no more mercy in them than bruit beasts and must be let goe to their fury as a beast that doth what mischiefe it can without any limitation or respect To passe from this poynt We see what base dejection sinne hath brought on us we that thought to be equall to God Vse as God saith Behold Adam is become as one of us Gen. 3.22 we are now become as the beasts that perish Psal 59.20 as the Prophet David saith Man being in honour understood it not but it become like the beasts that perish Gen. 3.21 And as man fell to bee like a beast so God clad him in the skinne of a beast Our first great grandfather Adam had the skinnes of beasts for his garments to signifie that as they were turned beasts so God gave them an outward habite and vesture to shew them what inwardly they were become This should teach us still to have our eye on that
Have no fellowship with the unprofitable workes of darkenesse This language here this ill language Ephes 5.11 it is called Caba taken from a word used in warre Quaere The Greeke word here is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and indeâ—d 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifieth fearefull cowardly sloaâ—hfull the Cabaly they are flying away still and running backe so in evill there is nothing but trembling and feare and running backe and want of security a man knowes not where to lurke safe therefore he turnes him this way and that way and runs before any man persecute him as the Prophet saith We see the quality now of these Adversaries Now we come a little to their fight how they meete together and who overcomes Corrupt good manners Good manners being well settled in us and comming to be a second nature Thiâ—d poynt the action betwixt Evill words and good manners they corrupt them as it were the spirit of God being our guardian they become impregnable against the divell But if they have a small and slacke guard and are intrenched onely within the bounds of reason and common religion or a perfunctory profession then Sathan is powerfull and the examples of the world are bewitching and a mans owne flesh his owne selfe is false to himselfe and in a moment or short time they make such a battery and assault upon him that all the whole Fort is yeelded to the divell and so evill words corrupt good manners If good words could amend evill manners it were excellent and so sometimes they doe by the blessing of God But on the other side there is a fearefull losse which is frequent and common for wheras once good manners mend evill a thousand times ill manners corrupt good for we have a divellish disposition in us till the Lord worke it out by his spirit and this divell is so false that if we want corruption rather then we will not be corrupted we will corrupt our selves and turne divels to our owne soules For what else are these common and daily fashions that are used in the world but a voluntary seeking after corruption Psal 4.2 as the Prophet saith Psalm 4. How long will ye seeke after lyes All these devices whereby we pamper this flesh of ours they are meer huntings after corruption that though corruption flee from us yet we runne after it and overtake it This pride and prancking of these poore tabernacles we carry about us which are nothing but dust and ashes These extraordinary eatings and drinkings These high surfettings These great and mighty spendings What are these but very voluntary running a whoring after our owne inventions and a seeking to be corrupted And because we thinke there is nothing without us to corrupt us therefore we will have it within us rather than we will want it Bern. 1 Tim. 6.9 Saint Bernard speaking of that place of the Apostle Those that will be rich fall into divers snares oh saith Bernard our rich men if they had heard him they would have wished they had had more snares and thinke themselves miserable because they have not So although they goe to hell they care not if they can but make themselves heavy laden with this thick clay Habac. 2.6 as the Prophet speakes They care for nothing else The like corruption is upon all men and especially in these dayes there was never more corruption of manners than in this last and sinfull age of the world of which the Lord foretold and we by lamentable experience finde it corruption growes so strongly every day The word Corruption signifieth in the best and most common notion to bring a thing to wormes to bring it to lice as the body of Herod by the stroke of the Angell for his proud speech was brought to Vermine and Lice in a moment So all things that are corrupted they grow to a mouldring out of which mouldering there growes wormes if the matter be vegetable or had any life in it corruption being in it selfe a meere alteration to a not being from a being As generation makes a thing to be that was not before so Salvianus Salvianus saith those things that be corrupted are not themselves any longer after they be corrupted So consequently in the manners of men when they be corrupted there is such an alteration and change that a man cannot say that this is the man We see by wofull experience how quicke corruption is that in a short time a man cannot know one to be the same A youth that hath beene educated in the feare of God for fourteene or fifteene yeares and is well grounded and settled in the schooles send him into another part of the world but one halfe yeare and many times all the frame and building of his former education will be utterly ruinate and the party so corrupted that a man would wonder at the beastlinesse and strangenesse of such a fatall change From hence come those frequent complaints every where in the Church of God there are so many blasts of adverse winde so many examples of filthinesse in the world that they change every thing and take away the glosse and beauty and perfection of it and instead of the Image of God they imbrace the picture of the divell and it is done before a man is aware so quickly are we deceived and so soone brought to destruction Bern. As Saint Bernard saith well of such What art thou come to now what a Saint hast thou beene in time past and what a divell art thou now turned too thou begunnest farre better than thou endest and the first time the first part of thy graces were more excellent than thy latter times are Oh what a great change there is how unlike is this man to that childe being a man to thy selfe now when thou wast a childe nothing is more fearfull then this Let our gold and silver corrupt let our garments corrupt let theeves breake through and steale them let all things without us corrupt But let us keepe our manners pure they are our best and choicest treasure that should sit in our mindes and keepe their residence in the Court of heaven in the soule and conscience God forbid that they should be corrupted or if they be let us labour to returne presently to grace wherby corruption may be amended and a reparation made by the Spirit of God Evill words corrupt good manners Where naturall corruption is it comes alway from a kinde of heat from a strange outward heat all corruption whether it be of fruits or the corruption of mens bodies or any other thing it comes with a certaine outward heat which frightens the naturall heat and overcomes it and so works all to a beastly and monstrous disease and so to a meere nothing at last Corruption is made in the tenderest things those that are more solid receive lesse corruption and endure longest As stones and trees because of the hardnesse and firmnesse of their
it is impossible for the body shall never grow worse and worse by degeneration but it shall bee brought by the power of God to that high perfection that it shall still be infinitely better and yet still it selfe it shall still be the selfe same in essence though not in qualities It shall be the same in substance and nature but not the same in eminencie of grace and glory It shall be the same in being but not the same in seeming or in circumstance And so Saint Chrysostome saith It is the same and not the same it is the same as touching the fundamentall essence of it and it is not the same concerning the augmentation and the rare qualities that God shall impose upon it and invest it withall And so I say it is that comfortable doctrine to this flesh of ours that there shall not be any other flesh glorified for it but that this flesh that hath suffered martyrdome this flesh that hath suffered hunger and thirst sicknesse and persecution in the world this flesh that hath suffered for Christ this flesh and no other but this shall receive the crowne of glory according to the manifold evils it hath indured Otherwise there could be no true consolation in this life seeing the spirit also shall have larger indowments The soule of man the wit shall be greater and the memory greater and all the parts and faculties shall be more excellent in the soule Now these being not visible parts therefore they are not that which shall rise For it is that which is visible which belongs to the Resurrection the glory of the soule cannot be manifest it is still hidden and inherent in the inner-man But this glory that shall be at the Resurrection it shall be manifest and there is no manifestation made but to the eye and the outward sences Therefore here comes the comfort to every poore distressed body that the same that suffers and is miserable afflicted and tormented in this world the very same body shall receive abundance of joy and comfort and glory and beautie in the day of the Lord. The poore creple that goes double that moves every mans heart to pittie to see him in the streets he shall rise with a glorious and goodly body being incorporate into Christ by faith he shall receive a body full of ample complements and blessed perfections To every seed his owne body If it be the same body how then is it a new body Ob. and how then in the Scripture is it called a glorious body which makes it different This I told you shall be by addition of certaine accidents of glory that shall acrew unto it Ans which cannot be separated as accidents may be from their subject but they indure with it continually And that consists 1. Partly in that goodly proportion that I spake of before wherein all men shall be raised in one size Not as they are now where there is great difference but all shall be of one stature and perfection And therein they shall more resemble the Image of God then if they should be made in greater variety 2. Secondly another qualitie wherewith they shall be indowed is the clearnesse and brightnesse of those bodies For although they shall not be transparent and translucent which is no property of a true body yet they shall be so full of light and gloriousnesse as the Lord Iesus his body were when he was transfigured in mount Tabor his garments did so shine that no Dyer or Fuller in the earth was able to make such a tincture or to give such a colour and glosse Mat. 17. as the garments of our Lord had Much more then was his countenance glorious and shining And if in the old Law Exod. 34.30.33 the glory of Moses face were so great that the Iewes could not endure to looke upon him but he was faine to take a veile and cover his face when hee read the Law that so they might heare what he spake without astonishment much more shall the glory of the bodies of the Saints be at that day They shall be all lightsome they shall shine like the starres in the firmament they being often compared in the Scriptures to the starres which cannot be numbred Thirdly another qualitie wherein they shall be like unto the corne The corne that seemed to bee a dead graine yet after comes to have an excellent greene colour and live so these bodies shall exceed in proportion of beauty There is great difference now some are faire and some are foule creatures and those that are the faire ones of the world they thinke themselves onely happie and those that are deformed they thinke they had better beene unborne then to live in the world Indeed it is a matter of great dejection and scorne to a naturall man to have a poore deformed body Therefore the Lord shall so alter all things in that day that every man shall have equall beauty The glorious Saints in heaven their perfection is one and the same perfection they shall have a common perfection like the Angels that waite before the Lord and the Seraphins that have the selfe same perfection and beautie shining upon them all although it be not sensible to us but is seene onely among themselves Fourthly all this glosse stature and goodlinesse that they shall have except it have also strength and vigour it is little worth Therefore God shall give them that too That as the corne riseth with an high stalke to a goodly stemme and hath knops to underproppe and support and keepe it up whereupon it is builded so the Lord saith Rev. 3.12 he that heares the word of God he will make him a pillar in the house of his Father that is he shall have the strength and glory and the fortitude of the great men of God that hee shall be able to do any thing that God shall assigne him to with great dexterity And all this with a further grace of incorruption for the seed that is sowne although it come up with a faire glosse for a time yet it presently corrupts and is brought unto a drie straw and stubble and that which is greene now to morrow it is cast into the fire But the Lord shall give unto this glorious glosse whereunto he shall bring the bodies of his Saints he shall give them an incorruptible crowne 1. Pet. 1.18 It is a crowne that is incorruptible an inheritance immortall that never hath any change The best beauty in this worldly glory a fit of an Ague will change it and long sicknesse will turne the fairest rose into an ashy coale there is nothing so subject to change and alteration as the glosse of beauty But that strength and beauty and goodlinesse of the creature after the resurrection shall be supported by that ever mighty power of Almighty God so that there shall bee no old age to draw wrinckles in the face of his Saints there shall be no sicknesse to
make them wither there shall be no griefe of heart no discontent of minde to make an alteration in the outward man there shall be nothing to make a change because God shall crowne them in heaven with incorruption And lastly the Lord shall give them another quality which shall be the rarest of all the rest And that is a strange agility and nimblenesse of body that they shall be able to move upward or downward as it shall please them While we are here in this life we have heavy bodies a man must walke upon his owne foundation hee must have the scaffold of the earth under him But if hee presume any further and offer to go any higher with Daedalus and with Icarus he shall be cast into the sea hee exposeth himselfe unto danger and his waxen wings will be fired by the beames of the Sunne But then at that day though our bodies in all things substantiall shall be like these and shall still bee true bodies yet the glory of them shall be so great and the strength and power that the spirit shall have over this flesh shall be so absolute as to command it which way it pleaseth When we move now either we go forward or backward or side-wayes or else downward but upward we cannot but then the Lord shall give us ability to move upward too And this is that the Apostle saith we shall be taken we shall bee snatched up to meete the Lord in the clouds 1. Thes 4.17 there shall bee such a mightie power and prevalencie in the spirit of man to rule and command the body The Lord hath given us instances of it in some things in the Gospell Mat. 14 26.29 Our Lord himselfe walked upon the water and not onely he himselfe but he gave Peter power to walke with him And this was a signe of that he meanes to do at the day of the Resurrection As their bodies then walked and were sustained by the power of God in the ayre and was able to make that which is fluent and soft and yeelding in it selfe to make it a sollid pavement like unto the stones to walke upon the same power shall also worke in our bodies that agilitie which is in the Eagle So the Prophet speaks yea our Lord compares us where he saith Where the body is Mat. 24.28 thither will the Eagles resort which is meant not onely of a spirituall flight by faith but also of the bodies assumption And this our Lord confirmed by the Ascention of his owne body Iob. 14.2 for he went before to prepare a place for us that beleeve in him Now we know that his body ascended to heaven it had the power to move upward as well as any other way We have examples of it also in Henoch and Elias which were both translated Elias carried in a fierie Car to heaven 2. King 2.11 And all this with eternitie and immortalitie that there shall not any thing of it passe away there shall be no expectation of death there shall be no feare of change This is the greatest thing of all when God shall give fulnesse of glory to have also full security For whatsoever glory men have in this world so long as they know that there is a worme â—hat can gnaw it or that it is possible for them to be outed this glory is nothing because it is glory that may be no glory Such is the state of these worldly things that there is nothing so great but it is subject to be brought from that greatnesse But the Lord shall give this glory for ever and ever as himselfe is he that is eternall in himselfe he is eternall to all those that he shall make his followers and companions in that blessed kingdome For they also shall receive that part of eternitie as farre as they are capable It is this safetie and securitie that makes this blessing amiable and for that the Lord hath given us an example for securitie in Scripture where for forty yeares together in the wildernesse the Lord so provided that there was no mans cloaths that were rent or worne not so much as the soale of his shoe impaired by that long and tedious travell We see also they had securitie of food continually it never ceased to follow them but in convenient time was still administred to them Therefore it follows that God that can do these things for garments for these ragges that we weare upon our bodies he meanes much more to do it to the bodies themselves As Christ saith Is not the body better then rayment Mat. 6.25 then garments Seeing therefore that he did it unto garments that are of farre lesse worth will hee not do it unto the bodies themselves He that kept their garments 40. yeares without wearing and yet what weares so soone as a garment he was able to have done it for eternity if it had pleased him But God gave them that for an instance to shew that these things belong in a higher nature and degree and measure to the setting forth of the lifâ—â—ternall and were to foreshew and to be an earnest of that infinite glory which God hath reposed for them that wait for the comming of his Sonne Which the Lord worke for us all c. 1 COR. 15.39 All flesh is not the same flesh but there is one flesh of man there is another flesh of beasts another of fishes and another of fowls THere is nothing more plain and easie then the sence of these words they are knowne to every man by experience And yet it is very hard to finde out the intent and reason why they were uttered Divers men have diversly commented upon them For some think as Tertullian Tertull. others that follow him that the Apostle speaks not as he seemeth to do of the flesh of beasts and of the flesh of men and of fishes and birds but by an allegorie comprehends some other thing concerning the diversitie and degrees of men And so he interprets The flesh of men that is of holy and just and good men There is one flesh of men that is of holy men for they are properly to be called men A man so farre forth as he is unholy so farre forth he comes short of a man and those are onely truly and really men that be good And then by the flesh of beasts he saith the Apostle meanes the flesh of beastly heathen men the flesh of Ethnicks of those that do not beleeve in God those that do not beleeve in Christ the Saviour of the world He saith such are beasts for they differ not world He saith such are beasts for they differ not from beasts neither in their sence nor in their conversation Then for the third there is another flesh of fishes he saith by fishes are meant those that are baptised and regenerate by water the fishes of our Lord Iesus Christ Mat. 4.19 whereof he said to his disciples I will make
have imployed themselves in this world And there are divers similitudes that set out this in the Gospell Mat. 25. As of him that received ten talents and was made Lord of ten Cities Mat. 19.29 Of him that sowes plenteously and reapes plenteously whereas another soweth sparingly Of him that offers his bloud for the Lord Iesus Christ and receives an hundred-fold for it Of the Dâ—scâ—ples that shall be chiefe and prime in the kingdome of heaven Mat. 19.28 and sit upon twelve thrones to judge the twelve Tribes of Israel Luk 6.23 and that promise that the Lord makes Great shall your reward be in heaven There shall be a great reward for you therefore it seemes there shall not be so great a reward for other men as for the Apostles This joy is accidentall it happens to them because they have wrought in their callings because they have beene diligent in their places So the Schooles say a man of learning which is an accidentall thing for learning comes accidentally it is not a thing that is substantiall a man is â—ot borne with learning therefore they say according to the wisedome which a man hath used wel in this world hee shall be rewarded in heaven in a greater measure In respect of the substantiall joy he shall have all one penie with the rest but in respect of his accidentall joy honour for his wisedome and learning and for his almes-deeds which is by way of accident and so according to his workes he shall have a reward according to a mans works so shall his reward be This I take to be very true although I cannot well see how it should bee an infallible ground But we follow the Fathers direction Saint Austin speaking of the puritie of virginity Aug. of the professed virgins of his time well saith he those that shall come to the common immortalitie hereafter they shall have a great reward above the rest because they had something in the flesh which was not of the flesh they had something in the flesh which had no use or benefit of the flesh And in his 146. Epistle saith he If God have made all bodies visible and these visible bodies be so different each from other in distance of place in operation and power and in evidence much more must wee thinke he will make a difference at the day of the Resurrection And although all shall be as starres that shall shine in the firmament yet all shall not have one kinde of glory and of lustre Tertull. And Tertullian How shall there be many mansions in Gods house How doth Christ say In my Fathers house are many mansions Iob. 14.2 except it bee for the varietie of mens merits You must not be offended for this word merit for the Fathers in old time tooke it not in a proud sence but for the deeds done in the flesh whether good or evill So men should be rewarded according to their works or fruits they had done the Saints shall differ as one hath had greater works then another and greater deeds And Chrysostome brings this argument that unlesse this be granted that the Saints of God shall have a different portion of glory in the world to come and not be all alike it would make men that beleeve the Resurrection to be carelesse how they lived in good works or at least how they abounded in good works Because when a man once seeth salvation that it is common and that every man shall have as good a share in it as he he will not seek to be better then his fellow and so good works and almes-deeds would grow faint Therefore it is the best way to incourage them and to make them open and inlarge themselves to make them as capable as they can that God may fill them To this purpose the Fathers have a comparison of divers vessels that are cast into the water and all are filled a pottle is filled and a pint is filled and yet there is great difference every one hath as much as it can conteine but yet the pinte hath not so much as the pottle so the Saints of God they shall all be full of joy and full of glory but according to their capacitie the Lord shall fill them Therefore wee should make our selves large unto God that God may fill us to be large handed and large minded and large hearted to God this brings largenesse of glory and beauty and makes men principall starres in the firmament Theophilact brings another reason Theoph. which presseth better and urgeth further then this If we marke it saith he we see the damned in hell have a different torment therefore the Saints in heaven shall have a different glory The other is plaine by that saying where our Lord saith Matth. 11. It shall be easier for Sodome and Gommorrah then for that Citie which would not receive the Apostles and it should be easier for Tyre and Sydon then for Chorazin and Bethsaida they should have easier torment then those that despised the Gospell And therefore seeing there shall be an inequalitie of torment and that those that are cast away from the sight of God shall have a divers deformitie they shall all be deformed but some more then other there is more unworthinesse in some bodies according to the qualitie of their sinnes And so it follows on the contrary that the mercie of God shall bee opened and manifested in a greater measure upon one man then upon another according to the qualitie of their good conversation repentance and the good deeds that they have done in the flesh Saint Ambrose Ambrose also discoursing upon this argument Even as saith he out of one lumpe out of one piece and clod of clay God hath made all things but yet in a wondrous varietie For out of the water he hath taken all the brightnesse that is in this world the starres of heaven are bright because they are taken out of the water and the brightnesse of jemmes and pearles is out of the water mingled with earth and out of the earth comes all things that are obscure and darke so the Lord shall make out of this body out of one lumpe and masse a wondrous varietie At that day he shall make some as those that bring forth thirty fold others as those that bring forth sixtie and some as those that bring forth an hundred fold in an admirable difference and yet all shall have glory sufficient and in contentment and be full of glory The glory shall be full in it selfe although it shall not be so great as others And Saint Anselme Anselme saith clearly that there shall be one way for chastitie and puritie to shine for them that have lived chaste in wedlocke and another way for virginitie there shall bee one way for a man that gives little out of much and another way for him that like the poore widdow give as it were all that they have
away from him yea and his dearest beloved shall stop their noses at him This should teach us to humble our selves in this disconsolation Vse and to adde this to all the honors we have in the world if we have any or doe yet looke for any This dishonour of death is a cooling card that should make a man moderate in all his proceedings It should make him fearfull in all his doings It should make him understand that he ought not to be puffed up with conceits and pretences of honour but to qualifie himselfe with this comparing his dishonour which the Lord will lay upon sinfull flesh There is nothing so honourable but it shall be covered with shame and dishonour at the hour of death when we shall depart this world It is sowne in dishonour Well! although it be thus yet the Lord hath a help for this againe it shall be raised after another manner It shall be raised in honour in great glory As disgrace and dishonour is the worst of punishments so honour and grace and glory againe is the best of preferments There is nothing so sweet unto us as that to be above others to be beloved of others to be admired of others and to be served of others this is that sweet breath of life and that sweet contentment that shall fill us with marrow and fatnesse And this God purposeth to poure upon these dishonourable bodies that die so beastly and deformed that they are trampled on by the feet of beasts if they lie abroad and if it be in the Church where wee usually bury the poorest and basest of men tread upon them I say the Lord shall raise it at that day in such honour that it shall be like the stars of heaven it shall be like the Sunne in glory it shall be like the Angels of God it shall be like the Sonne of God Phil. 3.21 for he shall change these vile bodies and make them like his glorious body according to his mighty power whereby he is able to subdue all things to himself Phil. 3.21 Now by the contrary dishonour we may see that the honour of the Saints shall consist 1. In a goodly stature 2. In a perfect beauty 3. In a gracious fragrancie In the stature of the body there shall be no uncomelinesse there shall be no crookednesse there shall be nothing wanting that can be required as we use to say of images that are drawne in waxe that they are compleat so likewise God shall so paint his image in the bodies of his Saints when they shall rise that it is not possible to find it so in any thing but in the Exemplar in the master-piece the body of Christ there is nothing else that shall be more glorious As in those happy Countries where the leaves are alwaies greene and the earth is alway budding and bringing forth so the bodies of Gods Saints as St. Austin saith shall have that greennesse and vigorousnesse of incorruption possesse them totally St. Augustine And lastly that it shall be of a gracious fragrancy it is certaine that that also may be opposed to the stench of these carkasses The dead body is dishonoured in nothing more then by a caryon-like smell for thereby it differs nothing from a beast nay it is far worse then a beast for there is nothing so putrifies as the body of a man there is nothing brings forth such ugly things as that For out of the brain comes scorpions and snakes and out of the flesh toads and serpents which is not usuall among the beasts For some of them bring forth bees and some wasps but of Ages and Eumines and divers others it is reported that scorpions and snakes came out of their heads after they were dead and wreathed about their faces And we know by wofull experience of late time of divers gentlemen that were troubled with such a wofull thing that they had wormes in their braines and in their entrailes I say therefore answerable to this as the miserie is great to which the body of man is subject greater then other creatures because he is the onely sinner so at that day God shall make an aboundant recompence by pouring upon it the spring of beauty and sweetnesse and fragrancie that they shall be as a garden of spices in the nostrills of God and of his Saints Every Saint shall also be as a glasse to each other and every one shall see his fellowes beauty and they shall reflect one upon another in the joy and gladnesse of the Holy Ghost to see the wonderous work which God hath wrought upon this piece of frailty And even as Iacob was as the smell of a field when he came near his Father Behold saith Isaack I smell the smell of my sonne as the smell of a field Gen. 27.27 which the Lord hath blessed There being nothing more delightfull to the sense then a blooming field of new corne and of sweet grasse and flowers that rise out of the earth And therefore the holy man compares his sonne to a field which the Lord hath blessed Much more shall these be fragrant fields the Lord blessing them with infinite variety of goodnesse and of grace and sweetnesse that the field of God shall be more pleasant then the fields and gardens of men and then all the paradises in this world And as the head of this company is described Cant. 1. Cant. 1.3 4. Draw me and I will run after thee in the odour of thine anointments noting unto us the sweetnesse that is incorporated in the body of Christ And as we reade also of St. Paul Acts 19.12 that by the blessing of God he had napkins and handkerchiefs brought from his body that were of such sweetnesse that they were able to cure diseases so also we may understand what shall be the variety there from the sweetnesse that is now in the body arising from the mixture of the bloud in the veines which makes a perfect sympathy and harmony The Lord at that day shall make all things much more abundant As the Church also is described by the sweetnesse of her cloathes in the Canticles Cant. 1.14 My Spouse saith Christ is as a garden of myrrh or of spices and her breasts are like the clusters of grapes and like the fruit of Engedi So every man and woman shall be although here they be sickly and subject to never so many infirmities and diseases in this life yet the Lord shall so alter the bodies of those that serve him here in that blessed estate there that they shall be sure to finde a singular proportion of beauty of strength and of fragrancie that all the just shall be termed the field and paradise which God hath blessed FINIS SERMONS On 1 COR. 15. Of the Resurrection 1 COR. 15.43 It is sowne in weaknesse it is raised in power It is sown a naturall body it is raised a spirituall body There is a naturall body and there is
hee was come there hee teacheth and converseth with the people hee goes not about his work upon the sudden The newes comes he is dead and buried Let him lie in his grave a long time that the glory of God may the more appeare Let him lie the first second and third day and the Lord comes not Upon the fourth day when all men gave him for stinking and desperate and that there was no hope of any good to bee done upon him then the Lord comes to work When Martha his sister had given over all hope and told Christ shee knew that hee should rise againe at the resurrection but for any other rising she never dreamed of or imagined that Well then when all things seemed to be senslesse and against reason and possibility then the power of God began to work And because Lazarus was so strongly held by death foure dayes therefore the stronger was the hand of God upon him in raysing him from death That the strength of death might be encountred and overcome and countermanded by the higher strength and arme of the Almighty it now gave way and made a passage to the arme of the Lord to work a mighty deliverance So still the misery of the child of God works for good and all things work for the best to those that love God Rom. 8.28 Therefore as we have borne the image of the earthly so we shall beare the image of the heavenly This is a great incouragement to us to beare Vse Wee are impatient we cannot endure any thing but we see that wee must beare and if wee looke for the image of the heavenly we must be content to beare the image of the earthly We must be content to be sick we must be content to be poore to be persecuted to be every way miserable and wretched We must be content to be tempted by the tempting devill and oft times to be foiled by him and to bee overcome in sinne and shamefull actions and courses We must be content with the Christian agony and the bloody sweat that Christ had in the garden at his passion We must beare these things it is the image of the earthly It is the condition of the other life the bearing of the heavenly And except wee have the one we cannot have the other except we beare the image of the earthly we shall not beare the image of the heavenly But here it may be objected that Infants have not this image Yes reason tells us they doe For in their death in their sicknesse in their distractions and strange convulsions to which they are subject they beare the image of the earthly although not in so great a measure as men of groweth doe yet they have for their tender yeares a fearefull yoake laid upon them which is mortality and all the wayes that tend to death To conclude this first point the proposition Let us mingle the one with the other and beare both If thou bee troubled in this world in any sort inwardly or outwardly If thou be troubled in conscience for sinne if thou bee troubled with enemies art thou troubled in thy fortunes in thy state in the world art thou troubled with sicknesse of body remember it is nothing but thine owne image Thus thou art made wilt thou deny thine owne face wilt thou deny thy owne name wilt thou not take that which thou art borne unto art thou ashamed of thine inheritance it is that which thy Father hath left thee therefore beare it And withall to comfort thy selfe beare it with this hope and lively assurance that thou shalt beare a better image one day The galley-slaves that serve the Turks in their galleys if they could but think that at seven yeares end some Christian would come and deliver them they would be the better affected and would cheare their mindes especially if they could be assured of it If Iacob serve the churle Laban seven yeares Gen. 29. if he think he shall have Rachell at the end of it hee thinks it but like unto seven dayes and with patience he comforts himselfe in the Lord and staies his leisure and is content that God shall use him unto his hand as it pleaseth him This is the true constitution of a pure mind therefore let us sweeten these outward worldly miseries with the expectation of future joy and the promises which God hath made to us in his holy Word There is no griefe so great but if wee tie heaven unto the end of it it is light As the Apostle saith This short moment any affliction Rom. 8.18 is not worthy of the glory that shall bee revealed Let us put them together and the one will bee swallowed up in the other For as we have borne the image of the earthly so shall wee beare the image of the heavenly Oh! when shall that blessed day appeare So must the Christian man aspire and hunger and thirst after the righteousnesse of God and after his blessed kingdome Wee mourne saith the Apostle as long as we are from Christ in this body we would faine see the consummation of the promise Why then there is no meanes but one that is by incessant prayer by continuall clamours to call upon God to crie unto him for it The cries and clamours of Gods Saints must bring Christ from heaven againe unto earth to make up the fulnesse of the promise which he hath condescēded unto in his holy Word This must be the use we must make of this doctrine That as wee are patiently to endure the image of the earthly man to endure the misery that sinne hath contracted and brought upon us that we also be faithfull and hopefull to cry and to call unto God for the sweet things that are reposed and laid up for us in the glory of the Gospel So much for the Proposition Now for the explanation in verse 50. Verse 50. This I say brethren that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdome of heaven neither can corruption inherit incorruption In these words the Apostle doth prevent those questionings and objections that simple men might make against this doctrine They might say that he taught in the cloudes that hee spake so as that they knew not what hee meant What doe you meane by the image of the earthly and the image of the heavenly we have heard of no such words we know no such matter For this the Apostle tells them that hee speaks out of the phrase of Scripture hee speaks it out of Genesis For hee had said before that Adam was made a living soule and that Christ was made a quickening spirit and so following the course of the creation he saith there was an image which at the first was heavenly but it was defaced by mans fault and so it became earthly and by consequence all of Adams blood were like their progenitor they all tooke part of the inheritance although it were against their will and they bore the image of
matter of this mystery follows We shall not all die but we shall all be changed The power and strength of death working unequally upon mankinde it seemes a great wonder and a mysterie indeed how that some should be happier than their fellowes to be exempted from this common law which is a Statute law Heb. 9 27. and It is appointed for all men once to die And how then are these become so happy to escape the common doome inflicted for the sin of Adam upon all mankinde surely to our common sense they are the happiest of all men even those that shall live in those dayes For we love our flesh so well that wee are loath to commit it to the ground wee are loath that dust should goe to dust and ashes to ashes but still wee would continue and be the last men upon the earth And this great ambition we have so truely and so radically in us that a man would give all that he had in this world not to be taken away till the world be taken away It is the greatest comfort of a mans life to be snatched and hurried away when the universality goes away It is a great comfort to have abundance of company in misery But for this the holy Ghost hath taught us Vse to settle our selves in patience the Lord hath appointed our severall times They are never a whit the more happy because they shall not die nor we never the more unhappy because wee shall die for life and death are all one to them that are planted in the Lord Iesus Christ For it is he that is our advantage he is our hope in death that wee shall attaine unto everlasting life And whether we shall come unto it by the way of resting and rottennesse in the grave or by a sudden and extemporarie change and mutation it ought to seeme all one unto us It is true if God should vouchsafe us that blessing to stand the last men upon the earth and to be the last generation it were a thing very plausible and that which we should desire but we ought not too much to settle upon it for the Lord hath made it a mysterie It is a mysterie when any man dies It is a mysterie in the generall and in the particular it is a mysterie when God calls any man unto him and wee must not wish contrary to the will of God but be content with that portion that he hath destinated unto us Our first parents because they were the authors of sin and transgression Adam and Eve the Lord hath given them the longest time of rotting they lie longest in their graves and they dwell in the pavillions and habitations of death the longest because they were the first authors of wrong to us In the later end of the world the Lord will incline in mercie because he hath been long in judgement in the judgement of death he will incline in the latter generations of the world and give them a taste of his mercy All things grow lesse by continuance and use as a raging plague and pestilence when it comes first into a Citie it takes away a number of people three or foure thousand in a weeke afterward the Lord allayes that rage and abates the disease that there are not so many this week as there were the week before nor so many the next week as there were this So in this common calamity as the world growes in yeares nearer the end of her time so her children that is the people of God which lie in their graves they have lesse time to lie The first authors of sinne when Gods anger was fierce and vehement they are condemned to lie longer in the dust to inhabit and dwell there At the last the plague of God shall begin to slacken and to abate it selfe and the anger of God shall be mitigated and mollified so that those that live in the last age they shall have the least time of sleeping in the dust But in these things we ought to make no difference for the patience that God indues his children with makes up this whether a man sleepe a thousand yeares or five thousand it is all one because God seasons their death with a meditation of the Resurrection and in the meane time inricheth the soule with the beatificall vision with the presence of his Majesty and with that joy that cannot be comprehended in the heart of man We shall not all sleepe Observe againe the Apostle speaks in the first person Wee he saith We shall not all sleepe and yet hee is asleep aswell as other men how then doth he say We shall not all sleep His meaning is to take upon him the person of the Church of God in generall and especially that part of the Church that shall survive when Christ shall come For St. Paul is done to dust as wee shall be and there is no difference in that part that went to the grave There is no difference but onely this that he sleeps in the Lord hee sleeps a glorious compasse and yet he saith We shall not al sleep Vnderstand that he speaks still of the â—ommon state of the Church and for that part of the Church which hee brings the argument for For now he brings his argument to answer an accusation or conclusion which might be made against his doctrine Some might aske him What shall become of those that shall be living at the comming of Christ Oh saith he I am of them although I die before that time yet I am of that number For the members of Christ are not distinguished by time but are all one Abel might have said Wee and Adam might have said Wee of the last end of the world This teacheth us how great the communion of Saints is that it is not broken by the entercourse of yeares time but that it still continues We shall not all sleep The blessing of God runs on still with perpetuity and that which is true to one generation is firme to another and that which belongs to one is common to all This is that communion of Saints in the strength of which the Apostle uttered this phrase We shall not all sleep as he doth oft times in his other Epistles We shall not doe this and wee shall not doe that Although the Apostle be dead and rotten 15. hundred years agoe yet he saith We shall not all sleep But we shall all be changed Still We as if he were one of the men Here he teacheth us another lesson that the Apostle was a man that still looked for the day of judgement He saith We shall all be changed It may be I shall be one of the men I know not it may be the trumpet shall blow while I live for the Lord hath reserved the time onely to himselfe the day of judgement is knowne to no man Nay the son of man as hee is man knowes not when Christ shall come to judgement Therefoâ—e I prepare my selfe
brought to such a wofull change as that Therefore a Christian upon this must consider that as he looks for a change at that day in his body so hee must labour for this change before hand of his manners and conditions even to change his pride into lowlinesse to turne his filthinesse into holy obedience God expects such a change at our hands and we should make our prayer to Almighty God that he that changeth all things would take the paines to change us that in the middest of other things we might not continue the same desperate men but bee renewed in the spirit of our mindes and be changed into another man Ephes 4.23 To put off the old man and his wickednesse and to put on the new man Colos 3.9 10. which is made according to the image of God in righteousnesse and holinesse to change our apparrell and to put on Christ This is the true devotion of the Saints and that which they should spend the time of their life in Oh thou that changest all things Vse thou that changest the bodies of men at the end of the world after a miraculous manner I beseech thee change my fortunes change my state bring mee out of this wretchednesse and misery to a competencie Especially change my vicious estate that I may not rot and corrupt in it but that I may be brought to holinesse and righteousnesse Change the hearts of mine enemies that they may turne to mee Alter their hearts Prov. 21.1 thou which haste the hearts of men in thy hand and turnest them as the rivers of waters change the hearts of them Change thine owne countenance which art angry with mee for my sins Although thou change not in thy selfe yet in respect of me thou seemest sometimes to be pleased and sometimes to be angry When I doe well thou art pleasant to my conscience when I doe ill thou art as a Lion to me Psal 18.25 26. With the godly thou wilt shew thy selfe godly with the righteous thou wilt bee righteous with the perverse thou wilt shew thy selfe perverse Therefore I beseech thee change this misery of mine change it to happinesse change my sinfull state to a holy and blessed estate change my spirit which is addicted to the world and worldly things to spirituall and gracious intentions that it may intend onely the things that belong to thy glory and to my owne soules health God is the God of changing and though there bee no shadow of changing in him yet it is hee that makes all the changes that are in us Iames 1.17 both in this little world and in the great world about us Now I come to the last point a word of it because the time is past The time And the meanes The time In the twinckling of an eye And the meanes The blowing of a trumpet Therefore as my Text is short a moment of time so I will indeavour to speake of it in a moment as it were The Apostle saith all this shall bee done in a moment in the twinckling of an eye This is the greatest wonder of all the rest the mystery was never great till now that there should bee such a deale of worke done in so small a time A moment is nothing The word signifieth an atome a thing that cannot be cut into quantity a very punctum a moâ—e in the Sunne which no man can cut or divide it into pieces it is a thing that cannot bee distinguished So his meaning is to signifie unto us the shortest time that can bee For certainly wee must needs imagine that these great things must require some time For first of all when the Lord began to make the world hee tooke some time he took sixe dayes to make a distinction and division of the work Therefore also it is likely that at the later end of the world the Lord shall take some time although it shall not be so much as that was Secondly againe it is needfull that there should be some time because of the observation that Gods children must make of these actions For if all things should bee done in a moment and hurried up in a confusion the children of God should want a great part of their instruction and a great part of their comfort For this is one part of their delight and comfort to see how the world shall bee destroyed to see how the dead shall bee raised and themselves to see how their bodies shall bee changed to see how the Iudge shall come This shall bee a great part of their learning to understand these things and without distinction of time it is impossible but there would be a confusion wrought Therefore it is needfull that there should bee an interpose of time Therefore the Apostles meaning is not to bee thus taken that there shall bee no time in the doing of these things But his meaning is this that the time shall be so short that it shall not bee perceived or conceived to bee agreeable to so great an action The Lord shall doe it so speedily as if it were in the twinckling of an eye For the Apostle speaks here out of an earnest desire as hee doth in other Epistles when he would set forth a thing to the full hee speaks in a kinde of holy hyperbole in a holy excesse therefore hee saith it shall bee in the twinckling of an eye to signifie that the Lord shall doe it in such a trice with such quicknesse as it is past all the understanding of men or Angels that such a great thing should be done upon such a sudden So I take the twinckling of an eye to bee understood So to conclude the point Vse We learne that God works upon a sudden when he begins to work Therefore this shoulâ— comfort us that no man should despaire of his well-being with God For God is able to work upon the sudden he requires no time to work in He calls some men at one houre and some at an other A man that hath been a wicked liver all his life time perhaps threescore perhaps fourescore yeares hee growes desperate in the sight of his sinnes and thinks that all time is past for recovery No hee is deceived the Lord can work without time he requires none Hast thou so much life in thee as the twinckling of an eye hast thou so much time as a moment will answer to if there be so much there is hope still If there be but so much breath and life in a sinner that a man may say hee will not die till hee have twinckled his eye once if there bee but so much there is hope of mercy still with God But let us not doate upon this and thinke upon the twinckling of an eye or a moment but let us take every moment to come unto God For God works in a moment and which moment hee works in that we know not Perhaps this is our moment God calls us now Perhaps Gods eyes
then bring a mighty Armado out of the bowels of the earth which in the conceit of men were gone they were given as lost for ever But the Lord shall then bring forth such an infinite army as doth exceed the wit and conceit of man to imagine For our thousands we shall have millions nay for our single persons we shall have millions at that day And those that shall survive at the comming of the Lord they shall be but a handfull in respect of the mighty army which the Lord shall raise and remount out of the earth which shall then pay her tribute with which the Lord hath intrusted her Here therefore he shewes the manner how this shall be done and he shewes the great difference between the trumpet of God and the trumpets of men For though they be both taken in a simile from war yet there is infinite difference in thē The trumpet of man summons and calls onely those that are living souldiers it calls the living to be at such an houre present in the battaile to follow their colours and to keep their ranks But the trumpet of God cals the dead themselves by a strange sound It shall penetrate the bowels of the earth and shall speak unto dust and ashes which is dissolved to nothing to rise and come in presence before the Emperour to come before God Againe there is another marvailous difference When the trumpets of men sound then the armies gather together and kill and murther each other there is nothing but death and murther slaughter vastation and destruction But the trumpet of God it calls men to no death but to life and sense and glory and abilities So contrary is the Trumpet of the Lord to the trvmpet of man and yet it hath some similitude and diverse conveniences with it which that I may in order observe Division into 6. parts We will first consider what this trumpet is Secondly why it is called the last trump in respect and difference to some other And thirdly what this trumpet shall doe when it shall sound for the trumpet shall sound Origen Origen translates it well the trumpet shall trump so the Greek words have it That is it shall sound after one manner after the musick that God shall appoint to sound out of such a hollow long musicall instrument and what shall be the effect of it in the substance and the matter for it shall be a voice significant that men may understand it Fourthly the effect and operation of it that so soone as the trumpet shall sound over the whole world presently the dead shall rise incorruptible The very wicked themselves shall then be incorruptible as concerning the integrity and perfectnesse of their members but not as concerning the happinesse and joy which the children of God shall be possest of Fiftly the Apostle shewes us the reason of all this For saith hee it behooves it should be thus for it must needs be so It must needs be so both in respect that it is impossible for this corrupt body to enter into incorruption unchanged and because also that congruity stands with divine justice that that body which had been before corrupt should be invested with and put on incorruption that every man might take and receive his reward or punishment according as he hath done in this corrupt flesh Lastly we are to consider the sweet metaphor in the word to put on Where the Lord shews us that now wee have the rags of corruption upon our backs we have this flesh but instead of that God will give us that blessed garment that fine linnen spoken of Rev. 19. Rev. 19.8 that fine silke that is the justification of Christ which shall be unto us as the soul is to the body a perpetuall rich vesture to keep us from the wrath of God and to preserve us in eternall happinesse for ever Of these things briefly and inorder as it shall please God to give assistance 1 Part. What Trumpet this is First concerning the word here used a Trumpet That the word trumpet doth signifie either properly the instrument musicall for the gathering of men together or metaphorically something else that doth the like office every man easily understands But in which of these senses it is here to be used it is not easily determined For it is very likely that indeed the meaning of the holy Ghost is that there shall be properly a trumpet that shall sound a very materiall trumpet although perhaps it shall not be of the same matter and metall that ours is of yet notwithstanding it shall be some kinde of instrument that God shall prepare to make the like sound as a trumpet doth And that this is likely to be true the letter will carry it The letter must never be shunned except there be some kinde of inconvenience that will follow upon the literall exposition For where there is no absurdity or inconvenience wee are bound in conscience to expound the Scriptures in a literall sense and where it includes any absurdity wee are to leave the literall sense and to take another which is analogicall But here because the letter will carry it and chiefly because the Apostle repeats it twice it is a great argument that it shall be a true materiall trumpet For first the Apostle saith in the verse going before the last trumpet and then hee shews the effect of this trumpet it shall blow or sound Our Lord Christ useth the same word in Mat. 24. Mat. 24.31 and St. Paul expresseth the same in 1 Thes 4. 1 Thes 4.16 Therefore it is an argument that properly and truly it is to be understood a trumpet as we in our sense doe apprehend it although the matter and effects and use of it be higher then any trumpet in the world Againe another reason is this When the Law was given in Exod. 19. Exod. 19.16 there was a trumpet with a high shrill voice which increased more and more I demand what that was Surely it was not made of metall or any artificiall composition as those that we have yet the Lord made it in the clouds even the sound of a trumpet he made it more exact and perfect by his power than any man can doe by art and invention Therefore as then at the promulgation of the Law there was a true distinct noise of a trumpet sounding that the people perceived and conceived it to be the voice of a trumpet so likewise when the new law shall be given that is when the fulnesse of all things is come at the Resurrection of the dead there shall be a created voice which shall be loud and it is likely that it shall be a true materiall trumpet Notwithstanding perhaps not after the common frame of men yet it shall be so ordered as that a man may distinguish it and say it is the voice of no other instrument but of a trumpet Lastly it appeares by this in that the great
Supper as that shall bee the Supper of the Lamb. Apoc. 19.9 Blessed are they that are called to the marriage Supper of the Lamb. I say the bidding to the supper of the Lamb is nothing else but the fulnesse of glory which the Lord shall invest his children with at his comming to judgement This trumpet shall call us to that supper to that banquet which shall be a continuall feast to last forever And for the trumpet of Tents the trumpet of Removeall it is manifest it shall bee so For there is no such removing in the world as that shall be For some men to remove to hell and other some to remove to heaven it shall be the greatest kind of progression that ever was taken So that this last trumpet hath an embleme or signification of that also And for the trumpet of manifestation we know it is that The Lord shall manifest at that day who are his and he shall manifest every thing tha◠hath been wrought were it never so close and secret it shall then bee brought to light And as the face of man or woman is knowne one of another by their aspect now so then the thoughts and secrets of the hearts shall bee mutually knowne and understood one by another That is the light that shall reveale all things it is that that shall manifest all things that is the trumpet of manifestation As Christ saith Matth. 6.2 Blow not a trumpet before thine almes doe not manifest it The manifestation of things indeed never comes till the end of the world and then every thing shall bee manifested Those things that are hidden from the eyes of men now either by the policy of men or by the connivence of God as there be many things that are though now they were never seene by any eye then they shall be manifest and laid open And for the trumpet of the Gospel this trumpet shall bee truely that for this trumpet shall bee the fulfilling of all the Gospel When the Lord shall gather by the last trump those whom he hath raised before by the trumpet of his doctrine by the holy trumpet of the Scriptures by preaching of the Word by the Sacraments them that hee hath rowzed by baptisme and by his gracious admonitions in this world he shall then bring upon them another sound which shall tend to the like effect to the same purpose to put them into glory which his voice had raised before unto the holy warre against the devill and the flesh and the world in this life So that this trumpet that wee here speake of is the miracle of all miracles it concludes all that was before it it comprehends all perfection that may be imagined It is a voice magnificall a voice angelical it is a voice terrible it is a voice that hath life in it a voice that shall give life It shall bee a voice so full of majesty as that all the world shall be taken with amazement and astonishment the best children of God shall not bee without feare saith St. Cyprian Cyprian at that day And saith St. Chrysostome Chrysost Woe is me when I thinke of that fearefull day For although we should bee so prepared for it Rom. 13.11 as that we should lift up our heads because our salvation drawes nigh yet saith hee I would see any Saint of God that dares looke there with a confident countenance For though our justification by Christ shall give us comfort yet love and feare shall bee mixed and mingled together a filiall feare shall possesse men in the hearing of the silver trumpet It must needs therefore be full of majesty and terror As St. Austin saith Aug. You know brethren that a trumpet hath not so much delight in it as feare and trembling having naturally a kinde of musique in it which makes the body to shake and shiver in the parts of it and that most of all separates a man from himselfe So shall be the voice of this great and mighty thunder which God shall give that it shall sound in the manner of this musicall instrument of this speciall instrument that gave the Law and that set forth the Prophesies and that was used at the solemne feasts It shall be full of majesty and full of comfort and joy and yet it shall bee with feare and terrour to the best of them that shall heare it For as the voice of God was so great when the Law was given that Gods owne people could not endure it Let not God speake unto us Exod. 20.19 but let Moses speake Let not God speake to us any more for then wee die for feare the chosen people of God were faine thus to say So at that day those that be the most sanctified although they shall bee full of joy in one respect that their redemption is consummate in Christ yet that joy shall consist in a mixture and mingling of feare For it is befitting Gods children as they love him so to feare him to feare him in love and to love him in feare to yeeld unto him all submission and reverence that they may bee reconciled and made one in those contrary passions feare and love which is a sweet union and reconcilement in the contemplation of one and the selfe same God To conclude therefore this point concerning this trumpet and what it is One saith That the trumpet is properly a priestly instrument a holy instrument for holy purposes But hee spake this above his clement Chrysost St. Chrysostome saith The presence of the Lord Iesus Christ is this trumpet this silver trumpet which shall passe through the world And St. Theophilact his scholler and follower Theophil hee saith This trumpet is nothing else but the will of God the command of God which shall runne thorow the world as it is said in the Psalme Psalm 147.15 the word of God runnes swiftly and fills all the world And St. Augustin in his Epistle to Honorius Aug ad Honoriū saith he In the name of a trumpet the Lord would have us to understand some most evident and rare thing And hee saith in his Epistle to Constantius Aug. ep ad Constantium not knowing what to determine of it In the last trump that is that signe which God shall give last to the earth whatsoever signe that shall be St. Ambrose Ambros thinks it is nothing but the comming of the Lord signified by the noise of a trumpet As Princes and great men and noble men when they come to a Towne have it divulged and manifested before they come by the sound of a trumpet So this same sound of this trumpet here spoken of is nothing else but the manifestation of the presence of the Sonne of God Genebrard Genebrard upon the Canticles saith The trumpets of God are of two sorts the one is paginall the trumpet of his word which is written clearly in this life The trumpet here is manifested
which is now accomplished but in one the Lord Iesus hath it alone in one Now it is in the first fruits then it shall be in the whole Harvest then it shall be made good to the whole Church which is now only performed to the head of the Church that Death is swallowed up into victory This I take to be the sense of the words To proceed in order First we are to consider it as the words lye and not as the logicall rule would carrie us For logically we have A subject A predicate And a Vinculum or Copulate The subject is corruption This corruptible The predicate is a certaine change it must have this corruptible must take and put on incorruption And the copulate is the oportet it must needs be so and this mortall must put on immortality And then after that there is a blessed comfort that the Church of God shall receive In the meane time shee receives it as being certaine that it shall be but then she shall receive it as a full payment at that time That Scripture which said Death is swallowed up into victory It shall then be utterly accomplished Wherein we are to consider First that the Apostle confirmes and strengthens himselfe by Scripture by that which is written Secondly where it is written Thirdly the substance and matter that is written That Death is swallowed up into victory Where againe we are to consider three termes First what that is that is swallowed Death and all evill and mischiefe Secondly the terme to which it is swallowed or consumed to victory Thirdly the efficient cause who swallowes it and what it is that swallowes Death that must needs be understood the death of the Sonne of God the death of Christ swallowes up the death of men into an absolute victory And then the answer to that question How is Death swallowed up in victory seeing it every day swallowes us up and consumes us how then is Death swallowed up himselfe And that is to be answered in these words because the time is not yet come When this corruption shall put on incorruption and this mortall shall put on immortality then shall be fulfilled this saying Every thing is in its own time when all things are done that should bee done when all things are accomplished that the Lord shall send before then that shall come after But we have it now onely in hope we have it onely in the first fruits we have it in some part we have it in the head then we shall have it in all the members We have it in some few that were raised with Christ to be witnesses of his Resurrection and they are pawnes for all the rest When this corruption hath put on incorruption and this mortall c. Of these parts briefly and in order as it shall please God to give assistance And first to follow the order of the words He saith this corruptible and this mortall speaking of the bodies of men For the soule of man is neither corruptible nor mortall as heretofore wee have touched Therefore those that understand these things of the Resurrection of the spirit of the Resurrection of the soule from vice to newnesse of life they are extremely mistaken and they abuse the word of grace which is here propounded unto us For the Apostle speakes of that part which is corrupt and mortall that the glory of God shall be shewed upon it and he saith this very body this Identicall thing this Idem numero not another body in stead of this but this which is now so corrupt The body shall remaine the same although the accidents and qualities shall be rare and glorious which shall accrew unto it yet it shall be one and the selfe same body As S. Chrysostome saith Chrysost the selfe same it shall be in the selfe same inches and quantity although the qualities shall be altred and it shall have gracious indowments yet they shall be the same substance they shall be the same bodies And againe it is to be observed that hee useth two words together hee repeates it This corruptible must put on incorruption and this mortall must put on immortality And this hee doth not without very good reason For it is no vaine repetition of the same thing twice over it is not S. Pauls purpose nor his custome so to doe but hee notes in us two certaine infirmities which the Lord shall stay and stanch at that day by that glorious vesture and garment of incorruption and immortality which he shall put upon us First then our body is corrupt that is changing from one forme to another it cannot continue in the same stay And secondly it is mortall that is subject to utter destruction to be altogether without any forme The first is the mutability which the matter whereof we consist cannot endure You understand that in all things that are made there are two great principles the matter and the forme besides the privation The matter is so infinitly capable and desirous of new formes that it cannot endure long to stay in one state still the matter desires a new forme to come upon it as being weary of that which it hath borne before We see it in all things in nature And though God worke his owne will and his gracious wonders by that yet notwithstanding it shewes the variety and disposition of the matter which is still capable and hath an appetite after a new forme and desires to be changed In the fruits of the earth The seed would not continue so a seed but when it is cast into the ground it comes to sprout and to spring and from thence it comes to be a little tree and so a greater and then it comes to grow backward it comes downe againe and comes to be a dead thing We see it in our selves First there is the matter of our nature then wee doe not so continue but it becomes an embrio then it comes from that forme to be a childe and when it is weary of that it comes higher So God brings things to perfection and then back againe to imperfection I speake onely of the variety in the materiall cause which as the Philosopher speaks is the devourer of formes it is ever desiring a new forme to be set upon it So God teacheth us by this that the very appetite of the matter shall carrie us to the certainty of a new forme which shal be set upon us in that blessed day because that this corruptible matter is ever changeable and changing formes It is certaine that God shall then stop the appetite of the matter and give it a forme which shall never be changed and that it shall never desire to change Here nature never stayes nor is never content with any forme but wee come from our prime matter to childhood from childhood wee passe along to youth and youth sends us to middle age middle age brings us to dotage and dotage sends us to our graves
And there wee cease not neither but still wee seeke for a new forme the matter still would have a new coate None of these content us but wee desire of God a forme that never may be changed This corruption must put on incorruption and this mortall must put on immortality The other condition of our nature is that as it cannot endure to be in the same kinde but still seeks new fashions and new formes so at length it comes to that forme that seemes to extinguish it utterly as if it had never beene which brings matter and forme and all to nothing as a man would think the goodliest temper the stateliest comely body the best and freshest countenance the best brued bloud and the sweetest colour these which are the materialls of man it brings them all at length to a handfull of dust that a man would think that now the matter had quite lost its forme and that it should never desire a further forme For it is mortalized it is brought to nothing it is brought to stench and corruption and it seemes to be drowned there there is no hope that ever it shall rise againe But yet still the appetite works for the matter works still to the God of nature and desires of him a new forme to give it a new garment And the Apostle saith that God shall heare that matter and hee shall regard the cries of it and shall graunt the petition that this dust shall make unto him and he shall give it a new vestment which shall be of such a fashion as it shall never desire any more to change and put off again For this corruption must put on incorruption and this mortall must put on immortality 6 â—art The metaphor Shall put on A sweet and blessed metaphor is this word put on It must be put on in stead of the ragges wee put off for mortality and corruption stick close to us not as a close-bodied garment sticks to the body but as the skinne and the flesh cleaves to the bones And we can never put them off and be rid of them but by the common law and necessity of dying and rotting in the grave There are only some few that shall have the prerogative which shall live at the comming of Christ they shall have a change in stead of this death But for us that must goe the common way of nature wee know our doome Now then this ragged garment and vesture that wee carrie about us by reason of Adams sinne and our corruption which wee have multiplied and added to Adams transgression it must first be shaken off by the omnipotent hand of God it must be so purely and so fully removed as that no threeds nor no tagg of it remaine And then when that is done there is time and place for the new robe to be put upon us for that blessed garment which is to come in the place of this But first these torne raggs must be cast away they must first be put off and then this blessed vestment which the Lord hath prepared even the vestment of incorruption and immortality shall succeed in the place of this So that from hence we see the truth of the former doctrine again Saith S. Austin the garment is one thing Aug. and the thing garnished and decked is another the garment is not the man but an accident to the man and it may be that hee may be here and that may be there or it may be here and he may be away and yet notwithstanding the man may be the same So likewise the bodies that the Saints have in this world they shall be still the same bodies the same in incorruption that they were in corruption the same body that it was when it was mortall the same shall it be when it is immortall the same in substance but not the same in glory and quality Tertull. For as Tertullian saith the Apostle disputes of the glory of the bodies and not of the substance of them Therefore as a man that is of any state and account in this world he hath divers suites of cloathes but he hath but one body so it is true in this case that the Lord upon one and the selfe same body shall poure multiplicity of garments and riches of the rayment which hee shall give in that blessed day The garment of beauty the garment of eternity the garment of strength of wisedome of all kinde of excellencies both of body and soule The Lord shall sit them then with many changes of apparell but still it shall be one and the selfe same body For this mortall must put on the glorious garment of immortality and this corruptible must put on incorruption So the Fathers in the Greeke Church taught their men and women in the Church to say I beleeve the resurrection of This flesh When we say the Creed wee say I beleeve the resurrection of the dead and the life everlasting But still they when they came to this article they clapt their hand upon their breast and said I beleeve the resurrection of This flesh punctually pointing at themselves because the Apostle saith This corruptible must put on incorruption and this mortall must put on immortality to shew that it belongs to the person properly and peculiarly to this very subject that he makes his proposition of And this glorious garment what it is but the garment which God himselfe hath worne from all eternity Hee is incorruptible that is unchangeable and he is immortall that is it is impossible for him to grow worse For God can never change from better to worse and hee shall give that power to the bodies of his Saints that their perfection shall be so great as that it shall not possibly be made better and they shall be so singular that it is impossible they should be made worse or decline For hee shall set them in the highest pitch of perfection in the top of excellencie that they shall receive neither majus nor minus neither more nor lesse neither better nor worse they shall have no kinde of change This is that glorious apparell that God puts on The Lord is King Psal 93.1 hee hath put on his glorious apparell hee hath girded himselfe with strength and majestie This is that apparell which the Apostle S. Iames speaks of when he saith That the Lord is without any change Iam. 1.16 or shadow of changing This garment which God hath put upon himselfe from all eternity hee will vouchsafe in a degree and measure to his Saints in time they shall be eternall from the time after as he hath beene from worlds and ages to world without end himselfe one and the same for evermore Now whereas hee saith in the vinculum of this proposition that Oportet this must needs be thus Vse that it can be no other way but thus This thing the Apostle adds for our comfort and consolation both to encourage us patiently to abide
the wofull calamity of our nature over which we must desire God to give us the victory and behold it followes in the Text But thanks be to God which hath given us victory through Iesus Christ our Lord. Which words I can but enter into of the gift or blessing which is vouchsafed victory Victory is alwayes welcome but especially when it is atchieved against a dangerous enemy The child of God is borne to be a Conquerour as St. Iohn saith 1 Iohn 5.4 1 Iohn 5.4 Every thing that is born of God overcommeth the world Every thing that is borne of God where the Fathers observe that the Apostle speaks in generall he speaks in the neuter gender to shew that there is no man that is so meane or so vile and base of whatsoever condition he be that he may rather be called a thing than a man yet that he hath the spirit of grace by that hee is able to encounter and overcome the world and this victory that wee have it is over such powerfull enemies as that except God had promised it except God should worke it all the power in heaven and earth could not attain unto it A man that is borne a Conquerour over his owne corruptions and over himselfe he is greater than ever was the greatest conquerour and it is better to be made in this kind a Victor over his owne passions than to be the universall Emperour of all the world Saith Seneca there are many men that have subdued Principalities Kingdomes Cities Townes and Countries and brought them under their owne masterie but there are few that have guided themselves but still there is a Tiger within them that disgraceth and obscureth their outward conquest by reason of the foule seethings and corruption in their owne flesh therefore for a man to get the victory and to overcome himselfe is to get the victory and to overcome all the world for man is a microcosme a little world as St. Austin saith thou maist obtaine the victory against thy selfe for thy selfe After a certaine wondrous manner God hath ordained a christian souldier a militant member of his Church to fight against himselfe for himselfe For hee that will lose his life saith Christ for my sake and the Gospels shall save it Hee that will lose his delights and his pleasures hee that will make warre with himselfe and will have no peace with his affections the Lord shall give him that peace that passeth all understanding and although hee kill his body with chastizing it yet it shall be saved in the day of the Lord St. Bern. saith St. Bernard The victory is thought and reputed in the world to be lost rather by flying than by dying for there are many men slaine in the field that are not accounted as cowards and fugitives or vanquished men because they died upon the place but when they quit the place when they fly and are not able to hold out in the field hee that remaines accounts himselfe the Victor because the rest are fled and vanished away So the spirituall victory in Christ it is lost by flying for we should rather die for God we should rather die in his zeale and for his glory and keep our standing than to yeeld and fly from the devill and our own corrupt affections and stoop to them then sathan gets the victory when wee cast away our weapons and play the loose scouts in the field There is no hope of victory in those actions Hee hath given us victory Over what hath he given us victory victory must be over some enemie I shewed you before the parties what they are now I am to shew you who they are that God hath given us the victory over over death over sinne over the law over death that there is not so much as a relique of it remaining there there is no hope that ever hee shall returne and make head againe that is a famous victory wherein the roots of future seditions are taken away and plucked up when there is nothing left for any hope of future rebellion When the Romanes had warred with the Carthagenians and oft times overcome them yet still within a while within 8. or 10. yeares or lesse they made head againe and stirred up new warres and so they had successive combustion And so in all the Nations of the world there are none that are so vanquished now but they may become conquerours hereafter The same thing that the Lord hath made an underling now may be the Head and Chieftaine in time to come But in this victory that we have over death it is without any hope or comfort on deaths part and without any feare of suffering on our part for it is so taken away as though it had never been and that which had the greatest triumph the mightiest trophees in the world unto which all Kings and Princes have bowed their heads and laid downe their scepters for all the goodly things in the world have been nothing else but the morsells of death I say this victorious enemie by the hand of Christ it shall be turned to a thing of nothing it shall have no name nor notion it shall be left without any hope of recovery It shall have no more strength to sting for the sting is gone The second enemy we shall have victory over is sin because the prince of this world sifted Christ to know whether hee were pure wheat or no and the Text saith he found nothing in him but he was as the finest flowre of wheat without all bran of corruption without all inclination to sinne being conceived and borne in perfect purity and living in the strength of that purity insomuch as hee defies all his adversaries hee challengeth them saying Who can accuse mee of sinne Because I say our blessed Saviour in all the parts of him had nothing but the light of purity in his eyes in his understanding in his tongue in his gesture in his words in his actions in his perseverance in all the parts of his doctrine in all the passages of his miracles there was nothing else but a fountaine and a world of purity therefore death incroaching by the malice and violence of sathan and the envy of the high priests upon him that had no sinne it lost all the power and government that it had before for taking away life from him that had no cause of death in him it follows therefore that it is justly exattorate and put out of place and hath lost his commission for ever for Christ overcame sinne by satisfying for it on his holy crosse and by his example in his holy life by giving a holy example to his Apostles and Disciples and all beleevers in the world Hee overcame sinne by drinking the cup of Gods wrath which by our sinnes was filled to him and he overcame sinne by his gracious example by the copie of his holy life and much more by his holy Spirit by which he diffuseth his grace
victory that we have in Christ it were a fanaticall madnesse a ridiculous base delusion Therefore let them that are willing to comfort their owne soules against the day of trouble let them thinke that there is no comfort to bee had but in this victory and there is no comfort can bee had in this victory except they strive to be Victors and Conquerors in Christ to have a part in him and to fight as well as they may under his banner as long as they live in sinne that they seeke it and study it and mainetaine it and defend it let them delude their owne soules and deceive themselves which is the grossest and most fearefull deceit of all others for a man to deceive himsefe they may thinke they are Conquerers but they are the Devills vanquished ones they are his captives they are held in the Devils Irons God be mercifull to us for there is none that lives in sin but the poore miserable thiefe that lies in the dungeon is better then hee But this victory notwithstanding is the Churches and wee are of the Church wee are baptized wee are called to the knowledge of the misteries of the Gospel and God doth not call men for nothing hee doth not make his mysteries idle It is true therefore as long time as God hath vouchsafed us wee have still time to bee victors and though our soules cleave to the earth though they sticke to the pavement yet God can raise us out of the dust and make us equall with the Princes of his people as the Prophet David saith Psal 113. Therefore let us call to the Lord God and though wee find no strength in our selves nor no meanes nor will if there bee not so much as a will yet let him that hath the wills of men in his hand that hath the hearts of men in his hand and turnes them as the rivers of waters let him doe as it pleaseth him let him worke this for us that can worke nothing for our selves To whom bee praise and glory obedience and thanksgiving both now and for evermore Amen FINIS SERMONS On 1 COR. 15. Of the Resurrection 1 COR. 15.56 57. But thanks be to God that hath given us victory through Christ our Lord therefore beloved Brethren be stedfast and unmoveable abounding in the worke of the Lord alway because you know your labour is not lost nor in vaine in the Lord. THere is nothing more certain Note then that it is the portion of a Christian soule to fight and labour in this life present The Church is a militant Church a People that are alway at combat and conflict with the devill and with men and if these faile with himselfe too Saith S. Austin St. Aug. we would faine be freed from this fight from this continuall perturbation but the comfort that God hath given against it is that as we are called to a triall so the Lord assists us too in the day of Trouble and assures us of the victory that howsoever we cannot overcome all these enemies by any grace that is inherent in us but that we are often foyled and conquered yet we have another Meane to conquer them by that is by faith and the apprehension of the victory that the Lord Iesus Christ hath purchased for us over the devill and all these Adversaries and this victory can be given us but by one hand it lyes onely there to dispense that is in the hand of God which is the Lord of Hoasts and Armies It is he alone that enclines the battaile it is hee that weakneth the adversaries and that strengthens those that follow his colours when they are foyled hee raiseth up them that are fallen it is he that beateth downe Sathan under our feet that was our conquerour This spirituall conquest is of all others the most excellent for the rest as Isay Isay 8. saith They are gotten with tumult and with tumbling of garments in bloud But this conquest that we have in the Lord Iesus it was like a Lamb-slaughter in the day of Madian You know in the day of Madian what kinde of victory it was Gideon went out hee did nothing the Lord did all for him for still hee brought downe his troups from thousands to hundreds to three hundred and when they were to be set to worke they did nothing but onely clash their broken pitchers and the Lord wrought a great slaughter in the Hoast of Madian Such a victory is the conquest wee have in Iesus Christ our Lord he is still the victor that got the conquest without all appearance of second Causes without all union of forces and power in the world that God may be all in all In other victories there be many sharers that may claime a part in the conquest there is something belongs to the Generall some to the Colonels some to the Captaines some to the other Officers some to the common Souldiers There is no man but hee may claime a part in the common victory But in this victory that we have obtained by the meanes of Christ Iesus our Lord there is nothing that belongs to any but to God Therefore the Apostle saith Thanks be to God thanks be to no man thanks be to no Angell thanks be to no power that can be supposed to help us but the thanks and praise must rest in God alone which hath wrought all this for us As the Heathen Orator said to Caesar when hee had overcome his anger and had pardoned his Enemie In other warres saith he there is a communication of the praise of the wars it belongs to one as well as to another But in this victory which thou hast gotten over thy selfe Orat. pro Milone in giving and forgiving thou hast gotten the glory The like may wee much more truly say of God as the Apostle saith here Thanks be to God and to none but to him that hath given us victory for he alone with his owne hand and his stretched out arme Psal 94. hath gotten himselfe the victory as the Psalmist saith So Tertullian Tertul. speaking of this point in his fifth booke against Marcian Chap. 10. The Apostle saith he being well advised how the conquest comes to a Christian hee gives no thanks to any other God but him alone that put the word of triumph and insultation into his mouth That God that gave him power to say by way of triumph Oh Death where is thy sting Oh grave where is thy victory To that same God that gave him the word of triumph he returnes the word of thanksgiving and retribution of praise because it belongs onely to him If Marcians god as Marcian supposed hee had another god than that which is the Father of our Lord Iesus Christ can tell mee such things as hee hath done or that hee hath published any such thing to the world as this I will account him the Father of mercy But till then I will account him Marcians Idoll
dammage and frustration But the Spirit of God doth not meane to set men a worke with a fooles errand to set men on worke without ensuing profit The blessed God that cannot lie to any man hee hath promised and assured that those that labour in him they shall not lose their reward The reason subdivided into 4. branches First then of the labour Secondly that it is not in vaine Your labour is not in vaine Thirdly why it is not in vaine Because it is in the Lord. Fourthly how we come to this You know this is so It is a thing that no man can make question of 1. The labour First of the labour It is true all the parts of religion are laborious and there is no man that takes such paines as a Christian doth When the great Conquerers of the world have subdued whole Nations yet the mastery was hard for them to atchieve over themselves that is the labour of the Lord but the labour that is spoken of here is chiefly to bee referred to three heads First to the Ministers of Corinth This labour is referred to 3. persons 1. Ministers you that preach the doctrine of the resurrection your labour is not lost therefore have a good confidence You preach that which is true you preach not lies and fancies but the doctrine that you preach that all men shall bee raised againe it is as true as God is true therefore you that are Preachers hold on be not dismaied whatsoever those Heretiques and adversaries goe about to cast against you and oppose you in your way Keepe the tenents of your profession hold on constantly for your labour is not lost the Lord shall make it good It is an idle thing for a man to stand in the Pulpit and tell nothing but lies to the people such a man deserves to be stoned to death for it to abuse the faith and to abuse the understandings of men to tell them things that God never meanes to doe And the Ministers of Corinth were men that were but Novices and there were so many hereticall fellows among them that they were not able to answer their sophismes and so they beganne to leave off their preaching of the doctrine of the resurrection because that was full of arguments and difficulties and they knew not how to evade out of it and answer their Opposers Therefore they began to give over that and take some other points but no saith the Apostle goe on with this doctrine let all the gates of hell open themselves they shall not prevaile against you It is the worke of the Lord and the Lords arme is higher and mightier then the powers of hell and that which you say the Lord will make it true in the time of the resurrection of the bodie whatsoever the gates and power of hell can make against it that is the first sense which Saint Basil S. Basil followes and indeed it is good and true Another sense is of the Brethren in Corinth that were of the common faith among them which were exercised in the Agonies of a christian life as if hee should say Brethren I understand you are by reason of this doctrine of the resurrection scoft at and laughed at they think you are fooles they imagine that such a thing as this is a meere dreame they account you creatures of another world and such as have a vaine beliefe and perswade your selves of these schismes which these new teachers have put into your heads and I see you have great troubles in your life and these troubles that you have by your persecution and troubles of conscience which are all sweetned by the Resurrection they are aggravated so that as I beseech my brethren that teach so also I intreat you that heare to abound in the worke of the Lord that as they preach and teach so that you may perceive this doctrine to be true although the world resist it never so much this is the agony of a christian life with Heretiques with Schismatiques with himselfe with the world This is the Agonie which a Christian is born unto which some of the Fathers take to be the labour here spoken of so St. Ierome Epiphanius S. Jerom. S. Epiphan and divers others follow that But that which I take to be the best is the sense which St. Austin and some others give S. Aug. which is this Your labour is not in vaine that is your labour of love Marke the Apostle there reciting all the Intellectuall graces of the Spirit of God 1 Thes 1.4 hee speakes there of the labour of love for there is nothing that hath so much labour in it as love although it be without paines if we regard the outward act and worke yet the imployment is great nothing is so laborious as love it is still doing good comforting those that are distressed bestowing somewhat to the poore out of that little it hath to spare it out of its owne mouth to give admonitions to the peevish to deale wisely with froward spirits A man were as good goe about to tame a wild Tigre as to tell men that are setled in evill courses of their faults yet a Christian must doe this so this is that labour of love the love of that blessed day the love to the time when a mans body shall be raised it makes him change his place remove his lodging it makes him spend his meanes it makes him doe all the good he can in this world because he hopes for the blessed resurrection of his body as the Apostle speaks Acts 20. For the hope of the Resurrection I am bound with this chaine This is that labour for wee doe not labour for nothing and indure all this toile and trouble but because wee looke for the resurrection of the dead This is that labour of love that wee must strive to finde in our selves that same unsatiable and unwearied labour that is still working still teaching without any intermission and although we be not called into the Vineyard of the Lord all at one time all at one houre but some at the third some at the sixth some at the ninth and some at the eleventh houre and though the worke of them be not all alike but some beare the burthen in the heat of the day and some are called at the evening yet we see all wrought untill the evening so long as they could worke So the labour of the Lord is never to be laid aside Luke 9.62 No man that puts his hand to the plough and looks back is meet And as our Saviour Christ saith Remember Lots wife Luke 17.32 But we must be constant as the greek word here signifieth a chopping labour a labour that cuts a man in pieces there is nothing that so divides betweene the sinewes and the joynts and the marrow as the labour that proceeds from true love and friendship And there is nothing that makes a man more settle himselfe
Lord because it is to him and for his sake or else if it were in the quality of the worke it were in vaine for there is nothing in us that is good therefore it is not any thing that is inherent in that but it is in the power of God that can doe what pleaseth him and that will give liberally even for the least thing that we have done he will give a great recompence it is he that makes it fruitfull and copious and plentifull in the recompence it is the Lord that rewardeth all thus And he concludes it under scale you know that this is true you know your labour is not in vaine in the Lord. This is that great blessing of God that double grace when hee makes us know the thing that it is impregnable that it is a thing not to be resisted that it is such a thing as all the powers of hell and darknesse and contrary disputations cannot make you doubt of You know this To know is to know by reasons naturall that never faile that this shall be thus the promise of God is so therefore you know it by that you know it by the practice of the Saints you know it by the testimony of the Spirit of God you know it by the common tenent of the world so that whatsoever God hath spoken hee is willing to performe and it is done already as though it were acted at this present time It is the heavenly and blessed contentment of a Christian man that hee hath the priviledge to know his happinesse before hee hath it that man that is advanced to morrow that is a poore man to day hee may hope well and wish well but hee knoweth nothing a man that goes to the field to fight in the battaile hee knowes not whether ever he shall come againe as Ahab said He that puts on his armour let him not brag as he that puts it off When a man sets forth on a journey hee knowes not whether ever hee shall returne home or not When a man enters into traffique for viands and matters of life hee knowes not whether hee shall gaine or lose there is nothing that wee can tell in this world that it shall be thus for time will alter and change it In all the works of Philosophy there is no certainty of the time to come but in the booke of God there is a certaine knowledge blessed be God for that knowledge It is a thing without exception it is a thing without all doubt Iohn 4. Our Lord Christ said to the woman of Samaria Ye know not what ye worship we know what we worship The knowledge therefore of true religion was among the people of God so the knowledge of the promises was among them too wee know saith the Apostle 1. Cor 5.1 when this earthly Tabernacle shall be abolished we have a heavenly mansion So the Apostle saith I know whom I have believed I know whom I have trusted And in 1 Iohn 2.15 Wee know that we are translated from death to life because wee love the brethren This therefore is that excellent priviledge of a Christian that he hath above all the schollers in the world that as he is made to glorie so he knows it before he hath a taste of the Spirit the earnest of the Spirit before which makes him cry Abba Father that helps him to pray that comforts him in trouble that stands by him that leads him and guides him on that never forsakes him in the state of grace till it bring him to the state of glory To the which the Lord bring us for Christ his sake Amen FINIS CORINTHS COLLECTION FOR THE SAINTS AT IERUSALEM Seven Sermons on 1 Corinth 16. the first 9. Verses BY That Worthy and Learned Preacher of Gods Word MARTIN DAY Chaplaine in Ordinarie to his Majestie and late Rector of S. FAITHS London Heb. 13.16 To do good and communicate forget not for with such sacrifices God is well pleased LONDON Printed by T.H. for Nathanael Butter and are to be sold at the signe of the Pide Bull neere Saint Austins gate 1636. 1. Cor. 16.1.2 Now concerning the collection for the Saints as I have given order to the Churches of Galatia â—ven so do yâ— â—pon the first of the Weeke Let every one of you lay by him in store as God hath prospered him that there be no gatherings when I come THis is the last head or common place of this holy Epistle which the Apostle hath therefore reserved to the last because he would have it the better in printed in the memory of his schoollars For all the rest indeed have beene matters of great concernment but this most of all it being the common office of Christianitie and a generall duty that runnes through the whole body as the life doth For the poore you shall have alway with you saith our Lord Christ and therefore your mercie to the poore shall be alway exacted so S. Chrysostome Chrysost The Apostle now saith hee goes forward to the head and principle of all good things He hath touched upon it before in Chap. 13. Chap. 13.1 speaking of charitie Though I had the tongue of men and Angels yet if I had not charitie I were nothing But that charitie is of another kinde for that intends the use of spirituall gifts that a man should forget himselfe for the common good that hee should not labour so much to shew himselfe a scholler or a Linguist as to speake to common capacities that is the charitie meant in that place But now here he speakes of another kinde of charitie not in the collation of things spirituall but of temporall wherein a man is put to his proofe more then then in the other for the conferring of sprituall things commonly as they come freely so they come easily without much paine or trouble There is no man almost but he will communicate his learning and knowledge to another gratis but for these temporall goods that we have in this world they can hardly be drawne from us and a small quantitie a poore despicable portion is exacted when we are brought to the best Therefore now the Apostle comes to that point of charitie which doth most of all discerne a Christian whereby he is best knowne the parting from his owne goods the defrauding of his owne genius of his owne belly that he may be helpfull to others And so this is the ninth and last part of this Epistle for as I told you heretofore Divines have diversly distinguished the Epistle but the best and the most neere and likely division is into nine severall points of doctrine whereof this is the last The first was of taking away the schismes and divisions which was in the Church of Christ One was of Paul another of Apollo another of Cephas another of Christ In the first second third and fourth Chapters that is the first common place of this Epistle The second was concerning the power
of correction which the Church hath by way of excommunication to purge it selfe of those that be notorious and scandalous livers and that is in the fift chapter concerning him that lived with his mother in law his fathers wife and made no matter of conscience of it no nor his neighbours neither but they were readie to beare him out in it The third head is concerning going to law among brethren and that under infidels too which is in the sixt chapter where he limits the causes and bids the Christians take upon them that charge for as much as it is a thing belonging to any man that is indifferently wise to compound and arbitrate matters in question The fourth is concerning marriage and virginity and widdowhood in the seventh chapter The fift is concerning things offred to Idols and things indifferent that they should abstaine from things that else were lawfull for avoyding of offence and scandall and that is in the eight and ninth chapters The sixt is concerning the use of the Sacraments in the tenth and eleventh chapters The seventh is concerning the improvement of spirituall gifts how the spirituall gifts of Prophesie of Revelation and of tongues should be used in the Church of God to the profit and benefit of all the hearers and that is in three chapters the 12.13 and 14. chapters The eighth common place is concerning the resurrection which is handled most nobly all through the fift chapter The last member of all is this concerning collections and gatherings in the Church of God which is the subject for the most part of this chapter whereunto he addes certaine solicitations after his manner and so concludes the Epistle Now it is true he hath formerly spoken of this also of charity in temporall things for in 1 Cor. 9. 1 Cor. 9. we finde that those that minister spirituall things must receive of them to whom they minister temporall things and it is no great matter for them to make an exchange of the one for the other but because the Apostle doth but touch it there by occasion and because the necessity of the times and the dignity of the argument was great therefore he now resumes and takes it againe to handle more copiously Now the purpose of the Apostle is this to speake for the Saints at Ierusalem for for them chiefly is this whole matter addrest that they should be provided for that were in most need The Saints at Ierusalem had undergone a great measure of affliction and persecution from their brethren more then any part of the world for there was knowledge there was priesthood there was authority and therefore there they had the greatest trouble whereas among the Gentiles and those nations that had not heard of Christ before there was lesse trouble and it was an easier matter to put upon them the truth and power of the Gospell then upon the others which were a stifnecked people so for the Saints there hee doth intercede that there might be a collection made for them as he had done formerly also in the Epistle to the Romans chap. 15. Rom. 15. and he saith it was the first legacy that they had Gal. 2. Gal. 2.2 That he and Barnabas were set on worke to goe and preach the Gospell and especially to have minde on the poore to have regard of the poore which were at Ierusalem for these I say he becomes a petitioner and he tels the Corinthians what he would have done in three principall heads The first is how they should make the collection The second is how they should keepe it The third is how they should send it For it must first be made and then it must be preserved to be presented and when it was presented by the Church it must be transmitted and goe from them to the parties to whom it was destinated that is to the Church at Ierusalem So concerning the first he saith in these two first ver That he would have every man to lay up by himselfe something upon the first day of the weeke that so there might be a stocke of treasure made against the time hee should come And then secondly he would have it kept in the custodie of them lest there should be some intervention because there were no officers appointed in the Church for this purpose at that time And lastly he would have it transmitted and sent to Ierusalem by the Brethren and if need were hee would goe himselfe to make the concord That we may keepe our selves within the compasse of these words we are First to consider the matter it selfe desired a collection what this collection is Secondly the object of it for whom it is intended a collection for the Saints and who these Saints are chiefly them that be at Ierusalem Thirdly the manner of this collection which is noted to us partly by an example and partly also by a speciall direction The example is this as it is in the Churches of Galatia as I have appointed them there even so doe you you have heard what I have appoynted other Churches doe you so too follow their example And the direction is in the second verse First to the persons Secondly of the action Thirdly of the time The persons every man every man must be a benefactor to the poore to the poore Saints Then the action what he must do He must lay it up as a treasure they must lay it up in their own houses by themselves they must bee Gods Deacons they must be Gods Overseers for the poore they must be Church wardens to themselves And then the quantity how much whatsoever shall seeme good or whatsoever the Lord hath prospered them in And lastly the time when this must be done upon the first of the weeke after which is adjoyned a reason wherefore he will have this done on this manner Lest when I come the collection be then to be made lest it be making then when it should be made before So the sence of the words is this that concerning the generall collection which you know God and Nature hath taught us to be made for our brethren as I by my Authority Apostolicall have appointed in other Churches so I would have you follow their example you are not worse then they you are not poorer then they you are as well able as they therefore insist in their steps doe as they have done therfore my ordinance is this that upon the first of the weeke wherein you meete together to praise the Lord upon that day when your meetings are in the Church for divine service every man shall upon the comfort that he hath received in the Church and from the love he beares to God whose word he hath heard and whose Sacrament he hath received every man shall goe home and lay downe something what he can spare if God have given him ability so if not he is not bound but such as he can spare out of his trading and negotiating in the
regard of this among the rest to have a care of the poore Gal. 2. Gal. 2. Wheresoever he came he did found and settle this constitution as strongly as any of the rest as that of faith so this of workes that those that had beleeved and received the Lord Christ into their hearts by faith that they should extend their hands by good workes to feed him and to minister to his members which are wanting here upon earth We have thus farre proceeded to shew what kinde of Gift or Present this was which the Apostle required it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their fruit it is the corne they yeeld the harvest which Gods children which be his fruitfull field yeeld unto him It is the shot they pay which are invited to the supper of the great King And it is not cast away upon such as are unworthy persons but bestowed upon the Saints themselves that whereas God requires that we should helpe our owne flesh whether good or bad and we should imitate our heavenly Father which makes his light to shine and his raine to fall as well upon the uniust as the iust yet the Apostle recommends unto them not the common refuse of men whereunto notwithstanding they were bound by nature but a select company of Saints and such a company as were under persecution and that the most hot and sharpe persecution and trouble that was then to be found in the world for the Church of God never suffers so ill as it suffers from it selfe all civill wars and intestine discords being the greatest plagues that can he The Church of Ierusalem having received the law and the promises and glorying in their prerogative they could not therefore indure that a new religion should come and confront theirs and put that out of place but they sought by all meanes to beat it downe againe and by consequent no man could lift up his head but presently there were letters from the high Priests and Elders to cast him into prison to thrust that light under a bushell which God had set upon a Candlesticke to give light to the whole house And againe there was another cause of it by reason of the famine which Agabus prophecied of in the end of Caligula his reigne for which cause the Church of God made provision against that time of famine and scarcity Now the quantity that they should give it is not set downe but it is left to every mans disposition for the Church of God will not make charity compulsive but leaves it to the free-will in it selfe that it may be the more gratious and the better accepted with God but look whatsoever God had prospered them withall according as God had blessed them according as he had given them a good voyage in the affaires of the world according to that hee should not scant and balk the Lord but he that had received much should give much and he that had received little should give of that little according to the quantity and proportion so that was left to the conscience of every man And that this collection should be done in private that every man should lay up by himselfe by himselfe because there were no officers appoynted as then in the Church or because he might be defeated of it by trusting of others or because some had so little that they durst not bring it every weeke being so small but were to lay it up by them that many littles might make a mickle therefore they were to keep it till it might be a convenient summe that it might carry some shew with it in regard of this the Apostle bids them lay up by themselves And they must lay it up as a Treasure for as much as the Lord accounted of that in heaven he tooke account of that in heaven which they layd forth in earth and it was a treasure to them that when they should come to faile to faile of this life when they should come to dye when no friend should help and rescue them from the hand of death they may have some treasure in heaven that when they came into a strange country they might finde some treasure there they might have a banke there to give them refreshing As when a man is outed in England when he is outlawed or banished if hee can make an escape and can have a banke at Venice or at Amsterdam and can goe to his friends there and have somewhat laid up for him in trusty hands he is as well there almost as he is here So the Lord compares the passages of this life to those of a better life but we cannot deny nor doubt but that we shall be infinitely farre better there then we are here but yet we are loath to part with this habitation we would faine keepe this tabernacle of the body as long as we could although it be with hard conditions Now the Lord tels us to incourage us in our journey that all our good works all our Almes-deeds are sent before as a treasure they are laid up as a stocke of money in a faithfull hand not in a mountebankes hand but in the trusty hand of God which will repay us againe and will repay us with interest he that gives to the poore lends to the Lord upon interest so it is called in this place 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of Thesaurus a treasure to lay up treasure to lay up for to morrow to lay up for the time to come thus farre we proceeded Now we come to the next point in the Text The time of the collection which is what day what time he chooseth out for the setting apart of this portion of those that offered to the Lord and to his poore Saints and that is noted here to be the first day of the weeke Secondly wee are to note the incentives reasons and arguments to moove them to this because charity and the workes of charity are not easily perswaded men must be drawne to them by very attractive and forcible reasons and arguments such as may win though not constraine and force their piety His first argument is this the common example for these things we must propound them diversly and otherwise then they lye in the Text for order sake and for method of teaching For those things that are first in the Text are not alway first in order of time nor in order of teaching how will he therfore winne the Corinthians to give unto strange poore when they had enow of their owne he tels them there is an example for it the Churches of Galatia As I have ordained in the Churches of Galatia so doe ye As if he should say I bring no new matter among you I put no burthen upon you which is not generall and common in all the Churches your brethren have gone before in other Countries which are poorer men and weaker every way in their fortunes then you therefore that which they doe which are poorer and more unable
in heaven and when a man is not cumbred with the labours of the world his minde is better and more easily induced to do good a man that is puzzelled about his worke he saith he hath other mattrrs to do then to attend a poore man he cannot be for him now he puts him off till another time and bids him come to morrow as the wise man saith Say not to thy neighbour Come againe to morrow Prov. 3. if thou have it now by thee A man being distracted with his businesse he takes his opportunitie and makes these excuses to answer God and his owne conscience with these or the like and saith he cannot now intend it he is otherwise busied But when hee hath a relaxation from his labour which is the proper fruit of the Sabbath the minde of man is made more gentle and more easily perswaded to do any good worke because it knows that therefore a man is lift up from the cares and troubles of this life to the speculation of heavenly things therefore he is the more easily perswaded to do the works of heavenly charitie and divine operation which the Spirit of God acts in the hearts and soules of all his children So that is one reason why the Apostle bids that this gathering should be on the first of the Sabbath because then men are at leasure then they are not cumbred with the world they are freed from peevishnesse and impatience which oft times hinders a poore man of an almes which if he had come when the partie was at quiet and rest he might have obtained 2 Reason The benefits received on that day Another reason is because of the benefits that we receive upon that day the commemoration of the blessings God hath vouchsafed us upon that day upon that day the root of life rose the Lord Iesus who rising againe from the dead hath opened to us a certaine gappe and hope of life everlasting the meditation of the good creatures of God the state of the Gospell cals us unto the liberty of the sonnes of God all the whole blessings of the Gospell be represented and accumulated unto us upon that day Therefore that was the fittest time to be thankfull to God for his mercies wherein God is most abundant in mercy to us that then wee should returne somewhat backe againe some small widdows mite some little portion to Gods children for all those infinite treasures we have received for this is all that God requires that we should give but something of his owne of some but the thousand part of some but the hundreth part this is all that he requires for that great store those mighty summes and infinite riches and treasures and masses of wealth he hath given us That we should make a little acknowledgement by giving some small sprinkling for all this That is another reason why the Apostle would have this collection be upon the Sunday wherin the memory of al the blessings of God upon body and soule are the goodliest in every thing therefore it makes men more prone and inclined to do some good for him that hath wrought so much good for them The third reason is Reas 3 The exercises of the day because upon that day the publique meetings were made where there was prophesie and preaching and praying and singing of Psalmes and holy revelations and instructions from heaven all which were as fire to kindle the zeale of a man to be for God and for his brethren and to joyne together the members of the Lord Iesus in a firmer conjunction then any other societie in the world If a man love a man abroad in the market he will love him ten times better in the Church if there be any pietie or any coales of love to kindle his affections elsewhere it will be much more in the Church where every word of God every Sermon every prayer every thanksgiving every Psalme that is sung brings some fuell to that heavenly flame Therefore for this cause the Apostle chuseth that time as being the most select and choise opportunitie for the conferring of that which God had blessed them withall upon the first day of the weeke that is upon the Lords day 4 Reason The Sacrament was th n received And lastly because that upon that day the Church was alway wont to receive the Sacrament of the Lords Supper it was not with them then as it is with us now men will receive it when they list but every Sunday was with them a Sacrament day and oft times every day in the weeke but on the Lords day they never failed Therefore as a testimony of their thankfulnesse to God for the benefit of the body and bloud of Christ which was offered on the Crosse as a ransome and propitiation for all their sins they thought they were bound in conscience and they were easily induced and perswaded upon the receiving of the Sacrament to give something to the sacred and holy Saints that belong unto the Lord. And so indeed after our Sacrament we have still a collection in remembrance of that there it was according to the greatnesse of their spirits and the greatnesse of their meanes which were supereminent ours are according to our poore meanes and measure and according to the scantinesse of our affections which is every day colder then other For these reasons the Apostle requireth that these things should be done and layd up upon the Sabbath day For then men are best affected of all times if ever a man will give any thing he will give it then when he is at rest for God and when he is expressing his thankfulnesse to God for the great mercies that he hath powred upon him in all the course of his life then he heares the word that stirres him up to good actions then he joynes in prayer with the Church of God then he understands that God hath not spared the precious bloud of Christ much lesse therefore should he spare a peny a small thing to give for his sake that hath given his bloud for his redemption Thus wee see great reason why the Apostle appointed the collection to bee made at this time It is true the collection for the Saints is due and seasonable at all times but especially when there is the fairest and goodliest opportunitie and then it is likely to prove best when there are the strongest motives to worke men unto it Vpon the first of the weeke But now we must launch into a great Sea to prove this doctrine which I need not do for men that are setled But because these last times affoord a number of monstrous doctrines and this Citie especially is plagued with those Iewish Sabbatarians that would still retaine the Iewish Sabbath and can very hardly be drawne from it but in their conventicles they draw away Gods children and trouble them that are not able to give a reason of their faith let us therefore a little search into this
began another age a more blessed and glorious age that of redemption that was now to flourish and to be esteemed in the world and so it was necessary that there should be a cessation of the former that there must be an introduction of this But how then will some say Quest shall we not remember the works of the creation still as well as wee should before Answ Yes but now the Lord hath given that grace and that light that wee may remember them every day we may meditate of them as we are doing our workes for the Gospell is so cleare and hath laid open the treasures of heaven so plainely that as we doe the workes of our hands we may remember the workes of the Lord too which the Iewes could not doe in their worke and labour for it was so hidden from them that they knew not that which was done before their faces as the Apostle saith 2 Cor. 3. 2 Cor. 3. Therefore this is one reason the gratious worke of the redemption and recreation of the world being the greatest worke that ever was requires the greatest memoriall Therefore it is necessary there should be a Sabbath day a time of rest for the contemplation and meditation of that rather then for the lesser worke the worke of the creation which may be meditated on and remembred every day as well as upon the Sabbath but the worke of redemption although it be to be thought upon and remembred every day and may be meditated upon daily yet then we must thinke of it more seriously with a more curious observation and meditation upon the Lords day because then upon that day was the resurrection of the Sonne of God who is the first fruits of all Christian beleevers 3 The Iewish Sabbath was for distinction Againe another reason of the change of the Sabbath is because the Sabbath was made for a matter of distinction to distinguish the Iewish nation from all other people in the world it was a matter of separation and privacy but the Lord Iesus came to be publique he would have none of those private signes continue he tooke down the partition wall which was made betweene Iewes and Gentiles they were before shut up one from another there was no agreement or correspondency betweene them and the symboll of this separation was the Sabbath day for the Gentiles scorned them and said they spent the seventh part of their time in idlenesse meaning their Sabbath day Now by this separation there grew enmity and hatred and outward opposition because the one had a rest and the other had not Now the Lord Iesus came to take downe this separation to take away this wall of distinction which was betweene them and so he made the eighth day the day of rest the Sabbath not for a day of separation as the seventh day was which separated them and made them strangers from all other men but to unite them so that now there is none strange in Christ but all are one Gal. Iewes and Gentiles male and female bond and free there is no nation nor no condition whatsoever but all are welcome to Christ the Saviour of the world Therfore he made the Sabbath upon a new day because the other was a day of separation and division but this is a day of common convocation and collection and gathering of all together as the Hen gathereth her chickens under her wings Mat. 23. Mat. 23. Further Reason 4 In memory of Christs resurrection because the Lord would assure us that both himselfe was risen and that wee also should rise by the vertue and power of his resurrection this is the maine head of our religion and all our faith therefore he would have us keepe the Sabbath upon the same day that he rose againe from the dead Therefore the Church changed that day from the Iewish Sabbath to rest not upon that day but upon the first day of the weeke which is our Lords day I say because the Lord would teach us the glorious article of his owne resurrection and would assure us of the consequent of it our resurrection by that power of his therefore he would have every Sabbath day to be a day of meditation upon that benefit that every Christian may say this is my resurrection day this day my Head rose againe which is the first fruits and I am assured that by the power of his resurrection I shall rise also therefore that Christ might make a way to my resurrection he hath ordained a day a Sabbath wherein I must contemplate upon that benefit and this I feed on this is my Sabbath dayes feast wherein I rest and quiet my soule and if it were not for the certainty of the resurrection of Christ and the certaine hope of my own resurrection I could keepe no Sabbath but now I keepe a Sabbath by the appoyntment of the Church by the wise judgement of my Mother as a symboll of my resurrection as a signe and symboll that my head is risen and that his body also shall rise in due time as certainly as the head is risen already Reason 5 From the end of the Sabbath Againe the Sabbath and the end of the Sabbath was a cessation from worke and it signifieth both a cessation from sinne and also the rest that our Lord and Saviour Christ was to have in the grave to make a cessation from our sinnes and from all sinne in his children Observe the argument ye shall see it in Heb. 4.10 Heb. 4.10 The Apostle there tels us that one of the ends of the Sabbath was this that a man should rest from his worke even as God rested from his what are mens works sinne what are Gods workes the glorious act of the creation therefore as God ceased from his worke and made a Sabbath to shew that then he had finished his worke and rested so there remaines a Sabbath to the people of God to shew that there is a cessation from their worke Now this cessation of Gods people it must come to the members from the head it must begin at our head Christ first he must cease from sinne but Christ had no sinne therefore he could not cease from sinne but because hee said consummatum est the day before the Sabbath that is the price of mans sinne which was cast upon him it was now payed therefore there is a cessation from sinne and wee must not live any longer therein but be dead to sinne as Christ was in his grave and rise to holinesse of life which is the proper end of his resurrection Marke how the Church concludes upon this the Sabbath was a type of Christs resting but he never rested till he was in his grave for saith he My Father workes hitherto and I worke and I worke to day and to morrow and the third day I shall be perfect still in this fraile life he was working but upon the Sabbath day then he rested to
shew that now he had given the Sabbath a perfect rest for ever that there should be no more ceremoniall worke he had then fulfilled all the ceremonies the sinne of man was payd for and all the troublesome ceremonies of the law were abrogate and to shew that the Sabbath was ended he celebrated it in his grave and then upon the Munday the Iewes Munday the day of his resurrection hee rose againe to shew that ours must be an active life not in idle circumstances to passe it away in ceremonies as in the law but to remaine as an eternall Sabbath for ever we keepe a publique Sabbath to God though not in the same time and in memory of the same thing yet in the remembrance of a farre greater benefit 6 From the apparitions of Christ To conclude the point our Lord graced this constitution of the Church by his own presence most of his apparitions were upon the eighth day as wee may see in the Gospell that day that he rose still he glorified it with his presence eight dayes after he rose he came and shewed himselfe to his Disciples and the next day to Thomas and the rest of the Disciples and so for the time of 40. dayes that he continued on earth after his resurrection look how many Mundayes of the Iewes there was which is our Lords day so many apparitions hee made upon that day whereby they gathered that it was the will of the Lord and that hee meant to make that day glorious by his comfortable apparitions for still as I said his apparitions were upon that day he was absent all the weeke before hee appeared to none except it were to some few persons as Peter and Iohn but he made no publique apparition but onely upon the Lords day And upon this the Church of God was induced to make this change and we see it acted Acts 20.10 Acts 20.10 1 Cor. 16. and this chapter is a publique testimony of it and likewise in Rev. 1. Rev. 1. Saint Iohn saith I was in the spirit upon the Lords day which is generally taken by the fathers of the Church and by the Interpreters of the Gospell for this that we hold instead of the Sabbath day But because these kinde of people will never be satisfied except wee can answer their reasons as well as they can heare ours give me leave a little to goe forward in this poynt and heare what they can object for this Arguments against the change of the Saâ—bâ—th which thinke the Iewish Sabbath still to remaine in force I have spent the time against my minde and purpose therefore I will but name the chiefe heads of their arguments and refute them They conclude therefore that there is no certaine warrant for the changing of the Iewish Sabbath to ours 1 There is no written word for it because there is no direct written Scripture to prove it we have no Text of Scripture to worke it into us But for that we are to answer them Answ The Apostles in this guided by the spirit of God whatsoever the Apostles did being guided by the spirit of God their practise is a sufficient direction to us it is warrant enough that they have done it before us For so we have in many other things the practise of the Apostles to be a rule of our faith Christ not determining many particular things in the Church but leaving it to the discretion of the wise those that should be well furnished with knowledge for the directing of things in their places where they were therefore that which the Apostles did it was the act of Christ for they did it not of themselves but from a higher person from him that sent them Another reason they have and that is this 2 It is a part of the decalogue the decalogue or tenne Commandements are a perpetuall law but this is a part of the decalogue therefore this is a perpetuall law and the precepts that be in the tenne Commandements are all morall they are precepts that belong to all men to all times and places in the world Thirdly God is pleased to call the Sabbath an everlasting covenant God cals the Sabbath an everlasting covenant Deut. 12.16 I have made an everlasting covnant saith the Lord Deuter. 12.16 and in divers other places hee cals it a perpetuall covenant betweene me and my people Israel therefore it follows it must last as long as the world lasts and consequently it cannot be changed for then we alter the covenant of God 4 It was aucienter then Moses A fourth objection is this all the laws that are ancienter then Moses are immutable but this was more ancient then Moses law for it was given to man in paradise the Lord there by resting upon the seventh day did consecrate the Sabbath to be kept although some of the Fathers say as Iustin Martyr Iustin Martyr that they did not keepe it before the Floud but yet there was the institutioÌ„ of it therfore seeing it was a law given before Moses and before the fall of man it follows it is immutable and unchangeable because if there be any change it must be for imperfection and if there be any imperfection it must be for sinne and there was no sinne before the fall Therefore whatsoever was commanded before the fall was so perfect that it could not be altered it had no respect of imperfection in it 5 The cause of it is perpetuall And lastly the perpetuall cause of a law makes the law continue if the cause of it remaine the law must also continue and therefore there are many lawes that are made and abrogate againe because there is no use of them they were made in such a time for such things and the cause failing the law ceaseth but where the law hath a perpetuall cause there the law is in force to continue alway but the cause of the Iewish Sabbath continueth the meditation and contemplation upon the works of God and the holy operation of his hands this is the cause of the Sabbath and this alwayes continueth therefore the Iewish sabbath must continue These are the prime and chiefe grounds of their arguments I will answer a word to these and so conclude First in that they say the decalogue or ten Commandements is a law perpetuall Ans to Ob. 2. The Iewish Sabbath partly ceremoniall and bindes the consciences of all men It is true as farre forth as it is morall it doth but those parts that bee ceremoniall as the Sabbath is partly morall and partly ceremoniall and as it is moral it binds but as it is ceremoniall it doth not For the moralitie of the Sabbath is this to worship God in a publique service that wee are bound unto that which is ceremoniall that we should serve him upon such a day upon the seventh day rather then any other that doth not binde there is no part of moralitie in that that
is but an appendix but a reference but a consequence for that it is a limited ordinance and is not to have a continuall succession and perpetuitie no more then circumcision and the rest of the figures of the law And for that they say Ans to Ob. 3. The Sabbath not said to be everlasting property that God made an everlasting covenant of the Sabbath you must understand that word there Legnolam it signifieth not that eternitie that never ceaseth but a diuturnitie a long time so it was for the law it continued 2000. yeares which is said in Scripture to bee eternall and those things which exceed the age of a man which passe the conceit and opinion of man that no mans memory can extend so farre they are called eternall many times in Scripture It is said of the kingdome of David that it should last unto eternitie and yet we know it lasted but five hundred yeares which is farre short of eternitie So for the land of Israel it is said the people of Israel should inhabite it for eternitie and yet in a thousand yeares they were outed and expelled But the word signifieth that which is of long induring of long continuance such a thing was the Sabbath for the testimony and covenant of God in ceremoniall things they were long but they were not eternall Ans to Ob. 4. All laws before Moses not immutable And then where it is said that those lawes that were before Moses those lawes that were in the state of paradice they are unchangeable and immutable because there is no imperfection in them First of al I denie their ground that the law of the Sabbath was given in Paradise And secondly that such lawes as were before Moses as onely thus farre immutable unlesse they may be otherwise better supplyed for it was Gods will that those things that were before should be types and figures and shaddowes of things that were to come after Now when the perfect body was once come in place all those figures and shaddowes were to be removed So was circumcision foure hundred yeares before Moses yet we see it is abrogate and ceaseth by the comming of our Lord and Saviour Christ So was the Sabbath the Lord Christ being the summe of circumcision and also being the summe of the Sabbath day being our rest in God and assuring us of our rest from all sinne from all torment from all feare and all paine which our nature is subject unto it was needfull therefore that he should come in the place of all these shaddows and that they should cease and have no further intelligence or operation And for the last Ans to Ob. 5. Meditation of Gods works not tyed to one day where they say the cause of the law continueth and therfore the law must continue but the cause of this law was the meditation of Gods works and that must be continuall therefore the Sabbath must be continuall It is true if the meditation of the works of God were of necessity put to one day then the argument were good and strong but because it may be done upon the eight or first or second as well as upon that the argument concludes not Indeed where the cause of the law and the end of it can be no otherwise attained but by the direct word and letter of the law there the law must continue as long as the end of it continueth But the end of the law of the Sabbath is the meditation of Gods creatures which may be attained unto another way for we see in Christ better then they could in Moses for we see the fulnesse of God the excellencie of the creation that cleare light of contemplation in the Sonne of God which was not to be discerned in the old Testament The grace of God hath appeared to all men 2. Tit. 11. and hath removed the clouds of darknesse that were before that we might walke in a new light that we might walk from glory to glory we see face to face 2. Cor. 3. as the Apostle saith I have beene too troublesome to you in this point to speake to them that are well setled but it is for this respect to cleare this point to make it appeare what phanaticall spirits these be that after so much and so long peace and quiet of the Church would begin to trouble the faith of Christians again by renewing the Iewish Sabbath For they go in effect to proove that there is no Christ come into the world for seeing their Sabbath was a type of Christs resting in the grave and that he should bury it in the grave with all other ceremonies they do in effect deny that Christ dyed and that he is risen againe they deny his resurrection by drowning the memory of that in remembring their Sabbath by obscuring our Lords day in keeping that Sabbath in which he lay in the grave and by keeping that they put a cessation to this But it is good also that we should understand the tenents of our faith upon firme and strong arguments that the powers of darknesse the gates of hell may have no prevailing against us in the time when they come to fight with us It is true this argument doth afford to wrangling spirits as much contradiction as any matter of Divinitie but we have the authoritie of the Church grounded upon good reasons and arguments why we do so to commemorate the glorious worke of the resurrection of our head To assure us that we which are his members shall rise with him Now follows to speake of the incentives and motives concerning this worke of charitie but I am afraid too much to oppresse your patience therefore I will conclude The third Sermon 1. Cor. 16.1.2.3 Now concerning the collection for the Saints as I have ordained in the Churches of Galatia even so do you In the first of the Sabbath let every one of you lay up by himselfe treasure of whatsoever God hath prospered him that there be no gathering when I come And when I come those whom you shall appoint and approve by your letters those will I send to carry your grace to Ierusalem THere are but two places in the Scripture that gives a powerfull warrant to the Church of God for the change of the Sabbath day from the seventh to the eighth day And therefore I thought it fit falling upon this Text not to leave that point negligently or sleightly handled but to regard it so farre as my weaknesse could attaine unto The last time I shewed the reasons of the change of it It was a thing that was partly ceremoniall and the Church of God is bound to it no further then it is morall It was a matter of distinction it made a separation betweene Iewes and Gentiles Christ came to take downe the wall of separation It was a memoriall of the Resurrection of Christ and the comfort of us all in that the root of life was raised therefore there
is a lively hope made over to all the branches that they shall rise againe with the root It was graced by the manifold apparitions of Christ and confirmed unto us according as the Apostles had receiued it from the will of Christ to grace that day the eighth day with his apparitions It was confirmed unto us by the Apostle Saint Iohn who maketh mention of the Lords day hee was rapt in the Spirit upon the Lords day And by these two places Act. 20.10 and this present place 1. Cor. 16.2 The time prevented me that I could not shew you the authoritie from age to age and the concurrence of these two things which was the gathering of collections upon that day for the Apostle includes both these both that the day should be changed to the first of the Sabbath that is to the first day of the weeke And secondly that upon this first day of the weeke it should be a particular appendix of the Sabbath dayes worke to lay up somewhat for the Saints because then there were no such officers appointed in the Church therefore every man waâ— his owne Treasurer every man was his owne overseer for the poore to lay up by himselfe as Chrysostome saith this priesthood thy charitie and thy love to thy brother hath bestowed upon thee that a man should provide and ordaine by his owne hands till such time as the Church should provide overseers and collectors for the poore and Deacons that they should be every where as they were then at Ierusalem Now it may seeme a matter not worth the labour to prove this point concerning the time of the Sabbath if it were not that some phanaticall spirits in these latter dayes had raised such a mist and vapour to cloud this truth and to bring backe the Iews ceremoniall Sabbath which saith Gregory if any go about to do he must bring in the Iews sacrifice and so he shall derogate and destroy the bloud and sacrifice of Christ which was offered once for all Give me leave therefore a little before I come to the residue of the Text for indeed it is full of matter to shew you how the Church of God in the first beginning acknowledged this day for the true Sabbath of the Lord. And upon these grounds out of Scripture I need not do it I know among you that are fully perswaded but there are some men that do infringe the glory and purpose of this Text and contradict the Fathers even some of our late Writers that are otherwise worthy Interpreters of the word of God yet here they hold that the Apostles meaning is where he saith One of the Sabbath that it is not to be understood upon the Lords day but they thinke it may be any one day in the week Wherein it is a wonder that they should give such a scandall to the Church of God in weakening the arguments and the faith of the Fathers that were before us and to make us uncertaine what to adhere and cleave unto I spare their names because they are worthy instruments of the Gospell Onely I go about to refute and cast down their opinion which I will do briefly and by the libertie and licence of the time that I may make the shorter worke The first of the Sabbath the Lords day Therefore that this first of the Sabbath is the Lords day it is manifest by other places of Scripture whose consent make an absolute verity every where for the rule of Scripture is to expound one place by another In Matth. 28.2 The woman came to the grave upon the first of the Sabbath when as it shined up when the light shined up upon the first of the Sabbath then came the woman to the grave the same word is used there as there is here The first of the Sabbath which was the day of the Lords resurrection and not every day in the weeke but the eight day from the creation So againe more clearly in Mark 16.2 and vers 9. it is said there verse 2. the women came very early in the morning upon the first of the Sabbath or of the weeke And in the 9. verse it is said Iesus did rise upon the first of the Sabbath in the morning that is upon the first day of the week This phrase in Scripture alludeth to that in Gen. 1.7 the morning and the evening were the one day that is the first day for one and first in the Hebrew tongue are promiscuously taken which is in every one day of the Sabbath that is in every Sabbath or upon the Lords day or in every first day of the weeke which is the Lords day Then the authoritie of the Acts of the Apostles and this place and that of Saint Iohn which saith he was rapt in the spirit upon the Lords day The judgement of the Fathers for the obâ—ervation of the Lords day All these things be firme and true establishers of the point we have declared Now for the Fathers that they were all also of the same minde you shall heare Iustin Martyr Iustin Martyr Apolog 1.2 that lived an hundred yeares after Christ within an hundred and foure yeares after he saith in the second of his Apollogeticks In the day saith he that we call Sunday the day which the Heathen men called Sunday which is now our Sabbath day for the other day before was called Saturne day of Saturne which was the Iews Sabbath in that day saith he the congregation come together and there are prayers offered up to God and after the Sacraments are received there is a collection made every man layes up as much as his own good will is according to his own election and it is given to the superintendent or to the chiefe Minister of the place and he seeth the poore provided for with it he seeth it be bestowed upon them Tertullian which lived two hundred and foure yeares after Christ in his booke called Tertull. in sould Crowne Apolog. ca. 16. The souldiers Crowne he saith Vpon the Lords day wee abhorre fasting for it is a time of feasting with us And in his Apolloget Chap. 16. saith he If we give one day in seven to merrinesse and joy to joyfulnesse in the holy Ghost it is but all one as the Iewes do which give yet superstitiously the day of Saturne to idlenesse and meere superstition so saith Tertullian there is a certaine little chest in the Church and every man puts into it what seemes good to him if he can and if he will for there is no man constrained and this is done once in a moneth For the place could not endure that it should be done every Sabbath as the Apostle saith here upon every first of the Sabbath but because of the povertie of the countrey it was but once in a moneth that they brought their charitie for the poore Clemens Alexandrinus in the fifth of his Stromata Clem. Alexan. Strom. 5. Pâ—ato he brings a prophesie out of
Plato that God would change the seventh day to the eighth to signifie thereby that God would bring a rest to all the world so that our change of the Sabbath day saith he it is not onely of us not onely manifested to us but it was opened to the Gentiles themselves they also acknowledged it Cyprian Diacon Epist 41. Cyprian the Deacon saith he shall reade the next Lords day wherein the Church must bring their accustomed sacrifice to God that is the sacrifice of Almes-deeds the treasure of life eternall and in his 41. Epistle saith he in the station that is in the Church where we meet and stand together before God let you almes be ready and let no man appeare empty before the Lord alluding to the law speaking of the change of the Sabbath and the collection for the poore Saints named in this place by the common state of the Church Basil Hexamer secund Basile in the second of his Hexameron saith he that the Lord might bring us from this present life to the thought of a better life of the life to come he hath appointed the first fruits of the Sabbath wherein the first fruits of the living rose again from the dead the Lord Christ which was dead did then live which was the beginner and continuer of light in his Church I meane saith he the holy Sabbath day glorified by the resurrection of Christ and commended to the Church to be alway fulfilled and kept Nazianzinus orat 43. Nazianzen saith he there were two Lords dayes the one for the Iewes the other for the Gentiles but ours that we have is more excellent than that for that was belonging to mans salvation but this was the very nativity of salvation the birth of our Saviour The Iewes Sabbath was the intermedium the passage betweene the buriall of Christ and his resurrection for Christ lay in his grave upon their Sabbath day and there he rested and with him rested all the ceremonies of the law never any more to revive but this of the resurrection of Christ is plainly and fully the day of the second generation and regeneration of all the Saints and he gives a reason for it For saith he even as the first creation of the world begun from the Sabbath day so we must imagine that God began to make the world upon the Munday as we call our weeke for in his eternall rest whereby he rested from all eternitie he began then to worke although it were no worke to God but a rest even the creation it was a rest to him he did not worke then more then before yet it is signified to us by worke in the Scripture and that he began in the beginning of the weeke to set himselfe to worke therefore as that worke of the creation began from the Sabbath so the worke of the recreation and redemption of man must begin from the Sabbath And although this be the eighth day yet it is the best day of all that were before it and of all that shall come after it being more high and glorious then that glorious day that was before and being more wonderful and admirable then that wondrous time that preceded it Saint Ierome in the second Epistle of his booke against Vigil The Apostle Paul saith he S. Hierom. contra Vigil Epist 3. Vigitantius I suppose commanded almost all Churches that there should be collections for the poore made upon the Lords day which is the first day of the weeke that is the first of the Iewish weeke And in his fourth question to Hibibbia How soone saith he did the Apostles of Christ turne and change the Iewish Sabbath to shew the libertie of Christians from the bondage of the law how soone did they turne it to the Lords day Aug. 10. Tom. Saint Austin in the tenth Tome of his Sermon upon these words of the Apostle saith he When the seventh day was fulfilled which is the consummation of the world we must come backe againe to the first and reckon from seven to seven and this first will be found the eight day the seventh day is ended and then the Lord is buried the eight day begins and then the Lord is raised for the raising up of the Lord Iesus hath promised unto us a day eternall and hath consecrated to us the Lords day which is the signe and note and assurance unto us of that eternall day of that everlasting Sabbath for now the rocke is raised up againe Let all our hearts be circumcised speaking of the manner of circumcision which was done with a knife of stone with a piece of a stone taken out of the rock out of the rock which is Christ Chrysost on 1. Cor. 16.2 Saint Chrysostome upon this place In one of the Sabbaths that is saith he upon the Lords day for the time it selfe was of sufficient force saith he to bring a man to bee liberall to give almes plentifully Oecumenius Oecumenius saith the same saith hee it should rouze us up this time the Lords day to do good to the Lords Saints Theophilact Theophilact being the first day of the weeke the time wherein we meet together before God they never saith he went without love to God and to the Saints upon the first day of the weeke which is the Lords day Theodoret Theodoret. saith he the day and the worke are met together a man should do the works of the time in his owne time a worke done in season is the more gratefull and acceptable Therefore saith he the day of the Lord wherein the resurrection of Christ is honoured is the fittest time to shew our bountifulnesse to God which hath beene so bountifull to us in giving us the memoriall of him that was Lord of his owne and of our resurrection Athanasius Athanasius upon that place All things are delivered to me of my Father which I stood on the last day and shewed his reasons for the change of the Sabbath Cirill of Ierusalem in the fourteenth of his Catechisme saith he Yesterday Cirill of Ierus Catech. 14. upon the Lords day in the congregation of the Saints and at the generall prayers of the people you heard me speak and discourse of these things where we may see that in that countrey also the same manner was retained Epiphanius in his second booke Epiph. lib. 2. The Sabbath of the Iewes remained in the law till the presence and comming of Christ but Christ dissolved the Sabbath and gave a Sabbath of his owne which is a type of that true rest of that sabbatism wherby the Saints rest from ceremonies and are come to the substance the Sonne of God as the Apostle speaks Heb. 4.7 Cirill of Alexandria in his seventh booke to Palladius We know saith he Cirill Alexand. l. 7. ad Pallad that the Lord Christ came to make us a perfect rest from sinne from death from miserie and to give us conquest over death
and he had power being Lord of the Sabbath to make a new day to make a new consecration which the Church of God hath alway followed Saint Ambrose Ambrose 2. Cor. 16.2 upon this place saith he this one of the Sabbaths or the first of the Sabbath is the Lords day as it is written every where in the Gospell that Christ rose on the first day of the weeke Leo on the Collects Leo on the Collects speaking to the Saints to give bountifully now is the time saith he now is the Lords day now shew your thankfulnesse and your love to God in Christ by your bountie to those that are the members of Christ Greg. Epist 3. Saint Gregory in his third Epistle If any man saith he say that the Iews sabbath should be reduced and brought backe let them reduce all the ceremonies with it and if the one be abhominable the other is abhominable also therefore take heed you be not seduced despise the words of fooles weigh every thing in the ballance of reason and that revelation that you have received the sabbath is made the day of the Lord that looke what errours we commit the week before we should make amends by expiation and confession and sorrow and contrition upon the Lords day Damâ—scene Damascene We celebrate the Lords day as the perfect rest of humane nature for the Iews sabbath was a carnall rest a temporall and figurative rest of that which was to come but this is the perfect rest of nature to have an assured promise of our resurrection which we could not have but by the memoriall of a resurrection and that could not be done but in the resurrection of Christ therefore we celebrate this day in memory of Christs resurrection and in token of the assurance of our resurrection Beza and Musculus Beza and Muscuâ—us and other late writers unlesse one or two which I spake of before which indeed are singular men in their place and degree I say these men dissent from them and they say and acknowledge that these two places of Scripture make it apparant the authoritie of the change of the Sabbath I have beene too long on this subject Now I come to that which is more plaine and easie After he had told them on what time this should be done and we see the time was upon the Lords day and we see the reasons why it was changed from the seventh day from the creation to the eighth day Now let us go to the next that follows in the order of the words By what reasons The motives to charitie by what arguments would the Apostle perswade them to this act What arguments doth he use It is a hard matter to bring a churles money out of his purse and even those that bee generous and excellent well minded yet they cannot endure to heare much of almes for charitie is soone wearie and being once wearie there must needs come infinite danger to the soule For the heart grows hard if charity bee weary And therefore to the intent it may hold out good arguments and reasons must be devised to feed and incourage it for charitie of it selfe will lagge and faile except it be well supported Therefore the Apostle gives such motives as that nothing could be found more opportune and fit to keepe men in practise then this And first from the example of other Churches As I have appointed in the Churches of Galatia so do ye that which other Churches do surely that you will do especially that which poorer Churches have done that are not able to come neere you in state and meanes you will be ashamed to come behinde them but the Churches of Galatia which are more ancient then you and withall poorer then you they have done this Therefore I pray do you so too that is one great incentive wherein we are to consider what the Church of Galatia was and also what his authoritie was among them I have appointed I have commanded saith he saith S. Chrysostome he did not counsell them he did not exhort them by faire words to do it but he appointed them by his power Apostolicall by his Apostolicall authoritie whereby it appeares that the Church hath power to dispose of mens goods in the generall though not in the speciall quantitie that is one motive to draw them on Another is taken from the faire carriage that should be in the businesse a man will more easily be intreated to do something if he be perswaded that there shall be no false play in it but that every thing shall be done according to the Donors intention and that the parties appointed shall be sure to receive that which they have given without any fraud or deceit for that the Apostle gives them satisfaction and tels them that when hee comes the money shall be sent and transmitted to Ierusalem to the poore Saints of Ierusalem for whom he begged as we heard before it should be sent to them and it should be sent by those that they should chuse themselves and if need were he himselfe also would go with them So that here is a full certaintie made that it should not be balked that it should not be interverted nor kept in private mens hands or be turned to the private good of a few but it should redound to the benefit of those for whom it was intended and for that purpose hee tels them there should be certaine men chosen and chosen of the Corinthians themselves men that should be approved by their letters and Epistles and if there were further necessitie he himselfe would go to be a witnesse and testifie of this their great grace which God had done by them This is the second motive whereby he incites them The third is the glorious title he gives them for charitie although it be not proud yet notwithstanding it looks that there should be some thankfull remembrance of it it desires no glorious titles nor no blazing yet the Lord God in mercie hath appointed that if the poore woman shall poure upon the body of Christ such a box of oyntment the Lord saith Verily I say unto you wheresoever the Gospell shall be preached a memoriall shall be made of her of this that she hath done her box shall go with her for a memoriall of her The Lord will not have the good deeds of his Saints to be buried in oblivion but hee will have them famous he will have them carried through the world therefore the Apostle gives it a glorious name a glorious title and saith your grace They shall carry your benefit or your grace your benefit as the word signifieth at large But the Apostle speakes here in another minde as of a thing that comes from the grace of God that ruled and reigned in them and moved them to this gracious worke And then the last is from the inconvenience that would come otherwise hee desires that it might be done with all speed for hee
was most acceptable to them To others he came as welcome as water into the shippe nay they had a great hope that he would never come there but that his occasions would so intangle him that hee should never set foot that way So we see that Saint Pauls veniam is expounded according to the contrary dispositions and qualities of men and accordingly it occasioned matter of joy or sorrow in Corinth Now if Saint Pauls comming to visite were a matter of such emphasis Vse as to make his friends rejoyce and to cause his enemies to repine and murmure what then shall be the veniam of the Lord Iesus the master of Saint Paul and the master of us all which will come and will not tarry Heb. 10.37 which comes unto us every day and visites us every houre if we had but sence to perceive it whose footsteps are at our doores who comes in mercie giving us long peace from the broyles and garboyles of warre he comes unto us in his judgements in these unseasonable seasons threatning us with this abundance of raine and deluges he comes to us in the judgement of scarsitie and want and many kinde of defects whereof every man complaines and whines and is in misery and yet no man can tell the cause or reason why certainly it is a steppe of the comming of the Lord Iesus he comes also in the ratling and tumults of warre therein the Sonne of God seemes to have girt his sword upon his thigh as the Prophet saith Psal 45. And he will make head hee will march and go forward and never leave the field untill his horse goeth up to the bridle in bloud as Saint Iohn prophesieth in the Revelation Thus the Lord comes and draweth neare unto us any man of wit or understanding may easily see him and may heare the noyse of his horse heeles as the Prophet Isaiah saith concerning the King of Babylon But suppose he do not come thus or that men will be deafe that they will not heare this nor perceive it yet there is another veniam his comming to judgement which shall certainly be and wee know not how soone it shall be for these things are fore-runners and presages of that dismall comming and that comming shall be as this veniam of Saint Paul with acceptation to his friends but with terrour to his enemies the comming of Christ to them shall be more terrible then all the Armadoes and Invasions of the world if they were all joyned together they are nothing comparable to the comming of the Sonne of man in the clouds To those that are perfect and just men that waite for his comming he saith Behold I come and my reward is with me Revel 22. Hebr. 11.5 Behold he that shall come will come and will not tarry saith Saint Paul And to this the Church in an earnest eccho replyes Yea come and come quickly Lord Iesus for they waite and expect that great visitation of mankinde when he shall come to root all the weeds out of his garden and shall make an everlasting spring of grace and shall settle his plants so strongly that they shall no more be subject to extirpation On the other side his enemies shall have a fearfull sentence at that veniam the wicked men of this world they would then give all to avoyd that fearfull comming of the Lambe of God and wish that he might never appeare nor come to judgement As for the godly they know that when their glory When Christ which is their glory shall appeare Col 3.4 then they shall appeare with him in glory So the enemies of the Lord they know that when he which is judge both of the quicke and dead shall come that he shall passe a sentence of judgement against them Matth. 25. Go ye cursed into hell-fire prepared for the divell and his angels Let therefore this sound be alway in our eares that whether it be men as Saint Paul that come to visit us let that keepe us in awe if Saint Paul say he will come certainly it will make a man look to himselfe the better for there are many men that can indure no visitation a man that lives and goes on in sinne and impietie these sacrilegious patrons these Lords and Ladies that maintaine the Priests with old shoes as the Prophet speaks that take all his livelyhood from him these cannot endure to heare of a visitation they are afraid lest their sacrilegious acts should be called in question Although they be secure enough and carelesse in these kinde of acts and there is no law that can take hold of them for it yet they do not love to have the memorie of them rubbed afresh they do not love to have themselves proposed and traduced they cannot endure to have other men to blaze it There are many other simonicall contracts that are come into the Church not by the doore but they come another way they take downe the tiles as the men did for the poore man that came to bee healed of Christ they tooke downe the tyles of the house and so let him downe so there are a number of simonicall Priests that come not in by the doore but are entred into the Church another way they climbe in at the windowes like theeves and robbers and these cannot endure to be visited if Saint Paul say hee will come it is likely they will flee if Paul come they will go they cannot consist together in one place because they live in sinne and in open profession of their impenitency Therefore it is good whatsoever a man do in this life to thinke still that there will come a visitation upon him and he is an happie man that can endure the visitation although it be but the visitation of a mortall man But when Christ shall come to visite and to visite all the world when he shall come with his fanne in his hand he shall purge his floore and gather the corne into his garner he shall come to plucke the proud feathers of the potentates of this world that could not be quiet and peaceable but were still disturbing each other he shall then come and heare the cries and lamentations of the afflicted he shall come to redresse the cause of the fatherlesse and widdow he shall come to remove all scandalous doctrine from his Church and to plant his owne truth there to flourish for evermore This shall bee the great and wondrous apparition this is that admirable marching and procession this is that comming that shall worke wonders this comming shall bee more terrible to the consciences of wicked men then the comming of all the power and glory in the world if they should come all together Therefore let this sound in our eares as Hierome saith that he did alwayes thinke he heard the trumpet sound in his eares Surgite mortui Arise ye dead and come to judgement Certainly beloved we must looke for a visitation either from men or from God or
from both in the meane time we have our conscience to serve instead of a visitor Let it therefore do it for good for there will be a visitation if wee do not by timely repentance meet the Lord in the way and intreat for mercie and pardon if wee do not follow the counsell of Christ that saith a man that goeth forth against his enemy if he go forth with ten thousand he will sit downe and reckon whether he be able to go against him that hath 20000 or else he will send Ambassadors to intreat peace of him if he be not able to match him If we do not take the like course we shall fall into the visitation of the Lord. The Lord strengthen us and support us that whensoever that day comes wee may finde him come with comfort as one that comes to reward us with abundant recompence SERM. 5. 1 COR. 16.5 6. But I will come unto you when I shall passe through Macedonia for I passe through Macedonia and perhaps I will abide with you or else will winter with you that you may have me along to any place whither I shall goe for I will not see you now as I passe by A Man that reades these things would presently imagine that all this were true and that all had an issue according as it is here spoken but that is not certaine for that which St. Paul wished and desired it did not alway come to passe as he saith Rom. 15. Rom. 15. that he had a purpose to goe to Spaine but yet St. Paul never came there So the Prophets were uncertaine in these particulars how God would dispose of them for wee see in Acts 16. Acts 16. that when they were come to Bythinia and would have preached the Gospel the Holy Ghost would not suffer them to doe it and when they came unto Asia-Minor the same Spirit of God forbade them to preach the Gospel there and if the Spirit of God would interpose himselfe to forbid the preaching of the Gospel you may then conclude for other matters of lesse importance for this Towne or that place the Lord would much more disturbe and turne away their purpose For man purposeth but God disposeth But howsoever although St. Paul did not finish this journey according to his promise here yet the efficacy the vertue and power of it is all one for hee shewes what hee would have done if God had not turned his will by necessity in calling him another way Such things as these in the Scriptures wee oft times meet withall and whether a man should insist upon them or no it may bee a matter of disputation because the common people think that nothing is fit to bee spoken of but that which makes for morality that which tends to manners they call that onely edifying which buildeth up in matter of life whereas those that are seene in learning or that are men of sense they know that edification is as well in matters of knowledge and there is no part of the Booke of God that is written but it is written for our learning to build us up first out of our Ignorance and then secondly to build us from wickednesse to newnesse and holinesse of life for the second can never bee without the first Therefore wee must take the Scripture as it lies and although this Text afford no great matter for manners or conversation of life yet the schollers of Christ must heare his Word preached wheresoever it is and make profit by it and as long as they doe understand that either they know something which they knew not before or that they know it better and more soundly and perfectly then they did before they cannot but say they are edified by it The first thing then that wee are here to consider is this Parts of the Text. the maine bulke of the Text whether this thing was performed or no that hee saith hee would come to them when hee should passe through Macedonia Secondly wee are to come to the particulars of the Text What is Macedonia What Macedonia was and how hee made his passage thereout and how God furnished him and where he stayed him in his journey Thirdly the purpose that hee had in staying and Wintring with the Corinthians His purpose wherein wee are to consider that though the Apostles were sent to preach the Gospel of Christ yet the Lord tied them not to any ill way or to any ill weather but he gave them place of lodging when they had time and how and upon whose cost the Apostle should lodge there The fourth thing to be considered is the end of his lodgiâ—â— there The end that they might carry him along on his joâ—â—ney where there is another act in his journey which Christian common duty called them unto to bring him along on his way both to defend him and to shew him the way and also to carry him with a kinde of credite belonging to an Apostle And lastly the forme of all these things that hee knowes not whether these things shall bee so or so and therefore hee referres all to the will of God and saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by chance I will doe thus or by fortune or if the Lord permit I will doe thus Where hee shewes what hee would have done what his affection did stand to but whether the consequence of it should bee answerable or no hee leaves it to the will of God and indeed that which hee here promiseth by all likelihood it never fell out I know it is argued both wayes but I thinke they are in the better opinion that conclude that this purpose of the Apostle was never effected 1. Part. That the Apostle came not to Corinth Concerning the first part of the Text that you may the better understand it looke to 2 Cor. 1.16 17 18. And in this confidence I would have come unto you before that you might have had a second grace or benefit and I would have gone by you and passed into Macedonia and againe would have come from Macedonia to you and by you have been led along or sent along to Iudea Marke what his purpose was it was his intent to doe thus but hee could not doe this and therefore hee answers the Corinthians againe which might have said unto him What dost thou tell us that thou wilt come and dost thou faile of thy promise art thou so inconstant art thou so forgetfull of thy selfe and of us Therefore it followes in the next verse where he answers for himselfe saith he when I consulted of these things with my selfe when I purposed to doe thus did I use lightnesse did I use inconstancy or did I make it so that those things that I counsell did I counsell according to the flesh that with mee there should bee yea yea and nay nay that my yea should bee yea and my nay nay observe the meaning of this hee answers them that when hee purposed
the Text saith that they went presently as soone as they saw the vision they went forward to goe to Macedon knowing by certaine arguments that the Lord had called them there to preach the Gospel So from Troas hee went to Samothracia and from thence hee went the same day to Neapolis from thence he passed to Philippos c. Now in this first journey to Macedon the Apostle was intercepted and hindred that he could not goe through as hee purposed to doe as we finde in the story from Philippos he passed to Appolonia which were a company of people that were strangers carried and planted in a strong place in the confines betweene Thrace and Macedon From thence he came to Amphipolis from thence to Thessalonica where he stayed three weeks untill the Iewes persecuted him thence for his life and then he came to Berea which were most noble minded men which examined the Scriptures tried daily whether those things that Paul spake were the Word of God as we see Acts 19. Act. 19. From Berea the Iewes hunted him they came from Thessalonica with permission to take him wheresoever they could find him therefore the brethren conveyed him from thence to Athens and then he came to Corinth where he stayed 18. Moneths that was the first time of his being at Corinth where he conversed I say a yeare and a halfe At Macedon he was twice for the second time he went he passed almost by Dalmatia and Illiricum as he speaks in the Epistle to the Romanes and then hee came backe and thought to have gone to Corinth but newes was brought him that the Iewes would take away his life therefore he returned and could not come but hee desired the money to bee sent to him to Philippi by Titus which they did and so it was carried to Ierusalem and bestowed on the brethren But here is some difficulty Object For how could it be that their benevolence should be put off for so long a time a poore man must have reliefe quickly or else he perisheth this money that was gathered at Corinth either it must be conveyed upon the sudden or else the brethren at Ierusalem for whom it was destinate are like to lose life and state and all Answ But for this we must understand that the want was not so great it was not so urgent but that they could stay some time and so it was almost a year indeed before he dispatched his journey in going to Macedon and returning from Philippos and if he receive their benevolence and it be sent from thence there will be time sufficient for it to relieve them at Ierusalem at the time of Pentecost These things are needfull to be knowne although the common people cannot brook them because they think they edifie not yet it is no great matter as long as I follow the Text I am carelesse of all censures 2 Part. Macedonia what Now I come to the particulars of the Text hee saith hee will come to them when he shall come from Macedonia Macedonia it is a great and large country in the North of Greece it is now called Ronnelli and Albania in old time it was called Emathia and Emonia it is that country which is intimated to us by the name of Kittim Macedonia Kittim Gen. 10.4 or Kethim Gen. 10.4 The sons of Iavan were Kethim and Dodanim of Dodanim came the inhabitants of Rhodes or Rodanim and of Kethim came the inhabitants of the Isles and especially the inhabitants of Macedonia And though Macedonia be no Isle but a Continent yet it is adjacent and they were the mother of it and this word Kethim I stand upon the more because the Scripture hath many ambiguities about it In Dan. 11. Dan. 11. The ships of Kethim shall come against them that is against the Assyrian Kingdome under the Antiochees In Isay 23.1 Isay 23.1 Houle ye ships of Tarshish for Kittim shall make good this word that is Alexander the great King of Macedon shall make good this word for that which Nebuchadnezzar had done before him he did in a short time after him againe that is to the Iland of Tyre which was seperate from the sea by the span of two miles or a mile and a halfe both Nebuchadnezzar with the strong and indefatigable labour of his men and Alexander after him by his infinite high spirit brought it of an Iland to be a Continent and made themselves Lords of the place so that where he saith Houle yee ships of Tarshish for Kittim shall make good this word that is that prophesie that I give of it There shall come a man out of Kittim that is Alexander Alexander the great King of Macedon hee shall make good this that I have prophesied this is a plaine demonstration that Kittim is this Macedon And in Ezek. 27. Ezek. 27. saith he speaking of the ships of Kittim although the Iews alway understand it of Ciprus yet better judgements have and doe take it for Macedon because there was a city built there which was called Ketiem or Ketium for Livie Livius saith that Perseus Perseus the last King of Macedon hee gathered his people together at Ketium and it is an easie translation of the word as Suidas Suidas a learned man notes that from Kethim comes Macedon by appendix of the syllable Ma Makethim Makedon or Makethia so the name is very natural and agreeable with the first Originall Kethim This I note onely to shew you the congruity of these words which we meet with oft in the Scriptures I know that Kethim is more than the City of Macedon I know that the Macedons possessed Italie and built a city there and called it Kittie but it was called Kittim of that city in Macedon the Macedons I say possessed great part of Italie as all the parts about Apulea and Brundis Brundusinm which were for a long time after called Magna Grecia Great Greece This is that Macedon saith Plinie Lib. 5. Cap. 11. that was once the mistresse of the world This is that which overcame Egypt Plinâ— l. 5. c. 11. that was Lord of Asia this is that which wandred as far as India namely by the prowesse and strength of Alexander the great King of Macedon but saith hee the same Macedon is fallen to a low ebbe and shee that was the mistresse of the world by one of our valiant men Paulus Aemilius Paulus Aemilius was in one day sacked and he did sell and mortgage 72. Cities of it See saith he what great difference there is in the luck and fortunes of two men Alexander the Great and Perseus the last King of Macedon Alexander the Great won and purchased all Perseus the last King of Macedon hee lost all that was won before This is that country therefore that the Apostle purposed to goe to it was fallen from the glory of the world and now it was come to receive the glory
and Kingdome of Christ it had lost something among the nations but it found place to be a most constant Church For Paul needed nothing to doe in that Church after he had once confirmed it as we see in many passages of his Epistles It was the most glorious constant and pure Church in the world the Church of Macedon We come now to the promise that hee makes to them at Corinth they might say 3 Part. St. Pauls promise to winter at Corinth If thou goe to Macedon when wilt thou come to us for this was the great and earnest desire of the Corinthians to see their Pastor they were troubled with seducers they were troubled with a number of ravening wolves that were crept into the flock and they knew not how to keepe the body of Christ unparted Some would be of Paul some would hold with Apollo some with Cephas some with Christ some with their owne fancie therefore they desired that he would come and rectifie these disorders which he was willing to doe if the Lord permitted him Now Paul promiseth them what he intended to doe in Theory in contemplation if God would give him leave he would come to them and stay with them and perhaps winter with them I passe to Macedon but I will stay with you Macedon is a Church that needs no great reformation it is enough that I visit that and passe by it but I will stay longer with you because you want my presence to make somewhat good which is amisse And for this wintering of St. Paul the holy Ghost gives us to understand that although of necessity the Minister of the Gospell be to apply himselfe to the word of God especially in the prime plantation of it yet the Lord vouchsafes unto them a kind of Sabbath a kind of resting time It is not for a man to expose himselfe to danger at all times and in all places but that liberty which the Lord hath afforded to men in reason and common nature that liberty the preachers of the Gospell may take to themselves There is some time indeed when a man must lay downe his life when God calls him to it but otherwise except he have a speciall command for it a man is not to offer himselfe The winter is an unfit time to travaile in therefore St. Paul takes his opportunity to winter at Corinth The snow in Thracia the dangerous weather by the sea the frost and cold of those countries are extream for the time that they last these things were sufficient motives to Paul to make him take up his lodging and his station at Corinth Liberty allowed to Preachers So it doth give and afford liberty to all the Ministers of the Gospell to take those opportunities which the Lord reacheth forth unto them a man is not bound to preach when he is sick nor he is not bound to find a Preacher in his sicknesse but at the charge of the parish and those that belong unto it for there is no reason for men to trouble a sick man with whole mens businesse for the seasons must be considered the Lord bids the wind blow at one time and hee bids it cease at another he commands the raine to fall at one time at another time the doores of heaven are stopped up So he saith Isay 5. Isay 5. that the clouds shall not raine so sometimes the Preacher of the Gospell he cannot raine he cannot distill that which hee hath received for want of health or by reason of discontent or else by reason of opposition in the world and men must take these things well A man might have said to Paul What will you spend a whole winter at Corinth You should goe about your masters businesse the Lord hath sent you to preach the Gospell through the world will you take up so much time at Corinth to lie there idle so long Nay saith he the Lord hath given me this liberty I may although not give indulgence to my flesh yet I must spare my life till God call for it and then I must not when he calls for it but till then I must take the opportunities as common sense and reason shall guide me But here behold what a wintering this was What winterings S. Pauls waâ— this wintering of the Apostle it was not as other winterings be the word is borrowed from souldiers and from shipping when the souldiers cannot keepe in the field by reason of the extremity of the weather they then take up their station in some good populous towne where they may have habitation and ability against the summer and then be brought forth into the field to doe more service It is also taken from ships when the sea is shut up in the winter times the ship is pulled into the dock till the spring come that it be brought out againe after reparation from these things is this word taken but yet the wintering of St. Paul it was not like that of souldiers or the wintering of ships for they commonly be both unprofitable but the wintering of St. Paul was as profitable where he was as his travailes could have been in other places for indeed souldiers cannot sight in winter they cannot beare armes in the field by reason of the extremity of the weather and if they doe any thing at home it is some small triviall thing to keep themselves in action to raise a rampier or sconce or some such thing not like unto the dangers that are abroad in the field so the ships in the dock they doe nothing but stand meerely without any use but the wintering of St. Paul was not so but it was full of action full of profit for in Corinth where hee wintered if he had wintered there and had come to effect his will and purpose hee had been still in the Lords Vineyard hee had been still preaching and exhorting and going from house to house as the fashion was then to give comfort and consolation to those that were afflicted to confirme them against the stormes of persecution to shine before them in the example of holy and good living In this regard St. Pauls wintering was a glorious progresse when hee rested he ceased not hee ceased not from his labour but still hee was full of life and action and as the sunne in the firmament which cannot stand still but is ever running his course like a mighty giant Psal 19. Psal 19. So we see here a mighty difference between the word of God and all other actions other men whatsoever is their profession and trade they must of necessity leave when their opportunity ceaseth they can work no longer a man cannot work by night as our Lord Iesus saith The night commeth when no man can worke Although there be many that work by artificiall light yet there are some kinde of works that will not admit of any but day light And when the water is up when the weather is extreame when the water is
what this Pentecost is it seemes not greatly materiall to enquire because every man thinks he hath the knowledge of it But if you should see the diversity of Writers and Interpreters you would wonder to see so much question about a thing that seemes so out of question For Erasmus and some others think that it signifies nothing but fifty dayes that S. Paul writ at a certaine time of the yeare not alluding to this that is that hee had no reference to this feast of Pentecost but onely that he purposed to stay fifty dayes at Ephesus and then to journey to Ierusalem But this cannot be for the Article 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 plainly proves that it was that feast that Pentecost that is that famous feast of the Iewes Others move the question whether it were the Christian Pentecost or the Iewish Pentecost for they will have the Christian Pentecost as soone as the holy Ghost came downe that it was kept ever after presently upon that day wherein I see many and great Writers and Interpreters doe much differ and I suppose indeed it is true that although the Apostles did keepe that Pentecost of the Iewes because that then the company met and assembled together and then it was the best time for them to worke yet I think the Apostles meaning in this place is not of any Iewish feast but of the Pentecost which the Christians used because it was coinsident happily with the Iewish Pentecost I shall intreat your patience a little in this point and although it bee somewhat troublesome yet it is good to know it You know the Pentecost of the Iewes was fifty dayes after the feast of Sweet bread or fifty dayes after the Passeover for the Passeover was then to be presented to God at the feast of Sweet bread when the corne was first ripe the first fruits of their corn The Iewes used to sprinkle their corne in the fire before it was ripe to broyle it in the fire and so to make a kinde of bread meale of that that was the beginning of their Harvest the time of first fruits was then come and that was that the Apostle alludes unto when he saith 1 Cor. 15. Our first fruits are raised from the dead and become the first fruits of them that sleepe because that hee was offered then at the feast of the Passeover now after that feast after the Passeover they were to number the feast of weekes that is they were to number 7. weeks or 50. dayes and then all their Harvest was come to be inned among the Iewes so that whereas before they offered sprinkled corne at Easter now they bring whole loaves at Whitsontide being made of the new corne of that yeare and so they presented it and an acknowledgement was made to God for the corne that hee had given them that yeare and this was the reason of it The word Pentecost signifieth 50. dayes called the feast of weekes Now it appeares in Acts 20. Act. 20. that the Apostle imbarked at Philippi presently after the Passeover after the day of Assum or the day of sweet bread that then hee tooke shipping at Philippi and sayled into Asia and that hee would not goe to Ephesus then for the reason before mentioned because of the treason of the Iewes This being a Iewish feast the feast of weekes or Pentecost which was 50. dayes after the Passeover when they offered of their new corne to the Lord Christ glorified it by sending downe the holy-Ghost upon that day as wee see Acts 2. Act. 2. when the Church was gathered together at the feast of Pentecost when the 50. dayes were ended after Easter there came a mighty noyse a mighty winde with cloven tongues and fire and sate upon the Apostles and gave them such evidence of the Spirit to speak in strange languages in strange tongues the great and wondrous things of God Now then I conclude that the Iewes Pentecost and the Christian Pentecost came altogether upon one day The Lord picking out that day that served most for his purpose for when there was most men gathered and assembled together a greater Harvest was like to be brought in to God when therefore they were met at the Iewish Pentecost which was now ended because the ceremoniall Law was abrogated yet the Lord so graced the time and the oportunity to work at that time as to send the holy Ghost upon that day Aug. And Austin gives the reason for saith he as the Law was given 50. dayes after the Passeover was eaten so 50. dayes after Christ our Passeover was offered the holy Ghost was given to write the Law of God in the hearts of all the faithfull people of God And I make no doubt but the Christians were possest with this that there was more glory in their Pentecost then in the Pentecost of the Iewes as being the summe of all things the sending of the holy Ghost And if the remembrance of their corne were so great a blessing that the feast of weekes must be celebrated for it the feast of Pentecost being a thing too which was given by Moses Law which is a killing letter Much more glorious must this feast be when God sent the holy Ghost into the hearts of men to inflame them well such heavenly qualities and such rare perfections as were never planted in the persons of any that were meere men so clearely as it was in them Quest But how could it be that the Iewes Pentecost and the Christians Pentecost could come both together to be observed upon one day Answ I beseech you observe a little About 190 yeares after Christ concerning the keeping of Easter there was great thundering and great excommunication Now observe 190 Yeares after Christ difference about keeping Easter I will tell you in a word how this came you know the feast of Whitsontide or Pentecost it is ruled according to the feast of Easter as Easter falls out so Pentecost falls out just 7. weekes after Now Easter it selfe was moveable also and came upon the 14. day of the first Moone after the Equinox after the Sunne hath bin in the Equinox of Aries the next full Moone of that new that came after was the day of the Passeover when the Passeover was offred As suppose I say that we should joyne March and April into one moneth as the computation of the Iewes is suppose it should be the 24. of March Now the Iewes whensoever it fell to be the 14th day of the Moone that is when it was full Moone for the course of the Moone is 28 dayes and it is full in 14. whensoever that day came it was kept precisely whether it were upon Tuesday or Wednesday after our calculation But now the Church of God thought fit to keepe it back till Sunday The Iewes and the Easterne Church that followed the Iewes they kept it upon the weeke day if so be that the 14. day fell
and cast him into prison yet his word and power and spirit was stronger than they all and convinced and confuted them that although they seemed to themselves to be conquerers yet they were vanquished for so the Word of God useth to doe to conquer the conquerers and although they thought they took him prisoner yet he took them prisoners for it is a horrible victory that a man gets against the truth a man were better to be taken by the truth than to overcome and quell it These things I note as not any way prejudiciall to the authority or antiquity of those great Fathers and Interpreters but being as I think the more cleare exposition the truer meaning of the Text that he purposed to goe to Ierusalem by the feast of Pentecost and that was but seven weeks off now and although hee purposed if matters had been in place to have staid a while at Ephesus yet still his mind was at Ierusalem where the door was opened because of the aboundance of people that flocked and came thither and the adversaries were so many that it exceeded all faith to make relation of for the Iewes were bound thrice in the yeare all that were above 15. yeares old in the neare countries and all that were above 20. yeares old in far countries they were all bound thrice in the yeare to present themselves before the Lord in Ierusalem and they were such an infinite multitude that a man would wonder that the Land was not over-runne with them like grashoppers and destroyed by their being there But wee are too narrow to consider the blessings of God upon that Land for besides this that they were men of a very sparing and moderate dyet and cared not so much for soft beds but were content to lie in the fields to lie in tents nor they cared not for variety of fare any thing was sufficient for them Wee see that faith and credit makes this good in the History of Iosephus who as I said reports that there were nine millions at one Passeover Wee see the possibility of it also in King Iehosaphats time that had eleven hundred thousand men and upwards that did alway wait upon him besides those that were in his strong gallies that were men of warre as we see in 2 Chron. 17. 2 Chron. 17. Now if he were able to maintain such a number of men it may well be thought that when the generall concourse of that people was from all the parts and kingdomes of the world that there must be an infinite masse of people If hee had above one million daily attending upon him surely the severall parts of the world would furnish it to the number that Iosephus speaks of And it is not to be disputed how the land could beare them how it could nourish them these things wee are not to question but to understand that the blessing of God was mightily poured forth upon that Nation It is apparant I say in 2 Chron. 17. that Iehosaphat had so many hundred thousand men alway at his command So then the Apostle saith here a doore was opened there were so many men and so many adversaries for the most part therefore his minde was set and his spirit was inflamed so much the more to throw himselfe into the danger and to cast himselfe into the front of the battaile because he knew he was secure of the victory although he were overcome by the troublesome world yet he knew he should overcome in the quarrell of Christ that the truth of God should prevaile against them and chaine the chainers So much for the story 2 Part. The Church of God cannot want adversaries Now for the common induction that wee are to make out of this we learne that the Church of God and the truth of God can never want enemies wee must look still for a great number of adversaries 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Apostle wee are made for this purpose In 1 Cor. 4. 1 Cor. 4. I am perswaded saith the Apostle that God hath set us the last Ministers of the Gospell he hath set us out to be the off-scouring of the world the scorne of the people to be a theatre and stage for men and Angels to gaze upon And Simeon when he had the babe our Lord Iesus Christ in his armes he saith of him that hee was borne to be a stumbling stone to be a marke of contradiction hee was borne to have adversaries No sooner could the Gospell peepe out into the world then it had a number of adversaries and enemies to tread and trample it downe againe Those persecutions that were under the first Emperours after Christ the ten bloudy persecutions they witnesse what great adversaries the poore truth of Christ had And the Church of the Iewes which the Apostle called before him Acts 28. Acts 28. when they were convented and called together by the Apostle they told him that this new heresie the doctrine of the Gospell of Christ Iesus which they accounted heresie they knew for a certaine that it was every where spoken against that it was every where gainsaid It is an easie matter for lies to prevaile in the world the sonnes of darknesse are predestinated to bee drowned in darknesse to vanish in their owne dreames and so the lies of one Philosopher may passe upon another and they may joyne and blend them together and live in quiet and peace and yet all be lies But the pure truth of God and the sincere light of the Gospel it can indure no such Egyptian smoaks but it will shine bright forth of it selfe and therefore it cannot bee suffered for the Devill the Prince of darknesse he doth alway shew himselfe against the Lord of light and against the Gospel of light still either to extinguish it if possibly he can or at least to eclipse and dazle the light of it or to immure it in cloudes that it may not appeare to the sonnes of men It was the fortune of all truth ever to be beaten downe by liars but yet the Lord hath given it this victory It runnes the same course with Christ for hee died and was buried three dayes but hee rose againe so the truth which is his daughter the daughter of the Trinity the sister of the Sunne the brightnesse of the world although it bee for a time obscured and damped by the wickednesse of the Devils instruments and such miscreants yet in time it riseth againe it selfe by the power of God it is raised from the dead after that never more to be outed and undone but still to shine and fill the Hemisphere Therefore this should teach us Vse that men must not be discouraged in the worke of the Ministery because of the noise and tumult of the adversaries he that is for Christ he must feare no rumors but in good reports and bad reports and through prosperity and mischiefe he must make a way unto him that he seeks for of
by paginalls by leaves that is to say the holy Scriptures contained in so many books But the trumpet at the comming of Christ it shall not be in pagina but in praesentia In the presence of the Sonne with the voice of the Sonne himselfe According as it is said Ioh. 5. Ioh. 5.25 there are many that sleep in their graves and monuments that shall heare the voice of the Sonne of God and shall rise againe Thus the Fathers seeme to incline to that opinion that the voice of the trumpet shall be metaphoricall that it is an allusiâ—n and a figurative speech But howsoever this it is most certaine that it shall be a sensible voice which shall be heard that as St. Ierom Jerome saith they shall heare with their eares and goe along with their feet unto the tribunall seat of judgement The best therefore that we can say and conclude of it is this according as wee see but in part 1 Cor. 13 9. we understand but in part in a darke riddle while wee live in this world the Lord shall then create a voice in the aire an audible voice in the aire which shall run through all parts and passages of the world and it shall be so mighty and so powerfull as that the dead bodies in the grave shall heare it Every thing heares when God speaks The waters heard the voice of Christ the windes heard the voice of Christ the devils heard his voice the rocks and stones heard him So there is an obedientiall power in every thing created and it cannot but heare when God speaks This is that trumpet that is a voice that shall be modulate and framed whether it shall be to descant as it is very likely or to a plain tune But howsoever it shall be a voice and a voice like the sound of a Trumpet which God shall frame in the body of the ayre Who shal blow this Trumpet But who shall blow this trumpet who shall sound it Here the curiosity of man must lay the hand up on the mouth and surcease It is a damnable thing for a man to enquire into that which God hath not reveiled Some of the Fathers have been inching and questioning about this point who it shall be but it is certain it shall be the voice of an Arch-angell Although the voice be properly the voice of the Son of God yet it is not meet that the voice should come from him it is not meet that the voice should be the immediate voice of the Sonne of God that should blow in the aire but as the voice of a Cryer or Herald when the King comes to a place is said to be the voice of the King because he cryes and proclaimes not his owne matters but the Kings So the Angell that shall be imployed in this businesse he is said to utter the voice of God and the voice of Christ from whom that which he utters receives all the efficacy and power And though it be the voice of an Angell and by the ministery of an Angell yet it shall be by the ordinance and power and authority of the Son of God that shall make this voice Therefore the Fathers resolve upon two which they think shall sound the trumpet Michaell or Gabriell They think Michaell shall sound it because he is the Prince of Angels and in the Revelation Michael his Angels Rev. 12.7 fought against the devill and his angels But this is unlikely for Michael there is to be understood of Christ the Sonne of God that fought with the power of satan upon the crosse But I rather incline to the other that it shall be Gabriell the Arch-angell who was hee onely that brought the newes of Christs first comming in Luke 1. Luke 1. As hee was used by God to bring tidings of Christs Incarnation that he should be borne of a virgin in his first comming so it is probable that he shall be imployed by the same Majesty againe to bring newes of the last comming of the Lord when hee shall come to judgement Concerning these things I will not be too inquisitive neither would I have you to be too curious for an Angell or an Arch-angell it must be for the word is so 2 Part. Why called the last trump I come now to the next thing Why is it called the last trump for if hee call it the last trump it hath reference to some others that were before it And so it is true for those that were before were figures of this last trump those seaven kinde of trumpets Theoph. Oecumenius Rev. 8. 9. and especially as Theophilact and Oecumenius observe St Paul hath reference to Rev. 8. there are seaven trumpets and they all sounded and presently there came vialls of wrath upon the world presently upon the sound of those trumpets So St. Paul tells us that there shall come trumpets betweene the time that he wrote and spake these things and betweene the last trump that shall sound there shall be other trumpets then this That is those seaven before spoken of which in the time of the Romane Empire the Lord uttered himselfe by expressing his will in them and also in the time of the Christian Empire And indeed in the time of all Christian Kings these trumpets have blowne and indeed these silver trumpets blow daily if wee could understand what were the right meaning of them and what the newes of them were And if there doe not one of these trumpets blow now a man cannot tell what to determine when there are such common combustions in the world when there are such warres and rumours of wars and such risings of one Prince against another when there is such common effusion of christian bloud Certainly this is a rare shrill trumpet which should be wisely by the cautelous and diligent hearing of every christian souldier observed to prepare them for the battaile to prepare them for the day of the Lord because it cannot be long before the last trump blow These trumpets indeed goe before but they are signes that the last trump is comming after and perhaps it shall come at the heeles and overtake the former before we be aware Aug. For as St. Austin saith well the Trumpet useth not to sound at midnight but in the morning and at the evening so saith he the Lords trumpet sounded in the morning when he gave the law at the promulgation of the law at the building of the Tabernacle at the dedication of the Temple it sounded in the morning of the world And now it sounds at the evening at the later end of the world it begins now to sound if men will open their eares to entertaine it But for the other trumpet saith he it may well be that the last trump of all shall sound at midnight that when men are quiet and secure and give themselves to profound sleepe that then the Lord may take them napping that as they
have been carelesse and negligent in his wayes before so God shall take the advantage and come upon them upon the Sabbath day and upon the Sabbath day at night when men use quietest and with greatest repose to lay themselves to rest It is the last trump And why is it called the last trump Because God will have no more messages to man When the trumpet hath sounded there shall be no more newes nor no more intercourse between God and man Till that trumpet sound there is a daily intercourse betweene heaven and earth the Lord sends us newes by his word he sends us newes by his Sacraments by his punishments and afflictions by his blessings and fatherly preservations The world is full of his gracious trumpets which are ever sounding either to make us better and to bring us from sinne or else to discourage and harden us if wee goe on in our ill doings Still there is an entercourse betweene God and man but when the last trump shall blow all such entercourse shall cease Those that have done well shall goe into life Mat. 25.46 and shall have the perfect vision of God without any more newes or message from God to them and those that have done ill shall goe into everlasting fire and shall have a continuall privation and absence of God without any hope of seeing his face any more This is called the last trump because that after the trumpet hath blowne there shall be no more change in the dealings and affaires betweene heaven and earth I see the time almost past 3 Part. What sound the trumpet shall give I come therefore to the next thing what the trumpet shall sound For if the voice shall be sensible then it must needs have some signification and must utter something that men must understand For it is not enough to say that it is a voice of a trumpet an inarticulate and generall sound and no word for it cannnot be so And though the trumpet of God shall sound it shall not be so dull but it shall have a more sweet and significant impression to teach men what they have to doe Therefore the Fathers have gone so farre as to expresse what words the Trumpet shall sound St. Ierome Jerome and some of the Fathers with him say the words that the trumpet shall sound shall be Arise ye dead and come to judgement Therefore saith hee I am so possest with this I am so possest with the assurance of this that to what place soever I goe if I goe to my study if I walke if I eate or drinke if I lie downe to sleepe whatsoever I encline my selfe to me thinks I ever heare in my eares the voice of the trumpet sounding Arise yee dead and come to judgement But the holy Father may seeme to speake rather out of a high straine of fervent zeale by allusion than of any certainty that the trumpet shall so sound Theophilact Theophilact saith the trumpet shall sound to this effect Draw neare for the Iudge is at hand the Iudge is before the doore prepare your selves As Isay saith The voice of a cryer Esay 40.3 Prepare you the way of the Lord make his paths straight This indeed is more agreeable to the Scriptures Iohn Baptist that prepared the way before Christ he was a type and figure of the Angell Gabriel that shall found the trumpet to prepare the way of the Lord and shall give a sensible and significant note what hee would have men to doe But this it is sufficient for us to point at because wee know not the certainty of it It shall be such a voice as shall give sufficient warning it shall be a voice that shall be sensibly perceived the intendment of it shall runne over all reasonable eares there is none shall be so deafe or so dull but they shall heare and apprehend the meaning of it But what word it is whether it shall be articulate or no it is not left for us to enquire after Howbeit wee honour the invention of the holy Fathers because they tend something to the rectifying of manners and for the stirring up of mens affections for this purpose 4 Part. The effect Now followes the effect and operation of it when the trumpet shall blow The dead shall rise incorruptible This is that wondrous effect that the trumpet of God hath this is the great difference between the trumpet of God and the trumpets of men For they worke death and destruction when they blow and sound to the warres but this trumpet of God shall sound to life and immortality But this shall not be in the power of the instrument but it shall have this force by the power of God and from the power of Christ unto whom God hath given all judgement and power to raise and to change the quick and the dead But what is this that he saith The dead shall rise incorruptible Some think it is onely meant of the Saints because all this discourse of the Resurrection as Beza Beza and some other Divines observe is restrained to the Saints But the former part of the Apostles discourse is more large and so also may this be taken that not onely the bodies of the Saints shall be incorrupt but also the bodies of the wicked But how Saith St. Austin they shall be in the fulnesse of perfection of the parts and members they shall all rise incorruptible they shall have bodies that shall never be obnoxious to corruption and destruction but shall last and indure in the fire for ever They shall have a braine and a wit that shall never be dissolved they shall have a memory that shall never forget their wickednesse and sinnes that they have done and the blasphemies they have committed against God and the abominable actions they have done in the tabernacle of this flesh They shall have the proportion also of men and women in their true frame and proper stature and not as being lame or blind or the like as perhaps some of them died But they shall be raised in the fulnesse and perfection of their members and parts howbeit it shall be so as it may most dispose them to eternall torments that they may be able to indure that is all the reason why God raiseth them uncorruptible that they may be able to indure the corrupting causes For those causes that seeme to corrupt any thing in the world as sorrow and feare and malice and vexation and torture of the flesh which a man would think in time would bring any thing to an end yet they shall not be able to corrupt them Therefore saith St. Austin Aug. though they shall be raised incorruptible yet after a sort they shall be corrupted by the paine and torment which they shall indure But how Not to be brought to a worstnesse or destruction but they shall have an eternall life to suffer misery Let us labour therefore Vse and desire of