Selected quad for the lemma: diversity_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
diversity_n	gift_n	lord_n	operation_n	869	5	8.9503	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A82313	The building and glory of the truely Christian and spiritual church. Represented in an exposition on Isai. 54, from vers. 11. to the 17. Preached to His Excellency Sir Tho. Fairfax and the general officers of the army, with divers other officers, and souldiers, and people, at Marston, being the head-quarter at the leaguer before Oxford, June. 7. 1646. / By William Dell, minister of the Gospel, attending on His Excellencie Sir Thomas Fairfax in the Army. Together with a faithful testimony touching that valiant and victorious army, in the epistle to the reader. Published by authority.	Dell, William, d. 1664.	1646 (1646)	Wing D918; Thomason E343_5; ESTC R200942	30,138	43

full sense of these words I shall give you forth in several particulars 1. You see here the matter of which the Church of the New Testament is made and that is not of common but of precious stones elect and precious stones and such are the faithful For 1. They have a more excellent nature then other men have for they are born of God and so partake of the nature of God and so in this sense may be said to come forth from God as the childe from the father and the Lord Jesus did not more truely partake of the nature of man then these do partake of the nature of God and therefore saith Peter Great and precious promises are made to us that we should be partakers of the divine nature Others have onely the nature of men in them or which is worse the nature of the devil but the faithful have in them the nature of God communicated to them through a new birth 2. They have a more excellent spirit then others have as it was said of Daniel that there was a more excellent spirit found with him then with all the other wise men Now the excellency of each creature is according to the spirit of it but the Saints have the Spirit of God even the Spirit of the Father and the Son dwelling in them they have the same Spirit of God dwelling in their flesh as Christ had dwelling in his flesh so that the very Spirit of God is found in the faithful and therefore they are more glorious then the rest of the world 3. They have a more excellent lustre then other men One thing that appertains to the excellency of precious stones is the lustre of them Now this lustre in the faithful is the glory of God upon them The Lord shall arise upon thee and his glory shall be seen upon thee saith Isaiah Chap. 60. And Paul saith We all beholding as in a glasse the glory of the Lord are changed into the same image from glory to glory even as by the Spirit of the Lord So that as Christ was taken into the glory of the Father so are we taken into the glory of Christ as he saith Joh. 17. And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them for the head and members are taken into the same glory according to their proportion 4. They have more excellent operations for the faithful are not such precious stones that are onely for shew but they also have some vertue in them even the very vertues of Jesus Christ for they having the same Nature and Spirit of God as he had are able according to the measure of the gift of Christ to do the same works that he did and so the Saints are excellent in the operations of faith hope love humility meeknesse patience temperance heavenly mindednesse c. and in this regard also are more precious then the rest of the world And therefore the Lord calls them his Jewels In the day wherein I make up my jewels and elsewhere they are called the precious sons of Sion The people of God are a most precious people men and women of a precious anointing though some wicked and scurrilous libellers against the spiritual Church will not allow them this name but according to the anointing they have received from Satan reproach it And yet still it is a truth that the gates of hell shall not prevail against That the truely faithful are precious stones in the building of the Church partaking of the Nature and Spirit of God and of the lustre and operation of both Whereas on the contrary other people are the vile of the earth the true filth and off scouring of all things Psal. 15. in whose eyes a vile person is contemned a man that is a natural man a sinful and unregenerate man who hath no other nature in him but that corrupt nature he brought into the world though in this present world he may be a Gentleman or a Knight or a Noble-man or a King yet in the eyes of God and his Saints he is but a vile person and a poor mean Christian that earns his bread by hard labour is a thousand times more precious and excellent then he according to the judgement of God and his Word And thus much for the first thing The matter of which the Church of the New Testament is made and that is of precious stones 2. Now the next thing observable is the variety of these precious stones For the spiritual Church is not built up of precious stones of one sort onely not all of Saphires or all of Agates or all of Carbuncles but of all these both Saphires Agates Carbuncles and many other precious stones of fair colours And this notes the diversity of gifts in the Saints of God For though all of them are precious stones yet they are of diversity of colours and lustre and operations And this also makes for the greater glory of the Church for the variety of lustre addes to the beauty and ornament of it In the body of a man there is not one member but many If the body were all but one member it would be but a lump of flesh but the variety of members with their several gifts and operations are the glory of the body And so it is in the Church the Body of Jesus Christ wherein are divers members with diversity of gifts and operations excellently set forth by Paul 1 Cor. 12. 4. c. Now there are diversity of gifts but the same Spirit and there are differences of administrations but the same Lord and there are diversities of operations but it is the same God that worketh all in all But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every one to profit withal for to one is given by the Spirit the word of wisedom to another the word of knowledge by the same Spirit to another faith by the same Spirit to another the gift of healing by the same Spirit to another the working of miracles to another prophecie to another discerning of spirits to another divers kind●s of tongues to another interpretation of tongues but all these work●● that one and the same Spirit dividing to every 〈…〉 he will Here you see are diversity of gifts and administrations and operations in the faithful but all proceed from one and the same Spirit and whatsoever gift proceeds from the Spirit there is an excellent beauty a heavenly lustre in it And therefore labour to distinguish between those gifts that are connatural to thee and flow from thy own spirit and those gifts that are supernatural and flow from Gods Spirit In all the operations of thine own spirit in all thy natural abilities parts wisedom learning actings there is nothing but ungloriousnesse deformity darknesse death how specious soever they may appear to the world but in the gifts and operations that flow from Gods Spirit there is a heavenly beauty and lustre and glory yea even in weak Christians that are true

Christians you shall oft see and discern an excellent beauty in some gift or other which they have received from the Spirit which shines not forth so clearly in some stronger Christians And therefore let us not expect all gifts in all men and that every man should excel in every gift for then one would be saying to another I have no need of thee But God hath given diversity of gifts to divers Saints that each may acknowledge something in another which he hath not himself and may reckon his perfection to lie in his union and communion with them that so the Communion of Saints may be kept up in the world in despight of the world One Christian hath the gift of Faith another the gift of Prayer another the gift of utterance in preaching another the gift of courage another the gift of meeknesse and the like and no man hath all things in himself that every man in the sight of his own wants may be kept humble And this is a glorius thing in this building that the lustre of each stone addes to the lustre of all and the lustre of all is communicated to each stone and so in the Spiritual building what one hath from the Spirit it is for all what all have is for each one If thou hast the gift of utterance in the ministration of the Spirit it is to build up me if I have the spirit of Prayer it commends thee as carefully to God as my self one watches over another as over his own soul and if any be weak the strong support them if any be doubtful they that have the gift of knowledge direct them if one be troubled the rest mourn with him if one be comforted the rest rejoyce with him and they are all so linked together in the body of Christ that the good and evil of one extends to all Where thou canst finde such another communion there joyn thy self but if this be the onely excellent communion in the world who would not willingly joyn himself to that spiritual people where no man calls his grace his own but all gifts are in common among all every one having a share in the faith hope love prayer peace joy wisdome strength of all and all having a share in these gifts and graces that are in any one And thus much for the diversity of the stones as well as the preciousnesse of them 3. The third thing that reveals the sense of the words is to observe that this spiritual building of the Church of the New Testament is made up all of precious stones without any mixture of common stones is made up of Saphires Agates Carbuncles and addes And all thy borders of pleasant stones Here then must be no mingling of the precious and the vile the holy and the profane the faithful and the unbeliever the spiritual and the carnal but all must be precious If a man had a jewel that had here and there onely a precious stone in it and all the rest common pebbles there would be no great glory in such a jewel but the common stones would take off from the lustre of the precious ones And so the Church is Gods jewel in the world and it must be made up onely of precious stones as you see here And where are their eyes that perceive not this There be some that talk much against New Doctrine which is the old reproach of the Gospel but surely there was never newer Doctrine then this That the Spiritual Church of the New Testament should be made up of all the people that live in a Kingdom and that all that are born in such a Nation should necessarily be stones for the building up the new Jerusalem This is a new Doctrine indeed which neither the Old nor the New Testament owns but was conveyed into the world by the spirit of Antichrist For God doth not now make any people or kinred or nation his Church but gathers his Church out of every people and kinred and nation and none can be stones of this building but those that are first elect and after made precious through a new birth and the gift of the Spirit And this Doctrine the Word will justifie against the world for Paul writing to the Churches of Ephesus and Corinth c. doth he mean all the people that lived at Ephesus or Corinth No but the faithful and elect children by adoption Saints by calling and saith So it was meet for him to judge of them all And if any were mistaken for a Saint that was none surely he carried himself very like one he was outwardly in sheeps clothing or he had not been reckoned among the flock and so if a stone be taken into this building that is not truely precious yet it is so like one in shew and colour that it can hardly be discerned to be other but a very skilful Lapidary And indeed such a mistake there may be in Christs Kingdom here that a few counterfeit stones may be taken up among many precious ones but that is the mistake of a false Church where a thousand counterfeit ones are taken in for one truely precious wherein for one faithful Christian there are many formalists and many more profane This is not such a building the Prophet speaks of for this is all of elect and precious stones But I cannot enlarge on these things because this exercise I intend chiefly as an Exposition onely I will adde one or two things more touching this particular and so go on 1. If the Church of the New Testament is to be built all of precious stones what a building is that where the onely care is to keep these stones out of the building lest by their glory and lustre they should darken the rest 2. Consider when the Church shall be built up all of such precious stones what a glorious Church will that be when the glory of the Lord shall shine forth in every stone of this building how will there be then glory upon glory till the glory of the Church first darken and then put out all the glory of the world 3. Consider what great enemies they are to the true and native glory of the Church that would have every man in a Kingdom a member of the Church and would have those taken into the flock that are none of Christs sheep and those taken into the Church of God that are not of God and would gather up any stones to make up this Temple of God These are the men that would keep off those glorious things from being fulfilled in the Church which are spoken of it 4. We are to take notice who is the builder of such a structure as this all made up of pretious stones and you shall finde in the Word that the builder and maker of it is God I will doe it saith the Lord behold I will lay thy stones with faire colours and I will lay thy foundations with Saphirs and I will make thy windowes