Selected quad for the lemma: doctrine_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
doctrine_n	church_n	teach_v	tradition_n	3,694	5	9.0240	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A88811	A plea for the vse of gospell ordinances: against the practice and opinions of certain men of these times. Unto which is added by way of an illustrious instance; a vindication of the ordinance of baptisme: against Mr. Dels booke, entituled The doctrine of baptismes. Wherein it's proved that the ordinance of baptism is of gospel institution, and by divine appointment, to continue of use in the Church, to the end of the world. / By Hen: Laurence Esq;.	Lawrence, Henry, 1600-1664.	1652 (1652)	Wing L668; Thomason E654_2; ESTC R205905	51,207	92

greatest concernment as that instanced in here Knowing the Lord that is with a practicall knowledge such as changes the heart and converts is so much the work of God himself and of the holy spirit as of the principall and chiefe agent that the subordinate instruments who contribute under God by the will and institution of God to that work are scarce considerable It is well knowne this being the promise of the New Covenant the time of opening and beginning of which was after the death and resurrection of Christ as Heb. 8. Christ became the mediator of a better Covenant It is knowne I say that in those times in the course of which we live there was the institution of Apostles Prophets Pastors and Teachers for the perfecting of the Saints for the worke of the Ministry for the edifying of the body of Christ Ephes 4. and 2 Tim. 4.2 Paul commanded him there To preach the Word and to be instant in season and out of season and Rom. 10. How shall they beleeve in him of whom they have not heard and how shall they heare without a preacher so that gifts and Offices and teaching were judged by the holy Ghost extreame necessaries to faith holinesse and the right knowledge of God in Christ This notwithstanding in respect of that great part the holy spirit acts the agency and working of men deserves scarce a thought or mention so as on that consideration it may be sayd not to be And it is not unusuall as elsewhere so in Scripture phrase that that should be affirmed of one and den●ed of others which more illustriously or more frequently appeares in that one though in some sort it be common with others It is certaine Isaack loved Jacob and Esau too but because he more loved Esau it s sayd Isaack loved Esau and Rebecca loved Jacob Gen. 25.28 And though Christ loved all the Disciples it is said notwithstanding that John was the Disciple whom Jesus loved But especially that place of Matth. 15. where Christ sayes He was not sent but to the lost sheepe of the house of Israel and yet if Christ were not sent as well to the Gentiles as to the Jewes it were little for our comfort The preaching of the Word how necessary soever to the begetting of faith for how can they beleeve in him on whom they have not heard and how can they heare without a Preacher yet how little doth it contribute and how truely may so great an effect be sayd to bee alone from God What can the sound of words doe but strike the eare but it is the unction that must affect the heart 'T is not the noyse of a voice without but something within that produces such great and mighty effects The great weight that turnes the ballance and that ignea vis that fire that inflames the mind and carryes it up to God to move after God to follow God is some greater and higher thing then the voyce of man or sound of words and is nothing else but the unction within us and the voyce of God himselfe In a word it is the effect of that which is here and more particularly in Isaiah promised That they should be all taught of God which place as it is expounded and applyed by our Saviour the best Expositor will give the surest witnesse to the exposition we have given of this The place is John 13.45 It is written in the Prophets they shall be all taught of God every man therefore that hath heard and hath learned of the Father cometh to me Our Saviour seemes to have respect to the place we have been speaking of all this while where God undertakes to do so much as he makes the Ministry of man in comparison nothing or more especially to that place in Isaiah 54.13 where the Prophet speaking of the restauration of the Church affirmes that their Children shall bee taught of God Now when our Saviour comes to apply and improve this passage of the Prophet doth he reject the Ministry of man as a thing of no use altogether carnall and unprofitable Doth he reprobate Preaching Exhortation and Doctrine No such thing He himselfe Preach't that hee was the Messiah that was to come and he sent our Apostles and Disciples to Teach and Baptize promising great rewards to those that shall not onely prophesie but shall receive a Prophet in his Name so farre was hee from abolishing the use of the Ministry or the Agency or assistance of men in that great worke of begetting and improving faith but tells the Jewes to whom he spake and who were offended with him for the meannesse of his birth and condition that the reason why they beleeved not was because they fell not under that great promise To be taught of God That no man could come to him except the Father drew him That teaching of God was especially necessary and that drawing of God that secret language and those invisible Cords without which all the words of man no of the man Jesus would doe no good nor contribute effectually to so great and high an end as comming to Jesus Christ and beleeving in him So as cleerly the use of this and other Scriptures of this kind is farre from excluding the Ministry of man and the use of the Scriptures and other Ordinances which the wisedome of God in the dayes of this new Covenant hath made extreamely necessary and usefull to us but to shew us where we must expect the Energy force and power which as an infusion into these Ordinances must produce these blessed effects and to give us an account of the difference that is found amongst men under the same Ordinances and dispensations that some come to God in Christ and forsake all things for him and others lye still dead in their sinnes for want of this Unction this being taught of God and of this strong and powerfull drawing which our Saviour speaks of in this place Having spoken that which is sufficient to the places last treated on I come now to that which I first propounded out of 2 Pet. 1.19 but this yet wee have gained already if wee assent to the expositions given that the highest teachings we are capable of in this life the teachings of God and of the anointings of the spirit are nothing of Supersedeas to the teachings of others or to our owne reading and meditation in the Word of God So as according to the truth already made out this Scripture will receive the easier accommodation First It is generally believed that those two Epistles were written to the Jewes of whom Peter was more particularly the Minister and the Apostle that this second Epistle was writ to the same persons to whom the first was appeares by the first Verse of the third Chapter This second Epistle beloved I now write unto you c. Now the first Epistle is intituled To the Strangers scattered abroad which James in his inscription calls The twelve Tribes scattered abroad James

A PLEA for the Vse of Gospell Ordinances Against the Practice And Opinions of certain men of these times Unto which is added By way of an illustrious Instance A Vindication of the Ordinance of BAPTISME AGAINST Mr. Dels Booke ENTITULED The Doctrine of Baptismes Wherein it 's proved That the Ordinance of Baptism is of Gospel Institution and by Divine appointment to continue of use in the Church to the end of the World By HEN LAURENCE Esq Beware least any man spoyle you through Philosophy and vain deceit after the tradition of men after the Rudiments of the world and not after Christ Col. 2.8 London printed by M. S. for Livewell Chapman at the Crown in Popes-head Alley 1652. TO My most Deare and most Honoured Mother the LADY LAWRENCE Most Honoured Mother WEE heare much of late of certain civil Hereticks they call the LEVELLERS Men who by pretending Salus Populi and the common good would render their owne share in the World better then it is And finding as their Lots are cast community more advantageous to them then propriety would take away all those troublesome bounds and metes which Laws or Customes have established upon particular rights that all things might be reduced to their Primitive as they pretend and Originall Community I designe not the processe of these Men at this time how great soever their crime may be and great enough certainly it will be judged if this Charge be true But the Charge that this Discourse intends is against another and more audacious kind of Levellers spirituall Levellers men that would levell God and as it was the vanity and ambition of Adam to make himselfe like God so it is the presumption and pride of these men to make God like them We have formerly had to doe with some who would bring the Justice of God to the modell and scantling of their justice which hath been the occasion of that great controversie with the Pelagians and their followers the Arminians And now we are importun'd by a Generation of men who would subject the wisedome of God to the modell and scantling of their wisedome would give lawes to God for the government and Oeconomy of his owne house and judge all at an undue and under rate that lye not levell with their either reason or fancy And because selfe-love making up in us all defects men are usually reasonably well satisfied with their own wisdomes howsoever others are and that as the Scripture sayes Vaine Man would be wise though Man bee as a wild Asses Colt Hence it is that men who have not learned sufficiently that the foolishnesse of God is wiser then men and therfore if any man would be wise he must become a foole that he may be wise men that have not been taught this of God are vying stil with God for wisedome and are extreamely scandalized at his method of saving men by the foolish and base and weake and despised meanes of Preaching with all other Ordinances and Institutions Our Saviour and Master taught us better by his owne example when considering of the reason why God had hid the great things of the Gospell from the wise and learned men of the World and revealed them to Babes He resolved it easily into the good pleasure of God Even so Father for so it pleased thee But these will rather dispute it out with God and Men then they will suffer such a blemish to their wisedome as the ayde and assistance that these foolish and weake and base despised things as the Scripture cals them brings with them And yet because it is hard to make an open Warre against God and apparent and evident truths held forth in his Word they imploy all the pittance of wisedome they have to this great worke of Levelling either in wholly taking away the use of the Scriptures to themselves and others of their elevation or by so mincing and altering them by their liberty of allegorizing Which you must beleeve although it be nonsence to be the Mystery of the History as they call it as they make them speake what they judge in wisedome they should since of themselves and naturally they are farre from speaking what they would But I shall trouble you no farther most Honoured Mother with prefacing having given you a short account who they are and what it is that this discourse pretends against as the title tels you what it pretends to I am not I thanke God so vaine as to imagine that this Essay should convert this kind of men especially such as are highest flowne and who having beene accustomed to defie reason and Scripture doe not use to bee satisfied when they are answered But I am not without hopes through the grace of God but that it may be of use to some truly godly for these temptations are fitted to persons and places of light who have not known the depths of Sathan nor are yet effectually insnared by these stratagems and wiles of the Devill And I am assured it will be accepted by you my Deare Mother to whom I present it not only upon that just account that you commanded it and the commands of Parents to their Children are of the highest Prerogative But because it will be satisfaction to you to see the Asserting and Vindicating of those things indeavored which have so much of truth and God in them and in a time when the profession and practice of them is expos'd not onely to the insultings of men openly and professedly prophane but which is lesse sufferable and more abominable to the scorne and contempt of such as would be esteemed Saints of the highest elevation But Wisedome is justified of her Children whose condition is very easily supportable with this assurance That as Christ was in the World so are they in the World and if Their life be hid with Christ in God when Christ who is their life shall appeare they shall appeare with him in glory I am Most Honoured Mother Your most obedient Sonne and Most Humble Servant Henry Lawrence A VINDICATION OF THE SCRIPTURES And Christian Ordinances NOTHING seems more to speak the misery of these evil and calamitous times in which we live then the extreame debordment of extravagant Opinions in matters of Religion diverse of which tend not onely directly to the undermining of Holinesse and Christian Religion which by the grace of God hath been long acknowledged and professed in this Kingdome but to the subversion also and destruction of civill society and communion with men as men The rise of which exorbitancy so far as my observation leads me is laid First in a slighting of the Ordinances of worship as things lesse profitable and usefull and more befitting Children then grown men and then according to the nature of errour which is easily multiplying and increasing for one absurdity granted a hundred will follow and grow out of it in a reprobating and utter casting of those Ordinances as things hurtfull and destructive to the nature of