Selected quad for the lemma: grace_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
grace_n	covenant_n	promise_n	seal_n	4,049	5	9.6971	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A59907	A vindication of the rights of ecclesiastical authority being an answer to the first part of the Protestant reconciler / by Will. Sherlock ...	Sherlock, William, 1641?-1707.	1685 (1685)	Wing S3379; ESTC R21191	238,170	475

to eat together at a common Table is a civil action and a testimony of civil kindnesses and respects but when this is done upon a religious account as a testimony and expression of Christian Charity it becomes a holy Kiss and a religious Feast These Ceremonies are as acceptable to God as those Duties and Graces are which we exercise and profess in them if we be sincere but they are no parts nor acts of Worship though performed in the time of Worship This short account of the nature of these Ceremonies shews us what a ridiculous pretence it is to charge them with being Sacraments of humane Institution Some tell us that the definition our Church gives of a Sacrament belongs to such Ceremonies as these that it is an outward visible signe of an inward spiritual Grace and here they stop as if this were the full definition of a Sacrament but our Church adds given unto us and ordained by Christ himself as a means whereby we receive the same and as a pledge to assure us thereof So that there can be no such thing as a humane Sacrament because there can be no Sacrament but what is ordained by Christ. True say they but that is the fault of it that when upon other accounts it has the nature of a Sacrament it has not that authority which should make it a divine and therefore it is onely a humane Sacrament These Ceremonies then it seems would be Sacraments if they had the authority of Christ then there is one Sacrament more than they think of viz. washing the Disciples feet which was instituted by Christ himself and is as much an outward visible signe of an inward spiritual Grace as the Cross in Baptism or any other significant Ceremony can be but it wants what our Church adds to make up the nature of a Sacrament that it is ordained as a means whereby we receive this spiritual Grace and as a pledge to assure us thereof Which shews that no Ceremony how symbolical soever it be can be a Sacrament which is not the Seal of a Covenant and Promise and an instituted means for the conveyance of Grace But to let that pass the nature of these Ceremonies does not consist in this That they are outward visible signs of an inward spiritual Grace but that they are the visible Exercise or Profession of some Grace or Duty Their nature does not consist in being signifying signs to teach a Duty but in signifying the actual Exercise or Profession of some Duty and this I suppose does not make them Sacraments Secondly Let us now consider the Decency of such Ceremonies and I cannot imagine what dispute there can be about it For if the Exercise or Profession of such Vertues be decent then the external Rite and Ceremony whereby such a Profession is made if it be used in a grave manner and upon a solemn occasion and be a proper and natural signe of such a Profession must be decent too If it be a decent thing for Christians to express their mutual love and charity to each other when they come together to worship God and to offer up their united Prayers to their common Father or to feast at the Table of their common Lord and Saviour then to kiss one another and to feast at a common Table which are proper and significant expressions of mutual Charity must be decent also at such times And thus they were used by the Primitive Christians they used to kiss each other after Prayers upon which account it is called Signaculum orationis or the Seal of Prayer Thus they kissed each other before their receiving the Lords Supper and began this mysterious Supper with a Love-Feast which was a common Table for the poor and the rich And if it were decent at such times to express their servent charity to each other the external Rite and Ceremony of this must be decent also for inward Charity cannot be expressed but either by words or signs and visible signs which are also the external acts and exercise of Charity are to be preferred before words Thus if it be decent upon some solemn occasions to make a publick profession of our Faith in a crucified Christ and our resolution to follow him even to the Cross and rather to die with him than deny him there cannot be a more solemn occasion for this than at our Baptism when we are received into the Communion of his Church this being an express Condition of our Discipleship to take up our Cross and follow him and therefore also there cannot be a more proper signe and emblem of this Profession than to receive the signe of the Cross in our foreheads for to receive the signe of the Cross is a natural profession of our crucified Lord and a suffering Religion and to receive this signe in our foreheads which are the seat of Modesty and Bashfulness is a visible Profession that we are not and will not be ashamed of the Cross. And as this is decent in it self so it contributes to the Gravity and Solemnity of that religious Administration as all awful grave and solemn Ceremonies do If we consider this as the profession of the Person baptised nothing can be more decent at such a time than to confess a crucified Christ under whose command we then lift our selves and our resolution to fight under the Banner of the Cross. If we consider it as the Profession of the Church who by her publick Ministers solemnly owns the Doctrine of the Cross and declares it as the Condition of our Discipleship when she receives any persons into the Communion of the Church is there any thing unbecoming in this Nay can any thing be more comely and decent than upon such solemn occasions to make such a solemn Profession of the Religion of the Cross Thirdly As for the lawfulness of these Ceremonies I think there is no need to prove that after what I have now discoursed for they being nothing else but the visible Exercise or Profession of some Grace or Duty upon fit and solemn occasions they cannot be unlawful unless the external Acts and visible Profession of a known Duty can be unlawful If it is our duty to make a publick Profession of our Faith in a crucified Saviour no time can be more proper for such a Profession than the time of our Baptism no signe can more naturally signifie this Profession than the signe of the Cross. Now I would gladly hear a wise reason why it should be unlawful to make such a Profession as this at our Baptism or unlawful to do it by signs as well as words I would desire to know why we may not profess our Faith in a crucified Saviour by the signe of the Cross as innocently and decently as make our Appeals to God in an Oath by laying our hand upon the Bible and kissing it Nay I would desire to know why the Church may not as well receive men into her Communion with the signe

them from Communion whom God will receive So that the poor Church of England must receive Papists into her Communion as well as the Phanaticks where we must observe the Charity is Bishop Sanderson's the Inference and Application the Reconciler's III. His next Argument is from one great purpose of Christ's Advent and the effusion of his precious bloud to make both Iew and Gentile one by breaking down the middle wall of partition that was between them and abolishing the Law of Commandments contained in Ordinances Now the conceit of it is this He supposes the Ceremonies of the Church of England to be such a Partition-wall between Conformists and Nonconformists as the Mosaical Law was between Jews and Gentiles and therefore as Christ has broken down one Partition-wall and made Jew and Gentile one Church so our Governours ought to break down the other Partition-wall to make Conformists and Nonconformists one Body and Church which is such a dull conceit and argues such stupid ignorance in the Mysteries of Christianity that I do not wonder he is so zealous an Advocate for Ignorance and Errour The Partition-wall is an Allusion to that Partition in the Temple which divided the Court where the Jews worshipped from the Court of the Gentiles and that which made this Partition was Gods Covenant with Abraham when he chose his carnal Seed and Posterity for his peculiar People and separated them from the rest of the World and the more effectually to separate them from other Nations gave them a peculiar Law which was to last as long as this distinction did For God did not intend for ever to confine his Church to one Nation but when the promised Messias came to enlarge the borders of his Church to all mankind And therefore this Law was so contrived as to typifie the Messias and to receive its full completion in the perfect Sacrifice and Expiation of his Death which put an end to the former Dispensation and sealed a Covenant of Grace and Mercy with all mankind Thus Christ by his death broke down the Partition-wall because he put an end to the Mosaical Covenant which was made onely with the Jews and to that external and ●ypical Religion which was peculiar to the Mosaical Dispensation and made a distinction and separation between Jew and Gentile that is as Christ made a Covenant now with all mankind so he put an end to all marks of distinction between Jew and Gentile and to that typical and ceremonial Worship which was peculiar to the Jews as a distinct and separate People Now indeed any such Partition-wall as this which confines the Covenant and Promises of God to any particular People or Nation and excludes all others is directly contrary to the end and designe of Christs death and ought immediately to be pulled down but must there therefore be no Partion to distinguish between the Church of Christ and Infidels and Hereticks and Schismaticks Must there be no Walls and Fences about the Church this Vineyard and Fold of Christ Must there be no Laws made for the government of Religious Assemblies and the Decency and Order of Christian Worship for fear of keeping those out of the Church who will not be orderly in it How come the Ceremonies of our Church to be a Wall of partition the Church never made them so for she onely designed them for Rules and decent Circumstances of Worship which it is her duty to take care of Let those then who set up this Wall of partition pull it down again that is let those who separate from the Church and make these Ceremonies a Wall of partition return to the Communion of the Church which no body keeps them from but themselves As for his modest insinuations that our Ceremonies are carnal Ordinances weak and beggarly Elements and therefore ought to be removed for their weakness and unprofitableness as the Mosaick Ceremonies were I have already largely shewn the difference between a Ritual and Ceremonial Religion and those Ceremonies which are for the Decency of Religious Worship which are as necessary and must continue as long as External Worship which requires external Signs of Decency and Honour does IV. His next Motive to Condescension is from the Example of Christ and his Apostles in preaching the Gospel which in short is this That when Christ was on Earth he did not instruct his Disciples in such Doctrines as they were not capable of understanding till after his Resurrection and therefore left the revelation of such matters to the Ministry of his Holy Spirit whom after his Ascension into Heaven he sent to them And the Apostles when they converted Jews and Gentiles to the Faith of Christ did not immediately tell them all that was to be known and believed but instructed them in the plainest matters first and allowed some time to wear off their Jewish and Pagan prejudices therefore the Governours of the Church should forbear imposing of some practices at which our Flocks by reason of their prejudice and weakness will be apt to stumble and take offence But how this follows I confess I cannot understand if it proves any thing it proves that the Governours of the Church must not instruct their People in any thing which they are not willing to learn that our Reconciler should never have published his second part to convince Dissenters that they may lawfully and therefore in duty ought to conform to the Ceremonies of the Church when they are imposed for if notwithstanding the Example of our Saviour and his Apostles we may instruct our People in such things we may require their obedience too otherwise we had as good never instruct them But did Christ and his Apostles then intend that Christians should be always children Did not St. Paul testifie that he had declared the whole Will of God to them And when the Gospel has been fully published to the World for above sixteen hundred years must the Church return again to her state of infancy and childhood to humour Diss●nters But indeed is the duty of obedience to Governours in all things which Christ has not forbid such a sublime and mysterious Doctrine that it ought to be concealed as too difficult to be understood Is it not a pretty way of reasoning that Euclid's Elements is too difficult a book for a young child to learn therefore his Master must not teach him to ob●y his Parents neither I am sure this was one of the first Lessons which the Apostles taught their Disciples whatever else they concealed from them for there can be no Church founded without Government and there can be no Government where Subjects must not be taught Obedience But however there is a great difference between the first publication of any Doctrine and the preaching of it after it is published The first requires great prudence in the choice of a fit time to do it in and of fit persons to communicate it to which was the case of Christ and his