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A55106 Popery and hypocrisy detected and opened from the Holy Scriptures as it respects magistrates, ministers, and people. In a sermon upon the occasion of a general fast, kept Decemb. 22. 1680. By the author of the Plotters doom, a true son of the Church of England. Palmer, Samuel, d. 1724. 1680 (1680) Wing P252; ESTC R217473 30,180 38

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Popery and Hypocrisy Detected and Opened FROM THE HOLY SCRIPTURES As it respects Magistrates Ministers and People IN A SERMON Upon the Occasion of A General Fast Kept Decemb. 22. 1680. By the Author of the Plotters Doom A True Son of the Church of England LONDON Printed for Richard Janeway in Queens-Head-Alley in Pater-Noster Row 1680. A Fast-Sermon Upon JOEL II. 13. Rent your Heart and not your Garments and turn unto the Lord your God BY the Commands of God and the Government we are here assembled to celebrate a Fast and I have chosen this Text as suitable to the Occasion because it instructs us how to perform our Duty herein both acceptably unto God and profitably unto our selves without which our present Fasting and all our Religious Performances are but a meer mocking of the Almighty and putting a Cheat upon our own Souls I shall not insist on the Context any farther then to give you a general scope of this Prophecy that you may see how this Command in the Text to rent our Heart and not our Garments doth arise The Prophet foreseeing sundry Judgments of God impending and ready to fall on this drousie stupid sottish People calls on them to awake Awake ye Drunkards Chap. 1.5 and weep and howl all ye drinkers of Wine And when he hath thus awakened them he gives them such a dreadful description of those Judgments that the Lord was a bringing on their Land that he declares the very Earth shall quake before them nay the Heavens themselves shall tremble at them in the 10th verse of this Chapter and certainly they must be notable Judgments that makes both Heaven and Earth to quake and tremble at them You read in many places such Judgments threatned that the Earth should tremble at them but here are such Judgments as shall make the Earth and Heavens too to tremble Well therefore might the Prophet after this amazing description of this great and terrible day of Judgment which he denounced was coming on them ask this question Who was able to abide it vers 11. For if the Earth quake and the Heavens tremble at it 't is no marvel that the Sinners in Zion are afraid and that fearfulness surprizeth the Hypocrites as Isaiah expresseth it Isa 33.14 The Prophet having thus declared the greatness and terribleness of their approaching Doom proposeth to them the one and onely way to prevent it and that is Repentance One branch of which Proposition is this of my Text for the whole runs thus Therefore also now saith the Lord Turn ye even to me with all your heart and with fasting and with weeping and with mourning vers 12. and rent your heart and not your Garments as here in the Text. To which thus briesly I have brought you and given you the occasion of these words Rent your Heart and not your Garments Which before I handle I must crave leave to give you these following Remarks upon the Context 1. That the Almighty seldom or never strikes a Nation with his Judgments but he gives them first a Warning of it 2. That the Warnings that God gives a Nation of his approaching Judgments ought to rouz and awaken them to their Duty 3. That nothing can avert Gods Judgments on a Nation for their Sins but Repentance 4. That it hath ever been the wont and practice of the true Prophets and faithful Ministers of God to preach forgiveness of Sins and aversion of Judgments upon no other terms but Repentance onely And now I proceed with the Text Rent your heart and not your Garments and turn unto the Lord your God Wherein you have these three particulars Two Duties enjoyned And One Practice forbidden The two Duties enjoyned are these 1. Rent your Heart 2. Turn unto the Lord your God The Practice forbidden is That they should not rent their Garments The whole Text is but a figurative Expression for it was a Custom amongst the Jews upon the hearing of any sad disaster that either had or was like to happen upon their Nation in general or upon their Families or themselves in particular to rent their Garments So upon the sight of Joseph's Coat the Patriark Jacob rent his Cloaths Gen. 37.34 through an apprehension that his Son was destroyed and so you sind King Hezekiah upon that invective and menacing Speech of Rabsheka rent his Cloaths Isa 37.1 Likewise Ezra upon hearing the enormous behaviour of the People rent his Garments and his Mantle Ezra 9.3 And you read that Tamar King David's Daughter being ravished by her Brother Amnon rent her Garment of divers colours 2 Sam. 13.19 But this external sign of Sorrow grew at length so into meer custom and formality that it signified no more the sence of their minds then our common wearing of Mourning does And therefore God that did accept it while there was any thing in it now it was grown to be a Ceremony only would have none of it but expresly forbids it saying Rent your heart and n●t your Garments As if the Lord should say Come don't ye think to cheat me with your pitiful feigned and formal Repentance of renting your Garments and tearing your Cloaths while you keep your sins whole But instead of all this ado of renting your Garments rent your Hearts 'T is not your Cloaths 't is your Wickedness and your Corruptions that I would have you rent off from you Wherefore rent your Hearts the Seat and Fountain of all your guilt and don 't ye think that the tearing your Coats shall explate your Sins or make an amends for your breaking my Commands and the defiling your own Consciences Wherefore the Text affords us this Proposition That true Repentance and such as is acceptable to God consists not in any formal exterior Observations but in the renting off of Sin from the Heart The terms of this Proposition are so plain that they need no explanation for the known and common acceptation of Repentance is the best that It is an Aversion from Sin and a Conversion to God And by formal and exterior Observations is meant such Religious Performances as Custom and Tradition not Divine Injunction hath deliver'd to and imposed upon us And therefore I proceed to the proof of the Proposition which is two-fold 1. Negative That true Repentance and such as is acceptable to God consists not in any formal outward Observations 2. Positive That it doth consist in renting off Sin from the heart But I doubt I shall not be able in this present opportunity to reach unto this second head of our Proposition Wherefore to the first or negative part thereof 1. That true Repentance and such as is acceptable unto God consists not in any formal exterior Observations For the proof of this part of the Proposition take ye the Pharisees who certainly were the greatest Sticklers for and Promoters of such Observations of any Generation of men that ever you read of either in sacred Writ or in prophane for they were so eaten
they are certainly right and well set for God but if to formality ceremony and exterior observations they are most assuredly wrong how right soever you may think them to be Secondly Examine and see how your will is inclined and this both to your selves and towards others First To your selves you see the will of God both negatively and affirmatively both in what you should and what you should not do herein that you should rent your hearts and that you should not rent your garments Examine then whether your wills be not cross and averse to this will of God that though God hath bid you rent your hearts and not your garments yet you will rent your garments and not your hearts you will be for formal and exterior observations rather than for that unfeigned repentance that is acceptable unto God It is said Psal 40.8 I delight to do thy will O God Examine then whether your will takes up a delight to be conformable to the will of God you pray every day Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven search therefore your own souls and see whether your will and heart be in that petition or whether you say it only by rote and custom if your will be well inclined to it then you will conform to the will of God here in the Text and not set up your posts against Gods posts nor your will against Gods will as you certainly do if you are for renting the garments before renting the heart and for formal observances before true and spiritual Worship Many a time in the Gospel you find our Lord answering supplicants Thus be it unto thee according as thou wilt O examine then your wills how they stand inclined for if they are not bent to God it were mercy to you if you miss'd your own wills So Saul found it before his conversion he would needs be going to Damascus while he was breathing out blood and cruelty to persecute the poor Christians there also but Almighty mercy prevented and made him miss his will in Acts 9. Among the many offerings which were in the time of the Law there was one which was called a free will-offering to which the Psalmist alludes Psal 119.108 Accept I beseech thee says he the free will offerings of my mouth O Lord and this offering above all the offerings seems to be most acceptable unto God it was purely voluntary because unconstrained therefore towards the place for the first publick Worship you find the people so liberal in this offering that Moses was fain to restrain them from offering any more Exod. 36.6 Now examine your selves whether your wills are thus bent for God whether you voluntarily and without any reluctancy or constraint so close with this holy pleasure and command of God nor to busie your selves about the many things of renting your garments and keeping a bustle about the formal ceremonious outward modes of Worship but have your wills taken up and wholly inclined to the one and only thing necessary the renting of your heart and if upon a thorow search you find your wills thus well inclined to your selves Then Secondly examine how they stand as to others for many are for that for themselves which they would deny to others they would be free themselves in their Worship but they would put a force on others Examine therefore how your wills stand inclined in this particular are you willing to give another the same measure that you would have meeted to you again do you love your neighbour as your self and are willing that he should rent his heart and worship God according to the perswasion of his Conscience though he do not rent his garments nor perform those formal and exteriour observations that you do as you your selves are willing to worship God according to the perswasion of your own Conscience are you willing to maintain the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace agreeable to that great exhortation Eph. 4.3 Or do your wills incline you to break all the bonds and tyes of unity love and peace which God and Nature have laid upon you because your neighbour doth not rent his garments and perform such formal and exteriour observations as you would have him In Mat. 13.14 our Lord put forth a Parable of a man which sowed wheat or good seed in his field and in the 25th an enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat in the 26th vers the tares appeared in the 27th vers the Ministers or servants tell their master of it in the 28th vers they ask the Master leave to root them out Wilt thou say they that we go and gather them up For they were willing to the work had he been so But now pray observe their masters answer and the reason thereof in the 29th vers But he said nay lest while ye gather up the tares ye root up also the wheat with them And in the 30th vers ye have the Masters express command Let both grow together until the harvest and this harvest our Lord himself tells you in the explanation of this Parable is the end of the world vers 39. And it is well we have our Masters mind in this matter for else here would be mad work in the world for you see that the very Ministers are for rooting up and pray whether would this go and where would be an end of it for we reckon the Dissenters tares and we would be a rooting up of them then the Papists reckon us the tares and they would be rooting out of us And 't is well if the Turk do not reckon both them and us all tares and would be a rooting up both them and us and the whole Christian name for tares So that all the bonds not only of Christianity would be broken but those of common society also Therefore try your wills by this command of your Masters for admit the Dissenters were tares which without a notorious breach of Christian charity you can never judg them to be for truly bate but their not renting their garments their conformity to a few formal and exterior Ceremonies they give as good an evidence that they are wheat and good grain as the best of us can do but I say admit they were yet here is the will and mind of your Lord concerning them and do you think that he did not know what was most fit and properest to be done in the field of his Church The Ministers you see then and I do not perceive that they have altered their temper yet were eager and hot to root them up Wilt thou say they that we go and gather them up Nay says our Lord lest while ye gather up the tares ye root up the wheat also He knew whither that zeal would tend and that though it pretended to root up none but tares yet it would fall upon the wheat too and therefore gives them a positive command to let them both grow together until the harvest Wherefore do you find your wills seconding the will of God in this command Or have you a rising of heart against it Examine well the matter for if your wills conform not to the will of Christ your Master even in this particular whatever opinion you may have of your selves you are the worst Nonconformists that the Church hath in it for your Nonconformity is of a cruel and a bloody nature and such as would make the Church a Shambles You see what work the Inquisition hath made in the world and all those murders and mischiefs that it hath committed have been perpetrated under the pretence of plucking up of tares Make a thorough inquiry therefore into your hearts and search the most inward recesses of your souls how the inclinations of your wills are in this point lest you also fulfill that dreadful Prophecy of our Saviour Of setting a man at variance against his father and the daughter against her mother and the daughter in law against her mother in law and make a mans fees to be those of his own houshold Mat. 10.35 36. And lest under the pretence of Law you break all the Laws of God Nature Duty and Relation to the observance of which you are so strictly injoined But if you find your wills inclined to answer the will of Christ and will use no other force than Gospel arguments and an upright conversation to convert and turn the Tares to be good seed and are willing that others should live quietly that rent their hearts though they do not conform to such renting of the garments to such exterior forms and Ceremonies as you practice then have we ground to believe that God will accept us and turn away that deluge of wrath which threatens our King our Church our Princes our Nobles and all ranks degrees and orders of men in the Land for the aversion of which we do solemnize this day and which God of his insinite mercy grant for his dear Sons sake our Lord Jesus Christ Amen FINIS