Selected quad for the lemma: lord_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
lord_n	aaron_n	bless_v	help_n	1,277	4	9.7756	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A96831	Beaten oyle for the lamps of the sanctuarie; or The great controversie concerning set prayers and our liturgie, examined in an epistle to a private friend: with an appendix that answers the paralell, and the most materiall objections of others against it. Unto which are added some usefull observations touching Christian libertie, and things indifferent.	Womock, Laurence, 1612-1685.	1641 (1641)	Wing W3338; Thomason E163_14; ESTC R4346	40,803	77

ancient Twelue they are a Iury will condemne you But surely you have of late abridged your faith omitted the Communion of Saints or else you professe to beleeue more then you can find in your heart to practise If your heart and tongue confesse this branch of faith why doe your works deny it He is not well affected to the inward communion that separates from the outward when it may be held with a safe conscience Open and vnanimous profession hath beene the holy ostentation of Gods true Worshipers I am sure you will not embrace Rome for you know too well that were to seeke fellowship with unfruitfull workes of darknesse whether will you goe you will not communicate with us yet you are afraid to renounce us Me thinks you multiply their number whose humour will neither let them goe to Church nor be at home For you are gone out from us and yet you will be of us Revel 12. Had the Dragon stirred up persecution and driven your mother into the wildernesse or into woods when she was in travell with you you might have pluckt some figge-leaves there to excuse your invisibility If you be a member of our Church as you professe your selfe why must you be concealed The secrecie and sheltring of parts 1 Cor. 12.23 is in Saint Paul's opinion an argument of their vncomlinesse as well as a signe of modestie Doe not thinke you may be betrothed to Christ in a wedding garment of your owne fashioning Clandestine contracts are not fit for Christs Spouse Iohn 18.20 and therefore 't was long ere the Church did admit of private Baptisme and still private Eucharists are rejected where publike ones may be administred by the Orthodoxall Churches * Aditus missis privatis est patefactus quae excommunicationem quandam magis referrent quam communitatem illan● à Domino institutam Calvin Inst lib. 4. cap. 18. § 7. A devout soule may discourse with Christ and Christ may make love to her in private but when he concludes the match hee will have the contract published and his wedding celebrated with a solemne visibility But I perceive where the shooe pinches you 'T is our set Liturgy that is offensive because you thinke it bereaves you of your Christian liberty Is it so I am sorry that thred-bare cloake worne for colour sake is so much in fashion Had the primitive Christians that lived under the iron Age of persecution had they had such formes prescrib'd them under a command of exact obedience doubtlesse they would not have complain'd against them as pressures upon their libertie but have construed them as happy licenses for the exercise of their Religion They would have kist those hands of Authority that had thus restrained them and worne such chaines about their neckes with a cherefull fredome I would we had as much of their Zeale as they wanted of this our happy Libertie Your quarrell to set prayers and to our liturgy in particular is but the same which St. Peter had to the sheet which was let downe from heaven to him viz. because you thinke it brings you things common and uncleane I wish this discourse may bee as a voice from heaven to awaken you out of that fond distemper that you may arise and eate If you doe not yet I am perswaded our devotions will bee received vp in this vessell into heaven I know you have not so resigned vp your reason to this opinion but still you have reserv'd to your selfe a power to desert it when you see it overthrowne upon faire grounds If not you will manifest by effect that only for an opinion of libertie you have altogether quitted the freedom of your judgement Halt no longer betweene two opinions be something either fish or flesh and live wholly on the land or in the water Hazard not your selfe alone in that new found way you treavell in Either returne to us or make me your Proselite to beare you company I 'le assure you I am loath to leave you though you make a light matter of it to forsake a Church I am contented to goe along if you can assure me I shall have Gods speed with me But if you cannot passe that assurance to another I doubt you have not obtaind it fully for your selfe and if it be so I should thinke it paines well bestowed if I could make my selfe an instrument of your diversion For which purpose I have here sent you certaine considerations that may happily prove a Remora to your ship and cause you to sound a retreat and returne to your former station The Considerations are these I come into no house but I meet with a Manuell of devotions a poesie of godly prayers Helps to devotion and the like And I conceiue this is like a Passeover-marke to secure the family from the destroying Angell Did not the Saints that bound up these bundles of Hysop dipt in the blood of the Lambe to besprinkle our soules did they not doe well in it Who doubts it And if it were well done their formes were lawfull and usefull to us I wonder any man can shelter himselfe from such a cloud of witnesses Did they compile these for the use of themselves or others all is one the argument will hold strong for a stinted forme of prayer But we have a more sure word of prophecie to confirme us might Aaron or his sons blesse the people as their owne fancy led them they might not there 's a forme extant of Gods own prescription and a strict charge laid upon them to observe it Numb 6.22 c. And the Lord spake unto Moses ther 's the Author Speake vnto Aaron and unto his sonnes saying on this wise yee shall blesse the children of Israel saying vnto them then comes the forme The Lord blesse thee and keepe thee The Lord make his face shine vpon thee and be gracious vnto thee The Lord lift up his countenance upon thee and give thee peace When thou commest to the house of God looke to thy foote sayes Solomon Eccles 5.1 2. he drives at our expressions as well as our affections so he unriddles himselfe in the words following Be not rash with thy mouth c. An I am sure they are those upon which our soules doe travell into the hearts of ot ers The Prophet bid the people take words with hem but they may not bee their owne choosers Turne unto the Lord and say thus unto him c. Hosea 14.2 If we take the wings of our thoughts and ascend to the Church Triumphant we shall find that those burning lamps of zeale the blessed Angels of God never ring those changes in their devotions They have a perfect knowledge and large hearts to expresse their thankfulnes to their maker Exod. 15.1 and yet they thinke it no disparagement to sing a song of Moses setting while hee lived this in valley of teares Revel 15.3 * In the margin of Bibles That song spoken

like others of the Saints of God why should you except this chaine The Gospell will admit of some compulsion Luke 4.23 and nothing but obedience can exempt you from it a Gal 5.23 Outward obligations doe not violate our inward freedome Spiritualis libertas cum politica servitute optimè stare potest Calv. Instit l. 4. c. 20. §. 1. The Law is not made for the righteous There is freedome indeed in in Christ What no law therefore no Commandement Yes but 't is not grievo s and therfore can consist with liberty There is a constraint of love as well as of Authority 2 Cor. 5.14 And yet you know that affection doth not so arrest the will but baile is ever put in that preserves the freedome of her working St. Paul saith Let all things be done to edification Let all things be done decently and in b Necesse est ut in domo deiomnia ordine fiant cujus ordinis vna quidem est vniversalis ratio ex verbo Dei petenda sed non vna et eadem forma quibusvis circumstanitis conveniens Beza Confes fidei cap. 5. §. 17. order These generall rules bind you to every particular that the church enjoyne when those ends he prescribes and no other are directly aimed at though the things so ordered be indifferent in their owne nature else why is the Apostles charge so peremptory and imperative let it be done saith he without contradiction without scruple He is no obedient Son of the Church who contemnes that Motherly Authority wherewith Christ and his Apostles have invested her And therefore the Apostle who upon just grounds contended most sharpely for his priviledges obtain'd by Christ yet even he seemes to chide and controll this tempest that you have raised and to becalme that Sea that growes too boisterous to be confined within those limits that are appointed for it Hath Christ made us free then we are free indeed but let us not use our libertie saith the Apostle for an occasion to the flesh Gal. 5.13 c Quae in altis libertas est in alijs 〈◊〉 vocatur Quintilian Nam fi●●i potest dum sector carnis libertatem utt● cidam in duram servitutem qua ventris g●●● aut libidints prauarumque effectionais meipsum mancipium abjectissimum faciam Pet. Mart loc com clas 3 Ca. 5. §. 6. et p●u lo post Cavendi sunt in terim affectus ne illis nos ipsos subijciamus Some have reckoned fornication amongst things indifferent whom the Apostle confutes 1 Cor. 6.13 Much lesse for a cloake of maliciousnesse 1 Pet. 2.16 Least by any meanes it become a stumbling blocke to them that are weake 1 Cor. 8 9. Here by the way give me leave to note thus much concerning Christian liberty and weakenes They were in those dayes things inconsistent and in such opposition that they did even mutually expell each other but now they are become termini convertibiles and of so neer a relation that this weakenes is made the exegesis or explication of that libertie Those which were well acquainted with the nature of this happy freedome that knew from what thraldome Christ had vindicated and unto what glorious prerogatives he had restored them those were never scandalized d Non enim offendentur si fortes fucrint Pet Mart. loc com clos 3. c 5. §. 6. at the use or omission of any thing indifferent they were not apt to take though they might vnadvisedly stretch the line of their liberty beyond that which was expedient and give offence to others as it appeares 1 Cor. 8.7.9 unto the end and in other places e Rom. 14. per totum This infirmitie in those dayes proceeded from want of knowledge Ignorance I confesse was the mother of that fraile devotion But now Christian liberty is become the mother and knowledge the very midwife to this weakenesse And they that would bee the most knowing thinke they cannot maintaine the great Charter of priviledges which Christ hath left us unlesse they pretend to be wheeled with the Bias of a weake and tender conscience we have a saying that if a horse knew his owne strength he would never be tamed I am sure to make the knowledge of our Christian liberty * Consequitur cum abuti christianae libertatis bereficio qui vel suis magistratibus vel prepositis suis sponte non paret vomino Beza Epist 24 ad pereg Eccles in Angliae fratres Pij autem hominis est cogitare sibi liberam in rebus externis potestatemideo esse concessam quo sit ad omnia charitatis officia expeditior Calvin Instit lib. 3.6.19 §. 12. a meanes to abuse it is too much to resemble the horse and mule that have no understanding whose mouth must bee held with bit and bridle I confesse I cannot thinke that the things which God hath left indifferent to us can though arm'd with mans Authority shed a perpendicular influence into our consciences neither can I like to have them urged under an Anathema as if their omission were a demerit in Gods construction that makes us liable to damnation yet I know the Church hath a power which is not to be contemned to appoint such things as tend to the outward decent and orderly frame of policie 'T is the Apostles charge Gal. 5.1 Stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free but Christ hath not purchased our immunitie from every ordinance of man they are still in force and therefore Wee must submit for the Lords sake 1 Pet. 2.13 and if so in things civill why not in things appointed for the advancement of the Lords glory No man doubts of the Magistrates power to enjoyne a fast except those by whom magistracy it selfe is denyed and a fast is cultus divini adminiculum an appendix yea an assistance to Gods worship and why may not other helps to devotion as formes of prayer are be impos'd upon us That Religion which allowes them to be enjoyned commands them to be observed If we were to take the Character of those weake ones in the New Testament which are fenced in with a hedge of Apostolicall precepts lest they should be wounded with scandall about things indifferent wee should find no indulgence given none demanded for an omission or relaxtion for the freedome to use or not to vse things prescribed for order for decency for edification in the Christian Church Their weakenesse enclind them to the other hand of supererrogation if I may so call the practice of that Ceremoniall Law which was dead and buried with our Saviour Their weaknesse was that they desired still to walke in a vaine shadow and therefore vaine because now the sun himselfe had appeared in his meredian brightnesse These were those that are borne up by the hands of the Apostles lest they should dash their feet against any stone of scandall as it appeareth in the quotations in the margin * Rom. 14. 1 Cor. 8.7.9 Gal.