Reflection our Love to God the same divine Love returning back again to its Original and carrying our Hearts along with it as the Beam or heat of the Sun reflected and cast back from the Wall towards the Sun again Thirdly There is Love in the Rebound in the Out-spreadings and Over-flowings of it upon al the Saints first upon al Mankind and upon al the Creatures according to its due proportions A Saint dwels in this Love as an Island in a Sea He sees all things coming to him as Merchandise conveyed to him over this Sea of Love All his way of commerce with all is by this Sea of Love Nay more a Beleever dwels in the Fountain of this Love in the Heart of God and this is his own Fountain from whence his streams of Love go abroad into the Streets Now he that thus dwelleth in Love as St. John saith dwelleth in God What Life what Blessings doth he enjoy who hath God for his dwelling place Where the Holy man saith in the Psalms That He had fainted if He had not hoped to have seen the Goodness of God in the Land of the Living some Divines both Jewish and Christian understand there God to be that Land of the Living There is a Scripture not unsuitable to this Exposition Esa 61.11 As the Earth bringeth forth her bud and as the Garden causeth the things that are sowen in it to spring forth so the Lord God wil cause Righteousness and Praise to spring up before all the Nations Hear this al you that have chosen Christ you that groan under the burden of Sin you that are hitherto in your Sins God invites you all to the Riches of his free Grace He cals aloud to you allures compels you to turn to the Habitation of his free Grace to dwel in Love that Love which makes him All Love to you which will make you All Love to Him and to every thing that bears any Image or Mark of Him Now consider the Encouragement Say not I am unworthy of this Love I am uncapable of it I shal be unfruitful uncomfortable under it For if once thou comest to dwel in this Love thou dwellest in God who is that Earth that Garden which hath the Seeds of al Righteousness Truth Holiness Consolation Joy Glory sowen in himself and will make them to bud and spring forth in thee before thine own Eyes and before all the Nations What Establishment of all Blessings hath he who dwelling in Love dwels in God He hath a City which hath a Foundation even the Rock of Ages for a Foundation to it Thus much for the Proof and Opening of the Point VSE 1. The first Vse which I intend of this point is for Conviction If the Lord have there ordained Blessings and Establishment of Blessings where the People of God dwel together in Vnity let then the People of God in the midst of us be convinced of the Evill of their Divisions so as to mourn over them to repent of them and to endeavor every one in his own heart place an amendment Esa 7.9 God tels the Jews If ye wil not beleeve surely ye shal not be established You may as wel read it according to the Hebrew It is because ye shal not be established This was spoken to Judah when Syria and Ephraim had taken evill Counsel against it saying Let us go up and vex it and make a breach in it v. 6. The same God now cries aloud in the midst of us that If we wil not beleeve and love one another surely we shall not be established If all intreaty perswasions commands chastenings sufferings wil not bring us to love one another surely it is because it is in the Design and Counsel of the Lord that we shal not be established I shal divide this Vse into Two Heads First I shal shew you Why we should mourn over our Divisions Secondly I shal set before you What those things are in our Divisions over which we are to mourn The first Head First I shal shew you several Reasons Why we should repent of our want of Vnity and our manifold great breaches of Charity Reason 1. It was the Dying Charge of our Lord Jesus that we love one another In these dying Discourses which our Lord Jesus had with his Disciples upon the administring of his Body and Blood to them in the Sacrament immediately before his Sufferings he giveth them this Command with a peculiar and strong impression upon it John 13.34 A new Commandement I give unto you that ye love one another then he doubles the Command with a Reason and a Rule annexed to it as I have loved you that ye also love one another You have it again urged in such a manner as if this were the only Command which their Savior left with them as if this Command were peculiarly his own coming from his Heart as having its Root there and having his Heart in it as Living and joying after an especial manner in it Joh. 15.12 This is my Commandment in the same sence in which before he had said A new Commandment that ye love one another as I have loved you Greater love than this hath no man that a man lay down his life for his Friend How strongly doth our Saviour press this Command of love How high doth he wind it up Yet a fourth time we have it so brought in as if al the Discourses of Christ his Truths and his Commands were aimed at this as the End of all and wrapt up in this as the Perfection of all John 15.17 These things I command ye that ye love one another St. Paul tels us in his Epistle to the Hebrews if it be his that a mans Testament no man disanuls and he signifies the reason in saying that every Testament is confirmed by the Death of the Testator This is the Testament and last Will of our Lord Jesus confirmed and sealed to us by his most precious Blood and Death that we love one another What griefe what a shame ought it to be to us that while we hate one another in our Hearts revile one another with our Tongues with our Hands are active with our Feet are swift Oh the horror of it to shed the Blood one of another we do with those Hearts Tongues Hands Feet which have their Life by the Death of Christ disanul and make void that Death of his go diriectly contrary to the end of it offer despight to trample upon his Heart-blood as a common thing as weak and worthless Reason 2. The Lord himself makes this a Mark and Character of his Disciples that they love one another John 13.35 By this shal all men know that ye are my Disciples if ye love one another Have we the Mark of Christ and of the Lamb which is Love or rather the Mark of the Beast and of Antichrist upon our Hearts Foreheads and Hands by our Babel-Confusions Divisions and Enmities Are we the Brood
greatest Abomination to him He that sows Discord among Brethren Prov. 6.15 This is a Scarlet and Crimson sin indeed What can make it white This covers the Soul all over with Spots of Blood Blood drop'd from the Hearts of thousands of men of many Excellent and precious Persons one of whom was worth ten thousand as was said of David What shall wash out these spots It is only the Blood of God which can wash out these bloody spots and make these Crimson sins white So far as any of us find any of this guilt upon himself let him take up this Lamentation and say I am guilty of the Blood of all these and I whether shal I cause my guilt to go where shall I make my shame to hide it self Go thy waies to the Cross of Christ Let thy Spirituall mournings formed in thee by a Spirit of Faith be as Nails to fasten thee and thy Shame to the Cross with the dead body of the Lord Jesus Go thy waies to the Grave of thy Savior to his Blood to his Spirit Bury thy self and thy guilt together with Christ in his Grave wash in the Laver of his Blood cast thy self into the Fountain of his Spirit So come forth a New man without Spot through the Resurrection of the Lord from the Dead Now contribute to the asswaging of these flames by Rivers of living waters flowing forth from the Fountains of the Holy Ghost opened within thee When Peter had denied Christ with Oaths and Curses Jesus looked upon him and he went out and wept bitterly When Jesus was risen from the Dead his chief care was of Peter At his first appearance Go saith he tel my Disciples and Peter Let our Lord Jesus look forth with a ful Eye of free Grace upon us So shall he open and awaken a Spiritual Eye in us to see how we have with Cursings denied and divided one from another that is from Him in each other Then shal we go into our several retirements and weep over our Breaches Then shal we come forth and in our Exaltations have the most earning bowels towards our most delinquent and dejected Brethren that when we are raised we may raise them also Thus much for the first Vse of Conviction VSE 2. Exhortation Let us study and endeavor the uniting of the People of God The Glory of Christ consists in this that He is a Mediator and a Reconciler His Father loves him for this that he delights to lay down his life to this end to break down the Partition-wal to blot out the Hand-writing of Ordinances to reconcile God to men Men to Men. Let us in this be followers of the Lord Jesus in making it our Joy Glory in thinking it worth the parting with our dearest Enjoyments Estates and Lives to break down the Partition-walls between the Saints and recoucile them one to another We read in the Prophet Esay of those who are called The makers up of Breaches the Builders up of the wast places of old What wast places what Desolations have there been of many yeers in Church and State which have all arisen from our Breaches When a Generation of men shall arise who shal make it their work to be The Makers up of Breaches these alone wil prove the Builders up of the wast places of old I shal humbly offer to the Daughter of my people three Waies of making up our Breaches and of uniting us The first Way Exalt Jesus Christ as the Head of the Vnion Cant. 6. The Church of Christ is twice said to be Terrible as an Army with Banners verse 4. and ver 10. When Beleevers are united in one Compact and Harmonious Body as an Army they are a strength to themselves and a Terror to all their Enemies Invisible or visible But then they must have Banners unto which they must be gathered and under which they may be united What are these Banners The Name of God that is the Manifestation of God in the face of Christ Psal 20.5 Christ himself figured out Psal 60.4 The Love of Christ Cant. 2.4 These are the Banners under which the Saints are formed into one Body as an Heavenly Host But who shall be the Standard-bearer to display these Banners to lift them up and to hold them forth Canticles 5.10 Jesus Christ is said to be the Chiefest among ten thousand You may in the margent of your Bibles see that it is read according to the Hebrew the Standard bearer among ten thousand The Love of Christ the Truths of Christ the Manifestations of God in Christ the Person of Christ as they are displayed and held forth to us by the Immediate Presence and Appearance of the Lord Jesus in the Spirit these are our Banners and this is the Standard-bearer among the Thousands and ten Thousands of the Saints This is the Head of the Vnion For this you have the Decree of God expresly set down by the Spirit of Prophesie in good old Jacob Gen. 49.10 To him shal the Gathering of the People be that is to Jesus Christ Through the Changes of these times how many Banners have been set up On how many Standard-bearers have we cast our Eyes several Principles and Persons several Opinions in Religion or waies in Worship divers Forms of Governments divers Parties hoping that to these the People would be gathered together But instead of Vnity and Beauty there hath been Burning and a Breach From whence hath this been Hath it not been from hence that this is the Ordinance of God this is the Eternal Decree concerning our Lord Jesus that to Him the Gathering of the People shall be I have known a man who through these Revolutions and houres of Temptation when he hath thought to be clean his own Cloaths have defiled him when he hath wash't himself in the Blood of Christ he hath been again rouled in the miry Pit as Job speaks This man in the nights of his Guilt Shame or Sufferings hath had this Voyce come to the Ears of his Spirit once yea twice he heard it Seek not thine own Things but the Things of Jesus Christ When thine heart is turned entirely to the Lord Jesus the Vail the Darkening Disguising and Dividing Vail shal be taken off This Voyce came to him nor for his sake alone but for yours also and all the Saints John 11.25 Jesus saith to Martha I am the Resurrection and the Life You the Honorable Members of this present High Court of Parliament you also have received Rebukes from the Lord whatever the Counsels of Men have been concerning you A Resurrection is agreed by Philosophers Divines to be a Supernatural Effect the work of an Almighty hand the undeniable Argument of a God Twice have you been scatterred as Dust by the Wind Twice have you been as the Dead Men lying in our Streets Twice hath the Lord by a mighty Voyce which hath rent the Rocks said to you Return again Twice have you been gathered together like scattered
THE TRUE WAY Of Uniting the People of God In These NATIONS Opened in a Sermon Preached in the Chappel at White-Hall Jan. 1. 1659. By PETER STERRY LONDON Printed by Peter Cole Printer and Book-seller at the sign of the Printing-press in Cornhill neer the Royal Exchange 1660. TO THE Christian Reader Christian Reader I Thought not of troubling the Press with this Sermon untill I had that Task imposed upon me by some worthy Persons and Honorable Members of this present Parliament who were Auditors When I have been meditating upon the Works of God with us in these Daies that Scripture hath come into my mind which our Savior propounds to his Apostles as a Cure of their Ambition and a quickening Cordial for their Mutual Love The first shal be last and the last shal be first As the Apothecary beats his rich Spices very a Compositio perfecta per minimas partes smal to the finest pouder then turns them often over from top to bottom from the bottom to the top again that so he may make a perfect mixture of them into one Body Thus the Lord beateth and bruiseth his People in these Nations thus he raiseth up and casteth down he sets them up over the heads he laies them low under the feet of each other by many Changes and Vicissitudes The end of all is that He may hide Pride Ambition and the Love of this World from our Eyes that He may work us through Humility Meekness and Mutual love unto the Unity of the Spirit and the sweet Fellowship of one Mystical Body in our Lord Jesus The little pleasure which I take in as also the little profit which for the most part redounds from Verbal Apologies have made me long silent while thou mayest perhaps have read or heard reported words as having proceeded from me in a publick Sermon which were absolutely untrue both for the form of Expression and the Sense It seems not unfit upon this occasion of appearing in Print nor improper for my present Subject to give thee this Account of my self First It appears to me a very vain thing for any person in this world to determine with an infallible Assurance the state of any person in the next world without a particular infallible and extraordinary Revelation from Heaven in the case which I never pretended to Secondly According to my poor measure of Understanding in the Gospel nothing can more fundamentally subvert the whol Mystery of Christ together with all Evangelical Spiritual Principles and Truths nothing can more directly oppose the Supream Design of the Father the Peace and Comfort of all his Children than to joyn any Creature with our Lord Jesus in the Great Work of his Mediation a principal part whereof his Intercession is the value and Vertue of which Part as of the whol Mediation consists in this That our Lord Jesus our only and ever blessed Mediator and Intercessor is the only true Eternal God of one undivided Essence with the Father and in all things equal to Him I humbly intreat thee Christian Reader to judg of me according to these Maxims and to beleeve that I never did and through Grace hope that I never shall express any thing unsuitable to them But it is good for us to say to all in all Cases as St. Paul saith to the Galatians You have not b Injury is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the privation of some good but the good things of a good man can never be taken from him Maxi. Tyr. injured me I am as you are be you as I am I am as you are I set my soul in your souls stead Be you as I am in the fellowship of the same Grace and Love of the Father in the Unity of the same Spirit through our Lord Jesus in whom I am for his sake Thy Servant PETER STERRY A Sermon Preached in White-Hall Chappel on the Lords day in the afternoon January 1. 1659. Psal 134.3 the latter part of the verse For there the Lord hath commanded the Blessing and Life for evermore THe Subject of this Psalm is the Vnity of Brethren In the first verse you have a Contemplation of the Beauty Profite or Pleasantness of this Unity with a high Admiration Behold how good and how pleasant is is for Brethren to dwell together in Vnity This is illustrated by a double Similitude The first is taken from the precious Oyntment upon the Head that ran down upon the Beard even Aarons Beard that went down to the Skirt of his Garment This costly Oyntment was a figure of the Holy Ghost poured forth upon our Lord Jesus our true high Priest and from him as from the Head running down upon his whole Mystical Body and going down even to the lowest Member of Christ which is but as the Skirt of his Garment This Annoynting makes them all One Spirit and from this unity of the Spirit as from a rich Oyntment goes forth a sweet savor of Love Spiritual Delight and Joy into the Nostrils of God the Father our Lord Jesus the Holy Angels and all the Saints This is the sence of the second verse In the third verse you have the second Similitude borrowed from the Dew of Hermon and that Dew that descends upon the Mountains of Sion As these Hills ow all their freshness and flourishing to the Dew or Rain that comes down from Heaven upon them so doth all the Beauty Pleasantness Fruitfulness of the Saints proceed from the Unity of the Spirit After this comes in the Conclusion of the Psalm which like a ful Close in Musick brings a fulness of Blessings along with it There the Lord hath commanded the Blessing even Life for evermore There that is where Brethren dwel together in Vnity there God hath commanded Blessing the fulness of all blessings which according to the Language of the Jews the Holy Scriptures is wont to be expressed by the single term of Life Together with all this goes the Establishment and Everlastingness of these Blessings Life for evermore It is manifest by what hath been spoken that the Brethren here mentioned are the Brethren of our Lord Jesus the Children of God his Father and their Father For among these Brethren alone is the true Vnity every Unity of every other sort of men being only a Conspiracy and Combination of Enmity and upon the Vnity of these Brethren alone is founded the Everlastingness of Life and Blessing The Doctrine which I shal from these words insist upon is this That God hath there ordained Establishment and a Lastingness of Blessing where his People dwel together in Vnity I shal satisfie my self with one full and clear Scripture for the opening and proving of this point 1. John 4.16 God is Love he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God and God dwelleth in him There is a threefold Love First There is Love in the Fountain which is the Love of God to us the Riches of free Grace Secondly There is Love in the
of the Dove the Holy Spirit or the Seed of the Serpent rather Do we shew our selves Christians or Devils the Children of him who hath his name of Devil and Satan from accusing the Brethren from Slanders and Hatred who was a Murtherer from the Beginning Do not we make our selves Murtherers like him as of the same Seed while we hate one another while we carry Swords and Fire in our Tongues I would they were not in our Hands also to destroy one another How was Jesus Christ Glorified in his Saints of old in the Primitive times when the Heathen cryed out with admiration See these Christians how they love one another But how should our Hears now faint and break with in us to hear the reproaches of al round about us while they cry See the Saints how endlessly they fall out and fight one with another how eagerly they tear one another in pieces for the prey and the spoil Reason 3. We have been joyned together in one common Faith we have Prayed together we have taken sweet advice together in the House of God in the presence of the Lord concerning these things at the beginning of these times The Heathen ever esteemed these things to have eaten of one Bread to have sate at one Hearth and warmed our selves at one Fire to have been partakers of one Table as sacred pledges of an inviolable Friendship Shal then Christians have no respect to these things that they have by their common Faith eaten of one Bread and that Bread the Lord Jesus that they have by their joynt Prayers warmed themselves at the same fires of the Love and Riches of the Father and Christ that they have been partakers in their Counsel and Communion of the same Table yea the same Altar which is Christ risen from the Dead Shall these things be Pledges and Ties of friendship among Christians which have no force no value in them like the Cords with which the Mad men in the Gospell were bound which they broke as fast as they were bound with them returning to their wildness and to converse among the Tombs There is a Mysterious Fable among the Poets of the Teeth of a Serpent which being sown immediately sprung up into armed men that as immediately destroyed one another What fear what confusions what repentings ought to arise out of this Consideration that our Faith Prayers Spiritual Communion should prove such Teeth a Serpentine Seed out of which indeed we are grown up into the strength and Powers of this World like armed men which we presently make use of so soon as we are sprung up into them to our mutual Ruine Reason 4. The Lord Jesus suffers greatly by our Divisions A Wound is described to be a violent separation of the parts of the body one from another Solutio Continui Sickness is the Disagreement of the Humors in the body fighting one with another The neerer any of these Parts or Humors are in place or influence to the Heart the more grievous is the Wound or Sickness While the Members of Jesus Christ which are so neer to his Heart are by the violence of their Divisions separated and torn asunder What Wounds are made upon the Body and Spirit and Heart of the Lord Jesus O! all you that pass by that look on nay that are actors in these things is it nothing to you the grief and pain which Jesus Christ feels The Jews say that their Messias lies sick in Paradise of the wounds which the Children of Israel have given him by their sins Alas how true it is that our Messias our blessed Savior who is our only Paradise while he is indeed in Himself and to Himself an Eternal Paradise yet in the midst of us and by the vertue of his Relation to us lies bleeding sick and dying of the wounds which he receives by our Contentions and Enmity Thus we blast our own Paradise and turn it into a Wilderness If Jesus Christ suffer thus much in us and from us shal we have no bowels no fellow feeling to suffer together with him It was a Heavenly Resolution in that Father who said If my Wife and Children were hanging upon my Arms and Legs if my aged Parents laid their bodies weeping in my way to keep me from going to die for the Testimony of Jesus I would throw away my Wife and Children from me I would go over the aged bodies of my dearest Parents But behold a quite contrary Image of things Jesus Christ hangs upon your Arms and Legs and Hearts he laies his bleeding Body his glorified Person in our way yet we cast him off violently from us we go trampling over him to pierce the bodies spirits one of another Can we cast our eye upon these Bleedings and Breakin gs of the Heart of Christ caused by our Divisions not wish that our heads were Fountains of Water to weep day and night for the Breaches of his People Can we hear him crying out from Heaven as he did to Saul O! all ye Beleevers of England why pierce ye me behold and see if any sorrow any sufferings were ever like unto mine who suffer in you all and for you all Which of you suffers and I am not sick and burn Can we hear this and not let our Weapons fal out of our hands and fal down weeping in the embraces one of another at the Feet of our Lord Jesus If we see not these things which I have urged as Spiritual truths it is because there is very little of the Light of Christ in us If we be not tenderly affected with them it is because we have very little of the Life of Christ Reason 5. Our Divisions keep off Blessings and Establishment from us Yea they multiply our Confusions and consume us Jesus Christ is a precious and sure Corner-stone to whom coming we grow up altogether into one Building to a Temple to the Lord. The Corner Stone unites the parts of the Building and so becomes the strength of it Jesus Christ is first a principle of Unity then of Strength Establishment and Beauty When Unity is gone nothing can come but Deformity Dissolution and Desolation St. Paul warns the Galatians and all us in them that If we bite and devour one another we should take heed that we be not consumed one of another Galat. 5.15 Let us not deceive our selves by thinking that we are the stronger party and may safely bite or devour the weaker The Spirit of God cleerly signifies the danger of being al of us strong and weak mutually consumed by one another if we bite and devour one another Wo unto us that instead of being as a faggot whose band is entire the least stick whereof cannot be broken by reason of the united strength of the whole we have a fire kindled upon us which hath burnt our Band that we consume the faster while every one by his own Heat not only consumes himself but encreaseth the flame in all the rest
and hastens the end of all But besides this Solomon hath a Proverb which I humbly pray that it prove not a Prophesie concerning us The Beginning of strife is as the letting out of Waters I know the common interpretation of this Scripture yet may I without wresting apply it to this sence also The People of God in these nations are as a little Medow encompassed on every side with a stormy Sea of raging Spirits at home and abroad The only Sea-wall that defends this Meadow from these multitudes of waters roaring round about it is the Unity of these Brethren in one Spirit If the least breach be in this our Sea-wall and not suddenly made up How will that Sea of domestick Enemies and foraign Nations break in with its waves foaming and roaring upon us untill it have overwhelmed us so that our place shall know us no more To conclude this first part of my Vse God promiseth by Zachariah to pour out upon his Children a Spirit of Grace that they shal see him whom they have pierced and mourn over him O! that the Lord would at this day fulfil this Scripture in the midst of these Nations that he would pour forth upon al the Members of Christ in England Scotland and Ireland such an Enlightning Spirit such a Melting Spirit of Grace that they may see whom they have pierced even their own Heart their own Life the Lord Jesus in their own Bosomes and in the Bosomes of their Brethren while they pierce one another that they may see how they pour Coals of fire rak't from Hel below upon the Head and into the Bosom of that Body of His of which they are al fellow-members and that having our Eyes opened to see this our hearts might be touch't to mourn kindly over this Jesus over our selves and over each other in Him The second Head Thus I have shewn Why we should mourn Now it follows to let you know What we should mourn for I shal divide this into four Particulars First Let us mourn for the Causes of these Divisions St. James teacheth us Jam. 4.1 that Warrs and Fighting among us are from hence even of our Lusts Let every one now go home into his own Soul and where he finds Covetousness Ambition Self-love Love of Pleasure Love of this World or any other Lust let him bring it forth before the Lord and say This is that Fire-brand which I have brought to kindle or encrease this flame of Contention that devours us Then let him give no rest to himself until he have quench't this Fire-brand and contributed to the quenching of the universal Burnings by repentant Tears and the Blood of Christ 1 Cor. 3.3 St. Paul thus expostulates For ye are Carnal For whereas there are amongst you Envying and Strife and Divisions are ye not Carnal and walk as men See the Reason of our Divisions our want of Spirituality our Carnality O that there were a man whose voyce were heard in the ears of the Lord saying If I had been Spiritual if I had walked in the Image and Likeness of God according to the vertues of God according to the Divine Nature I might have been that poor wise man spoken of by Solomon that might have Saved the City of God among us from these Desolations by its Divisions But now Alas I have been carnal and walked as a man I have been so far from suffering injury that I have done wrong Instead of Beleeving all things for Good I have been swift to hear and to beleeve Evill and have rejoyced in the Evill of others which I have heard When I should have born my own Burthen my self and have born my Brother's burthen too I have cast the whol weight of my own burthen upon others til they have been opprest with it but have refused to touch their burthens with my little Finger In the place of blessing those who cursed and praying for those that persecuted me and this way heaping Coals of the Fire of a Spiritual Love from Heaven upon their Heads Have I not cursed those who have blessed persecuted those who have prayed for me and as I have thought any man mine Enemy cal'd for a Fire of wrath and Vengeance from Hell to take hold of him This this Carnality in my Heart and Life is that Seed out of which Strife and War are grown up to this Heigth and Greatness The Living Viper carries a mortal poyson about with him but being dead as Physitians say makes an excellent Antidote and Cordial By being alive in the flesh and in Carnal Principles we are become a generation of Vipers O! that our Hearts broken and Spirits mortified through an Evangelical Repentance and a lively Faith in the Cross of Christ might now through the Grace and Spirit of Christ become saving Antidotes or reviving Cordials to the poor dying cause of God Interest of his People and the whol Three Nations Secondly Let us grieve for having ministred any Occasion to our Contentions The Fire is lodg'd in the Flint and comes forth from that but it is the striking of the Steel upon the Flint which makes it to fly out Perhaps the Fire of Strife hath come forth from other Spirits but if my want of care and caution my want of exactness and integrity my failing in prudence and tenderness have made me as the Steel which by striking upon another mans Spirit hath drawn forth sparks of Fire or if I by my Over-credulity or Incredulity by my slackness or hast have been as Tinder to receive and cherish those Sparks which otherwise might have dyed I am not to hold my self guiltless but to repent of this also as a Sore Evil among the Saints while they live under the Sun Moses fell in the Wilderness only for the unadvisedness of his words from impatience and hastiness of Spirit under the greatest provocations Thirdly We are to weep for our having been Actors in our Divisions Who can wash his hands in Innocency and say that he hath not been in som kind an Accessary in the Guilt of our confusions although he hath been no Principal Hast thou not contributed to them by advising abbetting encouraging countenancing of them at least by withdrawing that Barr which thou might'st have put in their way by thy Counsel Assistance and Interest Hast thou not been pleasing thy self to think of making out thine own Interest by the publick Discord by a violent and bloody Change when thou shouldst like Curtius have cast thy self with that which was dearest to thee into the Gulf to have stopt the flowing forth of these waters of strife or like Paul been ready to have offered thy self up upon this service of Love to have become a Sacrifice for the Peace of the Church and Nation Fourthly Let us weep and bleed for this if we have been the Authors of these Differences Solomon brings this in as the Highest and Last of those things which the Lord most eminently hates and which are the
Dust into a Living and Glorious Body as by a double Resurrection from the Dead O! that it may now appear that Jesus hath been this Resurrection that he is the Root out of which you are now the third time sprung up that it is He who is risen in you Then are you risen unto Honor and not unto Shame Then shal you exalt Jesus Christ in his Members Truth and Love in the Presence and Out-shinings of His Heavenly Person as the Head of your Union So shal he be in the midst of you a Head of Union to the Saints and to these Nations You shal go forth as his Angels to gather his Saints from the four winds to which they are dispersed and to Him in you shal the gathering of the People be Suffer him then to display his Banners freely choose him for your only Standard bearer Sin no more against him who hath thus wonderfully appeared unto you Twice lest a worse scattering and death come upon you This is the First Way of Vnion The Second Way Cherish the Spirit as the only Band of Vnion Ephes 4.3 Endeavoring to keep the Vnity of the Spirit in the Bond of Peace The Unity of the Spirit is the Bond of Peace 1 Cor. 12.13 By one Spirit we are all baptized into one Body To make way for that which I am to say of the Spirit I have two Cautions to interpose to prevent Objections First I intend not any thing that I shal plead for the Spirit as a pretence to the Flesh I humbly conceive a fleshly licentiousness justified by the name of the Spirit to be if not that sin it self yet the next step to the sin against the Holy Ghost Secondly I would not have the Glory which I give to the Spirit interpreted as a laying aside of the Ordinances or a reflection upon the Forms of Godliness While we have the Life of Christ in these Earthly Bodies and the manifestations of the Spirit in this flesh Ordinances and outward Forms wil be of necessary use Only these Rules are carefully to be observed First That our Ordinances and outward Forms flow naturally kindly and freely from the Spirit Secondly That we behold them in the Light and enjoy them in the Life of the Spirit Thirdly That we rest not in them but make use of them to grow up through them into the invisible and Heavenly things themselves I have premised this to the Second Way which I have propounded for the uniting of the People of God which is this Fix no Principle of Vnion among the Saints but only the Holy Spirit This one Spirit is that which baptizeth us into one body and by its unity preserveth us in the Bond of Peace Give me leave to insert here three Observations Two of which I have often heard made upon these Times One my self have made upon my self Obs 1. As the Spirit in the simplicity and liberty of it hath been held forth and asserted in our Supreme Counsels and Forces for the Bond of our Union so they have prospered they have not been only as stars in a cloudy night now appearing for a little while and then suddenly lost but as the Stars in the Revelation held cleerly forth held unmovably fast in the right hand of Jesus Christ But when they have declined this Interest when they have disowned or confined this Spirit as God is said to have set an ambush in the midst of Edom Moab and Ammon when they came against Jehoshaphat that they divided and destroyed one another so as by an invisible ambush from Heaven have they been broken to pieces Obs 2. When any persons have fixt to themselves any thing visible any thing besides this invisible anointing the blessed Spirit for a principle of Unity a dividing wrathful desolating Spirit hath sprung up into the midst of them All pretended Bonds of Union in this kind have been like the Formal names of Christ and Paul in the mouths of the Sons of Sheva instead of casting out they conjure up a fierce and fiery Spirit These are the Observations which I have heard made by others upon these Times Obs 3. That which I have observed in my self is this While I at any time in any measure have been back-sliding and warping from the simplicity and purity of the Spirit unto Sensuality or Formality of any kind I have found those satisfactions which I have sought like Jonahs Gourd a worm sent into them by which they have been unexpectedly eaten and withered What would I infer from al this Thus much That We should set up the Spirit alone as the Principle of our Unity and so of our Prosperity and so much the rather in that the day of the Spirit is upon us when as the Father hath been glorified in the Son so the Father and the Son wil have their ful and final Glory in the Spirit How long is it since our Lord Jesus told us that the Father sought such Worshippers as should worship him in Spirit and Truth opposing the Spirit to the Letter Truth to the Shadows and figures of Divine Things The Psalmist reciting the story of the Patriarks and the Israelites in the Wilderness hath this passage Psal 105. ver 14 15. He reproved Kings for their sakes then we interpose saying but the sentence follows as a dreadful admonition upon occasion of that example fixt there from the mouth of God for all Powers to the end of the World Touch not my Prophets do mine anointed no harm The Spirit is this anointing This Anointing is that which makes Prophets as it doth Kings and Priests to God It hath been for this Anointing's sake for these Anointed Ones that the Lord hath reproved Princes in the midst of us and gone before us through this Wilderness Es 4.5 It is spoken of the last daies God will create upon the Assemblies of Mount Sion a Cloud by day and a shining fire by night for upon all the Glory shal be a Defence Would you know what this Glory is that thus shal be a Defence upon al the Assemblies in the times of the Gospel St. Peter tels us 1 Pet. 4.14 The Spirit of glory and of God resteth upon you You to whom God hath given Spiritual Senses and in whom he keeps those hitherto exercised and awake see the glory which rests upon us which is our Pillar of a cloud by day and our shining flame of fire by night the Holy Spirit This hath been this alone is our Guide our Defence our Resting place our Glory is the midst of all the Nations Say not how shal we discern this Spirit As a Cloud by day and a Fire by night so will the Lord make him evident to the seeing Eye and to every one that waits for him To conclude this Particular In the Bowels of Christ and by the Consolations of this Spirit as I am able I earnestly beseech all that cal upon the Name of the Lord Jesus in these Nations together with their