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lord_n christian_a day_n sabbath_n 12,184 5 9.9778 5 false
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ID Title Author Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) STC Words Pages
A26885 Catholick vnity, or, The only way to bring us all to be of one religion by Rich. Baxter. Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691. 1660 (1660) Wing B1210; ESTC R14402 121,941 420

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1. An Engagement to and profession of Faith in the Promised Seed as promised and future 2. An Engagement to Moses Law for this use it had after the Law was given Now when Christ was come that man that would still be Circumcised into and profess to expect a Messiah yet to come and that would engage himself to that Law which contained the Types of a future Messiah and was but a School-master to lead to Christ I say that person that was thus Circumcised as all were that received it according to the institution did plainly deny that Christ was come and therefore Christ could profit them nothing But yet a man that used but the outward sign to avoid an impediment to the Gospel as Paul did in the case of Timothy or if it were erroneously as a meer Custom as the Abassines now do might yet be saved by Christ nevertheless 2. And when Paul used it it was as an indifferent thing but he condemned it as supposed necessary 3. When he used it it was in the beginning of the publication of the Gospel that as Austin speaks he might give the Ceremonies an honourable burial But when he condemned it it was after the full Publication of the abolition of the Law against those that would have raked it out of the grave again 4. He bore with it in the weak but he condemned it in the wilfull 5. He bore with it in those that scrupled the forsaking it as they were Jews but he condemned it in those that would have laid this yoke as necessary on the Gentiles Object But it seems here that Paul is against the necessary observation of the Lords day when he is for esteeming all days alike Answ. If you understand the subject of the debate you will understand his speech It is only Jewish Holy-days that was the matter in Question and therefore of these only is he to be understood As for the Lords day its plain in the New Testament that Christ did not only rise upon it and appear to his Disciples on it and send down the Holy Ghost upon it but that the Disciples presently after Christs Resurrection began their Religious Assemblies on it and so continued them by the guidance of the Holy Ghost and so setled that day for the use of the Holy Assemblies of the Church calling it the Lords day Ioh. 21.19 26. Act. 2.1 20.7 1 Cor. 16.2 Rev. 1.10 And it is past all doubt in the History of the Church that since the Apostles days till now the Church hath constantly kept this day as thus established by the name of the Lords day which the Fathers called the Christian Sabbath as they applyed the name of an Altar to the Table and of a Sacrifice to the Supper of the Lord so that he that will reject the observation of the Lords day must take on him to be wiser then the Holy Ghost in the Apostles and then all the Catholick Church of Christ from the beginning till these contentious persons did arise The Text being thus explained the Doctrine before mentioned is plain in it before us viz. Doctrine IT is the will of God that the Vnity of the Church should not be laid upon indifferent small and doubtfull points but that true Believers who differ in such things should notwithstanding have inward Charity and outward Communion with one another not Censuring nor despising nor dividing from each other upon this account In handling this point I shall briefly shew you 1. What I mean by things indifferent 2. What I mean by smaller matter 's 3. What by doubtfull things or disputations And then I shall give you the Reasons of it and then Apply it 1. For the Explication 1. By things indifferent I do not mean things hic nunc indifferent in the use but things that are not ordinarily in themselves either commanded as Duties or forbidden as sins but left as Lawfull or Indifferent by the Scriptures unless as some accident or circumstance may make them to be good or evil 2. By smaller matter 's its none of my intent to perswade you that any thing that is but an appurtenance to Faith or Piety is Absolutely small But they are small in comparison of the far greater things and so small that many are saved without them and they are not of flat necessity to salvation and the Greater matters must be preferred before them 3. By things doubtfull I do not mean such as are not certainly revealed in the Scripture nor yet such as perverse Heretical men do raise doubts about when they are plain in themselves But I mean such points as are revealed certainly but more darkly then the greater points and therefore cannot be so clearly known so that the sum is this 1. Indifferent things must not be taken to be Necessary or sinful but to be indifferent 2. Lower and Lesser points must not be taken to be Greater or Weightier then they are 3. Points of less certainty that are more darkly revealed must not be taken to be more clear and certain to us then they are 4. And it is not on such darker smaller matters that God hath laid our salvation or that the Churches Unity and Peace dependeth II. FOr the fuller Demonstration of this let these Reasons be observed 1. If our Unity were laid on these smaller matters the multitude of them is such that we should never Agree in all The Essentials of Christianity are so few that all men may well be expected to learn and know and entertain them But the smaller points are so many that there is no hope of an universal Agreement in them all You know in the Body of man or Beast the great Master veins that are the stock of all the rest are but a few but follow them further and you shall have so many Divisions and sub-divisions till you find them to be many hundreds or thousands So is it with the Arteries and with the Nerves The Body of a Tree is but one and the first division perhaps is but into two or three parts but follow it to the very ends of the branches and you may find many thousands So is it in Divinity And therefore if none should be in Unity with the Church but those that understand every branch of Christian verity what hope of Union could there be 2. Moreover the smaller points are far less discernable then the greater be and therefore there is the less hope that ever the Church should have Unity in these The great armes of a Tree are easily discerned when the extremities of the branches are very small The trunks of the master-veins are great and easily seen but the points and capillar veins are so small as hardly to be perceived So God in mercy hath made very plain those few essential points of faith that salvation lyeth on but if you follow on these generals to all the particulars and appurtenances you shall find them run so small as well as so many as
avoid them and the causers and fomenters of them There was never Master so much for Unity as Christ and never was there a Law or a Religion that did so much condemne Divisions and command brotherly Love and Peace and concord and forbearing and forgiving one another as the Christian Law and Religion doth And will you yet say that our Divisions are long of our Religion or of Christ the author of it You may as wisely say that eating is the cause of weakness because that some are weak for all their meat But you will find that none can live without it Or you may say as wisely that Physicians are the causes of the diseases of the world because they do not cure them all I tell you there is none in all the world that have done so much for Unity and Peace as Christ hath done No all the world set together have not done half so much for it as he He hath preached Peace and Unity forgiving and forbearing and Loving one another yea Loving our enemies and he hath gone before us in the perfect practice of what he taught He hath offered himself a Sacrifice to the Justice of his Father that by his blood he might reconcile us unto God He is the great Peacemaker between God and man between Jews and Gentiles taking away the enmity and becoming himself the Head of our Unity and giving us One Spirit one faith one baptism that we might be One in him who is One with the Father So that to charge the Center of Unity with our Divisions and the Prince of Peace himself with our Discords or his holy Word or waies with our Disagreements is all one as to charge the Sun with Darkness and to say that our Law-givers and Laws are the causes of theft and murder and Adultery which condemne them to death that are proved guilty of them The cause of all our disagreements and divisions is because we are no more Holy then we are and because we are no more Religious So that I may leave it now as a Proved Truth that we must Unite in the Spirit and Agree in Holiness of Heart and life if ever we will have true Unity and Agreement AND now Sirs you have seen the only way of Unity opened to you It s plain and past all doubt before you If yet you will divide from God and his servants and if yet you will be numbered with the straglers or quarrellers do not say but Peace was opened and offered to you Do not say You could not have Peace but that you would not Do not say any more hereafter that there were so many Religions and so many waies that you could not tell which to joyn with Never more pretend the differences of the godly as a cloak for your ungodliness I have opened the nakedness of such pretences You shall not be able when your lives are scan'd to look God in the face with such an unreasonable impudent pretence Your consciences and the world shall then be witnesses of your shame that while you cryed out of Sects and heresies and were offended at the Divisions of the Church it was your selves that were the cause of it It was you and such as you that were the great Dividers and that obstinately proceeded in your Divisions when the way of Peace was opened to you and would not be United in the Spirit to Christ nor would not Agree in Holiness with his Church when you were acquainted that there was no other way to Peace Would you but have joyned in a firm and everlaling Covenant to God the Father Son and Holy Ghost as your only Creator Redeemer and Sanctifyer as members of the Holy Catholick Church and have lived in the Communion of the Saints you should have received the Forgiveness of sins the Resurrection of the just and Everlasting Life But in refusing and obstinate refusing these you refused all your hopes of Blessedness and wilfully cast your selves on the wrath of God and therefore must endure it for ever THE last Advice that I have to give upon the ground of this Doctrine is To all that are United in the Spirit and Agreed upon an Holy life I mean to say but little to you now but briefly to tender you these two requests 1. I beseech you Christians but to live as Christians in that holy Unity as your principles and profession do engage you to Hath true Christianity and Holiness such abundance of advantages against division and yet will you be guilty of it Against all these bonds and healing principles and helps will you be dividers Doth it not grieve you and even break your hearts to hear ungodly persons say that Professors are of so many minds and partyes that they know not which of them to follow and that we had never concord since you bore sway O do not seek by your contentious wayes to perswade people that Holiness is a dividing thing and that Religion doth but tend to set the world together by the eares Is it not a precious mercy to us of this place that we have among us but one Church and one Religion and and have not Church against Church and Christian against Christian I charge you from the Lord that you be thankful for this benefit and that you look upon divided places and compare their case with yours that if ever dividers come amongst you the sense of your felicity in this blessed Unity may cause you to reject them and that you do not suffer any Dalilah to rob you of your strength and glory Were you but once here in pieces among your selves what a scorn would you be to all the ungodly what sport would it be to them to hear you disputing against one another and reproaching and condemning one another as bitterly as the wicked do reproach you all Do you not pitty those places where divisions have made Religion to be a scorn and the tender Love and Unity of the Saints is turned into uncharitable censures and separations Take warning then that you come not to the like If you should you would be as unexcusable as any People in the world because you have tryed and tasted so much of the sweetness and benefits of Unity as you have done shew men by your lives that Holiness is the most certain way to Unity as ever you desire either to propagate Holiness or to have any evidence of it in your selves 2. Judge by this undoubted truth of any doctrine that shall be offered you and of the wayes of men and of your selves 1. Suspect that doctrine that tendeth to divisions in the Church If it be not for Unity it is not of God Rom 16.17 Christ came to heal and reconcile and is the Prince of Peace and therefore sendeth not his servants on a contrary errand He will justifie your dividing from the unbelieving world but he hateth dividing among his servants He that 's for Church-division is not in that for Christ or you 2.