Selected quad for the lemma: power_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
power_n	ordain_v	ordination_n	presbyter_n	4,289	5	10.5064	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A60942	Interest deposed, and truth restored, or, A word in season, delivered in two sermons the first at St. Maryes in Oxford, on the 24th of July, 1659, being the time of the assizes : as also of the fears and groans of the nation in the threatned, and expected ruin of the lawes, ministry, and universityes : the other preached lately before the honourable Societie of Lincolns-Inn / by Robert South ...	South, Robert, 1634-1716.; South, Robert, 1634-1716. Ecclesiasticall policy the best policy.	1660 (1660)	Wing S4733; ESTC R4025	42,795	62

their new Worship he beginnes the Service himself and so countenances by his example what he had enjoyned by his command in the 1. v. of this chapter And Ieroboam stood by the Altar to burne Incense Burning of Incense was then the Ministerial Office amongst them as Preaching is now amongst us So that to represent you the nature of Ieroboams Action It was as if in a Christian Nation the chief Governour should authorize and encourage all the scumme and refuse of the people to Preach and call them to the Ministry by using to Preach and invading the Ministerial Function himself But Ieroboam rested not here but while he was busie in his work and a Prophet immediately sent by God declares against his Idolatry he endeavours to seize upon and commit him in the 4. v. He held forth his hand from the Altar and said lay hold of him Thus we have him compleating his sinne and by a strange Imposition of hands persecuting the true Prophets as wel as ordaining false But it was a natural transition and no wayes wonderful to see him that stood affronting God with false Incense in the right hand persecute with the left and abet the Idolatry of one Arme with the Violence of the other Now if we lay all these things together and consider the parts rise and degrees of his sinne we shall find that it was not for nothing that the Spirit of God so frequently and bitterly in Scripture stigmatizes this person For it represents him first incroaching upon the Civil Government thence changing that of the Church debasing the Office that God had made sacred introducing a false way of Worship destroying the right And in this we have a full and fair description of a foul thing that is of an Usurper and an Impostor or to use one word more comprehensive than both of Ieroboam the sonne of Nebat who made Israel to sinne From the Story and Practise of Ieroboam we might gather these Observations 1. That God sometimes punishes a Notorious sinne by suffering the sinner to fall into a worse Thus God punished the Rebellion of the Israelites by permitting them to fall into Idolatry 2. There is nothing so absurd but may be obtruded upon the Vulgar under pretence of Religion Certainly otherwise a Golden Calfe could never have been made either the Object or the means of Divine Worship 3. Sin especially that of perverting Gods Worship as it leaves a guilt upon the Soul so it perpetuates a blot upon the Name Hence nothing so frequent as for the Spirit of God to expresse wicked irreligious Kings by comparing them to Ahab or Ieroboam It being usuall to make the first and most eminent in any kind not onely the Standard for Comparison but also the Rule of Expression But I shall insist onely upon the words of the Text and what shall be drawn from thence There are two things in the words that may seem to require Explication 1. What is meant by the High places 2. By the Consecration of the Priests 1. Concerning the High places The use of these in the Divine Worship was generall and ancient And as Dionysius Vossius observes in his Notes upon Moses Maimonides the first way that was used long before Temples were either built or thought lawfull The reason of this seemes to be because those places did not shut up or confine the Immensity of God as they thought an house did and withall gave his Worshippers a nearer approach to heaven by their Height Hence we read that the Samaritanes worshipped upon Mount Gerezim 4 Ioh. 20. v. And Samuel went up to the High place to sacrifice 1 Sam. 9.14 And Solomon sacrificed at the High place in Gibeon 1 King 3.4 Yea the Temple it selfe was at length built upon a Mount or High place 2 Chr. 3.1 You will say then Why are these places condemned I answer that the use of them was not condemned as absolutely and alwaies unlawfull in it selfe but onely after the Temple was built and that God had professed to put his Name in that place and no other Therefore what was lawfull in the practice of Samuel and Solomon before the Temple was in being was now detestable in Ieroboam since it was constituted by God the onely place for his Worship To bring this Consideration to the times of Christianity Because the Apostles and Primitive Christians preached in houses and had onely private meetings in regard they were under Persecution and had no Churches this cannot warrant the practice of those now adaies that preferre Houses before Churches and a Conventicle before the Congregation 2. For the second thing which is the Consecration of the Priests it seems to have been correspondent to Ordination in the Christian Church Idolaters themselves were not so farre gone as to venture upon the Priesthood without Consecration and a Call To shew all the Solemnities of this would be tedious and here unnecessary The Hebrew word which we render to Consecrate signifies to fill the hand which indeed imports the manner of Consecration which was done by filling the hand for the Priest cut a peice of the Sacrifice and put it into the hands of him that was to be consecrated by which Ceremony he received right to Sacrifice and so became a Priest As our Ordination in the Christian Church is said to have been heretofore transacted by the Bishops delivering of the Bible into the hands of him that was to be ordained whereby he received power Ministerially to dispense the Mysteries contained in it and so was made a Presbyter Thus much breifly concerning Consecration There remains nothing else to be explained in the words I shall therefore now draw forth the sense of them in these two Propositions 1. The surest means to strengthen or the readiest to ruin the Civill Power is either to establish or destroy the Worship of God in the right exercise of Religion 2. The next and most effectuall way to destroy Religion is to Embase the Teachers and Dispensers of it Of both these in their order For the prosecution of the former we are to shew 1. The truth of the assertion that it is so 2. The reason of the assertion why and whence it is so 1. For the truth of it it is abundantly evinced from all Records both of Divine and Prophane History in which he that runs may read he ruine of the State in the Destruction of the Church and that not only portended by it as its Signe but also inferred from it as its Cause 2. For the Reason of the point it may be drawne 1. From the Judiciall proceeding of God the Great King of Kings and supreme Ruler of the Vniverse who for his commands is indeed carefull but for his Worship Jealous And therefore in States notoriously irreligious by a secret and irresistable power countermands their deepest Projects splits their Counsells and smites their most refined Policies with frustration and a curse being resolved that the Kingdomes of the