Selected quad for the lemma: saint_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
saint_n	day_n	lord_n	week_n	2,733	5	10.2407	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A35047	Reformation not separation, or, Mr. Crofton's plea for communion with the church ... in a letter, written July 20, 1661 ... / by the said R.S. to whom it was written ; unto which, is added the copy of another letter, written on the same occasion and subject.	Crofton, Zachary, 1625 or 6-1672.; P. E., Reverend.; R. S.	1662 (1662)	Wing C7000; ESTC R12168	52,912	78

John 20.19 26. 1 Cor. 16.2 held solemn Assemblies on the Lords day the first day of the Week and charged the Saints of their age and in them all others not to forsake the Assembling of themselves together Heb. 10.25 taxing the defect of some therein as the manner of some is As Solitary Sabbaths are in themselves so God knoweth they have been and are to me the sting of an imprisoned condition I hope I can say without vanity as David in his exile Psa 42.1 2 3. As the Hart panteth for the water Brooks so panteth my soul after thee O God My soul thirsteth for the living God When shall I come and appear before God when I remember these things I pour out my soul in me for I have gone with the multitude I went with them to the House of God with the voyce of joy and gladness with the multitude that kept the holy day I deny not God to be served and enjoyed in Solitary Worship Psal 84.7 but must needs observe in Zion the Saints pass from strenth to strength every one appearing before God Solemn publique Worship is Gods chief Ordinance for the support of his peoples faith this is denominated the Beauty of Gods Holiness Psal 27.4 96.9 and 110.3 To this his presence and power is promised and in it chiefly predicated attendance on this is charged as his peoples duty and discharged as their joy The want of this is the Sacra fames Spiritual famine Amos 8 11. under want of which Davids faith was ready to faint had it not been prevented by a speedy and seasonable supply When I sought to know this it was too painful for me until I went into the Sanctuary then understood I their end Psal 73.16 17. This therefore is not to be slighted or neglected or superficially desired or used but most highly prized earnestly desired and joyfully imbraced and not voluntarily declined on every light occasion and trivial exception or friendly perswasion but the grounds must be plain clear certain and weighty such as I may with confidence plead unto my God as the apology of my absence of choice not constraint in which I expect God should have mercy on me because and for that he cannot have Sacrifice from me which can be nothing but the restraining necessity of my condition or my running into sin to possess it My good Friend you see my case is hard and what now is my case may ere long be yours and others of Gods people You yet enjoy a liberty of worshipping God in due and right order and may drink the Waters of the Sanctuary in clean Vessels long may you enjoy it and if God take pleasure in me he will in due time restore me to it but if not let him do what seemeth him good At the present I have no choice if I will attend Gods publique Solemn Worship I must do it in this place and order or not at all whilest I dread to give the least occasion of insultation to the wicked or offence to the weak my conscience is under the apprehension and aw of a positive indispensible duty which I dare not decline unless on reasons constituting a clear and unavoidable necessity my present restraint doth indeed acquit me and carry the guilt of my absence from Gods House from off me to others I duly endeavouring by all just means to have the same removed which once effected what moral bar will lie upon my minde and in my way as a formal sin which I cannot without guilt break thorow that is the question I have desired seriously to consult and by Scripture to resolve And on mature thoughts I must profess I finde not any which will bear weight in the ballance of the Sanctuary as that which I shall dare to produce before the Lord when demanded a reason of my voluntary absence on which he may not pronounce He was bidden to the feast but would not come and therefore is not worthy and hereafter shall not For I must profess First I never did could or yet can deny 1. The Church of England a true Church and I a member the being of the Chur●h of England that is the community of Christians in this Nation incorporated by Baptism professing the true God and Jesus Christ and subjected to the Word and Sacraments in the Ministery of Christs lawful Ministers for I never believed any National Priviledge such as was peculiar to the Jews or the Hierarchical Order and collective Constitution which cannot be denied to be a meer humane and separable adjunct and is neither an equal nor regular Representation could or did give that appellation nor disown my own relation to it and must therefore see some good ground for my non-communion with it and for my choice of Solitary Worship of God rather then fellowship in its Solemn publique Worship where and whilest God affords his presence though with a grieved striving spirit I dare not be absent though thereby I might avoid some burthen It is well known I am not unacquainted with the Church renouncing rending ruining principles of the Anabaptists and old separating Brownists nor with the Paganizing practice of the seemingly more sober and serious Independent or Congregationalist who sometimes indeed pretend to own the being of this Church but by their Church-gathering Self-Constitution dispencing Ordinances by their self-consecration professed principle that in England there is much matter for but not the form of a Church and so no Church at all for forma dat essentiam and with the height of confidence to say no more of it proclaiming themselves the gathered Churches contradistinct to the Nation and all Christians in it as if they onely were the first fruits of Achaia I mean England an infidel Nation who had never received the Gospel or Christ had not been preached among them and professed by them nor any of her Inhabitants had been incorporated by Baptism into Christs Catholique Body but were to this day aliens and strangers to the Houshold of Faith and Commonwealth of Israel do plainly declare so to all rational men able and willing to discern that the being of a Church in England is by them disputed yea denied But these I never did nor could approve and therefore I must presume none that ever knew me and my constant contests by preaching writing and suffering under and against them can conceive this to be now any scruple to my conscience doubt to my soul demur to my duty or diversion to my Communion with them whose being a Church of Christ I have ever and openly asserted and defended and to whom I have ever professed my own relation Prophane members destroy not the Church That these men urge That many members in the Church of England are rude and prophane in their Conversation with their mouthes confessing but in works denying God and are not therefore fit matter for a Church I do well know and to my grief and

And being deeply sensible of the sad doom denounced against such as administer Offence to any of Christs little ones Mat 18.6 and the great damage and danger of a groundless offence choaking the joy and curbing the duty of such as take it 〈◊〉 who have for more then six moneths been buried alive do conceive a duty and necessity incumbent upon me to appear and by such utensils as a close and severe imprisonment will afford to speak for my self in the cause of God and his Church charged on my weak hands in reference to an act which Conscience doth constrain me to pursue and or obtained liberty to attend In which I discern some ready to insult whilest others soon scandalized beyond what the nature thereof may occasion to the one or the other for God whom I serve in the Spirit is my witness I would give no offence neither to the Jew nor to the Greek nor to the Church of God The case is this SIr John Robinson the Lieutenant of the Tower did of his own accord not at that time though often before moved to it by or from me on Fryday the thirteenth instant send me word by my Keeper That I should have liberty to go to Church and enjoy the Solemn Assembly and Publique Worship of God celebrated within this place the which on second thoughts he hath remanded in the use hereof I must of necessity attend that Order of Administration against which I have publiquely witnessed as that which is Corrupt and Superstitious yet conscience of duty doth compel me to receive and use this liberty when I can obtain it as a mercy from God and favour from men the which I have often prayed for and desired Hereupon I apprehend a clamour is sent abroad that Mr. Crofton is present at and attends unto the reading of the Service-Book in which some boast beyond measure as having gained a Proselyte whilest others stumble as if I started from the truth and work of Reformation and testimony which through Gods grace I have given thereunto My good Friend you must know this clamour is as to the fact as yet false the liberty being not yet obtained but I confined to my Solitary Sabbaths wherein I hope I can profess I am not alone because the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ is with me But indeed I must confess it true in the fieri my desire intention and endeavour to procure this liberty so soon as I can and my resolution to attend those corrupt Administrations and this disorderly service of God until God please to bring me forth and make me drink the waters of his Sanctuary in purer Vessels and I cannot but protest that the one or the other insulting or offended at my so doing may grieve me and wound their own souls but cannot say they know me who was ever satisfied and so declared my self in my publique Ministery as to this point or that I administer any cause for such insultation or offence Yet to the end Gods dishonor Religions disgrace their own danger by this their sin may if possible be prevented I thought it my duty to signifie to you and require you as you have opportunity to communicate to others these following considerations as Apologetical reasons for what I am convinced is not onely lawful but a positive duty not without sin to be omitted though the critisim of our times and my special case may require an Apology for the same My long close Consid 1. Deliberate thoughts not distress of condition provoke it and severe durance much beyond any other Prisoner in this place or any carnal self politique Principle hath not been the impulsive cause of my desire or use of this liberty but as in my other acts subjected to the censure of men pure conscience of duty towards God and my own soul and the preponderate dictates of my judgement I hope in some measure also to discern duty in difficult times and conditions in sense whereof I desired this liberty the f●rst day I was committed to this place and many times since and have often complained of it to God and such men as came near me as a defect in the Government of this His Majesties chiefest Prison in England that care is not taken nor liberty allowed for Christian Prisoners to attend upon the publique Worship and preaching of the Word of God I have in this respect often preferred the Compters or Newgate more base and despicable in vulgar account before the Tower of London It cannot I think be soberly I am sure not charitably denied that Christian Prisoners ought to have Christian liberty and accommodation in a Christian Kingdom It is supposed a Prisoner bringeth with him into this place some horrid crime and notorious guilt by reason whereof there is conceived but little between the Prison and death therefore the hand of Justice which punisheth the offence ought in Christian pity to seek the salvation of the soul and if possible prevent the Malefactor from dying in if he must dye for his sin I have often thought that if the Heathen indulged Paul a liberty to Preach in Prison Christians might and ought much more allow a Preacher liberty to hear the Word preached in Prison I hope it will be no offence to minde this Age that amongst other evils reflected by such as rose up against him on the Government of King Charls the first his late Majestie of honorable memory this was one Exact Collections p. 6. and not the least Men were detained close Prisoners without the liberty of using Books pen ink or paper denying them all the comforts of life not permitting their wives to come to them and for the compleating of that cruelty depriving them of the necessary means of Spiritual consolation not suffering them to go abroad to enjoy Gods Ordinances in Gods House or Gods Ministers to come to them to administer comfort to them in their Chambers Let none therefore dare to censure this act as the result of a distressed condition or base compliance by constraint of Prison against the perswasions of Conscience Consid 2 Solemn publique Worship positive duty Communion with the Church visible in all acts of solemn publique Worship is an essential part of the Sanctification of the Sabbath or Lords day and positive indispensable duty of every particular soul called by the name of God to be onely Superseded by a real inevitable necessity with assurance to any that God will have mercy and not Sacrifice This cannot be denyed by any who observe God hath denominated the Sabbath an holy Convocation Levit. 23. Synagogues were on this ground erected and frequented in all the Cities of Judah that the Lord Christ Luke 4 16. Acts 13 13 14. 17.2 fulfilling all righteousness and his Apostles in conscience of duty made it their custom to go to the Synagogue every Sabbath day that the Apostles and primitive Christians from the very Ascension of Christ