Selected quad for the lemma: sense_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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A54286
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A discourse concerning the worship of God towards the holy table or altar
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Penton, Stephen, 1639-1706.
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1682
(1682)
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Wing P1438; ESTC R31106
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36,950
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124
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Invocate and give thanks to his Father in the New-Testament are they not External Ceremonies and Services Did not the Apostles and the whole Church then and the whole Church after them supplicate God the Father by this Rite They continued breaking of Bread i. e. in the use of the Holy Sacrament and Prayers And Therefore in the Primitive Church they used to say all the Service at the Altar to Signify that they sent up their prayers in the Name of him whose Sacrifice the Ground of all attonement and Intercession was in that place Exhibited and Commemorated yet it seems very Novel to us to have part of our Service read there But least you might say the meaning is not that God will have no External Service but he will be worshipped by no External Gestures or Postures I say this also contradicts our Saviours Practise who himself lifted up his Sacred Eyes to Heaven when helprayed for Lazarus fell on his Face when he Prayed in his Agony c. What was Imposition of hands but an External gesture when God was invoked by way of benediction besides I see no reason why in the point of Evangelical worship Gesture should be more excepted against than Voice Is not Confessing Praying Praising an External Bodily worship as well as that of Gesture why then should the one derogate from the worship of the Father in Spirit and Truth and not the other In a word there never was yet in the World any Society of men that worshipped the Father in such a manner as this interpretation doth emply and therefore this cannot be the meaning Our Saviour intends here to reprehend the Idolatrous worship of the Samaritans The true sence who worshpped they knew not what Viz. God under the Representation of a Dove as the Israelites in Jeroboams time and long after under the similitude of a Calfe The Samaritans Idol This was the Object of the Samaritans worship as appears out of the writings of the Jewish Rabbies This was their Idolatry they worshipped God in a Bodily shape and the reason which our Saviour gives seems to emply this For God saith he is a Spirit i. e. he hath no body nor is he such therefore he must be worshipped as a Spirit for so indeed he is and not by any bodily Representatation So that the sense here is this The hour cometh and now is that the true worshippers shall Worship the Father in Spirit that is conceiving of him no otherwise than in Spirit and in Truth that is not under any Corporal or Visible shape for those that Worship under any Corporal similitude do indeed belye him For the Apostle saith of such as changed the Glory of the Incorruptible God into an Image made like to Corruptible man Rom. 1. they changed the truth of God into a lye Hence Idols also are called Lyes Amos. 6.4 Some interpret these words the true worshippers shall worship God in Spirit that is no longer by Jewish Ceremonies but in and by Christ who is the substance of those shadows This sence though it be true and plausible yet it is not congruous to our Saviours reason For God saith he is a Spirit and must be c. If this be the reason then God should never have been worshipped with Jewish Ceremonies and Rites for God was a Spirit from the beginning and manifested himself so to be even to the Jews who Worshipped him with Rites and Ceremonies Therefore I adhere to my first sense Thus your main Fort is blown up The Second Objection drawn from Goos Protestation against Sacrifices Michel 6.6 7 8. Hos 6.6 Isaiah 1. Psalm 51. with the Answer Vid. In a word Religion as man hath both a Body and Soul the Soul of our Service is the Service of our Soul but the Body of that Soul is the Service of our Body one must inform the other and both make a compleat man of God For as the Body without the Soul is dead so the Soul without the Body is imperfect God loves no maimed Sacrifice God calls for the Heart because he knows it commands the whole Man and therefore if he have the Heart at his devotion he is sure of the Body also Obj. Suppose all this God is to be adored outwardly as well as inward ly Yet this manner of Adoration is Dangerous and may become many ways Evil. For 1. It is Scandalous to weak brethren who hereat are offended 2. It may be an occasion to some Ignorant Ones to Commit Idolatry by Adoring the very Table 3. It is a fair Introduction to Popish Superstition 1. Every Scandal or offence taken is not a Scandal given Therefore that is properly called Scandalous which in its own nature tends to give offence not that which through willfulness or blindness may by accident become such Resp Resp Was not Christ himself a Scandal and Rock of offence to the Jews a Stumbling-block to the Greeks foolishness was not his Cross a Scandal should not therefore Christ have come and been Crucified because this proved an occasion of Scandal but who are these weak Ones and how is this an offence For the weak Ones Who are the weak they are such as usually think themselves strongly grounded in the Faith and able to confute this Worship we here maintain Such as though they be Women and Weavers think they can teach twenty of us thred-bare Schollers for all our Learning These are the weak Ones forsooth weak I confess in their knowledge for they are blind and therefore the bolder but in their own conceipt strong enough But how are these offended Why are they offended Are they drawn to imitate us in our Worship waveringly and doubtingly not knowing through the weakness of their Judgment whether they sin or no Scandal but relying on the knowledge and conscience of him whom they imitate thereby ensnare their consciences in sin This is properly a Scandal 1 Cor. 8. as the Apostle shews expresly were he makes that a Scandal given when in a thing in it self indifferent as Eating of meat Sacrificed to Idols not as such but as bought in the Market by a man of knowledge who knoweth that meat commendeth not to God and takes no notice of the Idol to whom it was offered but Eats is as Common or Ordinary When I say this Act of him that hath knowledge doth occasion one weak in knowledge to Eat the same meat with conscience of the Idol grounding himself upon the example of him whom he imitates and so offends Thus then comes in the Scandal The strong Eat of that without conscience of the Idol among the weak or ignorant that know not how to make such a distinction They imitate the strongs example as thinking what is lawful for the strong is lawful for them and so Eat of it with conscience of the Idol or as devoted to an Idol which is Idolatry Thus the strongs knowledge is an occasion of Sandal to the weak that