Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	ability_n	able_a	hear_v	48	3	4.2533	3	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A70471	A treatise of the episcopacy, liturgies, and ecclesiastical ceremonies of the primitive times and of the mutations which happened to them in the succeeding ages gathered out of the works of the ancient fathers and doctors of the church / by John Lloyd, B.D., presbyter of the church of North-Mimmes in Hertfordshire.	Lloyd, John, Presbyter of the Church of North-Mimmes.	1660 (1660)	Wing L2655A; ESTC R21763	79,334	101

in 2 Cor. hom 6. Conc. Forojuliens an 791. c. 13. Athanas dicta interpret parabol S. Script sacraments and censures c. breathing upon them and saying receive ye the Holy Ghost whosesoever sins ye remit they are remitted unto them and whosoever sins ye retain they are retained hence it is that the ministery of the new Testament fully confirmed is in an eminent way the ministery of the spirit and so called and hence it is that the Apostle saith that the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds casting down reasonings and every high thing that exalteth it self against the knowledge of God and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ This measure of the Spirit going along and operating in the ministerial preaching prayer baptising blessing absolving c. was now very necessary as in other respects so in this that the world that had been so long captivated by Sathan and mightily habituated in all sinful ways Semen Sermonis Christi cum in animam audientis inciderit per gradus suos crescit-tam diu in ancipiti est quamdiu pariat quod concepit Hierom. in Epist ad Gal. c. 4. might be converted unto God and preserved in his grace Some will say why are not all hearers of the Gospel converted to which it is soon answered that the Holy Spirit worketh in all them that hear the Gospel preached to them yet gradually first that they may co-work and then that they may continue co-working until the work of saving faith be perfected in them He gives an eat able to hear to the hearers he gives ability to understand and gives ability in some degree to will the good and where the good is willed he hath given the will and the deed and where the Good we are enabled to understand and Will is not understood or Willed that comes from the natural corrupted freedome of mans will which the spirit doth not take away against our will because he will not destrey his own work namely that good natural freedome of will conferred upon man in his creation capable of being a subject of good or evil A person not ordained to the holy ministery may in time and place teach and exhort with a speech no less Orthodox wholesome and perswasive then any ordained minister of the Cospel can use and yet it must be acknowledged to be far inferior in its operation tending to true edification then the speech of a minister seeming less perswasive because this is alwayes accompanied with the spirit the other is not but supposeth some grace in the hearer which it stirreth or if it be accompanied with a quickning or healing grace it is of Gods mere indulgence and not by vertue of Gods ordinary constitution and promise and therefore the spirit going with the exhortation of the minister doth alwayes edifie or is resisted and so the word preached by him is a sweet savour of Christ in them that are saved and in them that perish to the one the favour of death unto death and to the other the savour of life unto life The Apostles all this while had not received the gradual complement of the gifts ordained to be bestowed upon the ministers of the new Testament Sect. 3. it was meet that Christ should in our entire nature open heaven and enter into it before the fulness of the ordinary or extraordinary gifts subservient for the right using of the Keyes of Heaven should be granted to his Vicegerents upon earth Wherefore after his opening and possession of Heaven he gave those gifts unto men both extraordinary in the Apostles Evangelists and Prophets and ordinary in the Pastors and Doctors The first ordinary Pastors received their ordination from the Apostles of the Apostles we know no other ordination then Christs immediate calling of them to that office in which they were by the foresaid degrees perfected the Pastors received in the Apostles ordination their seminal or virtual ordination as was said to their function which received its perfection of degrees in the effusion of the Holy Ghost upon the Apostles The Author of the Comments upon St. Paul's Epistles attributed to St. Ambrose saith that it was lawful at the first for Laicks and Deacons to preach in the Assemblies and Baptize yet of that his assertion he brings no sound proof Philip was ordained a Deacon and he baptised the Eunuch Ananias a Disciple baptised Saul after called Paul did Ananias do so onely in the capacity of a Disciple and the other onely in the capacity of a Deacon No surely for it appears that they had an immediate mission from God to teach and baptise which is equivalent to an ordination to the office of a Pastor either as to those acts onely and for that time only or as to the whole pastoral function to be constantly exercised If any examples be found in the Acts of the Apostles of any Laicks or Deacons performing pastoral offices whose ordination ordinary or extraordinary is not mentioned it s meeter to judge and beleive that they had either the ordinary call or the extraordinary according to the examples of Ananias and Philip when the contrary cannot be proved then to affirm that any lay-man might then at his pleasure exercise the acts of that sacred vocation Paul was no sooner a Christian but he was instantly by Christs immediate appointment made an Apostle Act. 9.15 20. cum Gal. 1.16 17 23. and without any other ordination preached the Gospel of Christ 1 Tim. 2.7 yet some years after he together with Barnabas were by the express command of the Holy Ghost ordained by certain Prophets and Doctors which then were at Antioch In which ordination two things are observable First that the Apostles were ordained by their inferiors in office but the extraordinary commission whereby this was done makes an exception confirming the rule which is that without all contradiction the less is blessed of the greater Heb. 7.7 The second thing to be considered in that ordination are the sacred ceremonies used in the ordination of Pastors to wit prayer which is the principal fasting to commend the prayer and imposition of hands as a visible demonstration of Gods blessing them and their ministery with the gift of the spirit to accompany their service to the loosing of men from the guilt and power of sin and setting of them at liberty to walk in the wayes of Gods commandements An ordination of Pastors celebrated without any one of these ceremonies cannot be accounted right and regular St. Paul with other who were Presbyters ordained Timothy by the joint imposition of his and their hands we find imposition of hands placed by the Apostle among the fundamentals of Christian Religion 1 Tim. 4.14 cum 2 Tim. 1.6 Heb. 6.1 2. and there although it followeth the immersions in the names of the blessed Trinity and therefore may seem to import confirmation yet it need not