Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	act_n	act_v	action_n	376	4	6.5285	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A81924	A model of church-government: or, The grounds of the spirituall frame and government of the house of God. Shewing, what the holy Scriptures have therein delivered; what the best Reformed Churches do practise; what the tender consciences may rest in. For the better satisfaction of such as scruple at the work of reformation, declared and appointed by severall ordinances of Parliament. / By John Dury, one of the Assembly of Divines; who hath travelled heretofore in the work of peace among the churches.	Dury, John, 1596-1680.	1647 (1647)	Wing D2873; Thomason E383_26; ESTC R21589	67,352	88

great corner stones of the Reformation are not as yet publikely professed and laid upon which every one should make an orderly superstructure of gold and silver and precious stones in the unity of the spirit towards his Brethren So the more such Designes are stood upon and advanced in a private course they accidentally become the greater hinderances to the generall work whiles men that are thereby stinted within themselves rest satisfied in their own private wayes and by leaving the thoughts of a publike Communion they prove opposites thereunto when they admit of nothing that is not every way agreeable unto their particular Contrivements I am perswaded that many able men throughout the Kingdome have many excellent things in readinesse which might be usefully applied to the edification of the Churches both for the advancement of Knowledge and of Godlinesse if the wayes of our Settlement were cleared But now as matters stand I cannot look otherwise upon their excellencies but as upon the scattered stones of a building not yet framed and as upon the furniture of a house whose model is neither apparent nor yet well understood by any Therefore although there be many men in these Churches of eminent abilities and Vessels of great honour fit for very good uses in the building of this Tabernacle yet because the Rule and way of their Brotherly communion and correspondencie is not determined as it ought to be they stand though in their private sphere profitable as to God yet as to the Church uselesse in the Communion of Saints For the Parts of the building not being set together their serviceable gifs are not imployed as Joints should be in the Body to make up and compact the whole And for want of this aime and endeavour by all that they do they bring nothing forth unto perfection I have briefly pointed at the Causes of our Disease that thou mayest consider thy self Christian Reader as in the presence of God how thou art led by what spirit thou art guided and how thou shouldest free thy self from the guilt of contributing further any cause or matter of continuance to our Distempers Now the Lord grant us all grace to do all things without murmurings disputings to his glory unblameably in Love Amen I am in the last place to speak of the Remedies of this corrupt Profession of the true Religion And if I should enter at large upon this task I should be obliged to write a Volume but my purpose is only to name the Heads of things necessary to be intended and set awork to advance our Reformation and redresse the Evils which threaten our finall ruine That if thou Christian Reader art convicted of the usefulnesse thereof thou mayest contribute in thy way what thou canst thereunto The remedies then of our distracted condition I conceive will bee found in a discovery of two things first of that which will helpe to rectifie the disease at the root by taking away the cause which doth origionally beget it Secondly of that which will helpe to prevent Of the remedies of our publick distractions the effects thereof which become causes of increasing the distempers to propagate and continue the disease I have shewed my opinion that the causes which beget our distempers are the want of the true aime in the holy profession and the disproportionatnes of the meanes used to prosecute the true and lawfull aimes of the Reformation which wee seeke to rectifie the inward Hypocrisie of the heart is only Gods worke but to discover it and convict mens consciences of it may be the worke of his servants by the right interpretation and The Remedie of the first cause of our disease application of the word as the Apostle testifieth 1 Cor. 14. 24 25. Yet the bare discovery of vice or error and the conviction of a naturall man that hee is guilty of it is not enough to remedie the evill disposition of his spirit or to beget a true aime in him to answer the heavenly call nothing can doe this but God by the discovery of the truth in the lovelinesse thereof When hee giveth faith to the elect by the engrafted word wherein they receive the love of the truth which purifieth their soules and maketh them obedient thereunto through the spirit unto this worke of God the faithfull Ministers of the Word are subservient when they hold forth the Truth in sincerity and manifest the knowledge of the glory and life of God in the face of Jesus Christ The first remedy then will bee to stirre up Ministers who understand this Mystery of Godlinesse ordinarily to presse and preach the maine things which discover the life and spirituall estate of Christ as the Truth is in him that their hearers may know first positively what that life is whereunto they are called and then negatively what that life and state is wherein men are by nature from which they are called and this should bee done not so much by an inlargement of themselves upon many particular branches and twigges of duties as upon the manifestation of the Principles and essentiall properties of the spirituall and carnall man from whence the knowledge of duties will of it selfe flow I doe not meane that the preaching of particular duties is unprofitable or ought to bee omitted but I conceive that the fundamentals which discover the hidden man of the heart both in respect of the Righteousnesse of the spirituall and of the unrighteousnesse of the fleshly nature should be mainly and ordinarily so proposed as from the discovery of that which is conformable or inconformable unto the image of Gods life in Christ all particular duties should bee derived and pressed upon the conscience and I beleeve that because godly and zealous men commonly spend more of their strength in matters of particular concernment then in such a fundamentall course that two evils arise from thence unto the hearers and one in the Ministers themselves First that the naturall corruptions of the hearts of all men remaine in some altogether in others in a great measure undiscovered at the root by which means they still conceiving well of themselves or better than they ought are not truly humbled before God and mortified unto the world but live still as men in the world and take up the profession of Religion in the performance of certain duties rather than in the pursuit of a heavenly call to come unto Christ Jesus Secondly that such as are ingenuous and have tasted the Kingdome of God and thereupon are gotten into a hatred of the world being fervent in spirit to serve the Lord are driven by the much pressing of particular duties to an over acting zeale either against or for some persons or actions which zeale having no temperament of love meeknesse and lenity to heale and beare with the infirmities of the weake or to bring their owne proceeding with them home to the true aime of the holy profession which is to discover Christ unto those that

goe astary from him they are so farre from edifying the Church of God by their forwardnesse that they rather disturb and destroy every thing they meddle withall but if they were instructed by their teachers to understand the way wherein Christ did Mat. 12. 19 20. walke to shew judgement unto the Gentiles namely that he did not strive nor cry nor cause any man heare his voyce in the streets that hee did not break the bruised reed nor quench the smoking flax till hee send forth judgement unto victory If I say they were taught to know him in this as in all other things and were obliged to judge themselves in all their aimes to doe nothing out of the way of conformity unto him in his walking in the flesh they would easily refrain from the intemperancy of their passionate zeal for or against particular matters which reach not unto the heart of the profession The evill which in this course of preaching doth befall unto the Ministers themselves who otherwise are Godly and holy men is this that they easily overshoot themselves either by pressing a particular duty too much and indiscreetly laying too great weight upon it towards all without distinction of cases whereby the weaker consciences are straitned and ensnared or by applying a duty unto matters of state and publick relations to the prejudice of one party for the advantage of another upon reports or mistakes and misconstructions of matters from whence oft times great scandals and discontents arise and are fomented to the widening of breaches without all hope of reconcilement If the Ministers presse not the fundamentall aime of the profession but rest in the delivery of theoreticall truths and the application thereof unto particular duties It is no great wonder that their hearers remain ignorant of it and walke not up to it and it must naturally follow that all the care whereunto their conscience will draw them in their profession will bee nothing else but a professsion of some particular tenets and practises for which they will strive as for life and death not that I think that any truth or righteous practise is rightly to be esteemed or neglected but that all the Theorie of the world and all the performances that can be wrought in particular duties may bee a matter of meere Hypocrisie in the professor and nothing else but an occasion of strife and disturbance towards those to whom our profession is addressed if the true aime of the holy profession bee not minded the teaching then of the aime of our profession by Gods blessing upon the word of his servants may rectifie the purpose of the hearers in their profession and cure the first and fundamentall cause of all our distempers and if once this radicall cause be taken away the secundary which is but a streame flowing from that fountain will soon be dried up by the heat of true love and sincerity which will take possession of the affections of those that in the Spirit follow Jesus Christ For as the second Cause of our Distempers viz. the want of The Remedy of the second Cause of our Disease Proportion in the Means used towards a through Reformation to produce the Effect intended thereby is an effect of the first So the second Remedy of that evil will be a consequence of the first namely the way of doing all things in love For he that aimeth at nothing in the way of his Profession but to follow Jesus Christ will find that he in his way of walking did proportionate all his undertakings to the end for which he did them by the manifestation of Gods love to those towards whom he did make his application And because there is little or no sincerity of Brotherly love apparent in the use of the Means which are set a foot for the advancement of a Religious Reformation amongst us therefore every thing which is done by many of us is altogether unsutable to the end for which it is performed for although the thing which is done be in it self never so good and just yet if the spirit of Divine love do not go along with the performance of the work there will be no proportion found therein to reach the end for which it is to be undertaken because there is nothing but love that can fit every thing to the good of those to whom it is done The Apostle saith that there is neither circumcision available in Christ Jesus nor uncircumcision but Gal. 5. 6. Faith which worketh by Love The object of Faith is Christ when we take him in the Covenant as our aime to be found in him and if this Faith hath any life in us and is not a meer verball profession it will be operative in that Love wherein He did all his works amongst men and towards his Father The Apostle speaking of the Rule by which we should walk as children of God giveth us this charge Ephes 5. 2. Walk saith he in love as Christ also hath loved us and hath given himself for us If then our aime is Christ it will appeare that the chief thing wherein our conformity with Christ must stand will be the exercise of love towards the Brethren for Gods sake and of Holinesse to be separate from the world and when we shall reflect upon the use of the Means which are set afoot and put in the hands of most men for the advancement of our Reformation we shall find that nothing is so much wanting both in the framing of the counsels and in the execution of the works as the spirit of Brotherly love and of Holinesse and where these two are deficient in those who act a Reformation what can the event be other then disorder and confusion Some Act altogether by the way and in the means of Christian liberty some by the way and in the means of Christian Authority but because neither of these for the most part are acted by the spirit of love to one another or by the spirit of Holinesse to bee seperate from the world and from their owne interests in what they doe therefore they act nothing for but against one another as if Christian Liberty and Christian Authority were things altogether inconsistent and so the means which should advance both the one and the other part of our spirituall constitution are not only ineffectuall but offensive and destructive to each other because neither the desire of liberty nor the pretence of Authority are put forth in the spirit of love to serve others thereby in true Holinesse but a certain interest of state is rather look't upon both wayes which makes both the path of Liberty and of Authority to become unchristian to those that walke therein with partiality and worldly aimes and this is the only cause why all our works and proceedings of this nature doe miscarry because many of those that are the Actors thereof in making use of the means doe not for the most part minde the golden Rules