Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	apostle_n	holy_a	scripture_n	6,970	5	5.7262	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A46649	A sermon preached at the consecration of the Honourable Dr. Henry Compton, Lord Bishop of Oxford, in Lambeth-Chappel, on Sunday, December 6, 1674 by William Jane ...	Jane, William, 1645-1707.	1675 (1675)	Wing J455; ESTC R21231	23,378	49

and to trace the interest of the Holy Ghost in constituting Church Governors from the first Foundation of Christianity to this day to find him not only once fitting Bezaleel and Aholiab with Skill and Wisdom for the Building a material Tabernacle But in every Age empowering and qualifying serviceable Persons for the Strength and Beauty of his Church This was the Commission which the great Bishop of our Souls produced for himself at his entrance upon his Pastoral Charge The Spirit of the Lord is upon me and hath anointed me to Preach the Gospel Luke 4.18 Nor was this merely personal to our Saviour as Baronius would have it who confines that Text to the first year of our Saviours Preaching but when he comes to Ordain a Succession we shall find this to be the Rite and Solemnity of the Consecration As my Father sent me so send I you Where if the similitude will not infer the Gift of the Holy Ghost the next words will express it And he breathed on them and said receive ye the Holy Ghost John 20.21 And after that he bids them tarry at Jerusalem till they were endued with power from above Luke 24.49 which is Interpreted Acts I. endued with the Holy Ghost The Holy Ghost must first say separate before Saul and Barnabas undertake the Charge Acts 13.2 Nor could the laying on of hands have made Timothy a Bishop unless Prophecy had gone before And lest these should seem choice and peculiar instances of an extraordinary deputation of some persons to whom God was pleased to vouchsafe extraordinary Revelations of himself and we know those who have hence inferred that Timothy and Titus were Evangelists not fixed and standing Officers of the Church as Walo Messalinus and others We have the full attestation of Clemens Romanus in his Epistle to the Corinthians of the Apostles practice of Ordaining Bishops out of those whom they had Converted 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 after they had first tryed and approved them by the Revelation of the Holy Ghost whom Clemens Alexandrinus also calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 such as the Holy Spirit had designed and signified to them Nay so clear is this truth of the Spirits superintendency in these great Solemnities through the ancient Monuments of the Church that Cardinal Baronius however a stiff Asserter of the Popes Incroachments both upon the right of Bishops and the Holy Ghosts prerogative in their delegation yet is forced by the evidence of truth to confess that as Christ breathed the Holy Ghost upon the Apostles in like manner have they transferred the same upon all their Successors to this day in as much as they must undoubtedly partake of the Spirit of Christ who minister in Christs stead in the Sacred Offices of his Church It is an opinion fastned upon Durandus that when God made the World he threw it out of his Hands and left all things in it ever since to act of themselves from those several principles of Life and Motion which he distributed among them at the Creation A like conceit have some endeavoured to introduce into the Church that the world Spirit in Holy Scripture is to be confined to that plentiful effusion of it upon the Apostles on the day of Pentecost those miraculous Gifts and Graces which in the infancy of Christianity accompanied the Preaching of the Gospel Which Commission being personal to the Apostles by consequence expired withy them so that their Successors in the work of the Ministry for any concern the Holy Ghost has in them are left to shift for themselves or at most to subsist upon that stock of reputation which was at first gained in the World by the mighty Signs and Wonders of their inspired and gifted Predecessors But as the Schools from the common Principles of Reason have solidly maintained against the former that so precarious and dependent is the Creature as such both in its being and operation that should God subtract his influence and concurse whereby every moment he makes it and works with it all its operations are immediately suspended the whole Creation falls asunder and molders into its primitive Confusion so a like assertion if the Scripture were silent would common sense and experience suggest to us for a Confutation of the latter For so powerful are the batteries that are daily made by the Lusts of Men and the Malice of the Devil and so impotent and unarmed a thing is the Church of God considered in it self to withstand the assaults of either that not only the gates of Hell but the powers of the World would long ago have finally prevailed against it but that it was ever Founded upon the Rock of Ages and Supported by the Hand of Heaven The daily Sacrifice had long since ceased and the abomination of desolation been standing in the Holy Place And Christs Mystical Body had not so long survived his Natural did not the same Spirit which was at first breathed into it go on continually to actuate and enliven it Surely therefore now as well as then there is a heavenly Treasure in earthen Vessels and the continuance of the Ministration is from God and not from us He is God and not Man and therefore the Sons of Jacob are not consumed Bishops are the Stars in Christ's own right Hand and from this arises the utter impossibility for the Tayl of the Dragon to sweep them away for the force of Men to pluck them thence or for the powers of Darkness to extinguish them The Apostles then did not carry their Commissions with them to the other World which they knew were left them for a perpetuity of succession in this both for them and their Heirs for ever 'T was he told his Disciples who was never yet taxed with being worse than his word Behold I am with you to the end of the World He could not mean it doubtless of their persons who did not long survive him nor can the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 notwithstanding some bold Criticisms upon the words refer to any other period of time than that wherein the Fabrick of the World shall be dissolved when Time it self shall be no more He is still therefore with their Successors as he was with them after his Ascension Vicariâ spiritûs presentiâ as Tertullian speaks though not in the various distributions and admirable virtue of their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the extent of their Jurisdiction and extraordinary measure of their revelations yet in the effectual Administration of all those Ordinances which were to reside for ever in his Church in order to the salvation of the World Such are the Preaching of the Word Administration of the Sacraments Ordaining Ministers Ordering Church-discipline inflicting Censures and the power of the Keys All which as long as they are necessary for the edifying of the Body of Christ so long is the presence of the Holy Ghost necessary to authorize persons to dispence them Well therefore may we presume that our Veni Creator