Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	body_n	holy_a	soul_n	16,669	5	5.2335	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A56710	A treatise of the nesssity and frequency of receiving the Holy Communion With a resolution of doubts about it. In three discourses begun upon Whit-Sunday in the cathedral church of Peterburgh. To press the observation of the fourth Rubrick after the communion office. By Symon Patrick, D.D. Dean of Peterburgh, and one of Hi [sic] Majesties Chaplains in Ordinary.	Patrick, Simon, 1626-1707.	1685 (1685)	Wing P859; ESTC R216671	69,078	263

verily and indeed taken and received by the faithful in the Lords Supper 5. Of this therefore you cannot be ignorant and if you believe it and expect it understanding also what your eating and drinking of that Bread and Wine means and for what end you come to the holy Table what can there remain to be done to make you know certainly whether you may partake thereof safely nay profitably or no but only the last thing I mentioned 6. Whether you intend to do there what the Lord Commands and to receive those benefits which he there imparts Not eating and drinking that is as at a common Table to satisfy your hunger and quench your thirst not receiving with the same common spirit and the same unattentiveness wherewith you receive other food but composing your self seriously as at the Lords Table in a holy place where he is present thankfully to Commemorate his Death to partake of that Sacrifice which he offered for us on the Cross to give up your selves Souls and Bodies unto him and to thank him that you have the honour to be his Servants and that he hath purchased you at so dear a rate as with the price of his own most pretious blood to implore the continuance of his gracious and ready help upon all occasions c. If I say with this Spirit and for these and such like ends you approach to this holy Communion you need not have the least fear of being rejected as unworthy Guests but ought to be confident that you shall be welcome to that holy Feast as those that are faithful unto Christ For wanting none of these conditions which are all that can be thought requisite you want nothing to make you fit and prepared to have Communion with Christ in the merits of his Death which is there commemorated Yes will some perhaps further object there may be something still wanting For how came the Corinthians to be so severely punished as we read they were for their unworthy receiving the Communion if these things be sufficient to make men meet partakers of it Do you not think that they had all the forementioned qualifications and yet they did eat and drink their own Damnation I answer No it is most manifest from the very words which mention their Damnation that they were not thus prepared 1. For first they proceeding to partake of these Holy Mysteries at the end of their Feasts of Charity which was a common meal where they eat and drank all together for the maintaining Brotherly kindness among them they so perfectly confounded and blended these two the Holy Feast on Christs Sacrifice and the common Feast on ordinary food one with the other that they made not the least distinction but did eat this holy Bread and drink this holy Wine as they did common meat and liquors not discerning the Lords Body as you read v. 29. of this Chapter This was one horrid sin which they committed not to consider what they were doing for they went to the Lord's Table as if it had been still their own Table and did not distinguish between this Sacred and their ordinary food 2. One cause of which undiscerning spirit which would not let them see the difference was their riot and drunkenness at that Feast of Charity which ought to have been only a sober refreshment They revelled upon that good chear which should only have filled their hearts with love to God the Giver of all good things and to their Christian Brethren and thereby have prepared them to be partakers of a diviner food which followed the other This was another fearful sin of which you read v. 21. where the Apostle saith that as some were hungry at that Feast of Love and Friendship so others were drunken 3. Which leads me to take notice of a third Crime that the rich despised the poor and that in so vile a manner as not to suffer them to feast with them but to separate from them and to eat and drink by themselves and also to eat and drink up all the provision leaving the poor little or nothing For in eating viz. at the Feast of Charity every one taketh before his own Supper and so it came to pass that one was hungry and another drunken 4. Which suggest this further crime consequent upon the former that they turned a common Feast into a private the rich looking upon what they had brought to it as their own Whereas in truth they had no longer any propriety therein now that they were come together into one and the same place ver 20. Where there ought to have been no difference made between one man and another nor any part of the provision lookt upon as continuing any mans own proper food after it was brought thither for the entertainment of all 5. And that was another aggravation of their guilt that they committed all these crimes in that holy place where they assembled for the most holy action of their Religion to commemorate the Death of Christ ver 22. What have ye not Houses to eat and drink in or despise ye the Church of God c. Which question supposeth that they might in their own private Houses have eaten their own Supper alone by themselves or with whom it pleased them to invite but in the House of God and in his divine presence it was intolerable because there they met upon no private but a publick account to thank God for his love in Christ and to testify their mutual love to each other 6. Which they were so far from doing that they did the quite contrary For true love delights to keep others in countenance but they put such to the blush as were in a poor and mean condition and could bring nothing to the common Table but themselves Who were by the Laws of the Feast and by the rules of Charity to have feasted at the charge of the rich and with as much freedom and confidence as if they had brought the provision themselves but were lookt upon with such scorn that it made them sneak like wretched Beggars that were to be content with the scraps which the rich would leave them That 's the meaning of the last words of that Exprobration ver 22. and shame them that have not that is are not able to bring any thing to eat and drink at the Feast of Charity These were the grievous scandals committed in that Church some of them in the very act of holy Communion and all of them in their preparation to it and in the holy place where they were assembled to worship Christ with mutual affection one to another Which therefore brought down heavy judgments upon them as you read ver 29. He that eateth and drinketh unworthily eateth and drinketh damnation or judgment as the margin of the Bible hath it to himself not discerning the Lords body Which that it is spoken of the Church of Corinth the next words shew which inform us also what this judgment

confesses are acts of Worship to be constantly performed and also a commemoration of that upon which the efficacy of all our Prayers and Thanksgivings depends viz. the Sacrifice of Christ upon the Cross which is here likewise represented unto God as that which appearing always before him in the Heavens intercedes for us and makes all our Sacrifices acceptable to his Majesty And besides all this is the peculiar worship which the Church gives unto Christ as a grateful acknowledgment of his unparallel'd love in laying down his life for us to purchase the most inestimable benefits which he herein also assures unto us and bestows upon us Which is in part declared in these words upon which I have built my Discourse wherein we are told the end of this holy Sacrament is to show or publish the Lords Death that is show it with praise predicate extol and magnify as the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 imports proclaim with our highest praises the loving kindness of the Lord in the glorious work of our Redemption through his most pretious blood But is more fully declared in the very words of the Institution when he said Do this in remembrance of me which show that our doing this is the peculiar honour we do our blessed Lord by making a publick commemoration that he took our nature upon him that he died for us that he obtained thereby a glorious Victory over all our Enemies that he purchased for himself and for us immortal glory and is now at Gods right hand in full power to bestow it upon us In memory of all these things saith our Saviour do this that when I am dead I may always live in your hearts and the knowledge of all these things may go down to all posterity and be commemorated from one Generation unto another for ever with thankful praises but especially the memory of my Death may be transmitted to them and be celebrated with continual acknowledgments For it was but fit that he should be publickly honoured in that which when he suffered exposed him to the greatest contempt And no doubt it was the design of God in appointing this Rite of holy worship to have his Death commemorated with Everlasting praises which for the present had brought him into the utmost disgrace To which purpose is that passage in an Easter Sermon ascribed to Caesarius Bishop of Arles because he intended to remove out of our sight the body which he had taken and to place it in Heaven it was necessary that in the same day he should consecrate for us the Sacrament of his Body and Blood to the end that we should honour by the type that which had been once offered for the price of our Salvation In short this is the proper worship of God Incarnate and of our Crucified Saviour and therefore cannot be thought by wise considerers to have been intended to be left unto uncertainty whether we would perform it or no or when we would be pleased to perform it but to have been ordained as a daily Service which should be continually performed unto Christ Which in truth the continual necessities of the Church require it being the principal Act whereby we have Communion with Christ and partake of the Sacrifice he made on the Cross We are united unto him as Members of his Body in the other Sacrament of Baptism wherein also his holy Spirit is bestowed upon us as a principle of life and motion sutable to our Religion which directs us unto this Sacrament as the chief outward visible means of preserving our Union with Christ by having constant Communion with him and with his holy spirit Whose influences he here communicates unto us for our growth and increase in spiritual life and holiness and we therefore in reason should be desirous constantly to receive because we constantly want them and are too apt to start aside from him unto whom we ought to keep our selves stedfastly united by Faith and Love and uniform universal Obedience Put now all this together that it is an act of holy worship a worship altogether as peculiar to the Church as the Sacrifice on the Cross is peculiar to Christianity the only worship wherewith we honour our blessed Lord and Saviour a Commemoration nay a representation of that which makes all our Services acceptable unto God and the principal way and means whereby we have Communion with Christ from whom we stand in continual need of the Communication of his grace and we shall soon be satisfied that the plainest and most reasonable answer that can be given to those who ask how often did Christ intend we should eat of this Bread and drink of this Cup is this as often as we assemble publickly to worship God our Saviour For there is no worship peculiar to him but this nor is there any wherein we have such Communion with him as in this by which we do truly and indeed participate of the Sacrifice offered unto God upon the Cross as the Jews and the Gentiles did of their Sacrifices offered up on their Altars Thus the Apostle discourses at large in the Chapter before my Text 1 Cor. x. 16 17. c. where he takes it for an undeniable truth that Christians do communicate with God their Saviour in the merits of his Death by receiving the holy Eucharist And thence proves it to be unlawful for them to partake of the Gentile Sacrifices by proving that to eat of their Sacrifices was to be accessory to their Idolatries as the Jews by eating of such Sacrifices as were offered among them did partake of the Altar or did communicate with the Altar that is Communicate with God whose Altar that was upon which the Sacrifices were consumed Which evidently supposes that Christians also did in the Eucharist partake of a Sacrifice and were thereby joined to Christ who was that Sacrifice Which though carried by him into the most holy place of the Heavens there to be presented unto God is no less participated by Christians in this holy Feast of the Eucharist than the Jews did participate of their offerings of thanksgiving on the Altar I know very well it will be objected that by understanding our Saviours meaning in this Institution after this manner we prove a great deal too much and argue our publick service to be defective when it wants this peculiar worship of Christ which he ordained To which I shall only say this that if by discoursing thus we prove no more than is true our worship must be confessed to be but imperfect when the Holy Communion is wanting not so perfect at least as that of the ancient Christians was Which we had much better honestly acknowledge and beseech God to accept for Christs sake of such services as we do perform though in some regard and in comparison imperfect ones than by going about to defend untruths and establish false notions in Religion to make our selves more guilty before God I know also it will be urged