Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n
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A49464
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A sermon preached before His Majesty at Whitehall March 27th 1664 by ... B. Lord Bishop of Lincoln.; Sermons. Selections
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Laney, Benjamin, 1591-1675.
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1665
(1665)
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Wing L348; ESTC R17615
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15,955
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41
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the first Gods Word is a light we can do nothing more contrary to light then to hide it to put it under a Bushel i. e. to do any thing that will intercept the light and benefit of it Now this may be done several wayes First By perverting the proper end and use of hearing Hearing Gods word is certainly a good point of Religion for it is a duty commanded ver 23. If any man have ears to hear let him hear yet if he hear as he should he must not mistake one kinde of duty for another Duties are of divers kindes some essential parts of Religion some instrumental and some both The two chief duties of this time fasting and hearing are instrumental onely That Fasting is so we learn from St. Paul The Kingdom of heaven is not meat and drink i. e. consists not in it yet if well used is a help to it Instrumenti vis in usu consistit If fasting attains not the end and use of it it is good for nothing not to be reckon'd in the order of Religious duties So hearing Gods Word if it work no amendment in us is but a Cypher alone that stands for nothing no better then a Candle under a Bushel When hearing is not it self doth not the own duty we are extreamly mistaken if we make it serve for any other Hearing doth edifie help to the building but as an Instrument not as Stone and Timber the essential parts of it The Ax and the Hammer the Square and the Level are instruments without which there can be no building but we would think him mad that should therefore lay them in the Walls or the Foundation They are as much guilty of folly who make their ordinary worship of God to be nothing but to go hear the Sermon yea and the extraordinary a solemn Fast and Humiliation to hear a Sermon A publick Thanksgiving to hear a Sermon and that is all If any business extraordinary fall out hereunto we think fit by our Devotion to ingage Gods blessing and protection all we do for his sake we sit and hear a Sermon If the Sermon doth the work of an instrument it is well to fit and enable us to perform those duties it self is neither stick nor stone in the Building We must not think all is done when the Sermon is done Instruments are of an indifferent nature may be well or ill used so are not essentials as Faith Repentance and Charity are constantly the same Fasting I said was an instrumental duty and so was as well us'd for strife and debate as for Humiliation and Repentance We may remember many of those fighting Fasts Psal 74. He that hew'd Timber before out of the thick Trees was known to bring it to an excellent work but now they break down all the carved works therof with Axes and Hammers that is with the same tools that built it As Sermons are instruments to build up at another time they pull down as fast It is therefore very necessary we take heed how we hear them As we must not mistake in the kinde of the duty an instrumental for an essential so nor in the kinde of the Instrument for some are natural as the eye is of seeing the ear of hearing these naturally do their work Others positive of Divine Institution which have no vertue or power but from that and such are the Sacraments I confess I never heard any say that hearing of Gods Word was a Sacrament of Faith yet I know there is more vertue ascrib'd to it then natural and by some more then Sacramental for no Sacrament they think effectual without a Sermon If there be a mistake in the manner and kinde of operation in the Instrument it will prove another putting the Candle under a Bushel I hope you will not think it a fruitless curiosity to enquire a little farther into it Hearing and Preaching both for they always go together are so proper to the Gospel that by them it is distinguished from the Law for St. Paul arguing for the Christian Faith against the Jewish calls it the Hearing of Faith Gal. 3.2 He that ministreth to the spirit and worketh miracles among you doth he it by the works of the Law or by the hearing of Faith The like propriety in the Gospel hath preaching for whatsoever way the wisdom of the world may take It pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe 1 Cor. 1.21 And thus by way of distinction the Gospel is call'd the ministration of the Spirit because preached by inspiration of the Spirit and the Law the ministration of the Letter because given in writing 2 Cor. 3.6 Who hath made us Ministers of the New Testament 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not of the Letter but of the Spirit But was there then no hearing nor preaching under the Law That cannot be said neither They have Moses and the Prophets saith Abraham to Dives let them hear them And the Priest's lips could not preserve knowledge unless it were received from his mouth by hearing It was commonly practised in the Synagogues after the reading of the Law in the time of the Apostles to exhort the people When S. Paul and his company went into the Synagogue at Antioch in Pisidia they were desired to give the people a word of exhortation Acts 13.15 How then comes it to pass that by hearing and preaching the Christian Religion is distinguished from the Jews which are common to both And why is the Law call'd the ministration of the Letter by way of distinction seeing the Gospel is written as well as the Law 'T is plain that these things are spoken not simply and universally of either but in relation to their beginning and first publishing to the world Because the Law was then given by writing though afterwards preached it is called the ministration of the Letter So the Gospel though afterwards written yet because it was then only preached by revelation of the Holy Ghost it is call'd the ministration of the Spirit That likewise which S. Paul speaks of the hearing of Faith and of saving men by the foolishness of preaching hath a peculiar relation to Christianity in the manner of founding it at first For certain'y Preaching in it self was not in the eye of humane wisdom a foolish way to perswade but such as the wisest of them all used when they would perswade the people any thing they did it by orations and speeches which are of the same kinde with preaching But if we look at that preaching by which the Christian Religion was at first introduced it had in the eye of humane wisdom somthing of folly in it For to introduce a Law or Religion to any people these two things among others are necessary That they give it in Writing that they might more certainly know what they had to do and that it be by such as have authority and power And this way God himself took in giving the Jews a
Law for first he wrote it with his own fingers and then published it by the Ministry of Moses who was their leader and governour But for the introduction of the Gospel it pleased God to take a far different course that is to commit all to the preaching of a few poor despicable Fisher-men who were only private men of no authority and of whose Gospel they had no knowledge but from what was to be taken from their mouths And that when first preached was by some esteemed no better then a distemper yea plain drunkenness yet thus it pleased God to put the words of eternal life into these earthen vâ—ssels and by that means to make his own power known and by that folly to confound the wisdom of the world But for our preaching though it may have many times too good a title to foolishness in preaching yet not to the foolishnesse of preaching for those obstacles remov'd it is the ordinary way by which all knowledge humane as well as divine is communicated My meaning is that hearing now is to be looked upon as the common natural instrument to receive instruction and therefore no benefit to be reckon'd on from it but what is common to all other learning and knowledge that is by serious studying and diligently pondering the things we hear for if we trust to any secret sacramental mystical vertue in hearing that profit we should get by the Word we may lose by the Hearing Therefore take heed how you hear for this is a second way of putting Gods word under a Bushel There is another way which in part at least puts under the Bushel too when we confine it to the Sermon whereas that is of little use if Gods word be not in it they say The word is of as little if it be not in a Sermon which is a derogation to the goodness and bounty of Almighty God who hath dispensed his Divine Truth so many wayes besides as First by Reading for though when Gods Word was preached onely it could be onely heard yet when it was a Scripture it might be known as all other Writings by reading also for this reason S. Paul sets Timothy to his Book 1 Tim. 4.13 Till I come give attendance to reading Search the Scriptures for therein you think you have eternal life and search we cannot unless we read them that by reading we may finde the way to eternal life yea though all were to be done by preaching Reading is that too For Moses had in old time them that preached him being read in the Synagogues every Sabbath-day Acts 15.21 Secondly By writing Gods Word works Faith in us if S. John was not mistaken when he said 1 Joh. 5.13 These things have I written unto you that ye may know ye have eternal life and that ye may believe in the name of the Son of God Good writers are in their kinde good Preachers Why then should any be scandalized at the Preacher that looks upon his Book where his Ser. mon is written Indeed if men now were to speak as the Apostles did as the Spirit gave them utterance it were a great mistake to look for him in a Book But if we as all must take Gods Word out of the Scripture and every Preacher if he be not too bold with God and his Auditors that he may speak from thence what is both true and seasonable prepares by writing that which he is to preach the Sermon is the same in the Pulpit that it was in the study and though the Preacher that looks in his Book be the worse the Sermon I am sure is not We may receive the fruit of God's Word in the virtuous life and example of others for this St Paul calls the holding forth the Word of Life Phil. 2.16 That ye may be blameless the Sons of God without rebuke holding forth the Word of Life i. e. it is visible and legible in all our actions and demeanour Thus a Man may be a Preacher of God's Word though he be not in Orders Yea Women that are forbidden to speak in the Church may thus convert their Husbands at home Likewise 1 Pet. 1 ye Wives be in subjection to your Husbands that if any obey not the Word that is when it is preached they also may without the Word be won by the conversation of the Wife So powerful and effectual is God's Word that it works by example though on the weakest Vessels There be divers ways of preaching in the more proper sense besides the Sermon for preaching is either publick or private as we learn from St Paul Acts 20.20 where he gives account to the Elders of Ephesus of himself That he had taught them publickly and from house to house Sure he did not make a formal Sermon in every house he came into but as occasion and opportunity was given by Conference he made known to them the Will of God Again Publick preaching is not all of a kind for that may be either by laying the Foundation the Principles of the Doctrine of Christ as the Apostle calls them Heb. 6.1 which we call Catechising If this be not Preaching if laying the Foundation be not edifying we shall make but a sorry Building If this Foundation of Faith be not well laid every new wind of Doctrine that rises blows it straight down again In these several ways besides the Sermon is God's Word effectual Now if we put all these under the bushel and set up the Sermon only we had need need take heed how how we hear that for if that wherein all our hope and confidence lies should go under the bushel too we are in a sad case It will therefore neerly concern us to take heed That God's Word be not lost in the Sermon i. e. that the power of it which consists in the evident conviction of truth be not lost in formalities and impertinences commonly us'd in Sermons As when little regard is given by some to God's Word unless the Sermon presents it self dress'd up with all the curiosities of Art Language and Phansie too which sometimes so disguises it as it can hardly be known from a Poem But for the true use of Ornaments of Art and Speech if they make us love our duties the more as they make us more in love with hearing I should think it well bestow'd But if painted Sermons be like painted Glass that makes a Room beautiful but intercepts too much the light it may well go in the rank too of those things which put God's Word under the bushel The same is done too with a coarser sort of Forms which have no title to be divine but that they want humane Learning And yet if God's Word be not in that jejune formal dress it will not be so kindly received by those who out of a seeming tenderness of the liberty of God's Word are afraid that the Churches Form should bind it and spare not to fetter it in cold formalities of