will come by his Spirit into your Spirits he will come as an uniting quickning informing transforming Spirit into your soules He will give you an Understanding to Know him a Will to Love him a Power to Abide in him Jesus Christ comes to a man as Life from the dead as Eternall life spreading it self through the Soule 3. Object How shall I judge of this Spirit in another man Answ Saint Paul replies Rom. 14. 14. Who art thou that judgest another man's servant that is a man in his relation to God He hath a Master of his owne to whom he stands or falls Doe as the Father hath done leave all judgment to the Son to his manner and measure of appearing in thee So judge not that ye be not judged Judge not the Spirit by carnall Principles lest you be judged as evil doers and busie-bodies by the Spirit 4. Object Men may deceive themselves and abuse the world under this pretence saying I have the Spirit Answ What hath this Objection peculiar in the case of the Spirit The Jewes cry up The Temple of the Lord to cry down the Lord of the Temple May not men pretend falsly to Reason Miracles as well as the Spirit May there not be Apocryphall Scriptures as well as Apocryphall Spirits false Churches false Christs and false Gods What strange thing is there in this Hath not Saint Paul determin'd the state and manner of men universally in the world so far as they are not in Christ Deceiving and deceived 2 Tim. 3. 13. We read of the Law of the Spirit of life The Spirit is no further my Law then it is my Life The Spirit in another man is but the Letter to me which is old and dead till it be justified and quickened by the Spirit in my own breast If I then be deceived I deceive my own soul 5. Object But how ill is the Consequence of Impostures in this kind what confusions doe they beget Answ The best things counterfeited are most dangerous as the Idol-gods for many years drowned almost the whole world in Temporary deceits and desolations in eternall flames yet is this no disparagement to no argument against the Divine Nature The Counterfeiting of Mony brings confusion upon a Common-wealth yet men cannot traffique without Money 'T is true the aping of the Spirit the setting up of mockspirits is a darknesse a snare a storm upon the spirits of men in civill and religious affairs yet can we have no commerce with Spirituall things without the Spirit Ephes 2. 18. We have accesse to God in one Spirit There is no Communion with God but in the Unity of the Spirit These three the Father the Spirit the Soule are made One in every act of Spirituall life or enjoyment Hear then the voice of Jesus Christ calling you by his Spirit Come to me and I will give you Light Certainty Rest Man lives not by bread alone but by every word that commeth out of the mouth of God Mat. 4. 4. This is the bread of Heaven that alone feeds and satisfies the understanding this Eternall Word that comes forth from the Father and every word as it comes forth from this Word every Appearance as it springs up in this Appearance Oh! that He would Kisse our Souls with the Kisses of His mouth and so seal Truth upon our Vnderstandings The Philosopher describes Truth to be that which sistit intellectum stayes the Vnderstanding If you lay your Souls to rest upon any Opinion or Principle besides the sweet Breathings of this Master your Souls will sink thorow them So let them sink thorow every Creature till they fall below all into the Spirit of Jesus Christ This Spirit is the golden Girdle of Truth which will bind you fast and hold you in on every side This Spirit is the bed which God makes on which you may safely repose your selves Here an eternall Certainty shall be under you to sustain you an Infinite Cleernesse round about you as Curtains of Light shining upon you and shewing you all things in their lustre Use 3 For Exhortation It is often said that great Persons are much flatter'd They seldome know truth because they see with the eyes and hear with the ears of others Right Hon ble I humbly commend to you a Master who is Truth it self I beseech you to hear with his ears to see with his eyes to make his Person your book in which you shall read the stories of God and Eternity to make his face your glasse in which you shall see how glorious you are in him how to make your selves gracious for him If you are willing to be his Disciples I will point out to you some of those Lessons which he teacheth There are two Lessons which are most principall and most difficult They are hardest to be understood or believed But when these are learned they make all the rest easie They are these two 1. The Lovelinesse 2. The Love of Jesus Christ 1. Lesson The Lovelinesse of Jesus Christ I do not now wish that I had the skill of a powerfull Oratour to write the Lovelinesse of my Saviour upon your fancies with well-chosen words But I pray that He the Lord Jesus himself would write with the Spirit of the living God upon your hearts somthing any thing one Iota one tittle of his own Lovelinesse then I am sure you would go from this place as the Eunuch did from Philip rejoycing and praising God The Lord said Psal 27. 8. Seek ye my face Divines well interpret this of Christ The Face is the beauty and majesty of man Jesus Christ is the naked face of the Godhead He is called a Branch or a Flower Zach. 3. 8. Jesus Christ is the Godhead branch'd forth into its diversities of glories the Flower of the Divine nature ful-blown John 1. 1. The word was with God Prov. 8. I saith Wisdome was as one bred up with him that is God I was his delight Our Saviour's Person is the Word in which all things are exprest the Wisdome in which all things have their form and fulnesse God is a Spirit of an infinite capacity yet he entertains himself eternally with the musick of this Word and the beauties of this Wisdome God pleaseth himself to the heighth with the lovelinesse in the Person of Christ and satisfies himself to the full with the Varieties in that lovelinesse Do you not now begin to perceive something extraordinary in the Person of the Lord Could you not exchange the whole world for a Sight a tast of him When the Sop and the Devill were entred into Judas Jesus Christ saith Now is the Son of man glorified and the Father is glorified in him John 13. 31. Jesus Christ descends into the darkest shape the lowest state of things among the Creatures Yet by His presence He puts a glory upon it he makes it fit for the Father to glorifie himself with it because he finds himself and his own Heaven in it 1 Cor. 6.
manifestly declare not only a Negation but a Privation of some Great Light which should by It's Immediate Presence rule the Day of our Religion and by Its Beams falling upon our Reason as the Lesse Light rule the Night of of Nature and Civill Affairs The Watch-men watch for the Morning so doth my Soule wait for the Rising of the Lord Jesus upon Her and upon the whole Earth He is the Image of the Invincible God the Light that is Sowne even in This our Darkness But He shall breake these Chains of Darkness For it is not Possible that He should be Holden by them I have onely One Thing more to say which is this that There are Some things which I could not speake before your Lo ps though I had prepared them These things I have now taken the Boldness to present to your Lo ps Eyes together with those which I had formerly offered to your Lo ps Ears That Jesus Christ may discover Himself a Living Corner-stone in your Hearts out of which may grow up a Building of Eternall Peace to your own Persons and Present Peace to This Kingdome is My Lords the Prayer of Your Honours most humble Servant in the Lord Jesus PETER STERRY A SERMON Preached at the Monthly Fast before the Right Honourable House of Lords MATTH 23. 10. Neither be ye called Masters for one is your Master even Christ THE CONTEXT OUr blessed Saviour directs his discourse in this Chapter against the Scribes and Pharisees men of principall esteem among the Jewes for piety and learning for Exactnesse in the letter of the Scriptures Eminency of skill to Interpret and Comment upon the letter Austerity of Life Thus much they arrogated to themselves and had ascrib'd to them by the people Precious things these are where they are true and no more to be undervalued because they have their Counterfeits than Jesus Christ is because there are Anti-Christs The Lord notes Three things in these men 1. Their Practice 2. Their Principle 3. Their End 1. Their Practice This is Two-fold 1. Practice Imposalls upon men They require Vniversall Obedience Men must Believe all that they Say though Themselves Believe it not Men must Observe their Rules though themselves neglect and break them v. 4. They bind heavy burthens and grievous to be borne on men's shoulders but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers Thus it is for the most part They are such as have too little in them who take too much upon them 2. Practice Industry among men v. 15. Wo unto you Scribes and Pharisees Hypocrites for ye compasse Sea and Land to make one Proselyte and when he is made you make him two-fold more the Child of Hell than your selves They spare no Care Cost or Pains to make a Convert but it is to themselves by a Blind obedience and Implicite Faith While they promise to bring a man to Heaven they make his heart like Hell full of bitter zeale a violent heat without any light at all This was their Practice 2. Their Principle which is Hypocrisie Wo unto you Scribes and Pharisees Hypocrites v. 13. They pretended to come in the Name of God as sent forth from God yet they had nothing of the Divine Presence resting on them working in them or going forth by them but were as other men It is a vain thing to hope to put Life into the Dead child by the Staffe without the Person of Elisha or to divide the Waters with the Mantle without the God of Elijah Whoever attempts to conjure down any Devill by the sound of Christ's name without his Spirit and Presence let him take heed lest the Devil flie in his face more enraged This is the second thing which our Saviour notes in these men 3. Their End This is Two-fold 1. Vainglory v. 5. All their Works they doe to be seen of men 2. Covetousnesse v. 14. Ye devoure Widows houses and for a pretence make long Prayers Gold and Glory are the baites which the Devill layes for men He hath escaped the hooke of the Devill who cares not for these He that cares not to have any Possession or to make any Appearance in this World he is already in Heaven and dwells with God This is the Way of these men whom the Lord reproves and condemns He warns his own Disciples to take heed that they follow not their Examples He gives them two Cautions to this purpose The first Caution is in the Verse before my Text And call no man your Father upon the Earth for one is your Father which is in Heaven The second Caution is my Text Neither be ye called Masters for ye have one Master which is Christ You see the Context THE TEXT THese words with those foregoing them are to be opened by a two-fold Distinction 1. Distinction between Naturall and Spirituall things These Cautions concern the Latter of these but reach not to the First The Heaven even the Heavens the true Heaven of Spirituall things are the Lord's but the Earth all things of Nature hath he given to the Children of Men Ps 115. 16. Naturall things are shadows of Spirituall The Naturall man is an Image of God and no more An Image may raigne as Father and Master among shadows But in Spirituall things which are substantiall God himself who is the only substance and truth will be and appear All alone 2. Distinction The second Distinction is a two-fold Consideration of man one as he is in God the other as he is in himself As man is in God so he may be owned and acknowledged for a Father or Master in Spirituall things themselves Saint Paul attributes so much to himself but marke how he doth it For though you have ten thousand Instructers in Christ yet have you not many Fathers for in Christ Jesus I have begotten you thorow the Gospell 1 Cor. 4. 15. Saint Paul hedgeth in his expression on both Sides with Christ and the Gospell that the Glory might be all given to God In Jesus Christ I have begotten you thorow the Gospell I as I am not in my self but comprehended in one Spirit with Christ in one Mysticall Person which is Christ thorow the Gospell that is thorow the presence power and appearance of Christ Jesus in me Paul is ever carefull to speak with abundance of caution in things of this nature Now I live yet not I but Christ liveth in me Gal. 1. 20. I wrought more abundantly then they all Yet not I but the Grace of God which was with me 1 Cor. 15. 10. So here I have begotten you yet not I but a man in Jesus Christ yet not I but the Gospel the power of Christ which was in me Man in this sence is but the Garment and God is the Person that comes cloth'd with this garment While we call any man Master or Father in this sence we do as Thomas who put his hand upon the fraile the humane part of Christ his wounds and
himself 2 Cor. 3. 1. Need we Epistles of Commendations to you or from you ver 2. Ye are our Epistles written in our hearts ver 3. Ye are manifestly declared the Epistle of Christ ministred by us written not with Inke but with the Spirit of the living God not on tables of stone but on hearts of flesh These are the Commendatory Letters which a true Apostle the true Church carry about with them these are the Commission by vertue of which they challenge their authority The Epistle that is the Gospell that is the Discovery of Christ shining thorow them into the hearts of men by the Spirit These are the onely life power authority discovery of the true Church the Manifestation of Christ and the Ministery of the Spirit to the hearts of men We reade Gal. 4. 25 26. of two Hierusalems one above the other below that now is subject to temporary appearances in this world or that now is whose time is now whose being and glory is of this world These are the Two Churches one in the outward forme the other in the Spirit To be subject to the Hierusalem below to the Church in the outward forme for the outward forme's sake is a bondage For that Church is in bondage with her children This Church is but our Mother-in-law The Hierusalem which is above the Church in the unity of the Spirit is the true Mother of us all That Church is our right Mistresse which is our true Mother This is the Mount Sion that cannot be toucht that is not obvious to sense or subject to a carnall discerning Here is the great Congregation of the first-borne the meeting of all good Spirits in this one Spirit Heb. 12. 18 22 23. To be subject to the authority of this Church is to be truly free For this Church is seene onely in the Spirit and in that Spirit justifies her selfe This Spirit is the seale of the living God upon her Thus the Authority of the Church is none or t is that of Christ and his Spirit in her 3. Master Miracles Divines distinguish between Mirandum and Miraculum a thing to be admired and a Miracle That is to be admired which is unusuall or unknowne which proceeds from some unwonted or undiscovered cause in nature That onely is a Miracle which is above Nature which transcends the course and power of Nature which hath the Divine Nature putting forth it selfe in the vigour of its abstracted Being You have Miracles described Mark 16. 20. They went forth and preached the Lord working with them and confirming the Word by signes following That onely is a Miracle or a signe from heaven for confirmation of the truth which hath the Lord Jesus working and appearing in it joyntly with some creature There is no way of confirming the Appearances of Christ but onely by the multiplying of those Appearances How then shall I know which is a Miracle I must have a Spirit large as the sand of the Sea that can put a Girdle about the whole Compasse of Nature in her widest extent I must fathom her in the utmost of her Power before I can say of any thing This is supernaturall this is a Miracle Or else he that saith He sees a Miracle must say he sees God as he is above all creatures comming downe in his owne likenesse into some particular Creature and making a change of it by that Discovery of himselfe in it The waters saw thee O God and were driven backward saith the Psalmist of the Miracles wrought in the passage of the Children of Israel out of Aegypt No man can discerne a Miracle 'till he discover God which can never be done but by the Eye of God in the Soul of man Jesus Christ is the Head-miracle For in him first the Face of God is seen in union with the Creature as in a glasse Each Miracle is the same Appearance over again in severall shapes as the same Soul which shines out in the Head shewing it self in the various Members and parts of the body Therefore is the Working of Miracles a Gift of the Spirit and the working of a Miracle is by the faith of Christ 1 Cor. 12. 9 10. Mat. 17. 20. But let us passe from Miracles to the Letter of the Scriptures 4. Master Letter of the Scriptures Nothing is to be said of these but reverendly They are to be set below the Spirit alone It is in comparison with this Spirit that themselves undervalue themselves and testifie of themselves these things 1. The Scriptures in the Letter are Dead But now we are delivered from the Law that being dead wherein we were held that we might serve him in the newness of the Spirit and not in the oldness of the Letter Rom. 7. 6. The Law and the Letter are every where made of equall dignity power and extent Both as they are alone are old and dead The Scriptures thus taken signifie nothing except you bring some living Power or Principle to them to quicken them Lay them before a dead man and they are as dead as he 2. The Scriptures in the Letter are Killing 2 Cor. 3. 6. The Letter Killeth but the Spirit quickneth The Letter of the Scripture Kils two waies by confounding and condemning us It hath so much darknesse upon it so much difficulty in it it is subject to so many disputes to such variety of interpretations that it troubles and distracts our Vnderstanding making it able to see nothing to settle no where This indeed is the proper end and best effect of the Letter to put out quite all our Light that we may wait for a higher Light from Heaven which may restore the Letter without us and Reason within us as by a Regeneration Saint Paul saith I by the Law am dead to the Law Galat. 2. 19. Happy is he who can say in like manner I by the Letter am blind and dead to the Letter that the Spirit may shine thorow the Letter upon me and fulfill the law of the Letter in mee 3. The Letter of the Scripture is an Outward thing Rom. 2. 1. Saint Paul teacheth us that he is not a Jew who is one outwardly in the Letter but he that is one inwardly in the Spirit The Letter and the Spirit are opposed as inward and outward The Spirit is called a Sword Ephes 6. 17. The Scriptures are the Scabbard in which that Sword is laid up and out of which it is drawn The Spirit in the same place is called the Word of God This is the inward Word the Scriptures are the outward The Spirit is a Person the Scriptures are a Garment fitted to that Person and receiving their warmth from him before they can give any to us Yet every Principle and Power of falshood as well as truth can cloth it self with this Garment He is not a Jew that is one outwardly in the Letter Each Principle and Spirit makes the Scriptures appear to it selfe in its owne Likenesse Spirituall wickednesses
can set themselves up in the highest places of Scripture 4. The Scriptures in the Letter are but a Shadow The Law having a Shadow of good things to come but not the very Image it self Hebr. 10. 1. I have already said that the Law and the Letter are much one thing The Person of Jesus Christ in the Spirit is the Image it self of all good things The Scriptures are the Shadow which this Image casts from it self in the Light of the Spirit All creatures are Shadows of those good things which are in God and Christ The Scriptures are the largest the exactest the nearest the best Shadow and such a one as is rightly seen only in the Eternall light of Christ It vanishes into a confused spot when he withdraws and is clear again when he appears Saint Paul puts Timothy in mind of studying the Scriptures but then lest he should mistake them he gives him this Vniversall Caution 2 Tim. 3. 19. Knowing that every Scripture is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 given by inspiration of God Vnhappy is he that trusts himself to any thing as Scripture any further than it carries a Divine inspiration the breathings of God or his Spirit along with it That is Scripture which is the Word of God and that the Word which is in union with the immortall Word This Word hath the words of everlasting life John 6. 68. I will conclude this particular head of the Scriptures with an Answer to an Objection which the Papists make against us So shall we fall upon the last Master the Spirit Object They say we run in a Circle while we make not the Church the ground of our belief For we pretend to Know all things by the Scriptures But how the Scriptures by the Spirit And how the Spirit by the Scriptures Thus we run round Answ But if a man say he converseth with my body by my soule and with my soule by my body doth he run in a circle or speak vainly No for both are true in a distinct and proper sense The Body is the appropriate and immediate Instrument of the Soule the Soule is the Breath that fills that Instrument and gives it a distinct sound The Spirit quickneth As the Humane nature to the Divinity of Christ so the Scriptures are a kind of Incarnation or as a Body to the Holy Ghost which alone is their proper Soule The Scriptures are the materiall object of our Faith the Spirit the formall both the ultimate the last object in their kind The Truths which I am to believe lie in Scripture as Colours in the wall or in a Picture The Spirit is as the Light I see the coloured wall by the Light for that enlightens it actuates its shape and colours brings them unites them to my eye enlightning and actuating that also I see the Light by the Wall for it reflects and directs it self from that to my eye So the Spirit and the Scriptures as Light and Colours on a Picture are mutually seen in and by one another without any Maze or endlesse Circle Thy Word is a Light to my feet and a Lanthorn to my paths saith David Psal 119. The Eternall Word in the Written Word is the Light in the Lanthorne The Scriptures are my Spectacles though the Spirit of Christ be my Light or my Eye and his Person the Word which I read My God! Let me not want thee in the Humanity while I am a Creature Blessed Spirit let me enjoy thee in the Scriptures while I am in the flesh 5. Master the Spirit This is the Christ the true Master 1 Tim. 3. 13. Great is the mystery of godlinesse God manifested in the Flesh justified in the Spirit The Spirit is God and Christ in their Divine appearance as they are invisible to carnall eyes pure simple perfect in one All Flesh is a Manifestation of God and each Manifestation which is not the Substance it self is but Flesh The Spirit that is the Spirituall appearance of God in Christ tries and justifies or condemns all Appearances of Truth or Falshood This is the onely Judge at whose Bar every Manifestation of God in the flesh receives its Justification even the Spirit The Lord Jesus is that Spirit 2 Cor. 3. 17. 1 John 5. 6. The Spirit is Truth that is the Highest Truth Reason saith There must be One there can be only One first and last Truth from which all Truths primitively derive themselves into which they all ultimately resolve themselves for certainty and evidence Reason saith This Truth can be no other than the Highest of all the only true God as he is in his own Spirit and Spirituall appearance Thus the Spirit which is above Reason and can reveal it self at pleasure without Reason is witnest to by Reason This Spirit is the most high God This God is our Jesus as he stoops into our Natures as he puts forth himself in our Persons to become the Fountaine the Glasse of truth love life joy within us This is He who calls to our fluttering wandring Spirits and points them to himself and saith Here shall be your Rest build your nests on this Rock His Name is I am that I am I am Certainty I am Truth All other things are so far certain and true as they have a Certainty and Truth in him being comprehended in his Appearance or carrying forth his Appearance in themselves Come then all that hunger and thirst after Truth sit downe at the feet of this Master as Mary did There are many Objections made against these inward Teachings of Christ by the Evidence of the Spirit 1. Object How shall I know this Spirit Answ If you ask me how you shall see other things I answer by the Light But if you ask me how you shall see the Light I have nothing to say but the same thing again by the Light That which makes manifest is Light The Light comprehends the object in it self flowes with it into my eye unites it self to my eye informs it immediately with it self and with all shapes and colours in it self Thus if you ask me how you shall know Divine things I answer by the Spirit But you reply how shall I know the Spirit Still I answer by the Spirit 'T is the rule of School-Divines when you come to objectum quo sistendum est when you come to the first Principle of seeing or knowing you must stop there For that discerns and judges all but is discern'd and judg'd only by it self Saint Paul joynes them two a Spirit of Revelation and the opening the eyes of our understanding Ephes 1. 17 18. 2. Object But how can this be seeing my Soule knows not this Spirit hath no sense of it no suitablenesse to it Answ Saint John satisfies you in this doubt 1 Joh. 5. 20. The Son of God is come and hath given us an understanding that we may know him that is true Looke upward to the Mountaine of the Godhead from whence Salvation comes Jesus Christ
of colours It must have pleni-potency an all-sufficiency a Divinity of certainty and clearnesse in and of it self No other thing can ever make the soul fully sure without trembling or wavering A man must be of necessity double-minded and like a wave of the Sea as Saint James speaks Iames 1. till he come to the Corner stone the Bottom reason of truth because the whole Building of truth stands on this That only is a Demonstrating Principle an assuring a quieting truth which is so first of all that there lies no appeale from it to any it self being the Fountain which gives testimony to all truths but receives or needs a testimony from none 2. Immediate truths These are such as have an immediate Vnion with the Soul that there may be no dispute about their Evidence or diminution or danger of corruption by any second hand Saint Paul calls it a Demonstration of power when the first Light the first Truths communicate themselves nakedly to the naked soule of man both being uncloth'd of any intervening representations or reports Thus the Soul receives the Light of truth in the dignity of its strength in the excellenty of its might as Iacob speaks of his First-born The power of Truth is the first and highest Appearance which is proper perfect substantiall All inferiour appearances are Truth in its weakness and shadowy God made man and woman One that they might have a Holy Seed a Sead of God in the Hebrew Malac. 2. 15. The first Truth as the Man the Soule as the Woman must be espoused and married joyn'd without a Deputy or a Third they must be immediately entirely One that they may have a Seed of God a race of Truths cleer and Sure having the full brightnesse of a Demonstration shining in their faces If any thing come between your understanding or belief and the first Truths you doe not trust to their Testimony but to the report of some other thing concerning them The men of Samaria said to the Woman Now we believe not because of thy saying For we have heard Him our selves and know that this is indeed the Christ the Saviour of the world Iohn 4. 42. If thy Soul will have any one truth in the demonstration of power it must be able to say to the Principle of Truth the highest Truth Now I believe not because of any other testimony proof or evidence For I have heard and seen and handled thee in my self and so I know that thou art indeed in substance and power the anointing Truth the only Light and Anointing of all truths 2. Quest What is the Spirit Answ The Spirit is a name of essence or subsistence in God of the divine Nature or one of the three divine Persons I wil speak of it now as it signifies the essence or nature of God God is a Spirit and they that worship him must worship him in Spirit and Truth Iohn 4. 24. The Spirit is God unveil'd and shining out in his true Appearance above all the shadows types and Images of him in the Creatures The Flesh profits not but the Spirit quickneth Ioh. 6. 63. Thus our Saviour opposeth the Created and Uncreated part of things in his owne Person under the names of Flests and Spirit Divines say that every Creature even the highest Aâ—â—el hath something of materiality darknesse grosnesse composition carnality and so it is Flesh compared with God who only is a Spirit as the Spirit is a name of unity simplicity purity The Spirit then is God in the simplicity of his own Person abstracted from all mixture or composition with the Creature 3. Quest What is the Demonstration of the Spirit God in his Spirituall appearance to the Soul is the first Truth For He is above All. He is the Immediate Truth For he alone is most intimate with all things Nothing can unite it selfe to the Soul so inwardly so immediately as God For all things are by Him This is the onely Demonstration of every of any Truth the Spirituall appearance of God in the Soul holding forth that Truth in his own Light When Saint Paul had spoken of the Demonstration of the Spirit he adds that your faith might be not in the Wisdome of men but in the power of God 1 Cor. 2. 5. The Demonstration of the Spirit is above nature reason and all Principles of Wisdome or Truth in any Creature It is the power of God as God bringing forth the discovery of himself and all Truths as particular discoveries in that Vniversall One like branches in the stock of a tree or beames in the body of the Sun In thy light shall we see light Psal 36. 9. In the manifestation of God within us shall we see the manifestation of each Truth You are Light in the Lord Ephes 5. 8. Every Person every appearance is Light hath a power of evidencing and manifesting it self so far only as it is in the Light of God 4. Quest How is the Demonstration of the Spirit appropriated to Jesus Christ Answ Saint Paul shall answer this question Acts 3. 3. Having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost he hath shed forth this which we now see The Spirituall manifestation of God is the onely distinguishing character the demonstration of every spirituall truth This appearance is the Promise the great and last promise of the Father the great and last expectation of all the Saints The Lord Jesus received this manifestation of God in the Person of the Holy Ghost immediately We all receive it or wait for it in the Person of Jesus Christ by His Mediation This Spirit or this Spirituall shining out of the divine Majesty is the onely Seale of truth Ephes 1. 13. Ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise in the former part of the Verse were these words after that ye received the word of truth They were sealed that is the truth of the Gospel was sealed in and to and on them by the Seale of the Spirit which is the Ingraving of the first Truth upon each truth or heart The Lord Jesus is the Angel that hath this Seale of the living God in his hand Revel 7. 2. For He himself is first sealed with it and all other Members of this Truth or Disciples of this Master are sealed by and in Him Him hath the Father sealed Joh. 6. 27. The Father is the Sealer primitively by power and authority The Son as he is the second Person in the Trinity is the Image which the Father sets on when he seals Heb. 1. 3. the expresse Image of his Person the Sealing Image The Holy Spirit is the Impression of this Image in and by the Father In this sense the Holy Ghost is said to be received as the Wax receives Impression of the Image in sealing So he is called the Sealing wherewith we are sealed in that fore-quoted place of the Ephesians The Person of the Lord Jesus as he is Mediatour God-man is the Sealer by place and