Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	ghost_n	holy_a	lord_n	23,094	5	4.0162	3	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A45434	Of the reasonableness of Christian religion by H.H. D.D.	Hammond, Henry, 1605-1660.	1650 (1650)	Wing H570B; ESTC R40128	46,515	59

Commission to apprehend all that profest the worship of Christ in that place And besides there was company with him on the way when the prodigy befel him and all they heard the voice and saw no body Vers 7. 'T is true indeed that in one relation of that passage Acts 22. 9. it is said That they heard not the voice But that as all other seeming contradictions of the Scripture is easily salved by observing that the word {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} in Hebrew which signifies a voice signifies thunder also as Hebr. 12. 26. Whose voice i. e. Thunder shaketh the earth and so very often And so where it is said That they heard the voice the sense is That they heard the thunder which was joyned with the lightning that flasht about him and when it is said They heard not the voice it is exprest in the place what is meant by it They heard not the voice of him that spake to him i. e. The voice of Christ immediately appearing from Heaven and calling unto him Saul Saul c. but onely saw the lightning and heard the thunder but what was said to him he onely heard that was concerned in it but by the effects his answers and consequent change they easily discerned that also though they heard it not This story did this man alwaies avow as a notorious Truth whensoever he was called in question by Jews or Romans for Preaching Christ and there was never any question made of the truth of it And this went for his Commission to be an Apostle of Christ and he never sought for any other And after doing more service in the Church then all the rest of Christs own regularly chosen and designed Apostles he at last laid down his life for the testimony of that Truth which before this he had so sharply persecuted Sect. 12 This is not all yet for at the beginning of the diffusion of the Gospel to the Gentile World and for the declaring of Gods Will in that particular there was not onely a vision to Cornelius and an extasie and an audible voyce from Heaven to Saint Peter in these words Arise Peter kill and eat the obscurity of which words and of the representation to which they belonged was presently interpreted by the effect But beyond both these it follows That at the Preaching of Peter to Cornelius and the rest of his company of Gentile believers the Holy Ghost fell on all that heard the Word i. e. probably came down upon them in some way of visible appearance the like a as before had befaln the Apostles or if not so yet in such manner as evidenced it self by giving them power of speaking strange languages and other gifts and graces sitting them for several conditions in the Church And this was seen by the Jews that were very far from being inclinable to believe such a thing of Gentiles and being convinced by the evidence b were astonished at it rapt with admiration at the strangeness but no way doubting the truth of it And it so fell out that Peter afterwards being called in question by other Jews for what he had then done in Preaching to Gentiles which they thought utterly unlawful by this relation of the descent of the Holy Ghost upon those Gentiles c he satisfied them which sure he could not have done if there had remained any doubt of the truth of it And the same fell out again to the Ephesian Disciples and the truth that it did so was evidenced by their speaking all strange languages which they had never learned and prophecying Two gifts which were so constant consequents of that coming of the Holy Ghost on any that they testified it convincingly to those that had no evidence of the fact Sect. 13 The propriety of this descent to this turn and to that other grand one of giving Commissions and authorizing and so testifying the truth of all that should be taught by them on whom the Spirit thus descended may perhaps be better understood by remembring the customs appointed by God among the Jews Those that were among them called to be Prophets out of their Schools were assumed and consecrated to it by anointing a ceremony of advancing to some eminent office and therefore the Chaldee Paraphrase for unction reads ordinarily {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} advancement Now for many yeers before this coming of Christ Prophecy had failed among the Jews Under the second Temple say they there was no Oyl nor any a way of Revelation save only that of the voice from Heaven Now therefore when God was thus pleased to send His Son to reveal his compleat Will unto the World and from him to continue the same by his Apostles and others after him in stead of that solemn Ceremony of Vnction is this visible descent of the Holy Ghost on him and on them in a shining fiery cloud and with it these words of consecration to Christ This is my Beloved Son c. and in lieu of that voice the gift of Tongues to the Apostles and others This was foretold by one of the Jewish Prophets long before That the Lord should anoint him to Preach and that the Spirit of the Lord should be upon him i. e. that he should be anointed i. e. ordained to this office of Preaching Gods Will not by material oyl but spiritual unction by the real descent of the Spirit of God upon him And accordingly one of his Disciples Saint John being to confute a sort of Antichristian Hereticks of his time which denied Christ to be come really in the flesh useth no other Argument to fortifie them to whom he writes but onely the mention of this Testimony from Heaven this descent on Christ and the Apostles and others who had instructed them in Christianity which he vails under the title of the Vnction viz. that unction vulgarly known among them by that name the unction from the holy One as he calls it i. e. from God in Heaven by which as by their Teachers it had been communicated to them they knew all things i. e. were sure that the Doctrine they had been taught was true and needed not to be taught by any i. e. wanted no more Arguments to confirm this truth unto them That unction as he farther addes teaching them of all i. e. giving them sufficient instructions in that matter and in all other such fundamental truthes of the Christian Doctrine testified to them by those who had been thus anointed immediately from Heaven authorised to teach them Truth This same again as far as concerned Christ is by another a Evangelical writer joyned with his working of Miracles and called Gods anointing him with the Holy Ghost and with power as in b another place Gods anointing him alone which is directly the same with that other phrase used by Saint Paul the c demonstration of the Spirit and of power the descent of the Spirit and working of

the * Heathens themselves have affirmed not onely that it was an especial Star that never before appeared in the Heaven but also that it had a portentous significancy pointing at the descent of a venerable God for the salvation of men and the good of Mortals So again that of the Miracles wrought by Christ and his Apostles which are another kinde of Gods speaking to us in men and upon Earth particularly that of raising the dead and are by the Apostles styled what in reason they are demonstrations Acts 2. 22. and testifications of God himselfe Heb. 2. 4. But above all his own Resurrection out of the Grave after he had been Crucified by them God by thus raising him is said most truly according to the dictates of reason to have a given to all men Faith i. e. an argument of full conviction that he was what he pretended to be and so to g set him out as the person to be believed on h being powerfully and determinately pointed out by that great act to be the Son of God But because all of these would much lengthen this discourse above the designed proportion and because each of them are largely insisted on by others and because no testimony is ordinarily deemed more Authentick then that of audible voice I shall therefore choose principally to insist on that one ordinary way of Gods testifying to men known to the Jews by the title of {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} the daughter of voice or of thunder i. e. a revelation from Heaven delivered in or coming out of the midst of thunder which say the Jews was the speciall way of Gods revealing himself under the second Temple Sect. 7 And by this God three times gave testimony to Christ First immediately after his Baptism Behold the Heavens were opened to him i. e. visibly and miraculously parted asunder and he i. e. John that baptized him saw the Spirit of God descending like a Dove and coming upon him i. e. descending as a Dove descends upon any thing visibly hovering lightning on them And behold a voice out of the Heavens saying i. e. as the Heavens parted asunder a clap of thunder came out and with it a voice delivering these words This is my beloved Sonne in whom I am well pleased i. e. this is my Son whom I have sent his comming to the world and his undertaking is perfectly agreeable to and hath its original wholly from my wil From which testimony of Gods it is consequent That whatsoever he teaches comes from God and is to be embraced as that which is perfectly his Will and Law And it is observable that in one of the old prophecies of the Messiah where it is fore-told that Gods Spirit should descend upon him it is affirmed almost in the very words which were here said to come out of the thunder that this was Gods beloved in whom his soul i. e. he was well pleased Sect. 8 So again a second time in the presence of three sober men which was the number by which the weightiest matters were authentically testified Peter and James and John being all with him in a mountain Behold a lightsom cloud overshadowed them and a voice out of the cloud saying This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased Hear him Giving an unquestioned authority to all that should ever come from him after Sect. 9 Thirdly At a time not long before his death when he was a praying to his Father to glorifie his Name A voice came frō Heaven saying I have both glorified it and will glorifie it again And of them that stood by some said that it thundred others that it was an Angel that spake to him From both which it is easily concluded That God whether by or without the Ministery of an Angel was heard to speak to him out of the Thunder Sect. 10 What was thus done personally to Christ was with some small variation promised and so by John Baptist first foretold that it should be performed after his departure to his Apostles or Disciples who were to preach his Doctrine and what they knew of him after his going out of this world and accordingly in the very manner which was fore-told it came to pass as all other things foretold by him did punctually follow For as they were all together there was suddenly a noise from Heaven as of a violent wind and filled the whole house where they sate And so this styled the i Baptizing them with the Holy Ghost i. e. Receiving them with a far higher Ceremony then that of Baptism viz. with a shining glorious descent of the Spirit of God upon them did at once give them their Commission from Heaven and was a testimony of God himself That what they should teach from Christ was the very doctrine which God required to be embraced by the World Sect. 11 And of this sort there was yet farther one most eminent passage A known and eminent Jew one Saul who by his Sect a Pharisee and by his extraordinary warmth and zeal to the Jewish Law in opposition to Christianity had interessed himself profestly in the persecuting of it had a principall hand in the putting St. Stephen to death as appears by the witnesses laying their garments at his feet Acts 7. 58. and was engaged in a most vehement bloody designe against the Christians in Damascus and having gotten Letters of Commission from the High Priest to that purpose Acts 9. 1. was now very rageful upon his way thither This man thus breathing out threatnings and slaughters against the Church and as he was close to Damascus his journeys end on a sudden a light from Heaven shone about him like lightning flashing about his ears and falling to the ground by that means he heard a voice saying to him Saul Saul why persecutest thou me In words so convincingly delivered that he knew assuredly that it was God that by an Angel thus appeared and spake to him and thereupon he gave answer immediately Who art thou Lord The voice replyed I am Jesus whom thou persecutest with the addition of other words which struck him into such a horror that immediately trembling and in agony of Passion He said Lord what wilt thou have me to do And was again answered what he shold do Go unto the City and there he should receive particular Directions Which accordingly happened and this person became immediately a prime Apostle or Preacher of Christianity This thing was not done privately but every circumstance of the story was publickly known at that time his Letters from the High Priest were known to the Sanhedrin and before he came to Damascus the news of them was come thither so far that Ananias a Christian there that in a vision from God was bid to go to him in such a house made this objection against obeying the command That this was the man that had done so much mischief and was now come with such a