Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	gift_n	grace_n	holy_a	11,008	5	5.0756	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A42429	A description of the unregenerate and the truly Christian temper or state in a sermon preach'd before the University of Cambridge, on commencement Sunday, in the forenoon, June 30, 1700 / by John Gaskarth ...	Gaskarth, John, d. 1732.	1700 (1700)	Wing G286; ESTC R10111	23,817	34

it were a flash in our Minds as also Thoughts often long detain'd or continu'd on our Spirits and press'd upon them these still pursuing us with great Importunity towards some Instance of Vertue or to heighten our Remorse for some ill Behaviour when as our Minds so beset with the Affections of Sense are roving and inconstant and especially not apt to fix on a Pious Meditation and least of all on such as causes Trouble to them these so haunting our Souls and overcoming all the Pastimes of the World to remove them nay sometimes mastering our utmost Contrivance the whole command we have of our Wills against them and at last obtaining their happy Effect These with the other particulars at least must be thankfully acknowledg'd to the loving Spirit of God preventing us and as Convictions thereof And this blessed Spirit with all his saving Gifts or Influences is the Procurement of our holy Redeemer who by his so highly Meritorious Sufferings besides the Pardon of our Trespasses on the only true Term thereof John 7.38 Tit. 3.6 obtain'd such liberal Measures of Grace on our account to attend our smallest Endeavours with them nay even excite these first of all as if we fail not our Compliance with those Heavenly Succours will rescue us from the Power of our past Offences secure our Christian Behaviour or Vertues against every Temptation that shall at any time be permitted to befal us and while we duly peruse the written Revelation vouchsafed to us replenish our Minds with all Sacred Knowledge influential on Godliness every necessary Article of a Saving Faith We have these Advantages this common Treasure thro' our Lord's Mediation for all Mankind as it were extraneous or without our selves but which may be brought into the Faculties of our Souls and rendred an inward might of theirs if we please The Graces of the Spirit if we hinder not their force will enable us for the highest Exercises of Piety every inveterate Appetite of our Natures all the Assaults of Sin upon us must submit to him being allow'd to possess our Minds and display his infinite Efficacy in them that can only be resisted by our selves or the obstinacy of our Wills against him God will exhibit the same invincible Strength in us and along with us for Moral Purposes that he wrought in Christ after a Physical manner when he rais'd him from the Dead Eph. 1.19 20. Hence then being thus throughly furnish'd unto all good Works we must be sure to reduce these Heavenly Vertues or Powers into Act Crucify the whole Body of Sin the old Man after the Image of the disobedient Adam with the Affections and Lusts Gal. 5.24 so that we pronounce not of our Satisfactions nor establish our Notions and Estimate of Things thro' the Instigations of these or with respect to them we must thro' these gracious supplies afforded us that are only effectual in our Endeavours with them repress and keep under the Appetites of Body rescue our Minds from the most unnatural subjection to them that they may be able to exert themselves freely possess a clear Reason retriev'd and set at liberty from sensual Byasses which so being a right Conduct of Life and discerning things truly as far as its natural Sphere reaches will easily submit to the farther Enlightnings of Divine Grace that always both prevents us contributes to the forming of such a just Habit of intelligent Creatures and then more plentifully comes in with it Now this true Christian Principle our reasonable Natures or Faculties recover'd into their free Estate and then attended with more liberal or less interrupted Influences of Grace where it informs or directs the Man in respect of himself it prompts to the strictest Temperance or Purity even with regard to the inmost Propensions or Motions of the Heart that these ever be repress'd where they are enormous and being brought into Act would be a Transgression of the Gospel-Law It inspires a Man with the truest Thoughts both of the Entertainments or Delights of Sense and those relating to Mind that the one are mere Brutal Instances if some kinds of Intemperance be not worse than those without any Example in inferiour Creatures quite unbecoming a reasonable Being and that when the Soul once consents to such or entertains it self with polluted Phansies the Resolution of this our thinking Part one way or other being that which determines the quality of our Actions the Trespass is over in a right account there laying no difference between our allowing the luscious and unlawful relishes of Sense within our selves and the acting there of but the Contagion of the Fact or the Injury reflecting and redounding on others in the latter case and 't will suggest to us that the use of our upper Natures as independently as we can of their gross Companions the pure and abstracted Exercises of our Spirits on their right Objects being our suitable Acts or proper to our kind must constitute all our unallay'd Pleasures our true Delights And with respect to our Brethren who partake with us in the same nature it will incite an equal regard the same common Offices where opportunity is afforded to all of these that it would insist on in the nearest Interest or Instance of Self It helps a Man as it delivers him from the confinements of Sense to a true notion of the Grounds and Reasons of a general Beneficence or undistinguish'd Advantage where he is capable thereof as well to others as his own Soul not only that every Person stands in the same Prerogatives both with regard to the parts he consists of and the Gospel-Promises or the Heavenly Bounties he may enjoy if he pleases so that according to an equitable Verdict no Preference lays but because the Benefits we confer on others are more so on our own account reflect larger and better Advantages to our selves when we supply the wants of any in any respect there not only springs up a great satisfaction in our own Breasts the Results of Love the sweet the most delightful Passion of Joy as we have defeated the Afflictions of our Brethren in some measure at least afforded them a present Relief if not mended their case for afterwards which must needs communicate the same comfort wherever the true Christian Temper and Sympathy is not to reckon the Pleasure that so belongs to beneficent Persons of their being in the favour as they may well suppose and better regard of all People which gives them the confidence of their own Kind that they can freely address any of them and affords all the benefits of Converse and Society that Men are so made for that is so necessary in Humane Life with one another Or if because of their other Vertues all which are link'd in a Chain together so that one cannot really and in truth be without the rest the Reproofs these are in a wicked World they be disappointed of the due Treatment they might reasonably expect and meet only with

being fully deliver'd by such Miraculous Testimony as cannot reasonably be deny'd so that those who will not be induc'd in the exercise of their Freedom to study this Revelation which God be thanked he has given us in Writing and observe or practice the Terms of their Happiness it proposes can never certainly be prevail'd upon by any other Courses that Heaven can design nor do I mean that this Spirit should dictate words to People which perhaps he never did either to Prophets or Apostles only presenting a Scheme of Divine Truths to their Minds but leaving the Language to themselves to be express'd according to their different ways of Education and the prevailing Temper in them as we may observe their Figures and Stile ever answer'd these I say I do not mean that the Spirit should dictate words to People enable them to speak even the known Doctrines or Rules of the Gospel after an Extempore manner which would supersede their own Faculties and probably be an occasion of their Neglects in Heavenly Knowledge as it would greatly administer to Spiritual Pride and Contempt of others both which we may see the example of in a sort of Men among us that only conceit these things of themselves But my meaning is that the Spirit communicates such Light and Grace such clearer Informations of all saving Truths with respect to the Understanding such stronger Motives towards the rectifying of the Will upon our compliance with the means afforded us our due perusal of the Sacred Volumes the Dictates of this Spirit our honest Endeavours in the ways of Godliness according to the Precepts deliver'd in those Volumes as will secure us from any dangerous Error in point of Doctrine and enable us against all our evil Affections for every Vertue of a Christian Life we ever obediently following his Guidance and comporting with him This I mean by the larger Gifts of the holy Spirit in a Gospel-state that being dispens'd on our due Concourse with his first Motions a Vertuous Temper by that means after some measure obtain'd in our Minds they are only in order to our farther attainment of that Temper to afford our infirm lapsed Natures proper Assistances for that end not to operate in fluent Discourses or particular Revelations when we already have a complete Book given forth by this Spirit of our Faith and Practice that is of our whole Duty what God enjoyns us or is requir'd of us in the nature of Things with regard to our eternal Bliss and especially we cannot suppose this holy Inspirer thus to operate after this manner where Men imploy not their main Industry do not diligently Meditate in this Heavenly Book which Moses with respect to the Old Testament commanded his Charge the Israelites to do Night and Day Deut. 6.7.11.19 nor prepare their Minds by a more eminent degree of Gospel-Morals or Holiness of Life as some People who must be Conscious of their Defects in both these Instances unreasonably maintain of themselves and others that they are enabl'd whether to Preach or to Pray and I am apt to think as much without Fore-thought or Study too as the Apostles were And then as to this Doctrine of Habits the establishing the Spiritual Life the Heavenly Felicities and Joys upon them which I all-along here do as I do likewise the more liberal Gifts of the blessed Comforter in our Souls tho' this may not possibly be admitted by all but a pure Obedience not as it any ways disposes us for them accounted the Term of those great Rewards yet this Doctrine I think however it may be rejected plainly appears to be the Import of the Gospel-Law as this is not satisfy'd with outward Performances Opus operatum bare Acts of Obedience but every where condemns such giving them their deserv'd Stile of Hypocrisie when they are alone and requiring a compliance of the reasonable part a reconcilement of the Heart to its several Precepts that these be observ'd or conform'd withal in our very Thoughts which would be quite a needless Discipline unless an inward frame thus attainable were necessary for the Graces our Lord purchased the Joys he proposes And besides our blessed Saviour expresly says he repeats it to us that we must be born again or else we cannot enter into the Kingdom of God John 1.13.3.3 5. that is as he explains it we are to obtain a new Nature quite in opposition to the Desires of Flesh have another Temper advanc'd in our Spirits according to the Mind and Will of God so as that we may be capable of his Heavenly Bliss And the Apostles frequently tell us in Emblematical Phrases with reference to Christ that we must put off the Body of the Sins of the Flesh be altogether dead to them buried with our blessed Redeemer in Baptism when taking upon us his holy Profession we are to renounce those abominable Practices and likewise thro' the Faith of the operation of God his Almighty Power declaring it self in our honest Endeavours We must be raised with him to righteousness of Life Col. 2.12 Rom. 6.3 That we must crucifie the Flesh with the Affections and Lusts whatever proceeds from that evil Principle Gal. 5.24 that we being Dead as Christians should be to these Worldly Enjoyments and our true Life hid with Christ in God we must mortifie the Members of our Unregenerate Man which are set upon the Earth Earthly Interests or Pleasures there recounted by that Apostle Col. 3.3 5. This old Man we are injoyn'd again to put off which is corrupt according to the deceitful Lusts and to put on the new Man which after God is created in Righteousness and true Holiness Eph. 4.22 24. Col. 3.9 10. we must be transform'd by the renewing of our Minds Rom. 12.2 All which places being so many Testimonies of the holy Spirit besides the plain Assertion of our Saviour evidently set forth that 't is something beyond a mere Obedience which duly distinguishing may be accounted the Effect thereof where sincerely perform'd from just Motives viz. a Habit of Piety as our Minds are recover'd from the Affections of Body a Spiritualiz'd Temper with such sort of Appetites or Desires in it that disposes Men for their eternal Bliss not the pure Instances of Obedience only which may possibly be perform'd even habitually too thro' a kind of Mechanism or for sinister Purposes without any amendment of Spirit or reformation in the Soul the sensual Nature with its proper Offspring still being the reigning Principle in such Persons And the Apostle expresly confirms this that it must be a Habit of Christian Purity a Triumph or Mastery over the Desires of Flesh that founds the Disposition for our true Happiness declaring likewise that an Indulgence of these lower Appetites is the Genuine Cause of our eternal Sufferings the fruitful Parent or Seed-plot of our Miseries whence they naturally spring To be carnally minded is death but to be spiritually minded is life and Peace And again if ye live