Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	grace_n	heart_n	holy_a	14,318	5	4.7839	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A45133	An humble vindication of a free admission unto the Lords-Supper published for the ease, support, and satisfaction of tender consciences (otherwise remediless) in our mixt congregations / as it was delivered at two sermons upon the occasion of this solemnity in the weekly labours of Iohn Humfrey ...	Humfrey, John, 1621-1719.	1652 (1652)	Wing H3682; ESTC R43272	34,741	95

be secured but there may and will be some Hypocrites and so this true partaking as all one body and one blood in such an unmixt Communion as you pretend vanishes and there can be no such matter But now if men stand here upon a formall purity and will have the outward purest Church they can they go to separating againe and never leave separating and separating as we have dayly Testimony till they are quite separated one from another Even as in the peeling of an Onion where you may peele and peele till you have brought all to nothing unlesse to a few tears perchance with which the eyes of good men must needs runne over in the doing My fith Reason I gather from the uniformity of the Service of God If all other worship lies in common it is an intrenchment upon the common liberty to put an inclosure upon the Sacrament Are all the commands of God universall why not Doe this also If an unregenerate man cannot perform any thing that is acceptable to Christ but is turnes to sin non perse sed per pravam dispositionem Subjecti and so is Damnable Pro. 28.9 and yet he is to doe his endeavour and not to be excluded neverthelesse from any duty why must there needs be an exclusion here upon fear of the like sin and condemnation Let men on one side answer why do you allow a Syntax in the whole service of God besides and bring in a Qua genus of Anomolaes and Heteroclites onely at this Ordinance Let the other side answer how can we admit of Children as Members of the visible Church being born of Christian parents unto Baptisme and yet turn away the parents of those Children from the Sacrament Those that have gone about to answer this had better happly have said nothing for our free course of Baptisme and a deniall of this is such a Seam-rent as will never be handsomly drawn up though stitcht together Nevertheless in yielding the one they have granted the other I will adde whereas on either fide they have their formes which they urge as Necessary there being no admission otherwise to a very joyning in the service of God let both answer whether they offend not a branch of our Christian freedome concerning ordinances of men Col. 2.18.20 which though we might submit thereto as prudentiall only in the outward man we dare not suffer to be set or creepe into the seat of God I mean the conscience that is in bondage if any religion be placed in them It is ill putting Gods Worship upon stilts which to advance it a little higher in the outward port are sure to give it a fall into dangerous scruples divisions My sixt Reason I lay down from my innocency in this doing 1. I doe but my duty 2. I have no power to turn away any 3. I hope the best of all 4. I know God can turn the worst even at this ordinance if he please 5. I endeavour my utmost de jure that all come prepared 6. I humbly confess all our sins as Hezekiah desiring true repentance and a pardon for all our omissions and so lastly I venture the issue all on God knowing that his ordinances are a sweet savour unto him whether we are saved or perish by them I might adde here more considerations very pressing from the command and good of comming from the evill of omitting this ordinance For the good of comming The Sacrament is a means and a pledge a means as well to receive grace as a pledge to assure us thereof Now suppose a poor Soul wants grace whether shall he come but to the means of receiving it The ordinances are as the Baths there are many come to the Bath that are never the better for it yet as they are means of health they are open and free for all to come and make experience of them I conceive as much of the Sacrament and though we may scruple how an unregenerate man can receive it as a pledge yet as it is a means whereby grace is conveyed there is no difficulty For the evill of omission In the Law those that neglected Circumcision and the Passeover were to be cut off in the Gospell Matt. 22. those that came not into the Feast were destroyed the Lord giving a reason ver 8. because they were not worthy Alas we make a scruple only of comming unworthily whereas they are most unworthy of all that come not in to the Supper we doe not find any of the Servants durst refuse to call in all if they had left out any they might have bin worse served This one thing hath long stuck on my thoughts how shall we neglect a certain duty of administring or of comming to the Sacrament for fear of accidentall scandall or of committing an uncertaine sin in the doing It not this a kind of doing evill the evill of omission that good may come of it whose damnation is just Rom. 3.8 But I will say no more thus much shall suffice 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I will not give you my Reasons by the heape but by the weight I humbly commit them to you onely with this caution that no man take occasion from hence to presume for as the Isralites that were destroyed after they passed the Sea and drank of the Rock are set for a warning to the Corinthians so are they both set for a warning to us that wee daily examine our selves and come with reverence least we being freely admitted by Gods goodnesse perish nevertheless with them for our own unworthiness The Second SERMON NOw for answering Objections 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Two things I must premonish you 1. Whereas common notions are like dishes where the same matter dress'd but in another way or variegated in the expression receives a severall relish and esteem in the palats of ordinary judgements you must pardon me the Liberty if at any time I be forced in the Cookery of the same sense to serve you in more words than enough to any Objection 2. Whereas many Godly in these times have a prejudicate opinion against this free Admission so that whatsoever may be said is not like to remove all scruples which are so much fastened on their Consciences thinking they have holynesse on their side we are to goe unto the Throne of Grace to pray the Lord to give us his Spirit of illumination to direct us in this truth which is able alone to convince and satisfie us And as for me if I deliver what is not consonant to the holy Word I desire the Lord to blot out my Sermon with my sin that none of his Little ones may be offended by it but if it be the mouth of Truth too much kept in silence delivering nothing but the very doctrine and practice of Christ himself and his Apostles as one of his weakest servants does heartily beleeve I hope the Lord will give a blessing on it and send it out as a light into your

miracles have been means to some of their religion and conversion wee cannot doubt but the eyes may much more splritually instruct us here in the melting objects of Christs passion redemption and tender mercies outwardly represented seeing we hope the working of the Spirit too by virtue of an ordinance As at the word Christ comes into the heart by the sense of hearing so at the supper by the sense of seeing touching and tasting Let the World Answer Pauls argument To shew forth the death of Christ is the means of Conversion The Sacrament is the shewing forth his death 1. Cor. 11.26 Therefore as it does so it is undoubtedly converting Hence I observed in the words of institution there was a Take and an Eat two words a Take for such as have not Christ a word of grace to convert those and an Eat for such as have already received him to nourish and confirm them For put case a morall man taken for a good man yet unregenerate is and cannot be refused to be admitted hither The man does his beast to prepare himself and so comes doe wee think now to such a man the Ordinance is necessarily fruitlesse and can have no work on him then God help us Shall not his examination confession prayers meditation with all the Ministers exhortations be more solemnly conducing now to work grace in his heart and to convert him this being the way of the spirits motions than the bare preaching of a sermon Especially seeing the word doth not only precede but accompany and is a very part too of the Sacrament Accedat verbum ad elementum fit Sacramentum But put case further a poor Soul much humbled in the sight of his sinnes that cannot yet be able to believe and close with Christ comes hither hoping to meet with this favour here well the word of reconciliation is freely opened the free mercies of Christ set forth and all this while it hath not happily this effect upon his heart yet when he comes to see the truth of all this sealed with Gods own seal Christ freely offered and peculiarly received of him in the Sacrament his Soul by all these heavenly wires is catcht taken drawn and even enforced to a saving Faith the Spirit using such most powerfull methods for the work of his grace which he infuseth in us by a sweet attemperation to the will not by compulsion habitus infusi being wrought per modum acquisitorum And this we have lively represented in the two Disciples of Emmaus whose hearts did burne within them at the hearing of Christ but at the breaking of bread their eyes were fully opened to know and to believe him Luke 24.30 31. Rep. Although a Man may be converted At it is not By the Sacrament it is occasionally but not intentionally a converting Ordinance Ans This being undeniably granted of our opposites the matter is upon the point yeelded for consider sincerely this It may be Peradventure a man may be converted by it and no text expresly forbids any comming to it is not this enough An It may be granted lay it wel to heart and no place to the contrary alleged who doubts not but all It may bee's all occasions must be taken for our salvation But that I may wholly root out this subtility which I think the spirit of error has insinnuated in the hearts of many Godly men I have three things more to say which by Gods blessing will fully do it Provided if the thing serves our turn you will not be grating on the expression 1. Let us cleerly know that the Sacraments and all Ordinances are primarily and properly means of grace It is but in a remote sense they are means of conversion or confirmation For this grace we receive in the use of them is that which convert some and strengthens others Now then we come to this Sacrament as the means to receive Gods grace and this grace which he distributes as a most wise God works in every one as his state and need requires in the converted for their strength and establishment and in the unregenerate for their conversion 2. Consider what is Conversion There is an outward conversion from Heathenisme to the profession of Christ wee doe not stand to say the Sacrament is such a converting Ordinance as if Christ should bid us goe forth with this Sacrament and convert the Nations let this be imagined only of the word But there is an inward effectuall conversion of such as outwardly professe Christ to the truth of grace in their hearts Now how is the worke of grace or true conversion wrought through the word it self Not from any active power it has per se upon the Soul but per modum objecti we say and instrumentally the object is proposed or revealed that is all the word does and then it is the Spirit that by illuminating the mind and the touch upon the will brings the heart to embrace the object whereby it is converted Now is it not just thus likewise in the Sacrament This Sacrament shews forth Christ Crucified according to the Covenant who is the true object of Faith and Life upon this the Spirit of God draws the heart by illumination and conviction to embrace him upon those terms he here is offered insomuch that experience can witnesse that some are and have been hereby converted What difference is there imaginable between this conversion and at the Word what a shift is it to say it is only At and not By the Sacrament when it is instrumentall morally we mean not physically per medum objecti as the Word where I may say the same too as truly that it is more properly At than By the Word it self there being no active vertue but of the Spirit in the one or the other 3. As for this scruple of the Sacrament being occasionally not intentionally converting There may be a principall intention and subordinate more primary or secondary ends in an Ordinance Though the word be the principal converting Ordinance we cannot deny but others may be subordinately also converting as Prayer why els doth the Church pray Turn thou us and we shall be turned Convert thou us and we shall be converted Now as Prayer and other means of Grace are converting and that intentionally in being used to this end So I affirm of the Sacrament unlesse you can find in your heart to keep this pitifull shift still and say rather than this shall be you will distinguish between a converting ordinance and means of Conversion other ordinances are means of Conversion but yet the word you persist is the only intentionally that is intended converting ordinance Well goe too what then I pray To the purpose Then you wil say the word shall be held forth to all as intended to convert them but the Sacrament shall not being not so intended in the Institution Be it so It followes then there must be no Ordinance administred to those that are not converted