Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	apostle_n	church_n	faith_n	5,700	5	5.3212	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A54249	The true primitive state of civill and ecclesiasticall government discussed and cleared also a vvay briefly propounded to reconcile the saints, by what names (now) soever distinguished, in unity of doctrine and discipline, according to our covenant in a government neerest to the word of God.	D. P.	1649 (1649)	Wing P14; ESTC R35085	22,555	32

discourse as a second branch of the last particular First sum up all that hath been said touching this Primitive Ecclesiasticall constitution of government in a compendious form as it was then held forth And then secondly the grounds and reasons of the first defection and Apostacle from the same And lastly propound some means to re-estate the same in its former pureness As for the first I thinke I cannot doe better then only word for word to circumscribe what that Author hath set down touching the same in the Shrill cry where after he had shewed that the Covenant did not require conformity to a Nationall Church because the word of God acknowledgeth no other but that one visible Catholike Church which is in all Nations dispersed into congregations and families that Congregation then saith he or family wheresoever it is that in matter form doctrine or disciplin shal conform to theprimitive institution that must needs be the purest Church which we are bound by Covenant to hold forth in these Nations and that is conceived to be this when at the first by the preaching the sincere word of the Gospel so many as heard it that were convinced of their lost estate by reason of sin were incited therby publickly to professe repentance from dead works and faith towards God through the Lord Jesus desiring thereupon to bee baptized into the visible Church and under his Government to obey both in doctrine and discipline what they shall clearly be perswaded to bee his will and for that end frequently to meete in their severall Assemblies and there orderly and decently exercise each others gifts for the edification one of another in their most holy faith that so upon very good experience had upon such gifts they might out of themselves and for themselves successively choose as they stood in need Pastors and other Officers as they conceived necessary to the well-being and governing those who had voluntarily submitted themselves therunto So that then doubtles this constitution would have continued as a patterne to all succeeding Congregations Those extraordinary Messengers only excepted that by their Miracles shewed their authority from God to lay this foundation and prescribe the forme for this spirituall building Thus far the Shrill Cry But for the second touching the first grounds of apostacy its evident that from those very times this defection began the Apostle John testifying that there was then many Antichrists which by their carriages doctrines and cunning practices did deny the comming of Christ in the flesh which was in truth no lesse then to deny both the Father and the Son for he that doth deny the end of Christs comming which was to redeem inlighten fanctifie rule and governe his Church after his own mind doth in effect deny his very comming as also both father and son and is a very Antichrist To this also the Apostle Paul gives testimony that then this mistery of iniquity began to worke which first appeared in the defection and apostacy of some of those instruments that were first intrusted and furnished with ability to preach the word which afterward through a Satanicall pride and corruption in judgement began to fall off from the true Apostles usurping authority not onely over them but to reigne as Kings over the consciences of the Brethren whom then they did in the next place Secondly seduce from the sincerity of the Gospell pretending yet to be the Apostles of Christ which Paul calls notwithstanding false Apostles Ministers of Sathan transformed into the appearance of Angels of light because indeed they had a zeale for God after the righteousnesse of the law but not according to knowledge in that they could not distinguish between that active and passive righteousnesse of the Law and Gospell the one requiring and exacting obedience when it gives no power to performe the other freely giving a power to performe more than it at all times requires an exact performance to Besides from the womb of this error proceeded many more for as in the Law so in the Gospell there is such a concatination of Gospel truths that an error in one foundation truth causeth the like in others So that by falling off to the Law though they did professe faith in Christ They had no benefit thereby through the neglect of the Gospel either of an effectuall vocation justification true Sanctification or glorificaon which was only in this as Gods way to be found The Apostle to the Gallatians testifying that notwithstanding their profession of faith in Christ in that they preferred mans righteousnesse before Gods they were yet in their sins Christs death was in vaine to them And that all his benefits should profit them nothing which is as was said all one to them as if they had denyed Christs comming in the flesh And then thirdly having lost the purity of the Gospell they fell also from the forme and discipline of the same preferring circumcision before baptisme not assembling themselves as formerly refusing communion and fellowship with those purer Churches dispising and contemning those Sacraments which presented the benefits of Christs body and blood insomuch as the Apostle said in way of reproofe that if a temporall death followed the breach of one of Moses Laws how much shall he bee guilty of a sorer punishement which by the neglect of Gospell truths and Ordinances trample under foot the blood of the Sonne of God Finally After this corruption in doctrine there was so great a departure from the faith that ther followed as universal a corruption in manners and then the man of Sinne the Antichrist not long after came indeed to be revealed whose onely worke was to set himself against and above Christ in all his gospell-ministrations confounding all primitive order and forme both of doctrine and discipline admitting none but himselfe and his corrupt Clergy to be sole Judges in matters of faith which did assume to themselves onely the name of the holy Church that so he might the better sit in the consciences of those hee calls the Laiety as if it belonged not to them either to know or receive any benefit by Christ through a faith of their own over which he did so lord it that he compelled them contrary to their owne light implicitly to beleeve and obey many times those things that were both contrary to nature Law and Gospel Which together with many more horrid abominations that for brevity sake is here remitted So then by this such a thick and close darknes covered the eyes of the people that very few had in those dayes any true understanding in the mistery of the Gospell the Gospell then being turned into the Law and other humane traditions And when that darkenesse began a little to be expeld about Luthers time yet by and by after there was againe such a confused mixture of the Law and Gospell that it was hard to say which was either Which * Luther indeed prophetically foretold should come to passe through