lye is not the Spirit of God yet it is not true that every spirit which speaks any truth is therefore the Spirit of God Satan doth sometimes attest the highest and holyest truths viz. That Fesus is the Son of God that the Apostles are the Servants of God which shew the way of Salvation Act. 16.17 but our Saviour silenceth them and would not suffer them to speak though they spoke truths Mark 1.34 Act. 16.18 The difference therefore between Satans speaking truth and Gods Spirit speaking truth is this 1. If Satan speaks truth he speaketh not of his own a lye only is his own Ioh. 8.44 he doth but borrow truths or rather steal them from from the Scriptures the Ministers or people of God Fer. 23.30 2. When Satan speaks truth he usually misapplies it as Iobs Friends did many precious truths 3. He never speaks truth in the love or for the advantage of it but to be a pretence shadow and introduction to a lye If Error should appear in her own shape she would be very horrid and deformed therefore she puts on her the Mantle of Truth or gets some truth usually to bear her company CHAP. III. Of four other Qualifications of the Spirit of God and the vindication of them A Third Property of the Spirit of God is Light he is the Spirit of Light of Wisdom and Knowledge Isa 11.2 of Revelation in the knowledge of Christ Eph. 1.17 As God is light and Christ is light a Sun a bright Morning Star the Spirit is compared to fire Act. 2. 1 Thes 5. Heavenly fire which gives light as well as heat but Hell-fire is hot and dark Satan is that Prince of darkness the Ruler of the darkness of this world which darkens and blinds the minds of them that beleeve not 2 Cor. 4.4 Object But doth not the evil Spirit bring also a light with it Answ Satan doth indeed transform himself into an Angel of light 2 Cor. 11.14 especially in times and amongst persons pretending to much light and abounding in all utterance and knowledge 1 Cor. 1.5 And therefore we are to understand that the Light of the Spirit of God is to argue or convince the world of sin of righteousness of judgment Ioh. 16.8 Eph. 5.12 13. to shew us as the Angel did Dan. 10.21 that which is noted in the Scripture of truth to explain the glorious Mysteries of the Gospel and Godliness that we may discern them in a spiritual manner which a natural man cannot do 1 Cor. 2.10 11. to shew us that by Sun-light which reason can either not see at all or but as it were by Moon-light The Gospel is an everlasting Gospel Rev. 14.6 and the Spirit bids us contend for the faith once delivered to the Saints not alway in delivering This Light is a Light of the same nature with the light held forth in the Word Psal 119.105 the Word is a Lantorn a dark Lantorn say some without the Spirit but I am sure that Spirit is a going fire a deluding spirit that carries not but contemns and confounds this Lanthorn and there is no light in them Isa 8.20 The light that is in them is darkness and how great is that darkness Mat. 6.23 Gods people are led by the Spirit when they are led by the word inspired by the Spirit 2 Pet. 1. ult and they are taught by God when taught by his Book No Spirit of Christ doth abstract any mans faith from the Word of God which is indeed the word of faith Rom. 10.8 Spiritual knowledge doth not exclude but contain in it the litteral knowledge though the litteral knowledge may be without the spiritual yet the spiritual knowledge of Gods Word is not without the litteral We are not warranted to expect or trust to Enthusiasm's or praeter-scriptural much less contra-scriptural Revelations as they which had Moses and the Prophets the Books of Moses and the Prophets and those that sate in Moses Chair were not to expect guidance from revived returning Ghosts but to hear Moses and the Prophets Luk. 16.29 Mat. 23.2 3. so we which besides Moses and the Prophets have also Christ and his Apostles and have the Canon of the holy Scriptures perfected have much less reason to expect Revelations and to sleight the holy Scriptures but may and ought to build on the foundations of the Prophets of the old Testament and the Apostles of the new Eph. 2.21 That light which contradicts old Articles of faith and coyns new ones that Canonizeth new Scriptures or preacheth new Gospels yea the very questioning of Carping or Cavilling against known received Truths is of Satan Gen. 3.1.5 And he that preacheth another Gospel though he seem wise as an Angel and have the Tongue of an Angel and seem as holy and zealous as the Angels is to be accursed Gal. 1.7 8 9. The fourth Property of the true Spirit of God is Lowliness and indeed the more light the more lowliness The more loathing of our selves Ezek. 36. 27. with 31. for the Spirit convinceth us of sin Ioh. 16.8 makes Paul to judge himself the chief of sinners 1 Tim. 1.15 and to be carnal Rom. 7.14 but the evil Spirit is proud and puffeth up 1 Tim. 3.6 1 Cor. 8.1 is supercilious and censorious of other men speaking evil of persons and things which they know not and saying stand by thy self I am more holy then thou Isa 65.5 calling others carnal sensual divelish while they pretend themselves to be free from sin But the Apostle who had the true Spirit of God saith if we that is If I John that writ this Epistle or other Apostles or Beleevers say that we have no sin we are lyers 1 Ioh. 1. The first Property of the true Spirit of God is Liberty where the Spirit of the Lord is there is liberty 2 Cor. 3.17 He is a free Spirit Psal 51.12 Satan is a slave and of a servile Spirit and so all his Agents and Servants are yea say some that is it which we plead for viz. Liberty but you must therefore take notice of the marks of this Liberty First That Liberty which is from the Spirit of God is not a Liberty to sin but from sin Iohn 8.34 2 Peter 2.19 Secondly This Liberty overthrows not either Ecclesiastical or Civil Government 1 Pet. 2.13.16 for this were to make it a Cloak of maliciousness Thirdly This Liberty is to and in the service of God and not from it men now talk much against Forms but there are some Forms of Gods Institution and others of mens inventions though we be free from all sinful superstitious forms of mens inventing yet we are not therefore free from the lawful and needful Forms that are of Gods appointing His service is perfect freedom The sixt Property of the Spirit of God is Unity Unity Love and Peace is the fruit and effect of the good Spirit Eph. 4.3 Gal. 5.22 we are all made to drink into one Spirit as we all Jews and Gentiles are by
enemy to Timothy and other Ministers and their sound Doctrine and Teaching yet he is not an enemy to all Teaching he will admit that men shall get themselves an heap of corrupt and flattering Teachers 2 Tim. 4.2 3. and that Jeroboam should set up Idolatrous Priests of the lowest of the people and consecrate whosoever will which yet indeed were good enough for their Gods for they were but Calves so he sets up false Apostles false Ministers and As Jannes and Jambres resisted Moses so do these men resist the truth being men of corrupt minds reprobate concerning the faith Secondly In case there be some notorious pollution prophanation or corruption of that Ordinance which Elies Sons were in their Sacrificing guilty of 1 Sam. 2.12 13. whereby not only themselves were made vile but the Lords people possibly the better part of them were made to transgress because they abhorred not only that corruption but also the offering of the Lord because of it Thirdly In case that Ordinances be set up against Ordinances Church against Church and Altar against Altar Some saith Paul Preached Christ of envy and strife and contention Phil. 1.16 those which say they are of Christ in opposition to Peter and Paul are reproved 1 Cor. 1.12 so far as the holiest Minister that lives doth never so rightly and skilfully Preach the Word or administer other Ordinances in contention and opposition to any faithful though possibly not so well gifted Minister or people he therein doth the work of Satan and not of God CHAP. V. Of the Spirit of Prayer and Supplication Shewing how he doth assist in Prayer THat the Spirit doth help us to Pray I need not to prove only I shall endeavuor to search out the manner how he helps And that First Negatively Secondly Affirmatively First The Holy Ghost doth not immediately inspire the Method Matter words of Prayer as he inspired the holy men of God in their Prophesying and Penning of holy Scriptures for if he did then as those Prophesies were purely divine infallible free from any fault or failing corruption yea and indiscretion in the form phrase method or manner of them so also should the words of our Prayers be also perfect purely divine infallible c. but by sad experience we find the contrary 2ly It had been a sin I conceive for the Prophets or men of God not to have delivered the very same Message they received of the Lord both for matter manner and method but it cannot be conceived to have been a sin in any Saint of God against the guidance and governance of Gods Spirit if he had used another Method or Phrase of words in his morning Devotions then then he did Secondly The Spirit is not in our prayers properly the person praying or petitioning that is below the High and Holy Spirit of God Arrius Macedonius and others more lately do abuse Rom. 8.26 27. and finding him as they fancy upon his knees they degrade him from his Deity but Augustine Answers the Spirit is said to Pray as we say Solomon builded the House yet he was a Magistrate a King not a Mason or Carpenter he directed how to build found out Workmen furnisht them with Materials and Money for the work Indeed all the Persons in the Trinity are Authors of our Supplications as well as of our Sanctification Opera Trinitatis ad extra sunt indivisa but every one in his order the Father and Son do Sanctifie and also help us to pray by the Holy Ghost Thirdly The Spirit doth not make Intercession for us after the same manner that Christ doth Romans 8.34 Christ maketh Intercession in Heaven presenting himself to God for us as the high Priest did bear the names of the children of Israel upon his Shoulders and upon his Brest-Place noting to us that he would bear them up and bear them out that he loves them and they lie near to his heart Exod. 28.12.28 29. but the Spirit of God doth make Intercession in us upon Earth there is a vast difference which somewhat doth resemble this between directing or drawing up a Petition to a Prince or State and the preferring presenting it speaking to it and pleading for it the one may be done in the Country the other must be done at the Court. Fourthly The help of the Spirit of God in Prayer is not to be understood exclusively with relation to other Ordinances as though he did not help Godly Ministers to Preach and Godly men to hear remember and practise as well as to pray for the Sons of God are led by the Spirit in the one as well as the other Rom. 8.14 and he as hath been before shewed is the Spirit of wisdom of the fear of the Lord and of grace as well as of Supplication Now these have a general influence upon the whole conversation and not only upon Prayer We are to walk in the Spirit to sing with the Spirit to serve God in the Spirit Rom. 1.9 Ioh. 4.24 Fiftly The help of the Spirit of God doth not prohibit evacuate or invalidate other helps John did not sin in teaching his Disciples to Pray Luk. 11.1 nor did the Disciples of Christ sin in desiring Christ to teach them to pray and yet they did not consider Christ as God as Head of the Church or Saviour of the world but as their Master pressing him with the example of John the Baptist and perswading him to imitate it they it seems did not understand or not remember the mind and meaning of Christ in his Sermon Mat. 6.6 7. brief notes whereof are in Luk. 6. Therefore they here desire that he would teach them to pray and our Saviour saith not ye have the Spirit therefore you need not to be taught nor saith he John was to blame to teach them to pray nor I will teach you as being the Head of the Church but I oughe not to teach you as your Master no I will send my Spirit to teach you and in the mean time I will not help you but he teacheth them again giving them hence a special rule of direction to whom for what and in what manner and order they ought to pray as also we have a short directory 1 Tim. 2.1 And the Israelites were appointed to take unto them words Hosea 14.2 though the Spirit of God doth put us in remembrance Ioh. 14.26 yet Ministers also may yea must put people in remembrance of what is necessary 2 Pet. 1.12.15 the same may be said of Prayer Thus much for the Negative how the Spirit of God doth not help in Prayer Now I shall endeavor by the help of his Spirit and your Prayers to shew Affirmatively how the Spirit of God doth help in prayer and that help is of two sorts Habituating or Actuating the one is more remote and the other more neerer The one qualifies the person praying the other the Prayer it self The Spirit of God as to the person is First an Enlightening Spirit Secondly
that are come from beyond Sea to Preach to our Assemblies to revile and raile against Protestant Ministers to vent Errors and Heresies to the reproach and dishonour of the Protestant Religion To furnish all sort of men and scratch their itching eares with an heap of teachers for they will not abide called officers or sound Doctrine 1 Tim. 4. as the adulteress too often pleaseth the unchast Husband more then the beautiful yoke-fellow as Witches and Wizzards are merry at their diabolical fancied Feast as though they did eat and drink the most pleasant and wholesome meats and drinks How strangely did Satan fill the heart of Hacket Copinger and Arthington whose story you may read in Camdens Elizabetha as well as see the like in very many now adays To promote those sins that in opposition to the sins of the world and the sins of the flesh are properly and purely Sathanical viz. Errors Heresies Seduction for Satan is not a drunkard adulterer a swearer or a covetous person but a lyer seducer that abode not in the truth to disturb the unity and peace of our Congregations whilest almost every man is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an absurd man out of his place 2 Thes 3.2 multitudes of souls perverted very few saved a good Protestant of the old stamp whether conformable or non-conformable is worth a thousand of these new Saints Finally I have heard an ignorant one distempered in brain and overcome with melancholy speak excellently of the most divine and deep Mysteries of Religion and Doctor Merick Causabone indeavors to shew how this may be done by natural causes and we read that the Anabaptists in Munster having made a Law that all the Citizens should bring their goods into a common stock there were Maids amongst them could tell how much every man had left at home like as Paul did discern Ananias and Saphirah It is easie to guesse who taught them Little did Peter a pious and eminent Apostle think that he acted Satans part till Christ discerned and discovered Satan Mat. 16. CHAP. VIII Of the witnessing Spirit mentioned Rom. 8.16 EVery matter of worth and weight is to be transacted before and proved by two sufficient witnesses unus testis nullus testis In the mouth of two or three witnesses shall every word be established the Apostle produceth here two witnesses of our Adoption Son-ship which is a thing of very great consequence and concernment our Spirit and Gods Spirit and these witnesses depose point blank we cry Abba Father vers 15. and this is not a false cry but a true cry and the Spirit it self beareth witness together with our Spirit that it is so the Spirit as we use to say by way of excellency the Bible the Scripture the eminent excellent Spirit Infinite Eternal Spirit a wit-witness of greater authority evidence and credit After the reading of these and other words of Scripture it is unnecessary as well as it is beyond my purpose to prove that the Spirit doth witness that we are all the children of God I shall only enquire into the manner how the Spirit of God witnesseth And first it must be granted that the witness-bearing of the Spirit here mentioned is spoken of not as a peculiar priviledge of two or three or a few eminent Saints but as the general or usual priviledge of all the Saints of God which are led by the Spirit are the children Heirs of God and joynt Heirs with Christ and how this witness is born I shall endeavour to shew 1. Negatively 2. Affirmatively Negatively First not by outward voice as of Christ Mat. 3. ult Mat. 17.5 which voyce saith the Apostle Peter was heard of many 2. Pet. 1.18.19 this witness is inward and secret it is hidden Manna Rev. 2.17 which no man knows but he that receiveth it As Satan can suggest thoughts into the soul which no by-stander can see So can the Spirit of God set his privy seal upon the soul and none discern but the spirit of a man in him 2ly The Spirit of God doth not use the Ministry of Angels though Christs his Sonship was proclaimed by such Heavenly Heralds Luk. 1.30 31 32. Luk. 2.9.13 3ly The Spirit of God doth not witness our Adoption by immediate Revelation and Inspiration Jesus Christ indeed received not the Spirit by measure Ioh. 3.34 The fulness of the Godhead dwelt in him bodily Col. 2.9 and the Prophets and Apostles were in their measure so inspired 2 Pet. 1. ult by virtue of which Inspiration that which was not Canonical before was so aâ—ter and new Truths and Tenets were to be received and beleeved But now we may say are all Apostles are all Prophets Yea are there now any Apostles any Prophets so inspired 4ly The Spirit of God doth not witness our Sonship in such dark and dubious phrases as Apollos Oracles used to be delivered in but there is such certainty and clearness in this Testimony that it doth either altogether or in a great measure suspend and silence doubts and distrusts he that sees the Sun knows it is bright and light he that tastes honey knows it is sweet and he that tastes the hidden Manna and hears this Testimony is fully perswaded and satisfied by it Rom. 8.38 5ly The Spirit of God doth not witness to all men that they are the children of God there are multitudes myriads of men that never heard it when we speak of it to them we are as it were Barbarians to them this high Language of Canaan is an unknown Tongue to them for they must be the children of God by Adoption indeed before they be witnessed to be so prius est predicare de esse quam de cognosci Yea the Elect of God have it not before conversion nor usually in the first act of conversion then they lye under the spirit of bondage v. 15. and are in the pangs of the new Birth nor always afterward for the Testimony is not de esse but de bene esse of a Christian not their Diet but their Banquet not common food but a Cordial a witness the most punctual faithful witness doth but speak when there is need and occasion he witnesseth not alway but for always Secondly Affirmatively The Spirit of God I conceive doth witness all or at least some of these ways First He doth attest Scripture truths unto the soul saying the same in the breast of the beleever that it saith in the Bible by irradiating those truths he making the the light of Gods word brighter and illuminating the eyes of the soul he makes the sight better so that the divine Authority Infallibility and Majesty of the Word of God doth appear I shall instance in two sweet and comfortable Scripture truths Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after righteousness Mat. 5.6 which seems to be the minimum quod sic the lowest least degree of saving faith and Come to me I will give rest to them that are weary and heavy laden Mat. 11.28