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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A63067	A commentary or exposition upon the four Evangelists, and the Acts of the Apostles: wherein the text is explained, some controversies are discussed, divers common places are handled, and many remarkable matters hinted, that had by former interpreters been pretermitted. Besides, divers other texts of Scripture which occasionally occur are fully opened, and the whole so intermixed with pertinent histories, as will yeeld both pleasure and profit to the judicious reader. / By John Trapp M. A. Pastour of Weston upon Avon in Gloucestershire.	Trapp, John, 1601-1669.; Trapp, Joseph, 1601-1669. Brief commentary or exposition upon the Gospel according to St John.	1647 (1647)	Wing T2042; ESTC R201354	792,361	772

before we aske as he did David Psal. 32. He prevents us with many mercies we never sought him for that our praises may exceed our prayers I am found of them that sought me not saith God but yet in the same place it is said I am sought of them that asked not for me Importing that we never seek to him for grace till effectually called by his grace Howbeit no sooner is any truly called but he presently prayeth Say not then if God know our needs what need we open them to him The truth is we doe it not to inform him of that he knows not or to stir up mercy in him who is all bowels and perfectly pitieth us but 1. Hereby we acknowledge him as a childe doth his father when he runs to him for food 2. We run that course of getting good things that he hath prescribed us Jer. 29. 11 12. Which Moses and Elias knew and therefore the former turned Gods predictions the later his promises into prayers 3. Hereby we prepare our selves holily to enjoy the things we crave for prayer both sanctifieth the creature and encreaseth our love and thankfullnesse Psal. 116 1. 4. Prayer prepareth us either to go without that we beg if God see fit as David when he prayed for the childes life and was fitted thereby to bear the losse of it or else to part with that we have got by prayer for the glory of God the giver of it Those that make their requests known to God with thanksgiving shall have at least the peace of God that passeth all understanding to guard their hearts and mindes in Christ Iesus They shall have strength in their souls the joy of the Lord shall be their strength the glory of the Lord shall be their rereward In their marching in the wildernesse at the fourth Alarm arose the standard of Dan Asher and Nepthali these were the rereward of the Lords host and to these were committed the care of gathering together the lame feeble and sick and to look that nothing was left behinde Unto this the Prophet Isaiah seems in that text to allude and so doth David Psal. 27. 10. When my father and mother forsake me the Lord will gather me And this comfortable assurance was the fruit of his prayer Verse 9. After this manner therefore pray ye Forms of wholesome words are profitable A set form of prayer is held fittest for the publike and for such weak Christians as are not yet able to expresse their own desires in their own words The utterance of wisdom is given to some Christians only 1 Cor. 12. 8. yet are all to strive unto it that the testimony of Christ may be confirmed in them 1 Cor. 1. 5 6. God will take that at first that afterwards will not be accepted If words be wanting pray that God that commands thee to take words and come before him to vouchsafe thee those words wherewith thou mayest come before him Speak as the poor man doth supplications so did the prodigall Forecast also with him what thou wilt say Praemeditate of the matter disposing it in due order as one would doe that is to speak to a Prince God is a great King Mal. 1. 23. Some thinke we must never pray but upon the sudden and extraordinary instinct and motion of the spirit This is a fancy and those that practise it cannot but fall into idle repetitions and be confused going forward and backward like hounds at a losse saith a good Divine and having unadvisedly begun to speak they know not how wisely to make an end This to prevent premeditate and propound to thy self fit heads of prayer gather catalogues of thy sinnes and duties by the decalogue observe the daily straits of mortall condition consider Gods mercies your own infirmities troubles from Satan pressures from the world crosses on all hands c. And as you cannot want matter so neither words of prayer The Spirit will assist and God will accept if there be but an honest heart and lawfull petitions And albeit we cannot vary them as some can our Saviour in his agony used the self-same words thrice together in prayer and so may we when there is the same matter and occasion He also had a set form of giving thanks at meat which the two Disciples at Emaus hearing knew him by it A form then may be used we see when it is gathered out of the holy Scriptures and agreeable thereunto Neither is the spirit limited hereby for the largenesse of the heart stands not so much in the multitude and variety of expressions as in the extent of the affection Besides if forms were unlawfull then neither might we sing Psalms nor join in prayer with others nor use the forms prescribed by God Our Father which art in Heaven Tertullian calls this prayer a breviary of the Gospel and compend of saving doctrin It is framed in form of the decalogue the three former Petitions respecting God the three later our selves and others Every word therein hath its weight Our there 's our charity Father there 's our faith In heaven there 's our hope Father is taken sometimes personally as in that of our Saviour My father is greater then I sometimes essentially for the Whole Deity so here Now that God is in Heaven is a notion that heathens also have by nature and do therefore in distresse lift up eyes and hands thither-ward And lest man should not look upward God hath given to his eyes peculiar nerves to pull them up towards his habitation that he might direct his prayer unto him and look up Psal. 5. 3. that he might feelingly say with David Whom have I in heaven but thee Unto thee lift I up mine eyes ô thou that dwellest in the heavens Behold as the eyes of servants look to the hand of their Masters c. Psal 123 1 2. It is reported of 〈◊〉 that he preached so powerfully that he seemed to thunder and prayed so earnestly that he seemed to carry his hearers with him up into heaven Hallowed be thy Name 1. Honoured be thy Majesty According to thy Name O God so is thy praise Psal. 48. 10. Now Gods Name is holy and reverend Psal. 111. 9. Great and terrible Psal. 99. 3. Wonderfull and worthy Psal. 8. 1. Jam. 2. 7. High and honourable Isa. 12. 4. Dreadfull among the Heathen Mal. 1. 14. and exalted above all praise 〈◊〉 9. 5. His glory is as himself eternally infinite and so abideth not capable of our addition or detraction The Sun would shine though all the world were blinde or did wilfully shut their eyes Howbeit to try how we prize his glory and how industrious we will be to promote it God lets us know that he accounts himself as it were to receive a new being by those inward conceptions of his glory and by those outward honours we do him when we lift up his Name

Bernard who seek straws to put out their eyes withall If we break not off our sins by repentance that there may be a lengthening of our tranquillity a removall of our Candleslick may be as certainly fore-seen and fore-told as if visions and letters were sent us from heaven as once to the Church of Ephesus God may well say to us as to them of old Have I been a wildernesse unto Israel a land of darknesse Or as Themistocles to his Athenians Are ye weary of receiving so many benefits by one man Bona à tergo formosissima Our sins have long since sollicited an utter dissolution and desolation of all and that we should be made a heap and a hissing a waste and a wildernesse Quod Deus ave●tat Verse 2. And saying Repent ye Change your mindes now at the preaching of the Gospel as they changed their garments at the promulgation of the Law Rent your hearts and not your garments plough up the fallows of your hearts grieve for your sins even to a transmentation as those Corinthians did and as Simon Peter counselled Simon Magus that snake that had cast his coat but kept his poison For although he ca●ried the matter so cleanly and cunningly that Philip took him for a true convert and baptized him yet Peter soon saw that he was in the gall or venome of bitternesse for the word used Deut. 29. 18. whereunto the Apostle alludes signifieth both and therefore prescribes him an Antidote the very same that John doth here this generation of vipers Repent if perhaps the thoughts of thy heart may be forgiven thee His wicked thought is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the godly change of minde that the Apostle perswadeth him unto is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he that by some mischance hath drunk poison must cast it up again as soon as he can ere it get to the vitals Repentance is the souls vomit which is the hardest kinde of physick but the wholsomest Happy is he that by the dung-port of his mouth in a sorrowfull confession can disburden himself of the sinne that both clogs and hazards his soul to death eternall We r●n from God by sin to death and have no other way to return but by death to sin For the kingdom of heaven is at hand q. d. Ye have a price put into your hands a fair opportunity of making your selves for ever Will ye like the vine and olive in ●othams parable not leave your sweetnesse and fatnesse your dilecta delicta beloved sins although it be to raign yea and that in Gods kingdome Knowest thou not that the goodnesse of God should lead thee to repentance Is there not mercy with God therefore that he may be feared should not men rent their hearts because God is gracious and turn to the Lord because he will multiply pardon To argue from mercy to liberty is the devils logick and makes God repent him of his favours to such as David did of his kindenesse to Nabal Rather we should argue from mercy to duty as Joseph did to his master in a temptation from deliverance to obedience with David Psal. 116 8 9. And therefore return to our fathers house with the Prodigall because there is bread enough therefore repent because his Kingdome is at hand and would be laid hold on As John Baptist was Christs fore-runner into the world so must repentance be his fore-runner into our hearts Verse 3. For this is he which was spoken of Whether these be the words of the Baptist or of the Evangelist it appears not skils not The most say of the Evangelist concerning the Baptist. By the Prophet Isaias Thus one Testament infolds another as those wheels in Ezekiel And the Law preacheth faith in Christ as well as the Gospel Rom. 10. 6. 7. The voice of one crying Loudly and lustily lifting up his voice as a trumpet or as the sound of many waters Semblably S. Paul was ordained to be a crier 1 Tim. 1. ●1 and so is every faithfull Preacher 2 Tim. 4. 2. He must cry and be instant stand to the work and stand over it Sta cum diligentia saith the Syriack there clangite clamate Jer. 4. 5. Ye have to doe with deaf men dead men living carcases walking sepulchres of themselves Now therefore as our Saviour lifted up his voice when he said Lazarus come forth So must Christs Ministers when they speak to such as lie rotting and stinking in the graves of their corruptions cry aloud Awake thou that sleepest and stand up from the dead that Christ may give thee light Ecclesia the Church is a word in use among the Athenians and signifies an Assembly of Citizens called out of the multitude as it were by name or in their ranks by the voice of the publike Crier to hear some speech or sentence of the Senate The Church in like sort is a company called out of the kingdome of Satan by the voice of Gods Ministers as it were criers to hear the doctrine of the Gospel revealed from heaven There are that observe that John Baptist entered upon his calling in the year of Jubilee which used to be proclaimed by a Crier with the sound of a trumpet and that in allusion thereunto he is called The voice of a crier Prepare ye the way of the Lord. 〈◊〉 the terrours of the Lord to seize upon your souls take not up bucklers against the stroaks of Gods Law bring not your buckets to quench the motions of his Spirit knocking at your hearts by the hammer of his Word Make much of the least beginnings of grace even those they call repressing since they prepare the heart for conversion Open the everlasting doors that the King of glory may come in that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith As Esther leaned upon 〈◊〉 two maids when she came before the King So let the soul 〈◊〉 upon attrition of the Law and contrition of the Gospel so 〈◊〉 the King of glory stretch out the golden Scepter of his grace and we shall live As Iohn Baptist was Christs fore-runner into the world so must repentance be his fore-runner into our hearts for he that repenteth not the Kingdom of God is far from him he cannot see it for his lusts that hang in his light Make his paths straight Walk exactly precisely accurately 〈◊〉 line and by rule walk as in a frame make straight steps to your feet or else there is no passing the strait gate so strait that as few can walk in it so none can halt in it but must needs goe upright Plain things will joyn in every point one with another not so 〈◊〉 and rugged things In like sort plain spirits close with Gods truths not those that are swoln c. The old heart will never hold out the hardship of holines Verse 4. And the same Iohn had his raiment

courses Galileus used 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to 〈◊〉 mountains in the Moon so doe these to finde faults in those that are farre better then themselves they can pierce beyond the Moon and spy the least moat in the Sunne the smallest infirmity in the most glorious Saint yea some errours and exorbitancies that never had any 〈◊〉 but in their imagination detesting those sins in others that they 〈◊〉 in themselves And then shalt thou see clearly c. There is in every godly man an holy bashfulnesse an ingenuous modesty that he would be foully ashamed to charge others with those crimes which 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 allow in himself Not so every profligate 〈◊〉 frontlesse Pharisee censorious hypocrite These think belike to binde 〈◊〉 their own bleeding souls with a palliate cure as they call it by goring very bloudily into other mens consciences whereas they never yet purged their own Thus dealt the Priests and Elders with our Saviour the false Apostles with Paul Porphyry and others of the same brain with the Primitive Christians and the Papists with the Waldensis whose freedom of speech in blaming and reproving the dissolute manners and actions of the Clergy Effecit ut plures 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 iis 〈◊〉 a quibus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 alieni saith 〈◊〉 was the cause that they were reported to be Manichees Catharists what not And yet a certain Dominican was forced to confesse that 〈◊〉 were good in their lives true in their speeches full of brotherly love one towards another but their faith saith he is incorrigible and as bad as may be And why but because they maintained that the Pope was Antichrist that the Court of Rome was intolerably corrupted the Clergy debauched c. Novum 〈◊〉 Caie Caesar c. S. Paul was become the Galathians 〈◊〉 because he told them the truth and so were these the 〈◊〉 There was found a certain Postiller that meeting with this 〈◊〉 passage in S. Augustine The whole life of 〈◊〉 is 〈◊〉 neither is there any thing good without the chiefest good 〈◊〉 est 〈◊〉 sententia said he This is a cruell sentence This was a sinfull censure say I passed by a man that was never truly humbled with the sight and sense of his own wicked and wretched 〈◊〉 by nature and practice a stranger to himself and therefore so uncharitable to another It is not evil to marry saith one but good to be wary So it is not 〈◊〉 to reprove an 〈◊〉 but let a man take heed he hear not Phisitian healthy self 〈◊〉 first pull the beam out of thine own eye The Apostle after he had given rules for reproving Ephes. 5. 11 12 13. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 15. See that ye walk circumspectly or exactly that none may 〈◊〉 blame or blemish you with any foul fault Infirmities are 〈◊〉 in the best and will be till they come to be the spirits of just men made perfect Heb. 12. 23. And this is a means to make them warn the 〈◊〉 with more feeling experience and compassion Heb. 2. 17. But say they be 〈◊〉 of grosse sinnes as these 〈◊〉 though they should begin at home and first cast out the beam of their own eye yet if they speak according to Gods Word and the thing be so indeed hear them hardly Matth. 〈◊〉 2 3. 〈◊〉 by them An Angel may speak in an 〈◊〉 and God by Balaam The words doe but passe thorow him as when a man speaks 〈◊〉 a trunke they are not polluted by him because not his Verse 6. Give not that which is holy to dogs c. Having shew'd How here our Saviour shews Whom we should 〈◊〉 Give not holy things wholsome counsels or rebukes called 〈◊〉 where reproofs of life precious balms excellent ointments 〈◊〉 may 〈◊〉 a wound but make none to dogs that will not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the 〈◊〉 or swine that if they light upon such a 〈◊〉 will only 〈◊〉 and go their waies Beware of dogs beware of evil workers such especially 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 wrought so hard walked so 〈◊〉 and so 〈◊〉 that now they 〈◊〉 set down to rest in the seat of the 〈◊〉 Beware of such botches 〈◊〉 no good to be done upon 〈◊〉 or to be gotten by them but a great deal of danger The 〈◊〉 admonished all they met if men 〈◊〉 not 〈◊〉 they connted it an easie losse to cast away a few words upon 〈◊〉 But our Saviour prescribeth us prudence and caution He will not have holy 〈◊〉 spent and 〈◊〉 upon 〈◊〉 his pearls trampled on by swinish 〈◊〉 Mourn we may with Jeremy for such mad dogs as 〈◊〉 flee in the face of them that fairly tell them of their faults Pray we must and pity such 〈◊〉 swine such 〈◊〉 and scurrilous wretches as grunt against goodnesse and feed insatiably upon the garbage of carnall contentments As dogs and swine were unclean creatures and unfit for 〈◊〉 so are those for admonition that would entertain it with cruelty 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Speak not in the ears of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Solomon for he will despise the wisdome of thy words And again 〈◊〉 not a scorner lest he hate thee rebuke a wise man and he will love 〈◊〉 David praies for a friendly reprover Psal. 141. 5. Job 〈◊〉 Make me to know my transgression and my sinne Hezekiah 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 at that sharp and sad message Jonah though tetchy enough laies his hand upon 〈◊〉 mouth and seals up his prophecy with 〈◊〉 after Gods 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 licet 〈◊〉 perstricta The Virgin Mary held her peace Joh. 2. 5. when her sonne took her up so 〈◊〉 for her 〈◊〉 afore 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 company So did S. Peter when S. Paul took him up for 〈◊〉 at 〈◊〉 Gal. 2. 14. and commendeth that Epistle 〈◊〉 S. Paul had witnessed that reproof among the rest 2 Pet. 3. 16. The two Disciples going to Emaus constrained that stranger that had chidden them for their unbelief to abide and eat with them And luke warm Laodicea so roundly reproved and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with shamefull spewing out repented and was reformed as some ground and gather from that title our 〈◊〉 assumes in the Preface to the Epistle The beginning of the Creation of God Eusebius also testifieth that there was a 〈◊〉 Church there in his daies Next to the not deserving of a reproof is the well taking of it No suggar can bereave a pill of his 〈◊〉 None but the gracious can say Let the righteous smite me Bees only passe by Roses and violets and sit upon Thyme which is hot and biting Most men when we seek to fetch them 〈◊〉 of their sins to awaken them out of the snare of the devil they 〈◊〉 and snarl as 〈◊〉 that are wakened out of sleep are apt to do They snuf and take scorn are as horse and mule untameable untractable the more you rub their galled backs the more they kick These stray-asses will not be brought home Exod 23. 45. These old bottles will break with such new wine The more you touch these

are fools because they fail in the main point of their salvation they are troubled about many things 〈◊〉 but neglect the one thing necessary they trifle out their precious 〈◊〉 and in hearing or other services they do worse then lose their labour 〈◊〉 they commit sin and heap up 〈◊〉 Their house will down as the spiders house doth and all their building plowing planting sailing come to nothing Which built his house upon the sand Wherefore it soon sinks and shatters as having not the loose earth thrown up first by the practice of mortification and self deniall Men should first sit down and cast what it would cost them to build the tower of godlinesse or ere they leap into profession They should put their hearts often to those grand questions of abnegation Can I as all must that will be Christs Disciples deny my self in all my selves for a man hath many selves within himself and must utterly and absolutely deny them all take up my daily crosse 〈◊〉 every Christian is a 〈◊〉 or crosse-bearer saith Luther the rain will fall the flouds flow the windes blow and beat upon his building he shall have many trials and temptations that looks toward heaven troubles without terrours within his back-burden of both and follow Christ thorow thick and thin by doing and suffering his whole will Many will follow Christ in such duties as sute with their humours and no further as the rusty hand of a diall they will break the hedge of his Law to shun a piece of foul way They follow Christ as the dog follows his 〈◊〉 till he come by a carrion and then he turns him up Orpha made a fair proffer of going along with Naomi but when she had better considered it she turned again Lots wife set fair out of Sodom but looked back So do many forward hearers set their hands to Gods plough but loth to plough up the fallow 〈◊〉 of their hearts and to lay a good foundation in humiliation they start aside like broken bowes and steal away like cowardly souldiers and so judge themselves unworthy of eternal life and unfit for Gods Kingdom For the foolish shall not stand in his sight he hateth all the workers of iniquity Caleb was not discouraged by the Giants therefore he had Hebron given him the place of the Giants when the spies and 〈◊〉 were never suffered to enter No more shall they that hold not out to the death obtain the crown of life Verse 27. And the rain descended c. The old heart cannot possibly hold out the hardship of holinesse nor bear the brunt of persecution for well-doing Like a Chesnut cast into the 〈◊〉 if not broken first on the top it leaps out again or like a false jade in a teem which being put to a stresse turns tail and tramples When the godly hearer holds on his way to heaven thorow all disasters as those two kine of the Philistims that bore home the Ark held on their way though they had calves at home that might have made them turn back And it fell The wise-man and fools house come under a double difference 1. In the foundation this to see to and above ground is little discerned The Temple is said to be as low under ground as it was high above 2. In the building it self The unprofitable hearer is not cimented to Christ by faith but laid loose as it were upon a sandy foundation and so slips beside the ground work in foul weather He is not set into the stock as a science but only stuck into the ground as a stake and is therefore easily 〈◊〉 up Whereas the true Christian is knit fast to Christ the Rock by the ligament of a lively faith and as a lively stone is built up a spirituall house growing up in the mysticall body with so much sweetnesse and evennesse as if the whole Temple like that of Salomon were but one entire stone He that is joyned to the Lord is one spirit 1 Cor. 6. 17. So that although 1. Shakings and waverings in the very purpose of holy-walking may befall a Saint by violent temptations Psal. 73. 2 13. Yea 2. Intermissions of the exercise of grace as of life in a palsey or 〈◊〉 3. Particular falls we are not exempted from Peter himself though a pillar fell from his former stedfastnesse in part yet from 〈◊〉 prolapsion from utter and irrecoverable falling away they are 〈◊〉 because founded upon a Rock which can never be removed He is both the Authour and finisher of their faith He hath praied and procured that it utterly fail not And the fall thereof was great Great and griovous because irreparable irreedifiable as Hiericho and the Temple at Ierusalem God laies them aside like broken 〈◊〉 of which there is no further use and sith they will needs wallow again as swine in the filth of their former pollutions he proncunceth upon them that fearfull sentence Let him that is filthy be filthy still that unclean spirit entereth him again and his dispositions to evil are seven times more enflamed then ever He hath despised and despighted the Spirit of grace and is in the ready road to the unpardonable sin The Apostate cannot lightly chuse unto himself a worse condition Heb. 10. 26. He casts himself into hel-mouth Heb 10. 〈◊〉 where the back slider in heart shall be filled with his own waies and have the greater 〈◊〉 by how much he fell from greater hopes and possibilities of better as 〈◊〉 from his Monarchy and as Cranmer from his high preferment to so low a condition as that there was left him neither hop of 〈◊〉 nor place of worse Verse 28. And it came to passe when 〈◊〉 had ended these sayings All this then was but one Sermon though twice preached at severall times as some collect out of Luke A long Sermon it was and yet the people staid it out So did not those 〈◊〉 Joh. 6. and therefore fell away from Christ So did not Judas and therefore met 〈◊〉 devil at the door It is a lamentable thing that a winters-tale shall be heard with more patience and pleasure then a powerfull Sermon that if a Preacher exceed his glasse sometimes 〈◊〉 sit at as little 〈◊〉 as if they were in a fit of an ague and others prophanely turn their backs upon the Propitiatory and depart without the blessing In the Councel of Agathon it was decreed that none should presume to go out before the Minister had blessed the Congregation And in the fourth Councel of Carthage Let him that goes out of the Auditory when the Minister is speaking to the Congregation be excommunicated Ite missa est 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 were the old forms of dismission And although Zachary was long ere he came forth yet the people staied his coming But the Word of the Lord is to the wicked a burthen Jer. 27. 33. cords and bonds Psal. 2. 3. Yokes and