Selected quad for the lemma: work_n
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A47326
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Convivium cœleste a plain and familiar discourse concerning the Lords Supper, shewing at once the nature of that sacrament : as also the right way of preparing our selves for the receiving of it : in which are also considered those exceptions which men usually bring to excuse their not partaking of it.
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Kidder, Richard, 1633-1703.
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1684
(1684)
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Wing K401; ESTC R218778
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114,952
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274
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All-sufficiency and Veracity when he is in straits and difficulties He that believes as he should when trouble comes is not dismaid for his heart is fixed trusting in the Lord. He well knows that God is faithful and therefore he quiets himself when the greatest storms arise 2. Abraham did yield himself obedient to Gods commands also how cross soever they were to flesh and blood And his doing that was an act of that Faith which he is celebrated for in the Holy Scriptures When God commands him to leave his Country his kindred and his Fathers house Gen. 12.1 He readily departs ver 4. And obeys God who had commanded him though the thing it self were so very difficult For 't is no easie thing at such an age to leave ones Country our kindred and fathers house and go to a land which we know not of But this Abraham did and it was an act of his Faith also By faith Abraham when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance obeyed and he went out not knowing whither he went Heb. 11.8 Again when God had given him a Son a Son of all his hopes and of his old age a Son whom he loved and his only Son too a Son of the promise and of the free Woman yet when God who gave him requires him of him he is not only willing to part with him but with his own hands to sacrifice him where God appoints him Gen. 22. And this was an act of his Faith also for so we read By faith Abraham when he was tried offered up Isaac and he that received the promises offered up his only begotten Son of whom it was said that in Isaac shall thy seed be called Heb. 11.17 18. Such a Faith had this Father of the Faithful and such a Faith as this must we have also if we would be the Children of Abraham He hath the Faith of Abraham and he only that doth his works If our Faith be saving we shall yield our selves obedient to all the Laws of God Nothing will be so dear to us as the words of Gods mouth We shall part with every thing quietly which God commands away from us We shall obey his Precepts as well as believe his promises if our Faith be of the right stamp We shall be at Gods dispose if we be such Believers as we ought to be And our great care will be this that we resign up our will to the will of God We do but pretend to Faith if we be void of good works And then we may only be thought to be the Children of Abraham when we do his works Abraham shewed his faith by his works and so must we do also For as the body without the spirit is dead so faith without works is dead also Jam. 2.26 3. It will farther appear that a saving Faith is productive of a good life if we do but diligently consider what great things the Holy Scriptures speak of Faith For it is greatly magnified in the holy writ and such things are said of it as do greatly advance it above that lazy and ineffectual faith which we please our selves with Very many and very excellent things are said to have been done by Faith Heb. 11. This made the Sacrifice of Abel more excellent in Gods sight than that of Cain 'T was by Faith that Enoch pleased God and was translated This puts Noah upon making the Ark in which a remnant of of the World were saved By Faith Moses contemns the riches and pleasures of the Egyptian Court and rather chuses to suffer affliction with Gods people This carried the Israclites through the Red Sea this threw down the Walls of Jericho and saved Rahab from that common destruction Faith subdued Kingdoms wrought Righteousness obtained Promises stopped the mouths of Lions overcame fire and sword made weakness strong turned armies to flight This put courage and resolution into the weak and prevailed against that which did oppose it Great are the works which a true and saving Faith hath done It enables both to do and suffer for the name of Christ It enables us to perform the hardest tasks of Religion It will enable us to forgive our offending brother Luk. 17.5 And to cleanse our hearts of our filthines Act. 15.9 Aye and beside all this the Apostle tells us that this is the vistory that overcometh the World even our faith 1 Joh. 5.4 And when the Apostle exhorts us to put on the whole armour of God he bids us above all to take the sheild of faith wherewith we shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked Ephes 6.16 So that it is the great engine against the Devil the World and the Flesh It vanquishes our Spiritual enemies and triumphs over them It works miraculously where it is It subdues our lusts and enables us to conquer our greatest enemies And certainly then the Faith which the Scriptures speak thus greatly of is not a sluggish and lazy Faith but it does produce in us a great change of Heart and Life Our Saviour tells his Disciples that if they had faith as a grain of mustard-seed they might say to a mountain remove hence to yonder place and it shall remove and nothing should be impossible unto them Mat. 17.20 It is true indeed the first Preachers of the Gospel had the power of doing Miracles bestowed upon them such a faith had they but we have it not But yet we have a Faith still if we be the genuine followers of Christ that does enable us to do works that are miraculous also though not in the same kind with theirs Indeed they had power to do great Miracles and wonderful works in the World for the confirming that Gospel which was but newly planted among men This power is now ceased with the reason of it vid. Chrysost vol. 5. p. 274. Edit Savil. But yet a true Faith does very mighty works and such as are as pleasing to God and of themselves more advantagious to us than that power of working Miracles would have been They cast out Devils and could easily dispossess them from the bodies of men but then our Faith enables us to cast him out of our hearts They cured diseases that were bodily our Faith cleanses our Souls They could raise the dead our Faith raises us from the death of sin to the life of Righteousness They could heal Lepers give sight to the Blind restore the Lame and destroy the obstinate offenders Our saving Faith cures our leprosie of Sin opens our blind eyes enables us to walk in Gods ways and throws down the obstacles that lie in our way What was done by the first Preachers of the Gospel is done daily by every sincere Christian If they destroyed the Devil so does he They turn'd him out of his Temples he out of his heart The works of Faith now are as momentous as that of Miracles He that overcomes the world and vanquishes
his lusts he that despises riches and conquers himself does works as pleasing to God and as profitable to himself as he that removed Mountains and cast them into the Sea Nay such works as these are better for us and more acceptable to God than the power of doing the greatest Miracles He that lives well does more than he that wrought Miracles It was not the power of doing Wonders that made men Christians Their Christianity did consist in the obedience of there lives He that obeys the Gospel and our Faith teacheth us to do so receives the grace mercy which it offers If we could do wonders and yet remained void of the love and image of God we would not be in the state of Salvation The lives of the Apostles made them dear to God and not their miracles And St. Luke when he writes the story of what the Apostles did does not give his Book the title of the Miracles of the Apostles but the Acts or Practices of the Apostles is the title which it bears Our Saviour bids the Disciples not to rejoyce that the spirits are subject to them but rather says he rejoyce because your names are written in Heaven Luk. 10.20 Our obedience does intitle us to Gods favour but so does not our power to do wonderful works If we work iniquity it is not the gift of working Miracles that shall stand us in stead Many says Christ will say to me in that day Lord Lord have not we prophesied in thy name And in thy name have cast out Devils And in thy name done many wonderful works And then will I profess unto them I never knew you depart from me ye that work iniquity Matth. 7.22 23. That Faith which wrought Miracles endured but for a time but the Faith which works righteousness is to abide for ever If our Faith cleanse and purifie our hearts we shall not need be troubled that it does not remove Mountains If we be condemned at that great day it shall not be because we did not work Miracles but because we did not feed the hungred and cloth the naked c. Matth. 25. Jam. 2.15 16. 'T is our sincere obedience to the Gospel which God requires and will reward hereafter We must shew our Faith by our works as Abraham did or else we shall have no reason to judge Faith saving If it be such a Faith as cleanseth our hearts if it enable us to forgive our enemies if it help us to overcome the World if it make us strong against Temptations patient under Afflictions constant under Trials and careful to obey God then it is such a Faith as God requires of us But if on the other hand it be but a lazy belief of the truth of the Gospel and a confident expectation however of grace and pardon it is not such a Faith that will save our Souls And let us never so much vaunt our selves that we magnifie the free Grace of God when we profess a recumbency upon Christ and a resting upon him for Salvation yet if we remain idle and disobedient this Faith will not avail us He does savingly believe that does assent to the truth of what God hath revealed and is so far in love with it also that he does sincerely and heartily give himself up to the obedience of it And he that does this as he ought is so far from depressing the freeness of Gods Grace and exalting himself that when he hath done all that he can and which is commanded he can say from the bottom of his heart that he is an unprofitable Servant and hath done that which was his duty to do Luk. 17.10 CHAP. IX BUT as we must examine our Faith towards God so we must try our love towards one another For the Eucharist is a feast of love and a Sacrament of Charity And was not only designed for our renewing our most solemn Covenant with God but also for the maintaining a fervent Charity with one another as hath been shewed before Now as we are too forward to profess a Faith which we have not so it is to be feared we do commonly profess a Charity when we are devoid of it And therefore it will very highly concern us to enquire diligently whether or no we have a fervent Charity and Love to one another For the Holy Scriptures commend to us a Love without dissimulation Rom. 12.9 a Love that is fervent and with a pure heart 1 Pet. 1.22 A Love which does not lie in Word and in Tongue but in Deed and in Truth 1 Joh. 3.18 Now though we do make pretences of Love to one another yet it is much to be feared that we do frequently but pretend it and that under this great pretence of kindness there does frequently lurk a secret root of bitterness Now notwithstanding Charity be a most extensive Grace yet I shall consider it at this time as it does import these two things First a readiness to do our Neighbour good Secondly to forgive evil For where there is a true Love we shall be ready to give and forgive to do all the good we can and forgive all the evil which is done against us These two will make our love to one another like the love of God to us who does not only forgive our offences but does also load us daily with his benefits First we shall be ready to do our Neighbour all the good we can if we do love him as we should And if we would make a right judgment of the sincerity of this love which we bear our Neighbour we must judge of it by that love which we bear our selves for we are strictly obliged to Love our Neighbour as we love our selves Mat. 22.39 Now before we can be said to do this we must 1. Wish our Neighbour the same good which we wish to our selves We must have the same sincere affection to our Neighbour which we have to our selves This must be the standard by which we are to measure our love And as it is very easie to discern that we do very sincerely wish well to our selves so must we do by our Neighbour also before we can be said to love him as we love our selves And this must be understood in the greatest latitude Certain it is that we wish well in the general to our own souls to our Bodies our Credit and Estate though we many times use not the means which tend to their welfare we must do thus as sincerely by our Neighbour also And 2. We must in all our actions do by him as we in the like case should or may reasonably desire that he should do by us This we must inviolably observe before we can be said to love our Neighbour as we do love our selves And it is a very plain case that we would not that our Neighbour should invade our just rights and therefore if we love him as we love our selves we shall be as careful not to invade his If