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A46627 A sermon preached at Guildhall-Chappel Decemb. 24, 1682 before the Right Honourable the Lord Mayor &c. by John James. James, John, b. 1649. 1683 (1683) Wing J428; ESTC R28735 23,041 39

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Devil throughout the world in rescuing many Souls from the tyranny of the Devil and the powers of darkness and giving them power to become the Sons of God You therefore that call your selves by that worthy name of Christians consider the high Priest of your profession and the great obligation that lies upon you to walk worthy of your calling and to live as becomes the Gospel by renouncing the Devil and all his works the pomps and vanities of this wicked world and all the sinful lusts of the flesh that as you profess to believe the Articles of the Christian Faith ye may keep Gods holy will and Commandments all the days of your life That having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust ye may be partakers of the Divine Nature and as the Apostle exhorts give all diligence to add to your faith vertue and to vertue knowledge and to knowledge temperance and to temperance patience and to patience godliness and to godliness brotherly kindness and to brotherly kindness charity and that these things may be in you and abound 2 Pet. 1.4 c. This our Baptismal Covenant obligeth us to this the Sacrament of the Lords Supper would enable us to effect this the principles of our Christian profession require this the precepts of our most holy Religion commands for this the blessed promise of Gods Grace is tendered to Mankind in the dispensation of the Gospel this the blessed hope of Eternal Glory should incourage us to and the dreadful apprehension of everlasting damnation should make us afraid to neglect And if hitherto we have been so desperately mad to continue in slavery and subjection to the Devil and thereby to stand at open defiance and direct hostility with the Son of God Let us not persist a moment longer in so wretched so miserable a condition but immediately break off our League with Satan and become the servants and worshippers of the only true God and of his Son Jesus Christ whom he hath sent For though our case be very bad whilst inslaved to the Tyranny of the Devil yet since we enjoy the Gospel that word of Everlasting life no man ought to conclude that his condition is desperate For now is the accepted time now is the day of Salvation 2 Cor. 6.2 This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation that Jesus Christ came into the world to save the chiefest of sinners 1 Tim. 1.15 So that the Son of God is willing to save us from our sins and the malice of the Devil too if we be willing to leave off our sins and to serve him in holiness and righteousness we may yet be turned from darkness to light and from the power of Satan unto God and so be rescued from the slavery of the Devil and our lusts into the glorious liberty of the Sons of God But at this time especially in which we are to Commemorate the Incarnation of the Son of God who came to visit us in great humility and in infinite mercy to deliver us from the power of the Devil we should seriously resolve to banish sin from our hearts and lives that the Son of God may take possession of our Souls and dwelling in our Spirits by Faith we may bring forth the fruits of Piety and Charity and all other Christian Vertues and Graces to the praise and honour of his blessed Name that in the last day when he shall come again in his glorious Majesty to judge both the quick and the dead we may rise to the life immortal through him who liveth and raigneth with the Father and the Holy Ghost now and for ever Amen Amen FINIS
or Death are ascertained to us that he should delineate to our very eyes in plain and legible Characters the excellency of his Doctrine by the Piety and Innocency of his Life and so recommend his Precepts to our practice by his own Example set before us that he should convince and assure us of the Divinity of his Person and Doctrine by many and undeniable Miracles that he should seal the truth of what he delivered by his own bloud offer up his Life a Sacrifice to death to procure life to the sinful World that by his divine power he should rise out of the Grave gloriously ascend to Heaven intercede with his Father on our behalf and from thence send us another Comforter even the spirit of Truth which should inform our minds with the knowledge of all necessary truths and bring us to the love and practice of all Christian Vertues and Graces Certainly this method is abundantly able to destroy the works of the Devil and the prevail with sinners to lead godly and pious lives Which will most evidently appear if we proceed to consider the second Argument to illustrate the truth of the Apostles Assertion II. The Son of God hath in many remarkable instances already supplanted the Power of the Devil in delivering many Souls from the tyranny and dominion of that insulting Enemy notwithstanding the great disadvantages and discouragements that the Christian Religion hath met with in the World both from Jews and Gentiles from the first plantation of the Gospel until now For though the Jews were circumcised the eighth day and in their Childhood kept in cruel bondage under their Parents and Masters who constrained them to learn the Law of Moses and when they came to riper years were taught by the Scribes and Pharisees who sate in Moses Chair that their Religion was eternal and the Oeconomy thereof never to be altered and therefore were bound to reject any person that should broach any other Doctrine to discard him from their Synagogues to stop his mouth that he might not speak and their ears that they might not hear And 't is notorious that the Gentiles were no less fortified in their Heathen Rites and superstitious Customs every Nation having their respective Deities whom they constantly adored and offered Sacrifice to and some of them so careful to secure the honour of their Gods and all under their Authority in their Idolatrous observances that as Melanchton notes in his Epistle to his Comment upon the Romans every Athenian made a Vow at his admission to the Liberties and Franchises of the City se pugnare pro diis solum cum aliis not onely to fight valiantly in the front of an Army to defend and vindicate their Gods but like the Roman Scaeva to withstand whole Legions Adde to all this the Opposition that was to be expected without the Scoffs and Jears that Christians must expect from their Neighbours the Censures of their Laws and the displeasure of their Governours the meanness of Christ and the unworthiness of his Apostles the poverty and weakness of them both that they were utterly unable to supply the wants of their Disciples or defend them from the malice and cruelty of their Enemies But above all consider the corruption of their hearts and the contrariety of the Gospel to their former course of life forbidding the least Impurity and threatening vengeance against the smallest sin which they poor wretches were wholy immersed in and in honour of their Gods were not onely taught to practise but commanded to observe And yet notwithstanding such great contradictions the Gospel of Christ which is the power of God to salvation constrained both Jews and Gentiles with a holy violence to break asunder their unlawful Oaths to disclaim their former Religions to flie from the snares and delusions of the Devil and to become Proselytes to the Religion of Jesus For when that glorious Light the Sun of Righteousness appeared in the World the beams of his Majesty were immediately dispersed over the face of the Earth and his Glory in a short time dispelled that hideous darkness which had overspread the World and brought Life and Immortality to light For so the Evangelist tells us that by the miraculous instinct and conduct of a Star the news of his birth was revealed to the furthermost parts of the Earth as soon as ever he was born and the Princes thereof came to pay their Adoration to him and when they saw him fell down and worshipped him Mat. 2. And when he entered upon his Prophetick Office though he did not cry nor lift up nor cause his voice to be heard in the streets yet the Children of men slockt in abundance to hear him deservedly counting it their greatest honour to become the Disciples of so glorious a Master So great Worth they saw in his Person and such Excellency in his Doctrine such glorious Rewards he propounded to them such intolerable miseries he warn'd them to flie from that they made hast to deliver themselves from the bonds of sin by which they were detained Captives to the will of the Devil and without delay became the Followers of Christ glorying in nothing more than in being Christians And as our Lord himself did so miraculously rescue the Souls of men from their subjection to Sin and Satan so that life and vigour which continually attends the dispensation of the Gospel hath been illustriously manifest in opposition to all the Powers of Darkness and the Malice of Hell it self For as his Apostles went up and down preaching the Gospel the Lord added to the Church dayly such as should be saved Three thousand Souls became Converts to the Christian Faith at one Sermon of St. Peter's Acts 2.41 In the Roman Empire and the Province of Judea multitudes multitudes thronged into the Kingdom of Christ and not onely the weak and impotent people but the great ones and wise men of the Earth cheerfully embraced this divine Religion accounting their Strength weakness and their Wisdom folly until then Cornelius a Centurion became a Proselyte to it Nero's Family had some Saints Sergius Paulus a Proconsul and Dionysius the famous Areopagite at Athens became Converts to the Christian Faith And the Histories of the Church present us with many and many excellent Persons of great esteem for their admirable Learning and vast Endowments who in a short space of time voluntarily forsook the Pomps and Vanities of this wicked World and sincerely devoting themselves to the service of Christ were deservedly famous in their Generations for Piety and Devotions Which very Argument Arnobius insists upon when he reasoned with the Heathen to perswade them to receive the Faith of Christ that men of the greatest Wits and Parts Tam magnis Ingeniis paediti Oratores Grammatici Rhetores Consulti Juris ac Medici Philosophie etiam secreta rimantes Magisteria hec expetunt spretis quibus paulò antè fidebant c. Arnob. cont Gent. l. 2. p. 44.