there is not only the visible reception of the outward Signs but an invisible reception of the thing signified There is far more than a shadow than a type than a figure Christ did not only propose a Sign at that hour but also he gave us a Gift and that Gift really and effectually is Himself which is all one as you would say Spiritually himself for Spiritual Vnion is the most true and real union that can be That which is promised and Faith takes it and hath it is not fiction fansie opinion falsity but substance and verity Being strengthened with power by the Spirit in the inward mind Christ dwelleth in our hearts by Faith Ephes 3.17 As by a Ring or a meaner instrument of conveyance a man may be setled in Land or put into an Office and by such conveyances the Ratification of such Grants are held to be real How much more real is the gift and receipt of Christ's Body and Bloud when conveyed unto us by the confirmation of the Eternal Spirit For observe it is the same Spirit that is in Christ and that is in Us and we are quickned by one and the same Spirit Rom. 8.11 Therefore it cannot chuse but that a real Union must follow between Christ and Us as there is a Union between all the parts of a Body by the animation of one Soul But Faith is the mouth wherewith we Eat his Body and Drink his Bloud not the mouth of a man but of a Faithful man for we hunger after him not with a Corporal appetite but a Spiritual therefore our Eating must be Spiritual and not Corporal Yet this is a real a substantial partaking of Christ crucified broken his flesh bleeding his wounds gaping so he is exhibited so we are sure we receive him which doth not only touch our outward senses in the Elements but pass through into the depth of the Soul For in true Divinity real and spiritual are aequipollent although with the Papists nothing is real unless it be corporal which is a gross way to defraud us of the Sublime and Soul-ravishing vertue of the mystery A mystery neither to be set out in words nor to be comprehended sufficiently in the mind but to be adored with Faith says Calvin lib. Instit c. 17. Sect. 5. But herein we pledge Christ in the Cup of love herein we renew the Covenant of forgiveness strongly assured by the sprinkling of Bloud the life is in the Bloud and without shedding of Bloud is no remission of sins Because death is the wages of sin Sin is the greatest dishonour that can be done to God and death in Christ's person is the greatest satisfaction that can be made He died and gave himself for me he died and gave himself to me as he was dead in his gored and pierced body that his sacrifice might be in me and in all those that are redeemed by it We read of some Mothers that in a great famine have eaten their own Children 2 Kings 6. but what Mother in the time of famine did ever give her own flesh to save the life of her Child But Christ hath given himself for us that we might not perish O Lord I owe all my life to thee because thou hast laid down thy life for me O let me bleed out my sins that thy Bloud may fill all the veins of my Spirit O let my Body be transfigur'd to be Heavenly by cleanness and chastity by being used only for thy worship and service that the Body of my Saviour may come under the roof of it Then when the King shall let forth his Table and give himself to me in his wonderful Feast my Spicknard shall send forth a sweet smell Cant. 1.12 My Soul shall magnifie the Lord and my Spirit shall rejoyce in Christ my Saviour We have found the Messias says Philip to Nathaniel And where have we found him at a Feast a Feast of his own Body and Bloud but set out with no more cost and shew than a piece of Bread and a sip of Wine In this manner it is brought to pass by the Omnipotency of God's pleasure to institute it with the efficacy of a strong Faith concurring to receive it The Church had done very ill if of its own head it had made so mean a representation of Christ but the Lord must be obeyed and ought to be admired in the humility of his Ordinance who hath not given us rich Viands and full Cups but made the Feast out of the fragments of the meanest Creatures Let them understand this that will make themselves fit to be his guests bring a preparation of humility suitable to the exility of those oblations The meek shall Eat and be satisfied they shall praise the Lord and seek him Psalm 22.26 And at that season let the riotous remember his fulness of Bread and excess of Wine God is honour'd in a little and his liberality is abused in the excess of his creatures And it is worth the noting that the Elements which we are invited to take are of fruits that grow out of the Earth to shew that the Earth which was cursed for Adam's sake is blessed for Christ's sake As it brings forth Thorns and Thistles to call to mind our rebellion so it brings forth Bread and Wine to call to mind our redemption Neither doth God supply us with Bread only out of the furrows of the Earth but sometime it hath fallen out of the clouds of Heaven Behold says God I will rain Bread from Heaven for you Exod. 16.4 This was Manna called the Corn of Heaven Psalm 78.24 This was the Spiritual meat or Angels food in which the old believers in the Wilderness did Eat Christ with an implicit Faith Our outward Sign is the Bread of the Earth true Bread that grows in the Fields yet the Bread signified is that which the Father hath given us from Heaven Jo. 6.31 Bread is a great part of mans nourishment so Christ crucified is the sole refection of Faith Bread is champed in the mouth to make it fit for the stomach so the Body of Christ was ordained to be slain before it could profit us If the Corn of Wheat fall not into the ground and die it abideth alone but if it die it bringeth sorth much fruit Jo. 12.24 By his life we learn to live and by his death we are made alive Bread when it is grounded between our teeth and eaten is turn'd by concoction into the substance of our Body which explains our mystical union with Christ that we are made one Spirit with him by Faith as this sensible food is converted into our flesh and bone Beside in the several parts of the outward Signs it is God's meaning we should conceive how he loves the gathering together of many into one which is thus to be qualified At a common Supper or any Meal all that are at the Board feed of the same Meats yet every one feeds to himself and to none beside So
Faith is drawn through these narrow and abject means that like himself have no comeliness in specie and when we see them there is no comeliness that we should desire them Isa 53.2 Nevertheless it is fit we should be well taught in the Contemplation of the hidden vertue inclosed in Baptism or else we could never think it worth our labour and obedience Our Common-Prayer-Book a store-house of rare Divinity tells us what is to be expected at that Laver for them that come to be Baptized 1. That God hath promised to be the Father of the faithful and of their seed and will most surely perform and keep his promise with them and by this introduction we are incorporated into the holy Congregation Behold they whom we love above all others by nature our Children are naturalized to be the Citizens of the Heavenly Kingdom and enter into it through this door of Grace 2. Secondly As God did save Noah and his Family from perishing by water and safely led the Children of Israel through the Red Sea while their enemies were drowned so the millions of the Nations whom God hath not given to Christ for his inheritance are drowned in their own lusts and corruptions But O what a priviledge it is to be among those few that are received into the Ark of Christs Church to be exempted from the common deluge and to be the faithful seed of Abraham led through the Chanel of the Sea and Baptized in the Cloud that went along with them when the Armies of the mighty are mightily consumed 3. Thirdly We may gather out of our Church-office for Baptism that the everlasting benediction of Heavenly washing affords two Comforts it signifies the bloud of Christ to cleanse us Per modum pretii as the price that was paid to ransom us from death and the sanctifying of the Holy Spirit to cleanse us per modum habitûs by his In-being and Celestial infusion and both are put together in one Collect That all that are Baptized may receive remission of sins by spiritual regeneration There is no remission of sin without bloud says the Apostle Heb. 9.22 meaning the invaluable bloud of the Lamb of God Verse 14. And the Heavenly thing is represented by the visible Element of Water for there must be some aptitude between the Sign and the Thing signified else it were not a Sacrament that as Water washeth away the filth of the body so the Bloud of Christ delivereth our Souls from the guilt and damnableness of sin The Bloud of Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin 1 Epist Jo. 1.7 The metaphor of cleansing must have respect to Baptismal-water Again Who loved us and washed us from our sins in his Bloud Revel 1.5 Where the Scripture speaks of washing from sin it must be taken from the water of Baptism figuring the vertue of Christs Bloud that in the sight of his Father makes us white as Snow The Scriptures indeed strike most upon the other string and more directly as Ephes 5.25 Christ loved the Church and gave himself for it that he might sanctifie and cleanse it with the washing of water by the Word Titus 3.6 He saved us by the washing of regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Ghost And in many other places Therefore our Liturgy falls most upon the purifying operation of the Spirit to be shadowed in the outward washing of water As when it prays Send thy Holy Spirit to these Infants and grant that they may be Baptiz'd with Water and with the Holy Ghost And Grant that all that are Baptized may receive the fulness of thy Grace Spiritual Regeneration is that which the Gospel hath set forth to be the principal correlative of Baptism O happy it is for us to be born again by Water and the Holy Ghost For better it were never to be born than not to be born twice God put a good mind into us and reform one great fault in us which is that our Baptism being past over a great while ago we cast it out of our memory and meditate but little upon the benefits and comforts of it We are got into the Church and do in a sort forget how we got in Whereas the whole life of a Christian man and woman should be a continual reflection how in Baptism we entred into Covenant with Christ to believe in him to serve him to forsake the Devil the vanities of the world and the sinful desires of the flesh Water is a pellucid Element to look through it to the bottom So look often through the sanctified Water to see what Christ hath done for you and what you have engaged to do for Christ And there is no heart so full of blackness and melancholy but will recover upon it and be as fresh in sound health as if it were filled with marrow and fatness Well did St. Paul put Baptism among the principles and foundations of Christian doctrine Heb. 6.2 For all the weight of Faith Sanctification and Mercy doth lie upon it Recount this by particulars 1. The first thought that my Soul hath upon it is That I am no longer a stranger and foreigner but a fellow-Citizen with the Saints and of the houshold of God Ephes 2.19 I am no more a-far off but made nigh by the Bloud of Christ partaker of the priviledges of the Church and called by the new Name which the mouth of the Lord shall name a Christian Isa Chap. 62. Verse 2. 2. Secondly I find that I have gained to have the highest point of Faith unfolded to me which was but darkly discerned in the Old Testament to confess the Holy Trinity in which Faith I was Baptized For because that mystery was revealed at Christs Baptism it goes ever along with this Sacrament All Nations being Baptized in the Name of the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost 3. Thirdly I observe that my Christian engagement allows me not the liberty of sinning after the custom of the world but obligeth me to the strict discipline of my Lord to live holily justly and soberly to walk in newness of life as planted into the likeness of Christs death so to die unto sin for he that is dead is freed from sin Rom. 6.7 In every thing and at all times I must remember what the Sureties at the Font called Godfathers and Godmothers did promise for me in my Name which the Liturgy of Geneva retains in these words Do you promise to warn this Child to live according to God's Word and make the Law of God the square of his life to live by 'T is a binding Ceremony and we are brought up from our tender years in the knowledge of it that we continually may feel the work of the Ordinance to have our hearts sprinkled from an evil Conscience and our bodies washt with clean Water Heb. 10.21 22. And as many as are Baptized into Christ have put on Christ Gal. 3.27 To put on Christ is to follow Christ in the Law of a
1. the Angels desire to look to give us redemption and forgiveness of sins through the bloud of Christ according to the riches of his grace Eph. 1.7 We have trespassed against our God but there is hope concerning this thing Ezra 10.2 Forgiveness of sins is put into our Creed he that doth not believe it hath no Creed nor Christianity in him Do you believe a Catholick Church that 's the dowry of that Church which Christ espoused to him in his bloud Do you believe a Communion of Saints this is it in which we are baptized in which all our communion doth joyn That through Christ is preached forgiveness of sins and by him all that believe are justified from all things from which we could not be justified by the law of Moses Acts 13. verses 38 39. So also it is put into our prayer as well as into our Creed And he that taught us to pray Forgive us our sins hath taught us this comfort that sins are pardonable Yet an afflicted Conscience will receive suggestion that some sins indeed are pardonable but not all not the sin of the evil Angels not the sin against the Holy Ghost and there is a sin unto death I do not say ye should pray for it says St. John 1 Ep. 5.16 These verily are set out for instances of irreversible judgment to deter us from committing crimes of a vast magnitude But mark the Holy Scriptures have not unfolded it clearly and explicitly wherein the hainousness of these sins did consist that we may not accuse our selves of them and fall into despair as if we had committed them Since you know not expresly what these are how can you lay them to your own charge Nay if you lay them to your own charge you must be mistaken for he that condemns himself shall not be condemned of the Lord. Such incurable cast-aways have their Consciences seared and are not sensible of their guilt Who more like to be of that number than the Pharisees who justified themselves saying Are we also blind Well says a forlorn sinner my sins then are not the fore-named nor out of possibility of mercy but it is almost as bad that they are in an unlikelihood to mercy for they are very hainous As unto that confession that your trespasses are very hainous conceive so of them and spare not true repentance thinks no sin to be a little one So St. Hierom spake to the commendation of the Lady Paula in her Funeral Sermon that she was wont to bewail every fault she had committed as if it were one of the most presumptuous crimes But be it so really that God hath let you incur no small delinquencies as Aaron was not free from idolatry nor David from adultery nor Peter from abjuration of Christ nor Paul from persecuting the Church nor Manasses from witchcraft nor Mary Magdalen from indefinite scandal well I know not what who yet all obtained mercy for a pattern to them who hereafter should believe in Christ to everlasting life 1 Tim. 1.18 They were called Novatians who blotted out the beginning of the Eighth Chapter of St. John's Gospel because the story tells us that Christ dismist the woman taken in adultery with a gracious gentleness Why should not his procedure in judgment be like his doctrine did he not preach that Publicans and Harlots should go into Heaven before proud Justiciaries Be merciful unto my sin for it is great says David Psalm 25.11 This is not the way to deal with mortal Judges when we stand at their bar but this is the way to obtain propitiation from our God Heal me for I am sore wounded cure me for I am very sick be merciful to my sin for it is very great Zozimus a Pagan that envied the honour of Constantine the Great makes this tale to discredit him in his History that Constantine had put his wife Fausta and his son Crispus to death after which being haunted with an ill Conscience that gave him no quiet he sought among the Heathen Priests for expiation and they could give him no peace but he was told that the Religion of Christians was so audacious as to promise pardon to all sins were they never so horrible Is not this to commend the Emperor and his Religion under the form of a dispraise for what rest could a troubled mind attain to from the Rites and Superstitions of Idol-gods But in the immense value of the price of the bloud of Christ there is redemption for every sinner that repents and believes Whatsoever ye loose on Earth shall be loosed in Heaven says Christ to his Apostles Matth. 18.18 O lose not a syllable of such comfort in this discomfortable world Quodcunque is all manner of sin great and little And if Christ hath given such commission to men on Earth to unloose every sin by the power of their office and the word of consolation then how unbounded is his own clemency No sins can super-abound his grace if we do not sin presumptuously because grace abounds Yet the poor Publican will beat his breast and cry out dolefully My sins are many they are more in number than the hairs of my head The bill of endictment is a true bill who can tell how oft he offendeth Scarce any sin we act but hath a nest of sins in it then think we what a heap will they make when they are put all together Peter it seems misdoubted that if a man were forgiven that had trespast often it would be scandalous and encourage the offender therefore he thought it fit to stint indulgence to some mediocrity as it is Matth. 18.21 Lord how oft shall my brother sin against me and I forgive him until seven times Jesus answereth I say not unto thee Vntil seven times but until seventy times seven times so that Christ commends a boundless forgiveness in a finite number for an infinite And doubtless himself would not stick with us for the same number God forbid we should think he taught to be more merciful or of greater perfection than himself Her sins which are many are forgiven Luke 7.47 Be thankful and admire the mercies of our Father both for nailing our great sins to the Cross of Christ and for acquitting us from the innumerable fry of Minim-sins those of daily incursion because when one of the least is remitted all are remitted together Mark that considerately One that committed some soul and leprous sin goes mourning upon the deep sense of it and especially the horror of it makes him fear damnation yet he greatly deceives himself if he think his other sins are past over and this great one or a few such do remain to his perdition For do you hope comfortably that some faults of omission some idle words some garish and customary fashion of pride are remitted to you with the same affiance leaning on Christ you may hope that you are discharged from your greatest enormities For all unrighteousness is covered at once to
the first enticement no nor upon the second or third assault Resist the Devil and he will fly from you quit your self like a man fight like a Christian The flesh is weak but the Spirit is willing ready able to assist you Matth. 26.41 Thus Hope waxeth valiant and assures it self of victory against customs habits and all contracted impotencies 2. Lay now our adventure the toil and peril of our labour wherein we are employ'd in another balance and more difficulty will appear For Hope is wise and doth not flatter it self as if the Kingdom of Heaven were accessible with little pains What carefulness ought this to work in us what self-denial what fear what zeal what unblamable conversation I run I fight I keep under my body and bring it into subjection 1 Cor. 9.27 For Christ Jesus I have suffered the loss of all things Phil. 3.8 Christ having overcome the sharpness of death hath opened the kingdom of Heaven to all believers yet to put us to our skill and labour to follow mark what he hath taught us Matth. 7.14 Strait is the gate and narrow is the way that leadeth unto life and few there be that find it And therefore is it so strait and narrow a question worthy to be resolved to teach us and to comfort us First a very religious life is said by a Metaphor to go in at a strait gate because it is our master-piece to find the door or to begin well therefore it is call'd to be born again For as to be born into the world needs more art and skilful Midwifery than to bring us up so to be regenerate to begin to live the life that is in Christ is exceeding irksom to flesh and bloud so many are the enticements that throng about the way to keep us from the door and to hold us in love with those sins which have been our companions As an Orator will be more timorous to deliver the first period of his speech than all that follows so we stick long at the first on-set to reform to be strict to pass away with so much vanity as must be forsaken The penitent thief could not find the door till he was going out of the world St. Paul as some compute was twenty eight years old before he left to be a blasphemer But rush on and make way through all resistances he that hath one foot over the threshold and hath cast the world behind him is well advanced into the courts of our God Secondly A Heavenly mind gathers it self up into one wish and no more One thing have I desired of the Lord which I will require Psal 27.4 Grant me thy self O Lord and I will ask no more The new creature asks nothing of God but to enjoy God give me this O Lord and for the rest let Ziba take all I will part with all to buy that one Pearl the riches of Heavenly grace The servant of sin hath all manner of pleasures under Heaven to trade in Can he ask for a shop with more variety of ware why may he not have these you will say and life eternal to boot Some of them are inconsistent with life eternal but all are not so they be added and not sought for as our Saviour distinguisheth First seek the kingdom of God and these things shall be added Matth. 6.33 But if you seek them which is to love them for themselves and above the kingdom of God it is like a man that carries a piece of timber at bredth upon his back there is no door wide enough for a man to get in with such an impediment upon his shoulders It is not the gate that excludes him but he thrusts himself out with his own improvidence Thirdly There are thousands of scandals millions of errors to be avoided but truth and holiness are in the middle in a little compass and happy is he that shuns extreams and falls perpendicularly upon the golden mean The Commandments of God are but ten words Deut. 4.13 the inventions of men and the forms of will-worship are innumerous Pray Fast give Alms Christ comprehends much external duty under those three Heads but the Traditions of men are more than can be put into a Catalogue Call upon God in the time of trouble that and no more is the Pole-star of Faith in Prayer but what a compass doth Monkishness take in to drop beads in the invocation of Angels and Saints Profaneness neglects the honour of God Superstition falls into needless excesses about it the true fear of God is in the centre as far from the one extream as from the other As in an accurate Song you must keep Minim-time or else you will put the whole Quire out so look that you sing the new song of the Lord with trembling and accurate observation miss neither Cliff nor Note that is neither sound doctrine nor pious practice These are the Reasons why it is so hard to get access to Christ in a narrow way and through a strait gate If these difficulties be not discern'd by some it is because they take up Christianity as it is in use among men and as they are born to it But they that came to it in their years of understanding and were trained up in Church-discipline many years before they were baptized and all that time were put to exact trial what they would prove and were taught it over and over how the Laws of Christ were far stricter than any other Laws in the world these were preacquainted with the Covenant which they must perform and then received it with the largest and hardest conditions Yet they were brought on with two special comforts First that God did behold from Heaven the mightiness of the task which we took upon us the troubles of persecutions the dangers of temptations the infirmities of man to resist them He knows whereof we are made he remembreth we are but dust it puts him to admire the performances of his Saints as Jesus marvelled at the Centurion's Faith Matth. 8.10 Secondly when we are under our hazards we shall have an answer from the Lord as St. Paul had My grace is sufficient for thee for my strength is made perfect in weakness 2 Cor. 12.11 Therefore as the Lord said of David when he had chosen him I have laid help upon one that is mighty Psalm 89.19 So we casting our selves upon the help of God upon one that is Almighty though of our selves we have gathered little into our Omer the blessing of God upon it will not let us lack Every hard matter that rose among the people was to be brought to Moses Exod. 18.16 so in every hard cause desire the Lord to plead it and to judge it bring it to him leave it in his Court and he will end it These are the Cordials to revive Hope touching the difficulties it finds in the way to obtain that Good which is set before it CHAP. III. How a Christian's Comforts flow from the
says that a discontented person challeng'd the Oracle of Delphos that it never gave a comfortable answer That 's your fault says the Oracle for none of you come to me till your case is past help Venimus huc lapsis quaesitum oracula rebus says the Poet that ever keeps decorum in his Verses Therefore awake right early seek the Lord in the first season that the course of misery may not wax too strong and remediless Otherwise the Prophet will say The days of visitation are come the days of recompence are come Israel shall know it Hos 9.7 and then whither will ye flie for help to be delivered But prevent such dismal tribulations while it is called To day For nothing is more Consolatory than seasonable Supplication CHAP. V. How the Sacraments minister to a Christian's Comfort A general Survey of Sacraments Five Reasons why God ordained Two Sacraments under the Gospel What Comforts flow from the Grace of Baptism What Comforts flow from the Lord's Supper THough by that which hitherto hath been set forth I trust I may assume that every one that sets his heart to make use of it hath drunk well yet as the Ruler of the Feast said at the Marriage in Cana of Galilee I have kept the good that is the best Wine until now Jo. 2.10 The water of life in Baptism the wine that delighteth the Spiritual thirst in the Lord's Supper Other things in the Word report unto us what a good land the Lord hath promised to his Israel but these two Sacraments are Caleb and Josuah spies that have seen and searcht the land and bring us sensible and sure tidings that it is a noble land flowing with Milk and Hony by the Grapes which they have brought with them and by their ocular and diligent survey they yield evident testimony that God hath provided a gracious Country for us in the Kingdom of Heaven To put all my work of Consolation into one prospect together Prayer the best comfortable Grace is married to Hope the Holy Ghost gives it in marriage Faith is the Priest that joyns them together and the two Sacraments are the outward signs by which they have declared their consent as it were by giving and receiving a Ring and by joyning of hands First I will treat of Sacraments in general then of each in particular by it self A Sacrament being a visible sign of inward grace as a means whereby we receive the same and a pledge to assure us thereof or more at large which comprizeth the end of all such outward signs a token to confirm mens Faith in the promises of God observe first That God hath condescended above all expression to our weakness that He would have us to take notice of his mercies in gross and sensible things A way that is framed to our level and dull apprehension For God is a Spirit and they that worship him must worship him in Spirit and Truth Jo. 4.24 that 's purely a Heavenly way But some alterations have been admitted to bring us forward in our own pace that is after humane and bodily fancies Deus quandoque insantilia loquitur For our sakes the Lord speaks in the Scriptures in a plain and vulgar Emphasis strangely beneath his Infinite wisdom as a nurse useth to babble to her Infant So He is pleased to give himself to our hands to our eyes to our taste in common and obvious matter but out of his surpassing wisdom to make us more spiritual by cloathing Religion in a bodily attire The Church began in innocency and yet it began with a Sacrament the Tree of life instituted to keep mankind on Earth immortal by tasting it if Adam had not ambitiously eaten of the Tree of knowledge When the old world was drowned and repaired again God told Noah Gen. 9. I do set my Bow in the cloud and it shall be for a tokken of a Covenant between me and the Earth that the waters shall no more become a floud to destroy all the Earth This is the World's Covenant and not the Churche's a Covenant to save all the Earth from a total deluge And God is to be perceived and to be thought of in that sign Ezek. 1.28 The glory of the Throne of God was as the appearance of the Bow that is in the cloud in the day of rain this was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord and so the same glory is figur'd in the Rainbow Revel 4.3 After this it being not discovered who did openly and entirely profess the worship of the true God Abraham was called out of Chaldea and he and his family were imbodied into a Church and received the sign of Circumcision as a mark stampt upon them to be known to be those whom God had called out for his own and did admonish them to circumcise the fore-skin of their heart Deut. 10.16 Chiefly to imprint into them that the promised seed should come from that stock in whom all Nations should be blessed When Abraham's seed became a National Church before they could get out of Egypt the bloud of a Lamb was sprinkled upon their doors with a statute given upon it that from thenceforth every family at that time of the year should give account for a Lamb slain and be eaten within their houses till John Baptist's Lamb was slain to take away the sin of the world Under the like discipline they were trained up for a while in the wilderness when Moses set up the figure of a Serpent upon a Pole that they might look upon it and live that were stung by Serpents Numb 21. verse 9. The Author of the Book of Wisdom writes Divinely upon it That they might be admonisht for a small season it was a sign of Salvation And he that turned himself toward it was not saved by the thing he saw but by thee that art the Saviour of the world Wisd Chap. 16. Verses 6 7. Neither are we such perfect men under the New Testament to be taught only by the words of holiness and truth but we are received into the Covenant of Grace and preserved in it by Mysteries signifying wonderful things to our outward senses that we may suck and be satisfied with the Churches two breasts of Consolation Isa 66.11 And be filled with the two golden pipes that empty the golden oil out of themselves Zach. 4.12 I stand upon the number of Two because they are put together 1 Cor. 10.3 The Israelites were all baptized in the cloud did all eat the same spiritual meat and all drank of the same spiritual drink As good account for it is 1 Cor. 12.13 By one spirit we are all baptized into one body and have been all made to drink into one Spirit Or learn it from St. John 1 Epist 5.6 Christ came not by water alone but by water and bloud And there are three that bear witness the Spirit that is the ministry of the Gospel the water that is Baptism and the bloud
new Creature and to perfect holiness without which no man shall see God 4. Fourthly I have assurance that the Spirit is not disjoyned from the Water for Christs Word cannot sail that we shall be Baptized with the Holy Ghost But ye are washed but ye are sanctified but ye are justified in the Name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God 1. Cor. 6.11 The power given to keep the Covenant makes it a Covenant of Grace else we shall administer but the Letter and not the Spirit The outward act of man unless we make our selves unworthy is certainly assisted with the increase of God If the good effect ensue not the Sacrament doth not want its vertue but the receiver marr'd it Very much it s to be ascribed to the Word preacht it is a powerful means to convert us and to save us 1 Tim. 4.15 Take heed unto thy doctrine for in doing this thou shalt save thy self and them that hear thee And 1 Pet. 1.23 Being born again not of corruptible seed but incorruptible by the Word of God which liveth and abideth in you The Word disposeth and prepares God is the efficient cause of our Regeneration Now this Sacrament whether we speak of Infants they are to call to mind how they received the outward Seal of Grace or whether we speak of Converts of ripe years who at the same time were taught the vertue of it it hath reason to work more powerfully and effectually upon their knowledge and affections than doctrine alone because Christ and his Benefits are manifested in a sensible operation which himself did dignifie in his own person at the waters of Jordan and afterward institute it to be used by all his Disciples 5. The fifth thing that I draw from hence gives me exceeding Consolation in Christ that no man who is made the Child of God is in the damnable state of sin therefore in Baptism being made the adopted Child of God I have obtained the pardon of all sins Original and Actual as Naaman was cured of all his leprosie Who saved us by the washing of Regeneration Tit. 3.6 Be Baptized every one of you in the Name of the Lord Jesus for the remission of sins Acts 2.38 So Ananias said to Paul Acts 22.16 Arise and be Baptized and wash away thy sins Yea but some will cavil Infants have not Faith and God hath set forth Christ to be a propitiation through Faith in his Bloud and he that believeth and is Baptized shall be saved Mark 16.16 I will not contend about it whether Baptized Infants have a secret imperceptible habit of Faith I am sure there is Innocency of life in them instead of Faith They that are of Age to come to the knowledge of Faith must bring their own Faith with them to the Font but for Infants they have priviledge to be in Church-communion by the Faith of the Church wherein they were born There is another contest made by some that notwithstanding Baptism Original sin remains in us all the days of our life True the sin is not blotted out in the Infant but it is blotted out of the Book of God And as Actual sins are pardon'd for Christ's sake yet it cannot be brought about that they should never be done which are done and past but it is enough that they shall not be imputed so Original sin cleaves unto us it is not cast out for I feel it in me but it is remitted 6. For the complement of this subject the largest and the longest Comfort flowing from the Grace of Baptism is That we are to rely upon the Covenant made between God and us therein for the remission of all our sins which we commit after Baptism unto the end of our life Far be it from me to say that it sufficeth us to cast our eyes back to the Covenant then made as if the bare and historical memory of it did suffice to blot out sins that 's but an empty flash and a vapour of presumption But this I say Build upon the Eternity and Infallibility of God's Truth and then by a true and sure-grasping Faith joyn'd with Repentance renew your self in God's mercies by the promise of the Old Baptismal Covenant Repentance is a condition never to be omitted to lift us up again when we have been overtaken with sins But Faith doth not comfort it self in the sincerity of Repentance which in us is ever imperfect but in Christ's merits once for all consigned to us in Baptism For the Scriptures speak indefinitely that the Laver of Regeneration purgeth away all our sins it doth not speak restrictively of sins past as if it did operate no longer than in that moment when the water is sprinkled For Baptism doth now at the very present time save us 1 Pet. 3.21 And some collect it out of that figurative place Ezek. 49.9 Every thing where the Waters do come shall live After a shower of rain is fallen and ceaseth the grass continues to grow By grievous and presumptous sins we debar our selves from the sense and comfort of the Covenant for the present yet when we repent we come not to make a new Covenant with God but to beseech him to be gracious to us for the old Covenants sake As an Adulteress if she be received again and pardon'd by her Husband is not new married but accepted for a wife upon the first contract of marriage Take some examples of those in the New Testament that sinned against God and in their return again did not suppose the first Covenant of Baptism to be abolisht but they comforted themselves that the mercies promised then would hold firm and not fail them St. Paul challengeth the Corinthians Chap. 6. Epist 1. that they had been Adulterers Effeminate and much of the like Yet Verse 11. he speaks thus to them Ye are washed sanctified justified in the Name of the Lord Jesus In the same manner he deals with the Galatians who had embraced much false doctrine mingled Judaism with the Gospel yet Chap. 3. Verse 27. As many of you as are Baptized into Christ have put on Christ Can any thing equal all these heart-refreshings that swim in the pool of Baptism Therefore in many Ages past the joy of the Neophytes was excessive that came to be Baptized Many Torches were lighted and carried before them to shew it was the day of their illumination They came in white garments and wore them constantly eight days together a most Festival habit Yet they affected too much to defer their Baptism till their elder nay their latest years out of the erroneous principle that Baptism was the healing water for the remission of sins past and they rather relied upon Repentance than upon the Baptism which they had received for the remission of sins that did follow Whereas Repentance is not a new paction with God but a return to the use of the old a restitution as it were to our bloud when we had been tainted by