triumphant Resurrection Then was Christ proclaimed Lord of quick and dead Rom. 14. 9. then Death gave its last groan and then Satan fell like lightning the forces of 1 Cor. 15. 55. Hell were scattered and discomfited when Christ appeared Luke 10. 18. in the Field after his detention in the Grave Christ by rising brake both the Chains of death and darkness together Resurrectione Christi et vita initium et mors recepit interitum and so far put the Law out of date that it super-annuated its threats that they are insignificant to the Believer Christ now had suffered whatever the Law could demand upon the Sinner And as his sufferings answered all the clamours of the Law so his Resurrection brake all the Chains of his Resurrectio Christi plena fuit mortis abolitio et vitae reductio Alap sufferings Indeed through the Grace of God we may read inflamed love Rom. 5. 8. and eternal life John 3. 15. in the death of Christ but the hope and assurance of both is built upon his Resurrection and therefore when the Apostle would set the door of hope wide open to us 1 Pet. 1. Col. 2. 14. 3 4. he shews us an empty Sepulchre and tells us with the Angel He is risen 1 Cor. 15. 17 18 19. The Promise is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Just Mart. Apol. 2. 1 Cor. 9. 27. Col. 3. 5. 2 Cor. 10. 4 5. the ground and Anchor-hold of our hope and that is performed by our Lords Resurrection by which he brake the Serpents head and scattered his power Acts 26. 6 7 8 9. This day then is Christs triumphal day when all his enemies were drawn at his Chariot-wheel And is not Christ in this our Ensample Shall not we on this day trample Satan under our feet conquer lust and get above the snares nay thoughts of the World and in holy and divine Ordinances pursue triumphant grace Conquest is our great work on the Sabbath-day then are we to subjugate our passions to subdue our corruptions to keep under the flesh to fetter the Old man and to bring into obedience our whole man to Jesus Christ The Sabbath properly is a day of Victories then light is to overcome our darkness the word to overcome our hearts Christ to over-rule and Conquer our affections and then is the season for the spirit to subdue and to bring into Captivity every high thought to the obedience of the Gospel And shall we then on Christs conquering-day be slaves to our fancy to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ignat. spend our time in vanity and recreations be Vassals to our lusts to spend our Sabbaths in riots and prophaneness be subjugated by the flesh to spend this golden season in sloth or formality Is not this to pour contempt on Christs triumphal-day and to cover the glory of it with thick darkness As if one should draw a Canvas Curtain before a curious Picture It may truly be said of those who prophane the Lords day they are the ecclipses of Christs Resurrection-day spots in that Feast and the foul blemishes of that lovely season Ignatius will tell us It is but a Jewish trick and a falling back and recidivation to their sin and folly The Resurrection of Christ was the loosing of his fetters then and not before did our dear Jesus rest from the temptations of Satan from the persecutions of the Jewish and the Gentile World from the flashes and scorching of his Fathers wrath and from the bonds of his own transient death His rising-day was his resting-day and all his disturbance and discomposures were scattered as the Clouds Vos in die quem dicunt solis solem colitis sicut autem nos eundem diem dominicum vocamus In eo non solem sed resurrectionem domini laetè veneramur which have nestled together are put to flight at the rise of the Sun And therefore it was the will of God that the day of Christs Resurrection should be honoured as holy rather then any other day of his Incarnation Birth Passion Ascension because his rising-day was his resting or Sabbath-day and whereon his rest began So the day of Gods rest from the work of Creation and the day of Christs rest from the work of Redemption are only fit the one to be the Churches Sabbath in the time of the Law the other to be the Churches Sabbath in the time of the Gospel The Lord Aug. contr Faust Manich. lib. 18. cap. 5. Christ in the day of his Birth did not enter into his rest but rather made an entrance into labour and sorrow and then began his work of Humiliation And so likewise in the day of his Passion he was then under the sorest part of his labour in the bitter Agonies in the Garden and on the Cross and therefore none of these could be consecrated to be our Sabbath Nor could the day of his Ascension be fit Gal. 4. 4 5. to be made our Sabbath because although Christ then and thereby entred into the third Heavens his place of Rest yet he did not then make his first entrance into his estate of Rest which was in the day of his Resurrection This day then was the first step of Christs exaltation the dawning of his glory Dies dominicus Christi resurrectione est sacratus Aug. when as Elijah he dropped the Mantle of all natural imperfections Now Christ was to bear no more bruises to give his Cheek to no more Smiters to tread the Winepress of his Fathers wrath no more This bright Sun was no more to be masked with Clouds this Morning Star was no more Isa 53. 10. to be veiled with shade or darkness Christs rising left his Isa 50. 6. Grave-cloaths behind him to shew us that now no more Revel 22. 16. he was to tast any thing which savoured of sorrow or mortality John 20. 5 6. And now how incongruous is it that the day of Christs freedom should be the day of our fetters That when he threw off his bonds we should bind them on us the faster That we should be fetter'd to any way of sin or chained to our sensual appetite or wanton fancy on the Lords day the weekly commemoration of Christs Resurrection On Diâ—s dominicus dieâ— est quam nobis salvatoris noâ—tri resurrectio consecravit this day Christ threw off his Grave-cloaths and so should we cast off whatever savours of dust and earth In a word to be captivated to any way of offence on this holy day no way comports with the nature and freedom of Christs resurrection then all his bonds were loosed and then should we Leâ— Epist 93. cap. 4. cast from us whatsoever may hinder us from running the ways of Gods Commandements all our sloth frothiness of Spirit carnal delights cold formality and whatever may slacken our pace in our duties and spiritual services The Resurrection of Christ is the very life of the
cares the body shall not be wasted with toyle nor the spirits spent with labour or the heart torn with griefs but soul and body shall be calmed into an eternal quietation The Apostle saith Heb. 4. 9. There remains therefore a rest to the people of God The Greeks call it a Sabbatism our future Sabbath and Rest being all one When the Apostle wrote his Epistle to the Hebrews the rest of the legal Sabbath was over and the rest of Canaan was first disturbed by Nebuchadnezzar and upon overthrowing and quite taking away by Titus the Roman so now then there remains onely a rest in Heaven a heavenly Sabbath for the people of God In this life our Laudabile Sabbati otium sanctorum vitam requie et sanctificatione exprimit tum futuram ostendit cùm omni hujus vitae curâ de positâ bonis aeternis fruimur Cyril Alex. Sabbath it self is disturbed sometimes with vain thoughts with deadness and coldness in duties it is disquieted with the iniquity of our holy things we cannot pray as we would and we do not hear as we should we often displease Christ at his own table when we come with polluted hands and unprepared hearts and when duties are over we either dash upon sins of omission or rush upon language or practices unbecoming the Lords day there is still something to discompose our spirits our hearts are sad and our moans are great but however the week treads upon the heels of Sabbatâ—m Coeleste est requies illa Coelestis patriae 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 our Sabbath and then like the Sons of Adam we get our livelihood in the sweat of our brows then we toyle our brains harden our hands and weary our bodies and all for that which is not bread Isa 55. 2. And besides as Master Herbert that sweet and excellent Poet observes our Sabbath doth but leap from seven to seven it flies away and then recurs in a constant revolution One Sabbath passeth over and we must press through the croud of weekly and worldly Rabbin affairs which will make us sweat and faint before we attain Isa 55. 2. to another But our Sabbath above is A rest from sin In it we shall enjoy absolute purity and spotless perfection we shall there be a Glorious Church Excitat sibi Christus ecclesiam 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 multo decore et gloriâ illustrem non habentem maculam peccati aut rugam vetustatis Alap not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing Eph. 5. 27. Sin cannot dwell in Heaven with God it is impossible if Achans wedge one sin disturbed the whole Camp of Israel John 7. 11. How would one sin disturb the Court of Heaven It would put a damp upon all the triumphs of it there cannot be perfect joy where there is the least relique of sin A rest from troubles and afflictions In our heavenly Sabbath there shall be no groans but musicks no sighs but songs no tears but triumphs not a drop of the waters of Marah in a whole ocean of joy and satisfaction if any grief remain'd our joy would not be full The Saints in glory shall be freed from natural afflictions They shall hunger no more nor thirst any more Rev. 7. to 16. Rev. 7. 16. to which accords that of the Prophet Isa 49. 10. The Isa 49. 10. Saints cannot hunger in their eternal Sabbath for the good Shepherd of our souls doth not onely fâ—ed us to eternal life Psal 16. 11. but likewise in eternal life and there he shall feed us with fulness of joy with the smiles of his face with the fruits of his love and with the over-coming influences of his grace and favour And moreover the Saints cannot thirst in glory The Lamb shall bring them to living fountains Rev. 22. 1. of waters Rev. 22. 1. They shall have waters for their necessity Rev. 7. 17. Rivers of water for their plenty nay pure rivers of water for their greater extasie and these rivers of water shall proceed out of the Throne of God and the Lamb for their superlative complacency Nor shall the Saints Eternal rest be disturbed with pressing afflictions All tears shall be wiped from their eyes a Isa 25. 8. sentence mentioned three times in Scripture Isa 25. 8. John 7. 17. Rev. 7. 17. Rev. 21. 4. As if every person in the Trinity Rev. 21. 4. would severally assure the Saints of future undisturbed felicity A learned man observes this phrase of wiping tears from our eyes is a metaphor taken from tender mothers Lacrymae malorum sensu exprimuntur who give their breasts to their infants when they cry for want and then wipe off their tears from their pretty cheeks which were bedewed with that emblem of sorrow Tears Altera foelicitatis pars est quòd nullis miseriis aerumnis molestiis hujus praesentis vitae obnoxii erimus Malorum immunem esse maximum est bonum cujus Author deus est Par. are those drops which fall when the fire of affliction is put under the sense of some evil the feeling of some corroding sorrow squeizeth them out as the extremity of pain makes the patient sweat But such oppressive calamities shall not seize upon the Saints in their Sabbath and Rest above here indeed they are in a valley of tears but one tear shall not interrupt the joyes of the glorified Saints The Psalmist saith Psal 30. 6. Weeping endures for a night but joy cometh in the morning and when the Saints are arrived at their rest above all night is past to return no more the morning is begun to pass away no more The Saints Eternal Rest shall not be disturbed with privative afflictions There shall be no more death Rev. 21. 4. Rev. 21. 4. Isa 25. 8. 1 Cor. 15. 57. John 3. 16. Then death shall be swallowed up in victory 1 Cor. 15. 57. and it shall rally no more to do any execution upon the Saints in glory Our Sabbath in heaven is eternal and therefore our life is eternal Indeed here below death is alwayes Sabbatum hoc coeleste est sempiternum sicut omnia alia bona quae ad perfectionem pervenerunt Musc to be expected Job 14. 14. But above death is never to be dreaded there that King of terrours as Job calls it Job 18. 14. hath lost both his Scepter and hs Sithe both his force and his prevalency There is neither fear nor expectation of death in glory were it not so it would turn those rivers of pleasure memorized by the Psalmist Psal 36. 8. into Psal 55. 4. salt and unpleasant waters and upon the very possessions of heaven would be written bitterness in the latter end But faith in Christ gives us eternal life John 3. 16. A full assurance and security against the approaches and seizures of death or conclusion Perfection which is the character of the Saints future condition excludes and denies all
Now then a sacred work is no sleepy work Our enjoyment of God in Ordinances is a day of salvation 2 Cor. 6. 2. It is no night to sleep in It is against reason to 2 Cor. 6. 2. sleep with the Sun shining in our faces In Gospel Ordinances the Sun of righteousness shines in the face of the soul it doth shed its warming and its winning beams upon us The Gospel is called bright John 3. 19. which is to rouse us not to rock us asleep It was once a sharp expostulation of our Saviour What could ye not watch with me Mat. 26. 40. one hour The same query may be put to every sleepy hearer 2. In Ordinances the work we are employed in is opus animae the souls work Will the prisoner fall asleep when he is begging his pardon What are we doing in prayer but suing out our pardons and making up our peace with our offended God The Heir will not fall asleep while he is Evangelium est sublustre quidcam et praegustus clarae lucis sive 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. gloriae divinae Quae revelabitur in coelis Chrys hearing the Will read in which he is highly concerned the discoveries of the Gospel are the Fathers will concerning his Children and when we meet in Ordinances we are hearing this will and is that a time of sleep and drowsiness In Ordinances the case of our souls is agitated heaven and eternity are proposed life and death are set before us the silver trumpet of the Gospel sounds and is that a time of sloth and oscitancy Ordinances are the way to life the means of grace not onely the radicall moisture to preserve spiritual life but the very first means to beget it and shall we sleep in Ordinances When the wind blows right shall the mariner betake himself to his bed or to his tackle to drown himself in sloath or to hoise sail and trace the floating Idem sermo aliis est propiâ—iatio ad vitam aliis condemnatio ad mortem quae diversitas non verbo sed nostrae incredulitati debetur fic admonitiones exhortationes doctrinae castigationes quibâ—â— delinquentes ad recipiscentiam vocantur contemptores et impaenitentes judicantur in die ultimo Muse waves Every opportunity of grace is a good wind for heaven and shall we sleep away that seasonable and precious gale How then shall we finish our voyage to eternity We hear Proclamations with great attention Every Sermon is Christs Proclamation to proclaim pardon to all penitent sinners who will come in and lay down the weapons of sin and lust and submit themselves to the Scepter and Obedience of Jesus Christ and shall we sleep in hearing this royal Proclamation It is very observable what awakening and heart-penetrating expressions the Prisoner uses at the bar and there is nothing unobserved by him but with much greediness and attention he hearkens to the Evidence of the Witnesses to the Verdict of the Jury to the Sentence of the Judge and no wonder it is for his life Now the word we hear it is that which shall judge us at the great day John 12. 48. By it our eternal estate shall be disposed either to life or death that blessed word shall cast or crown us and shall we sleep away this word Shall it not then condemn us for mutes and so to be pressed to eternal death Our life our peace our souls are all concerned in the entertainment of this word and we sleep and dream it away surely greater frenzy cannot befall the Children of men Sleeping in Ordinances is a great affront to the richest priviledge we enjoy on this side heaven The time of worship is the souls Term time a few choyce minutes to gain glory in and shall we sleep away these golden filings of time these sweet Veniente Christo mors vigebat et regrâ—bat sed Christus ejus vigorem et regnâ—m sustulit et destruxit Alap opportunities of the soul when Christ is wooing us to court us to a Crown Did we ever understand the true value of Ordinances 1. Ordinances they are the purchases and price of Christs blood that we have a Gospel to hear divine truth to entertain this is the Revenue of Christs death The Apostle tells us Christ brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel 2 Tim. 1. 10. Christ by dying brought this life Christ by descending into the dark grave brought this immortality to light And the Gospel is the full declaration of these glorious atchievements And Christ by his Heb. 10. 20. blood hath opened a new and living way for prayer to the throne of grace Heb. 10. 20. And shall a priviledge purchased with blood be slept away We will not throw away Diamonds fetcht from far with care and hazzard nor cast away Rings left us as tokens of love by endeared friends why should we sleep away opportunities not purchased with treasure but tears not with wealth but blood nay the best blood which ever ran in the veins of humane nature 2. Ordinances are the Benjamins mess which are given to few in the world some corners onely of the earth are guilded and guided by this light Hath God indulged us with these distinguishing opportunities and must they pass away from us in a dream This very ingratitude is not so much a trespass as a prodigy Shall Christ select us out to feast with Cant. 2. 4. Esth 7. 1. him in his hanqueting house as once the King selected Haman to feast with him with the Queen and shall we sleep at the table when we should feast upon Gospel dainties shall we drowsily throw away those seasons of love nay the best love which few in the world are honoured with 3. In Ordinances we have the offers of the sweetest grace Quia filius dei est vivus cum Patre et sp sancto deus et quia secundum humanam naturam ad patrem abiit et ad dextram patris est evectus et omnem in coelo et in terrâ potestatem accepit indeut verus deus verus homo preces credentium exaudit ac 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 orationem ex fide in Christum prosectam non exaudiri Ger. Prayer hath the key of the treasury door John 14. 14. where our comforts are banked up In hearing we have the gracious offers of Christ and in him of life and happiness and shall all these offers these paramount tenders of love be slept away Shall we shut our eyes shut our hands shut our souls against all these rich revenues freely proffered in Gospel dispensations Beasts by natures instinct will not sleep at the provender nor at their manger 4. Ordinances they are precious but transcient priviledges As we sometimes pass upon the water and view a stately structure but we quickly lose the sight of it our prospect is upon the speed so yet a little while and we shall pray no more hear no more enjoy
men defile not enjoy an Ordinance John 17. 21. They are spots not guests in that holy Feast It is onely the spiritual man is fit for converse with God Princes converse not with Beggars nor God with sinners Christ in his incarnation tabernacled with the Sons of men John 1. 14. But in his communion he converses with the Sons of God he gives his people the meeting Mat. 18. 20. The Sun shines upon the stars and they reflect its light with a glittering rebound Christ when he arose again gave not the meeting to the world but to his Disciples Luke 24. 36. And so in his blessed fellowship he visits not the formalist but the Saint Christ in his ordinances influences his living Eph. 1. 22 2â— members not glass eyes the speculative Atheist not painted faces the varnished hypocrite not ' wooden legs with the silken stocking upon them the spruce and self-deceiving moralist who with Agag are ready to depose the bitterness 1 Sam. 15 32. of death is over We must be on the Lords day in grace actual On the Sabbath the soul is to be set on work in acting several graces and some seem to be of a different nature As faith and fear heavenliness of mind and humbleness of heart repentings for sin and relyings on God tremblings of the soul and restings on Christ a real longing for promised mercies and yet a quiet staying for those mercies promise by hope expecting good things to come and yet by faith possessing those things at present This embroydery of grace must be on the heart of Lam. 3. 26 a Saint upon the Sabbath One of the Ancients compares Greg. Mor. l. 19. sect 30. holy men upon Earth unto those holy Angels of Heaven Rev. 4. 8. that are said to be full of eyes within and without In the week the Saints must use their eyes without Psal 77. 6. looking after their necessary callings and their occasions in Hos 6. 3. the world but upon the Sabbath they more solemnly set Ex cognitione dei omnia utriusque tabulae officia tanquam ex fonte promanant et eatenus placent quatenus illam praelucentem habent Riv. on work their eyes within looking inward upon the estate of their souls knowledge must open its eyes and repentance must drop its tears every grace must be in ure and exercise Indeed the Sabbath is the proper season for the acting of our several graces working as Bees in a Hive making honey of every ordinance Sorrow and confession must begin faith and prayer must carry on and holy thanksgiving must conclude the duties of a Sabbath Our hearing the Word must be introduced by holy appetite and desire we must long to be in the Courts of God It must be entertained Psal 84. 2. Luke 8. 1. Heb. 4. 2. Mat. 13. 19. by faith and affection it must be improved by zeal and an holy conversation our lives must be comments on Gods sacred truths and so all other ordinances of the Sabbath must be the sphears for our graces to move in as stars in their Phil. 1. 27. Orbs and this is to be in the spirit on the Lords day Let us study to be in the comforts of the spirit upon the Lords day The joyes of the Holy Ghost are the musick of heaven below the hearts rapture paradise in the bosome the sweet earnest of future blessedness they are the ecchoes of assurance and the reverberations of a good God and a good Conscience Spiritual comforts hath many springs but all most pleasing and complacential They are the comforts of God 2 Cor. 1. 3. who is a fountain above us The Father of mercies leaves a seed of joy in the soul They are the comforts of the Holy Ghost Acts 9. 31. who is a blessed spring within us John 7. 37. shedding those grateful streams of peace and joy which drench the soul with unspeakable delight They are the comforts of the Scriptures Rom. 15. 4. which are as sweet Gardens without us every promise being Consolatio omnis nititur promissionibus gratuitâ— Dav. as a sweet rose every truth being as a flower of the Sun and every threatning being as wholesome worm-wood in this salvifical garden They are the comforts of the Saints Col. 4. 11. which are as lights about us for our more comfortable passages to Sancti nos solantur invisendo condolendo necessitatibus nostris administrando et miserrimas nostras conditiones sublevando Dav. our rest and happiness Communion of Saints being not only an article of our Creed but an helper of our joy in our travels to Canaan But to return to the comforts of the spirit Gods people may find soul-refreshing comforts in Christ the Lord upon his own day and the measure of their comforts may mount their souls so high as to make them like Moses upon Mount Pisgah viewing Canaan the heavenly Canaan flowing with that which is better then milk and honey the soul of a sincere Isa 51. 12. 2 Cor. 1. 4. Luke 2. 29. Isa 56. 7. Christian may swim in a sea of sweet delight he whose heart hath been as a boat which could not be got up all the week because of low water yet may be brought up in an high spring tide of spiritual comfort upon the Lords day being ready to say with Old Simeon Lord now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace Luke 2. 29. the soul may be so Psal 94. 19. Isa 57. 18. filled with joy upon Gods holy day in his house of prayer that he may be ambitious of his eternal Requiem in the bosome of Christ Nay upon the Lords day a believer being in the spirit the worst evils may amplifie his best comforts to think of sin remitted hell removed death vanquished devil Gen. 42. 38. conquered all these make for him that he may go down with Jud. 14. 14. joy and triumph to the grave Out of every eater comes meat the upper and the neither springs run all into the Josh 15. 19. same stream of comfort to the Saints Every thing on a Sabbath is an occasion of spiritual joy to them If they look up Isa 29. 19. to God they will joy in the Lord Rom. 5. 11. If they consider Isa 35. 2. the season of a Sabbath that is the time nay the term Isa 52. 9. time for the soul which is matter of joy nay as the joy of harvest Isa 9. 3. If they glance at the word they receive the word with joy Luke 8. 13. If they act their graces this is with joy unspeakable and full of glory 1 Pet. 1. 8. It was a brave speech of a Martyr to his cruel tormentors Work your will upon my weak body as for my soul it is in heaven already and over that Caesar hath no power So it may be the case of a Christian upon a Sabbath he may be as in heaven beginning his triumphal hallelujahs It is no
part of our inheritance above whereof our Sabbath is but a sign and pledge When we come to glory we shall cease from all sweat and painfulness and as there shall be no tears lying upon our cheeks so there shall be no sweat bedewing our brows Our toile shall be turned into triumph our pains into pleasure our industry into rest our hard labours into soft loves and glorious rewards and therefore Lazarus lies in Abrahams hosome a place not of sweat but repose and all this our present Sabbath is but a harbinger of So the working upon a Sabbath doth not onely destroy the Observation of it which is to be Rev. 14. 13. The holy rest of the Sabbath is the twilight and dawning of heaven Shep. Treatise of the Sabbath p. 79. Luke 16. 23. Sabbathum nostrum perpetuum illum caelestem Sabbatismum consequentem et perfectum figurat ubi fideles à propriis malisque operibus sint in aeternum feriantes Leid Prof. with no manner of work but the very significancy of it Working on this day eclipses the Sabbath as it is our earnest of a better rest and undervalues this noble end of a Sabbath finis sublimior as some call it to represent the perpetual sabbatisme the Saints shall enjoy in a better place and state Let us consider the equitableness of mans resting from worldly labours on the Lords day Shall Man that frail piece of dust be like a Salamander alwayes in the fire of toyle and painfulness Shall there be no time for him to interferiate and feast with God and consecrate himself to Exod. 31. 17. holy observances God was refreshed on the Sabbath as was hinted before and shall trembling flesh have no leisure Omnis actio deâ— nobis pietatis et virtutis regula est Basil to pause and walk with Christ in his ordinances Doth devout sequestration to pious and holy exercises no way belong to him Or shall God in the fourth Commandment that grand Charter of the Sabbath take care for the repose Quia durabile non est quod requie earet otium quoddam sanctum deus praecepit ut insatiabilem hominum cupiditatem frae naret qui tam seipsos quam servos suos nimiis laboribus exhauriunt modò lucrum faciunt Gualt of the Oxe and the Ass the beasts that perish as the Psalmist speaks Psal 49. 20. and no care of Man that sublime piece in the Creation which is little lower then the Angels Psal 8. 5. To conclude this large Argumentation The Labourer who defiles the Sabbath with his sweat opposeth divine command universal authority and the dictates of sound Reason which are the cords of a man But now for works of absolute necessity which could neither be done before the Sabbath nor deferred till after the case is far otherwise here to labour is not our crime but our duty To breath a vein to one sick of a Plurifie is the duty of a Sabbath so to quench our neighbours house on fire is our proper work on the Lords day to stop inundations Psal 8. 5. of waters which else would break forth to the prejudice Hos 11. 4. of the adjacent parts this is not to defile but to honour Acts 20. 10. a â—abbath Paul on the Sabbath day uses means to recover Luke 13. 15. Lutichus who was dead for the present The Jewes Mat. 12. 5. in their greatest strictness were not so bound up as not to do works of necessity They might fight against their enemies on a Sabbath take and destroy the Cities of their adversaries Jericho is encompassed seven dayes and taken the seventh Josh 6. 20. Excipiantur illa opera quae singulari aliquâ necessitate nobis imponantur quo in numero illa non sunt habendâ— quae homines sibimetipsis quasi necessari fingunt Ames probably the Sabbath Josh 6. 20. which was no blemish to Israels Victory but an inhancement to the praise of Israels God Works of necessity they do sweeten they do not soyle a Sabbath they shew the love of God they do not break the law of God It no wayes hinders my Soul from being put in joynt upon the Lords day because my leg is put in joynt which was broken by a sad and afflictive providence And works of necessity are secured from Sabbath-prophanation by a four-fold warrant and dispensation Our Saviours holy example signs this dispensation He wrought his cures on the Sabbath for the most part Mat. 12. Luke 6. 10. Mark 3. 5. Mat. 2. 28. 13. and many other places The wound should not bleed to death because our Saviour would not act the Physician on this holy day Christ who was the Lord of the Sabbath would oftentimes cause an Ordinance to wait on a Cure and many times the Preacher must yield to the Physician Our dear Lord well knew a dying Patient was not fit to be a devout Worshipper The necessities of the Disciples being gratified were no blemish to the holiness of the Sabbath upon that day they Mat. 12. 1. Christus sumptâ occasione ex discipulorum facto viz. spicarum fricatione et comessione factum illud defendit Lysit pluckt the eares of Corn. They carried bodies of clay about them which must be shored up or their souls would fly out at the cracks of them If the glass be broken the cordial will be spilt Our bodies must be indulged or our souls will be uncapable of services or ordinances Faint bodies are listless to lively duties The very plea's of Reason have warranted a dispensation Our Saviour urges three rare Arguments to indulge cases of necessity The first Argument is a majori from the stronger and more forcible inference which argument we find Luke 13. Luk. 13. 15. Verbis exprimi non potest quantum homo qui ad imaginem dei conditus est et pro quo unigenitus dei filius proprium suum sanguinem fudit quem denique spiritus sanctus per verbum Evangelii ad communionem filiorum dei vocavit et sanctificavit irrationelibus animalibus praestat Chem. 15. where our Saviour urges most sweetly and wisely that if we can secure and take care of the beast on the Sabbath man should not in his necessity be neglected on that holy day Man is not onely more worth then many Sparrows Mat. 10. 31. but then many Oxen or Asses or more valuable Cattel If the beast must be pluckt out of the ditch on a Sabbath shall the plucking of a man from the jawes of death on that day be a polution of it This Argument the great Master of the Assemblies is pleased to use to indemnifie works of necessity The second Argument is a meliori from the better which we find Mark 3. 4. where our Saviour sharply expostulates Mark 3. 4. Finis est praestantior medie salus hominis est finis proptâ—r quem Sabbathum est institutum Par. and queries whether it be lawful or no to do good on
piece of Reformation well becoming the Care and Conscience of the best of Princes 4. By the Law Ecclesiastical especially that Homilie of our Church which is established by a political Law which Hom. Of the time place of worship forbids all Labour and requires us wholly to give our selves to Religious Exercises and so by consequence strongly forbids and prohibits all kind of Recreations and the same Homilie forbids all toyish talking on the Lords day and so a majori ad minus from the greater to the lesser sports and pastimes Now therefore what is thus prohibited by the Law of God Nature Church and State is certainly a sinfull practice Recreations on a Sabbath are the wasts of time they alienate the time of a Sabbath from the intention of the Law-giver God never sanctified a piece of a day or ever set apart a few hours onely of his holy day for his service and worship and left the remainder to mans disposal either to pursue his Games or Delights Such sinfull encroachments Mat. 9. 16. to use our Saviours phrase are onely the putting a piece of new cloth to an old Garment Obj. And if the plea of the labouring person be brought in who labours hard all the week and therefore lays claim to Recreations on the Sabbath especially if it be considered that God will have Mercy and not Sacrifice To this plea and apology Mat. 12. 7. it may be replyed Sol. 1 This Argument may as well proceed against the Old Sabbath as against the Lords day and yet it is generally confessed Exod. 20. 8 9 10 11. that the Lord enjoyned the Jews a whole day and allowed them no bodily recreations on the Sabbath and therefore it is no violation of mercy to deny the like on the Lords day Ad minutula et leviora quibus nec corpus fatigatur nec mens à cultu avocatur ad illa non attendendum quia illa anxietatem potius servilem quà m libertatem filialem respicium modò libertatem illam in licentiam carnis non vertamus Wal. James 4. 14. The word Recreation is equivocal Indeed there is a Recreation which is mercy viz. the necessary refreshment of the body as eating drinking resting it self especially to those who have wearied themselves with labour yea to some sickly bodies some ordinary moderate and inoffensive Recreations may be allowed as a learned man observes But there is a Recreation which we call sports and pastimes when there is no necessity and to allow this is no work of mercy and if it be a mercy to the body it is severity to the soul and in this case God will have sacrifice and no such kind of mercy which pleases the fancy and the corrupt heart of man against the advantage of his better part This is to rob the soul that bears the Image of God to pay the body which beareth the Image of death and frailty The greatest mercy which can be shewed to such as labour hard all the week is to give them rest for their bodies and divine refreshments and recreations for their souls and for Dr. Turners Sermon at VVhitehall 1635. this the Lord himself was carefull And if their bodies have rest and repose the greatest mercy is mercy to their soul to breath the soul in holy meditation to draw out the soul Sic agamus in Sabbatho ut deum in nobis agere patiamur atque ita aeternum inchoemus Sabbathum Wal. Cant. 1. 7. Cant. 2. 5. in holy prayer to refresh the soul with divine truth to recreate the soul with singing of psalms to bring the soul to holy ordinances where it may meet with its Beloved these are the very spirits of mercy when Christs stays his beloved on a Sabbath with Flaggons and Apples in Gospel dispensations And if any desire to be mercifull the way is not to steal it from God but to allow it of his own Let the Labourer take his rest on his own day And some well observe If the Mr. C. and Mr. P. Voluptatem vicisse est mâ—â—ima voluptâ—s neque est â—lla major victoria quà mquae à upiditatibus refertur Cypr. Sabbath be Gods it is no more true mercy to permit bodily recreations on that day then it is mercy to give men leave to steal other mens goods on the Sabbath because they have fared hard all the week before the person offending in the first bâ—ing far more guilty Can it be rational that Gods Commands should wait on mans conveniencies and happily this conveniency is created from mans neglect not necessity But supposing it was mercy to permit some bodily recreation which yet cannot be granted to such as have laboured hard all the week long yet what is that to such who have laboured very little or nothing in the week to such whose week is nothing but a Sabbath a rest and time of leasure and vacation and yet these are most ready to call and clamour for sports and recreations on the Lords day But as one wittily observes Those who are not annihilated Dr. Paul Micklethwait with hard labour have no title or claim to be recreated created again by delight and liberty If any can pretend to this plea They are such whose cheeks are moystened with sweat and hands hardned with toyle and work all the Epicuri disciplina multò ceâ—ebrior est non quia aliquid boni afferat sed quia multos ad populare nomen voluptatis invitat Lactant. Lib. 3. Divin week but such are most silent and modest in their claim and pretentious and therefore it cannot be any mercy to such who spend their time in Courtships and Dalliancings who converse like a wanton Epicurus or a plump Anacreon whose whole life is nothing else but a recreation and a successive chain of pleasures and worldly satisfactions and yet these as I said are they who are most importunate for sports and pastimes on Gods holy day And therefore to reassume that Argument from which we have a little diverted Recreations on the blessed Sabbath are inexcusably the wasts of that time which is wholly dedicated to the service of God and the soul as now comes to be shewed CHAP. V. The Whole Sabbath is to be spent with God THere are many persons both of Eminency and Learning who have taken much pains to prove the lawfulness of sports and pastimes on the Lords day I shall onely reply it was heartily to be wished such great parts had been improved on some other subject and the stream of Nemo non in â—itia proâ—â—â— est illâ— vincere diffiâ—illi mum est Lactant. their sweat had run in some other channel Alas in this Argument mans corrupt Nature will be the bâ—st Orâ—tour and produce the strongest pleâ—s we are naturally enâ—lined to fleshly ease and the flatteries of sense as other things which hasten to the Center Nature I say here can plead its own Qâ—i hâ—â—erâ— viciâ—
shady Ceremonies which were to teach the Children of Israel But our Sabbath is of a higher and nobler nature not covered with so much darkness nor subject to so much decay and therefore if God be so punctual Mark 2. 28. and exact in his time in these flitting solemnities which were to cease at the very first dawning of the Gospel Ah how much more on his fixed Sabbath the souls weekly banqueting day with the Lord Jesus the blessed Lord of the Sabbath Hiâ— verò infertur ut aeqâ—â—â—â—s quâ—rti praecepti patesâ—â—t nempe quod deus benignè nobiscum vildè agit qui cum sex dies nobis relinquat unum tantùm in septimanâ diem sibi postulat Wal. Mic. 6. 3. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrys Tom. 5. Nos illorum Apostolorum sequentes traditionem dominicum diem divinis conventibus sequestramus Isich in Levit. Cap. 9. And fourthly yet further to clear this truth we must conclude To abate any thing of spending a whole day with God is but the wanton abuse of divine indulgence The Sabbath is a price God puts into our hands and to play and sport upon it is to trample upon our pearls And truly God hath so smoothed and sweetned the fourth Commandment with so much equity and kindness in giving us six dayes and taking to himself but one that to break this Commandment is but the greater evidence of obstinacy and stubbornness and indeed to those who encroach upon his Sabbath by their toyle and their pastimes God may frame the same expostulation which once he made to back-sliding Israel What iniquity have you found in me wherein have I wearied thee come testifie against me Have I roughed my Commâ—ndmenâ—s with any grievous severity have I not given you six dayes and reserved to my self onely one And must part of that one day be prostituted to the flatteries of sin to vain sports and unprofitable recreations is not this to abuse my â—â—ve and sport with my indulgence Nay to crumble the Sabbath into so many pieces and divisions to spend part of it in holy services part of it in civil labours and part of it in sensual pleasures it is nothing else but so to disfigure the Sabbath that neither Divine command nor Apostolical institution will know it so as to own it to be their issue and production We may likewise fetch an Argument from the Text it self which commands our delight in the holy Sabbath We must Isa 53. 13. Sabbatum est delicatum i. e. delicatè tenerè observandum delicatum i. e. delitiae tui domini Deus enim capiet mognam delectationem ex religioso sui cultu in Sabbato Alap in Isai call the Sabbath our delight saith the Text. Now can this be consistent with that delight and complacency a Christian should take in the Sabbath after a few hours to break from holy services and spiritual duties to gad after the pleasures or profits of the World To refresh their wearied and tyred selves with a bowle or a foot-ball and to leave Communion with God to recreate their selves with a fit of masking dancing or shooting Surely our delights in Gods holy day are weak and faint if they must be fetcht again and revived with such loose and vain satisfactions Indeed it argues a very vain and frothy spirit to have no more pleasure in Gods day then to spend a good part of it in vain talk and idleness in rioting and wantonness in sports and foolishness It cannot be imagined that any men who ever tasted any sweetness in Christ or his Sabbath and felt the Sponsa Christum laudans ab oculis crsa est sed cur quontam cum amantes aspectu mutuo nequeant satiari et semper abaltero ad intuentis oculion imago gratior reflectatur et fit ut crescat admiratio et simul laudandi cupiditas neque in hacre sit ullus modus Et oculi sunt amoris duces Del. Rio. unknown refreshings of his holy Rest but that they will mourn for their cold affections and that they have not spent their Sabbath more accurately and exactly Certainly those who plead and inveigh much against the strict observation of Gods holy day never fully tasted what the Sabbath was and what the glory and excellency of it Is the Majesty and Glory of God so vile in our eyes that we do not think him worthy of special attendance one day in a week doth he call us now to rest in his bosome on his holy Sabbath and do we kick his bowels and despise his bounty Doth he call upon us to spend this day in holiness and shall we spend it or at the least part of it in mirth sports and pastimes and in all manner of vanity Where are our longings and breathings after Christ upon a Sabbath Were holy duties gratefull to us we should not so soon shake them off we should not make the time of a Sabbath like the vail of the Temple at Christs death to be rent in twain viz. between the Lord and the World whereas one bone of Christ was not to be broken so not one hour of this day Psal 42. 1 2. here we must say as Christ of the fragments gather up the fragments let nothing be lost It is perilous to clip the Mat. 27. 51. Kings Coyne and very dangerous to clip the Lords day Joh. 19. 36. let us not with Annanias and Saphira bring half the price Mark 6. 43. This holy time was never ours nor ever was there any part Acts 5. 2. thereof in our power therefore to keep back any hour of this holy day must needs be sinfull If no part of this day be the Lords why do we give him any And if the whole Communio nostra est cum Patre et Filio et in Patre cum Filio sunt omnia vera et coelestia bona Zanch. be the Lords as certainly it it why do we put him off with part But there would be no need of these questions were our delight in Gods holy day and were our hearts captivated with Divine Communion Delight sweetens duty and makes it easie and pleasurous That Sabbath cannot be long which is complacential David did request to spend not onely the Sabbath but his life in the Temple and counted 1 John 1. 3. one day in Gods house better then a thousand It is nothing but a carnal frame of spirit disgusting the things of Psal 27. 4. God makes the Sabbath tedious and wearisome and seeks to break open the Cage door that it may fly out to its sensual Psal 84. 10. delights and recreations Was the Sabbath our delight we should not cast lots upon it which should have most of it God or the World holy duties or trashy pastimes Our own Conveniency and advantage calls for the whole day of a Sabbath to be spent in holy and spiritual services Sabbatha docent perseverantiam totius diet Iren.
did so love the very nature of his Elect that though for the present he had them not all with him in heaven yet he must have their picture in his Son to see them in and to love them in O let us meditate much on this admirable strain of love till it melt our hearts Luk. 24. 32. Zach. 12. 10. Isa 53. 2 3. and make them burn within us Thirdly From the incarnation of our Saviour we may trace him through the several passages of his life to his death 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and passion and here with an eye of faith look upon him whom we have pierced and view that man of sorrows suffering 1 Pet. 2. 24. bleeding dying on that tree of shame and ignominy there we may dwell upon the death of Christ till it put life into our dead hearts and then let us follow Christ in our meditations from the Cross to the Sepulcher and by the way ponder deeply of the severity of Divine Justice of the sinfulness of sin of the inexpressible love of Christ and the rare worth of souls which are not redeemed with corruptible 1 Pet. 1. 18 19. things as silver and gold but with the precious blood of Jesus Christ as a lamb without blemish and spot 1 Pet. 1. 18 19. Acts 20. 7. And why did the primitive Saints sacramentally shew forth the Lords death on the Lords day Acts 20. 7. but to signifie to us that to contemplate and commemorate the death of Christ is a special duty of that day But a little more distinctly to supply our meditations on this glorious subject Let us meditate on the Author of our Redemption he that carried it on from the first to the last Let us contemplate Mat. 3. 17. Hag. 2. 7. Isa 29. 19. Promissiones in Christo constantes et veracâ—s sunt in eoque impletae sunt Alap on our dear Redeemer He is the Son of God the wonder of Angels the desire of Nations the joy of Saints All the prophesies of old were fulfilled in him Luk. 24. 27. All the favours of God are conveyed to us by him Eph. 1. 4 5 6 7. All the types of the Law were the shadow of him Col. 2. 17. Heb. 10. 1. Nay all the promises of the Gospel are yea and Amen in him 2 Cor. 1. 20. Let us meditate on his person it is altogether lovely Cant. 5. 16. Let us meditate on his natures The Creatour and the Creature never met in any but in him such a person 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God-Man Joh. 4. 19. Rev. 15. 3. Heb. 9. 28. Heb. 4. 15. 1 Tim. 1. 15. never was nor never will be in the world besides him Let us meditate on his offices they are necessary and glorious Let us meditate on his behaviours they are spotless and fructiferous Let us meditate on his designs they are affectionate stupendous Let us meditate on the objects of redemption viz. Gods Elect a company of poor helpless succourless sinners Isa 29. 22. whom God out of eternal pity hath designed for himself to be ransomed by the blood of his dearly beloved These redeemed ones are sometimes called his people Luk. 1. 68. Peculium hebraicè 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 peculium selectum thesauros pretiosiores et charos significat Hieron Chaldaeus vertit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Syrus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 novum populum Exod. 28. 29. sometimes his Israel Luk. 24. 21. sometimes his peculiar people Tit. 2. 14. sometimes his treasure as Hierom observes his New people as the Syriack translation renders it There are a few scattered up and down in the world in all places in all times and in all ages whom God set his heart upon from everlasting and Christ leaves heaven and is incarnate to purchase and redeem these scattered ones Aaron was to have the twelve Tribes engraven on his breast-plate and to bear them before God when he was to go into the holy place Exod. 28. 29. Our dear Redeemer whom Aaron was onely to typifie did bear the names of his Israel upon his heart when he did sacrifice himself to divine justice upon his shamefull but fruitful Cross Let us meditate on the price of our Redemption And here as the Apostle speaks we must conceive We are not Redeemed 1 Pet. 1. 18 19. with corruptible things as silver and gold but with 1 Cor. 6 20. the precious blood of Jesus Christ Tears not treasure Col. 1. 14. not silver but sighs not full coffers but emptied veins were Agnosce ô homo quam gravia sunt vulnera pro quibus necesse est filium dei vulnerari Bern. the price of our redemption Eph. 1. 7. All the mines in the world could not have purchased the life of one soul for as the Psalmist speaketh Ps 49. 8. The redemption of the soul is precious Nothing but precious blood could redeem the precious soul our sinfull wounds are onely healed by Christ's sacred wound we are cured by stripes Christs chastisements are our peace Our Olive leaf is dipt in blood Christ trod Isa 53. 5. the wine-press alone and his garments were sprinkled with blood Isa 63. 3. There are four wayes by which the Isa 63. 9. Isa 63. 3. Rev. 5. 9. redeemed person attains his freedom 1. When the Captive is freely manumitted and let go without price or ransom But this is not our case for neither would Satan have ever dismissed us from his thraldome of his own accord and freely nor yet our sin would leave us freely and spontaneously it stuck so close to us When the Captive is freed by way of exchange Nor is this our condition what bartery could we make with God to Quorundum permutatione fieri potest omnium electorum redemptio Gravius est peccatum quà m ut ullâ permutatione puraealicujus creaturae tolli et ita captivum redimi potest Zanch. purchase our freedom Could the Elect be redeemed by their own sweat or services or by the sacrificing of the purest Creatures This is no way proportionable to divine justice which we have provoked these means are too weak to file off our chains Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of Rams saith the Prophet or with ten thousand rivers of Oyl which yet is impossible or shall I give my first-born for my transgression or the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul Mic. 6. 7. Observe in this Text of Scripture here is offered all varieties of creature-contributions for mans redemption Here are inanimate creatures offered ten thousand rivers of oyl here are irrational creatures made proffer of thousands Mic. 6. 7. of Rams nay here rational creatures are tender'd the fruit of our bodys nay further here are the most beloved creatures frankly and pathetically presented for an oblation our first-born the heirs both of our love and revenue and yet all this to no purpose All these great offers can contribute nothing to our
of sin cannot over-rule the spot of sin cannot so unbeautifie him as to render him repudiate in the sight of his beloved sin may bring the Saint to the bar of conscience to be arraigned their but never to the bar of God to be condemned 1 Joh. 29. Jer. 31. 34. Heb. 9. 14. Isa 43. 25. Isa 44. 22. 1 Joh. 1. 9. there Christ hath satisfied for the sins of his people and divine justice will not require a double satisfaction The Apostle saith 1 Joh. 1. 9. If we confess our sins much more if Christ die for them God is just to forgive our sins Christ hath redeemed us from the killing power of death The Saints death is his alteration not his execution his Job 14. 14. Phil. 1. 23. Mors non est interitus sed introitus change but not his curse His priviledge and not his penalty Our death by the death of Christ is become a desireable thing the bitterness of Christs death hath put a sweetness and loveliness upon ours When the Saints die they only go to their Fathers house Death sees them safe home it Joh. 14 2 unites the body to the Earth their Mother and the soul to Tempus diversionis est teâ—â— reversionis et regressionis ad Deuâ— Tertul. the Lord their Father who in the Resurrection will conjoyn these dissever'd pieces of Man and glorify them both for ever Tertullian calls the time of dying the time of return to God after the years of absence here below Cyprian calls death the time of a Saints assumption and conveyance to his Augustinus in 1 Tim. 4 7. Exultantis magis sunt verba ad mortâ—â— praesentiam et ad corâ—â—â—m â—â— helantis quà m timentis et seipsum cruciantis Aug. Kingdom And it is recorded when the same holy Martyr heard of a sentence of death passed upon him by the Emperour Valerian he answered I thank God who is pleased to loosen the chains of my body that at last I may truly be at liberty Christs death indeed hath sweetned and perfumed ours the spices which were thrown into Christs grave are now taken up and thrown into ours Life to a believer is but an unkind Wall which parteth the Saint from his Beloved death throwes down this Wall and brings him into Luc. 24. 1. Joh. 19. 40. the same Heaven with Jesus Christ Death convey'd Lazarus from the comfortless gate of the rich man to the refreshing Luc. 16. 23. Heb. 9. 27. bosom of blessed because believing Abraham Christ hath redeemed us from the sting though not from the stroak of death from its hurt though not from its hold A Saint Rev. 14 13. 1 Thes 4. 14 16. now dies in Christ and though he die in his bed yet he sleeps in Jesus Death is only his ceasing to be any longer in a valley of tears and a wilderness of snares But a little farther to dilate on this point The Attributes resplendent in the work of Redemption In the great work of our Redemption all the Divine Attributes manifest themselves in their greatest lustre and splendor in this beautiful Orb they shine the brightest The Justice of God that if the sinner did not die the Son must One must die if the sinner be not cast into hell the Saviour must go out of his Fathers bosom Here was infinite 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 delectatus est Deus voluit et ejus beneplacito profectus est quòd infirmitatibus subjecerit filium suâ—m eumque afflictionibus contuderit Alioquin nihil actum esset si existimaremus illud accidisse vel nolente deo vel otiosè spectante Riv. justice here justice had a Selah put upon it That Text of Scripture is most remarkable in Isa 53. 10. It pleased the Father to bruise him he hath put him to grief c. God took a delight in bruising his own Son because in those bruises justice rid triumphant Innocency must bleed that the sinner may escape and that justice may be displayed Lycurgus once made a Law that Adultery should be punished with the loss of both the eyes his own Son being found guilty that justice might not be waved he puts out one of his Sons eyes and one of his own So the wages of sin is death Rom. 6. 23. That Law is unalterable now sin is committed there is an accursed thing in the Camp Iosh 7. 11. Either the sinner or the Saviour must die If the Principal cannot pay the Debt the surety must Divine Justice is so inexorable that the sinner escaping the Cup of Divine Rom. 6. 23. Heb. 7. 22. wrath must be put into the hand of an only Son Thus justice is eminent in the work of Mans Redemption The faithfulness of God God from eternity made a compact with his Son the Copy of which is laid up in that Ad successum mortis de quod attinet Rectè exprimitur videndi et saturandi verbis quibus omni moda fruitio rei conquisitae laboribus significatur et accipitur pro foelici et ubere sanctarum animarum messe Christus ad mortis suae tempus esuriebat grandi charitatis aestu c. Joh. 17. 4 5 6. Text Isa 53. 10 11. And one iota of this agreement must not pass away The substance of this compact is comprised in this main Article If Christ will make his soul an offering for sin he shall see the travel of his soul and be satisfied If Christ will die his Spouse his Church shall live his Cross shall make way for their Crown Now in the fulness of time Gal. 4. 4. Christ attempts and accomplisheth this stupendous undertaking he becomes incarnate and dies for his people and so his people live by his death the Father altogether comporting with this glorious agreement and not only gives his Son to redeem sinners Ioh. 3. 16. but likewises gives redeemed sinners to his Son Ioh. 17. 4 5 6. And thus Divine faithfulness gloriously breaks forth in the blessed work of our Redemption Every Article is made good and Christ meets with no disappointment not a soul miscarries for which he laid down a price and a ransom The Love of God did most transcendently appear in the work of Mâ—ns Redempâ—ion There was rich love on the Fathers part Ioh. 3. 16. Unspeakable bowels did the Father express to part with a Son a holy Son the Son of the bosom the Son from Eternity the very Character of his Father Heb. 1. 3. An only Son a begotten Son Psal 2. 7. to die Gen. 22. 12. for sinners Though Isaac was on the Altar yet he was rescued but our dear Jesus was on the Cross and he must die Christ begs his life of the Father Mat. 26. 39. But Non solum confiâ—mat Christus se discipulos suos dilexisse sed dilectionis suae magnitudinem exaggerat quod summo amorisgradu eos dilexerit Ger. the Father will not hear Great love was manifested in the
souls benighted by darkness by the appearing of the true morning star Rev. 22. 16. are lead out of this darkness into his marvellous light 1 Pet. 2. 9. and being fettered before are loosned and enfranchised into the glorious liberty of the Sons 1 Pet. 2. 9. Rom. 8. 21. of God Rom. 8. 21. The rich and rare benefit which we commemorate on our Sabbath is Christs rising from the grave when he conquered death pinnion'd Satan locked Necte natus est Christus nocte captus et sole obtenebrato mortuus est sed illucescent die resurrexit ut ostenderet quòd gloriosâ suâ resurrectione c. up the gates of Hell perfumed the grave and became the powerfull cause and great exemplar of our resurrection I cannot let slip the Elegance of a learned man who takes notice That Christ was born in the night apprehended in the night died when the Sun was darkned and wrapt up in Cypress and Sables but rose at day break when the light began to appear to intimate that the dark shadows of our sins were put to flight by his glorious resurrection and eternal light of righteousness did compass us as with a garment The Jewish Sabbath and the Christian agree in this That holiness to the Lord is written upon the breast-plate of Exod. 28. 36. both both must be inviolably and spiritually observed to God Purity and sanctification is the beauty and comliness the end and answer of bâ—â—h There was a time when the Jews were so exact in the observation of the Sabbath Ex Rabbinis refertur quod in die Sabbati non licet pomum admovere carboni aut vinum super sinapi pulverem mittere aut allium quod edere velit decorticare c. Munster that they screwed up the pag â—oo high and the string broke into superstition their own Raâ—bins aver that to put an Apple to the fire to take a Flea which was skipping from one part of the body to another to peele Garlick to eat to climb a tree to break down a bough c. was reputed amongst them altogether unlawfull nay such minute trifles which the learned man gravely asserts are more foolish then the toyes and jests of Sicily Indeed these over-zealous Rabbins thinking to make the Sabbath more specious made it more ridiculous and put black spots upon it instead of making it more beautifull yet thus much we may learn that the over-plus of Ceremonies implied their exact observation and their niceness and superstition did strongly imply there was much religious devotion as the guilding of the frame speaks the choiceness of the picture However we may confidently conclude that the Jewish Sabbath was encompassed with a hedge of thorns that neither secular labour nor sensual pleasure nor sinfull practice was to break in to prophane Ter paenam capitalem infligendam violatoribus Sabbatum exprimit deus per Mosen Riv. it And God was very zealous of his Sabbath that it might not be polluted when the transgressour was to be punished with no less penalty then death Exod. 31. 14 15. And which is observable not riot but work on the Sabbath not lust but sweat was punishable with the loss of life Nay God did see the least wrinkles in the face of the Sabbath Nec est quod quis de suppliciâ— gravitate conqueri debuerit quia contemptus dei nunquam potest nimis gravi supplicio vindicari Riv. and took notice of the least defilements if it was but the gathering of a few sticks Num. 15. 32. And this example was in terrorem for greater dread and terrour to others And Rivet animadverts That eternal death in the Scripture mentioned is threatned to obstinate sinners But to slide down to Gospel times Holiness doth not less become the Christian Sabbath we may hear by the thunder and see by the lightning of Gods judgements upon Sabbath breakers how jealous God is still of his own day the change of the day from the seventh to the first opens no gap to looseness gives no dispensation to sin or sensuality The day is changed but the bonds are not broken our tie is as strong as that of the Jews to the strict and holy observation of Gods blessed Sabbath If the Sabbath was to be kept holy in the times of the Law much more in Gospel-times The fourth Commandment binds us as forcibly as them and it is our Obstinatis autem ut in omnibus peccatis eternam mortem fuisse denunciatam non inficias imus Riv. glasse as well as their directory our chain as well as their bond it is still Remember to keep holy the Sabbath day Exod. 20. 8. whether it be the seventh day or the first Gospel light may make sin more shameful not more venial more hateful and not more excusable And if Sabbath-pollution was matter of complaint heretofore in legal times Ezek. Ezek. 20. 13. 20. 13. To act the same sin under Gospel-grace is a more prodigious crime Purity certainly is the decency of the Lords day The love of Christ in rising for our justification Rom. 8. 34. should in no wise make us more wanton but Rom. 8. 34. more obedient And as the Jewish Sabbath agrees with the Christian in many particulars so in several things we may discern a difference First They differ in this There was a multitude of appendices and impositions which did clog the Jewish Sabbath Exod. 16. 22 27. Exod. 35. 3. Numb 15. 32. Exod. 16. 29. Acts 1. 12. all which are taken off from the Christian to make the yoak more easie and lightsome to the bearer The Jews on their Sabbath were not to gather Manna nor to pick a few sticks or to kindle a fire nay they were not to stir out of their places And in after times they were only indulged to travel a Sabbath days journy which some learned Expositors Buxtorf lib. 3. p. 100. confine to a mile and others stretch it out only to two Thus God was pleased to pinnion and streighten the Jews Sabbath with a multitude of burdensome circumstances and Communio nostra est cum Patre Filie ejus In Patre in Christo sunt omnia vera Caelestia bona Zanch. a failure in any one of them was very prejudicial to the offendor But Christ rising from the dead did not only loosen the bonds of the grave but of the Sabbath too Those circumstances which did load the Sabbath of the Jews are now like knots plained off like darker shades which are now blown away And the Lords day is freed from those fruitless ceremonies and is wholly to be spent in sweet communion with the Father and his Son Jesus Christ John 1. John 1. 1 3. 1. 3. Our Christian Sabbath hath not its fetters on but holy liberty is its character and Shibboleth Our stages are not laid how far we shall go on the Sabbath if pure Ordinances are our errand Holy Christians went many
Shepherd of our souls the musick of the Gospel allures us the truths of the Gospel enlighten us the power of the Gospel saves us Rom. 1. 16. Take the Gospel out of the world and it is onely a larger Dungeon a wast howling wilderness the broad rode which leads to eternal destruction If the people of Constantinople so honoured the Ministry of Chrysostome as they could rather want the Sun then want it of how much more value is the light of the salvifical Gospel And Thirdly This glorious and necessary work of the Gospel is much furthered by prayer The Minister preacheth not without annexing prayer to the word and sometimes the Saints prayers obtain that for the Minister which his own doth not However a multitude of prayers must carry the greater force and be the most likely battery against Heaven The wise man saith Eccl. 4. 9. Two are better then one and as in other things so in devotion Single prayers may be like the single hairs of Samson but united devotions are like the locks of Samson which were full of extraordinary strength The prayers of many are an united troop which promises more probably victory and success and Rev. 6. 2. therefore let us earnestly beg in our Closets and in our Families Hic est effectus ministerii Evangelici ut Satan instar fulguris ex toto suo regno verbi ministerio ejiciatur et vana est sine viribus ira et hoc facit mircâ—ilitèr ad piorum consolationem Ger. John 6. 20. on the morning of the Sabbath that the Gospel may ride on triumphantly in conquering and to conquer and that many may fall captive before the power and force of it The conquests of the Gospel are most amiable when the engine of our captivity becomes the object of our love and we who are taken are not prisoners but proselytes The Sword of the word saves not slayes and it is onely sharp when it is ineffectual This was the glory of the primitive times that the Gospel encreased Acts 6. 7. That the Gospel was spread Acts 13. 49. That the Gospel grew and multiplyed Acts 12. 24. This was the gold of those golden times the Gospel made a multitude of converts and with its Doctrine leavened the world And so we should be earnest in prayer for Gospel propagation that the heaven of the Church might Regnum Christi ponitur pro promulgatione et cognitione Evangelii et deus dicitur transferre illos in regnum filii sui quos eruit ex tenebris ignorantiae et illuminat cognitione Evangelii Daven be full of stars And to spirit this argument now before us Let us take notice that by the propagation of the Gospel the Kingdom of Christ is much enlarged It must speak a pleasant day when the Sun of Righteousness scatters more plenteously his enlightning and refreshing beams Christs Glory in the World is the Saints both wish and happiness as the Members are honoured when the Crown is set upon the head and nothing more advances Christ on the Earth then the stupendous success of the Gospel And by the Gospels progress Satan his power is enfeebled in the world which is most complacential to the friends of the Bridegroom This blessed spread causeth Satan to fall Josh 6. 20. like lightning Luke 10. 18. His cursed walls fall down at the sounding of the Trumpet of the Gospel it is deplorable to consider what power Satan hath had in those Nations Diabolus instar fulguris è toto suo regno Ministerio verbi ejicitur Chemnit which have wanted the Preaching of the Gospel How did he bring the Philistims to worship a Dagon the Sidonians Ashtaroth the Graecians to worship Apollo the Latins Jupiter and other Gods and Goddesses wanton and lascivious Deities nay others their God Remphan Figures which they made Acts 7. 43. Such abominations have clouded the Land 2 Kings 23. 13. where the light of the Gospel Praedicatio Evangelii ceu potiùs res praedicata in Evangelio per Evangelium viz. Christâ— mors merita c. Dei virtus est per quam potenter in credentibus operâ—tur salutem fidem justitiam immò vitam aeternam Alap hath not broken forth nay where the Gospel makes no progress there Salvation is wholly exiled Rom. 1. 16. And how lushious soever the enjoyments of such a place may be their souls must pay the reckoning Though such a Nation had the milk and honey of Canaan the spices of Arabia the gums of Aegypt the gold of India yet wanting a glori-Gospel Eternal death is mingled with all these dainties this Jubilee only reacheth to the grave And the Inhabitants of such a place only tread on Carpets and Roses to hell life is not within their walls nor Salvation within their Pallaces When the Apostle would dispute the priviledges of the Jews he brings in this as their greatest To them were committed the Oracles of God Rom. 3. 2. Christ is the Sun the Ministers are the stars and the Gospel is the Amos 8. 11. light of a Nation The famine of the word is the plague of a place To enjoy Pastors after Gods own heart is the sweetness Jer. 3. 15. of a promise Jer. 3. 15. Golden Mines which are the rich linings of the Earth may make a place or a Nation Mat. 13. 16. gaudy but it is the Gospel only can make a Nation glorious And Satan hath least footing there where the Gospel is most scattered and disseminated where the Gospell is either wholly Luke 10. 18. wanting or penned up what prodigious evils over-run that place and how doth Satan reign and rage The Scriptures tell us of the unnatural lusts of Sodom the pride and wantonness of Tyre Ezek. 27. 3. The cruelty and ambition of Gen. 18. 20. Babylon nor may we omit the Turkish Polygamy the Heathens Jer. 4. 13. Idolatry the Indians brutish nakedness at this day Jer. 8. 16. where the Gospel takes no place It is no wonder to hear of bloudy Nero's lascivious Caracalla's and frantick Domitians Nero dictus fuit Pestis humani generis those monsters of men who were strangers to the sweets the power and light of the Gospel It is the Gospel lays the ax to the root of Satans power and where this Mat. 3. 10. blessed light shines not or very faintly the Prince of darkness Eph. 6. 12. exercises a cursed sway and a destructive Soveraignty By the progress of the Gospel our consummate blessedness is hastened and secured for the more efficacious the Gospel is the more maturated and mellowed we are for heaven and eternity The Gospel is like the Sun to the 1 Pet. 2. 2. fruits or the shower to the flowers which ripens the one and blows and draws out the scent and sweetness of the other we grow in strength and spiritual stature by the 2 Pet. 3. 18. power and efficacy of the Ordinances and Preaching of
Jer. 31. 33. of growth in Promissio facta est Christianis amicitiae dei remissionis peccatorum et regni coelestis grace Hos 14. 5. the gift of a Christ lay under a promise Gen. 3. 15. Luke 1. 71. the gift of the spirit was bound up in a promise Acts 2. 33. Gal. 3. 14. If a new heart be put into our bosomes it is the issue of a promise Ezek. 36. 26. And God in a pursuance of a promise breaths a new spirit Ezek. 36. 26. into our souls Shall we rise higher Thirdly God hath made promises to his people of things eternal Of a future Crown 2 Tim. 4. 8. Of a glorious Kingdom Luke 12. 32. Of a heavenly Throne Rev. 3. 21. Of eternal Inrer pocula Germaniae clamatum est spiritus calriviamus est spiritus melancholicus Sclat Life John 3. 16. Of everlasting Habitations Luke 16. 9. Of everlasting Salvation Heb. 5. 9. And therefore how much are they to be censured who accuse Religion of sadness and sorrow and upon the force of that argument draw back to courses of sin and prophaneness What do they less then blaspheme both the God and the priviledges of the Saints Joy is a constant dish with the people of God but Cujusmodi est gaudium quod est in domino In his quae secundum domini mandatum fiunt gaudere debemus Basil their joy is hidden Manna it lodges in their bosomes not in their looks their musick-room is a little more retired the world doth not hear their melody Look upon the Saints in their lowest condition when grace it self is at an ebb at very low water Yet then First The Lord assures us that little is a pledge of more 2 Cor. 1. 22. And even Secondly That little he will enable to get a final victory Rev. 3. 8 9. And in Rev. 2. 7. the promise is made to him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 who is overcoming not to him who hath already overcome And Thirdly That little shall be kept perfect to the day of the Lord Jesus 1 Thes 3. 10. Phil. 1. 6. So many causes of constant joy are there to all Gods Children what roses do they walk upon here even while they are in a valley of tears In their bosomes lies a pardon like Aarons Rod blossoming in the Ark their consciences are serene and calme with holy peace nay they can laugh in a storm they can joy in tribulations Rom. 5. 3. Jam. 1. 2. And they can Gaudium Christiano utile est immò necessarium ut jucunde vivat et alacritèr in virtutibus pergat glory in a ship-wrack they can triumph in death it self 1 Cor. 15. 55. And therefore the Apostle inculcates and reduplicates the command for holy joy Rejoyce in the Lord alwayes again I say rejoyce Phil. 4. 4. But though the joy of the Saints open to the wide Common they can and may rejoyce in all things and in all times yet in the inclosure of Gods blessed Sabbath the freshest and sweetest springs of joy are to be found And thus much for the third duty Jam. 1. 2. to be performed on the morning of a Sabbath before we go to the publick congregation Viz. Labouring with our own hearts The fourth duty to be discharged before the publick on Gods holy day is private reading of the Scriptures What a charge doth God lay upon the Jews to be acquainted with Deut. 11. 18. the Scriptures Deut. 6. 7 8 9. And these words which I command thee this day they shall be in thy heart and thou Verbum dei in nos totos admittamus in mentem in memoriam in affectus in vitam ut nulla sit pars nostri in quâ verbum dei non inhabitet shalt teach them diligently to thy Children and thou shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thy house and when thou walkest in the way when thou liest down and when thou risest up and thou shalt bind them as a sign upon thy hand and they shall be as frontlets between thy eyes and thou shalt write them upon the posts of thy house and on thy gates Let us summe up this charge First Gods word it must possess every part it must be between our eyes for direction it must be a sign on our hands to regulate our works and operations it must be lodged in Evangelica historia debet esse perpetua lectio cujuslibet hominis Christiani Mirandul our hearts to sanctifie and spiritualize our love and affections that the heart may be warm but not feavourish Secondly Gods word must possess every room it must be our discourse in our Parlors where we use to sit it must be our meditation in our chambers where we use to lie and if we take the air abroad this holy word must be our companion this must be testis conversationis the witness of our conversation Thirdly Gods word must possess every season It must go to bed with us to sanctifie the farewell thoughts of the day that we shut up the day and our eyes with God if we rise in the morning it must be our morning star to guide us our morning dew to soften us our morning Sun to warm us Ne patiamini verbum dei esse quasi peregrinum et foris sâ—are sed intromittatur in domicilium cordis nostri versetur assiduè in animis nostris non secus ac domestici versantur in domo suâ immò sit nobis non minùs noâ—um ac familiare quà m illi esse solent qui apud nos habitant Daven it must be our first company and our best Breakfast in the morning And Fourthly Gods word must not only possess the inside of the house but the out-side too it must be written on the posts and the gates to shew its own excellency that we must hold it out and own it in the view of all the world This is the summe of the charge and indeed it is not unnecessary if we consider the Scriptures are the guide of our youth 2 Tim. 3. 15. They are the cure of our minds Mat. 22. 29. Ignorance of Gods word breeds errour and spiritual distempers in us They are the comfort of our souls Rom. 15. 4. They are both a Cordial and a Julip to warm us in cold affliction and to cool us in careless prosperity They are the treasure of our hearts Col. 3. 16. He is the potent and mighty man who is an Apollos in the Scriptures Acts 18. 24. Nay they are the breathings of the Holy Ghost 2 Pet. 1. 20. They are not only mens advantage but the divine issue of the third person in the Trinity The result of the whole is this if God lay so much weight on reading of the Scriptures and man receives so much advantage by acquaintance with them no season fitter for this duty then the morning of a Sabbath First The reading of the word prepares for the hearing of it that we
when we should be Prov. 24. 33. prosecuting our salvation It was Davids resolution He 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sunt homines electi studio zelo divinae gloriae servidi ardore salutis eorum flagrantes metaphora esthaec à bellatoribus Par. would follow hard after God Psalm 63. 8. What a contradiction to this holy man is a sleepy Hearer one who buries himself alive at an Ordinance The Scriptures assure us we must storm heaven and take it by force Math. 11. 12. And we must enter in at the straight gate by striving Matth. 13. 24. Nay we must make our way to Heaven by fighting the good fight of Faitb 1 Tim. 6. 12. And all these are actions most inconsistent with sleep and slothfulness Matth. 11. 12. It is too probable a sign we taste little sweetness in holy Matth. 13 24. 1 Tim. 2. 12. Ordinances and that Gospel-dispensations never shed their perfumes upon our soules when we can wish them away with a nod or a dream Rich Banquets will scarce meet with sleepy guests Sweet Musiques will court and captivate Verbum Dei satiat non saturat creat amantes non fastidientes our attention And had we the taste either of a Job Job 23. 12. Or of a David Psalm 19. 10. we should keep both eye and heart open in divine Ordinances Were Ordinances so pleasant or parturient to us as either to delight our souls or awaken our consciences we should not throw Siulte quid est somnus gelidae nisi mortis imago them away at so cheap a rate as the gratifying of the flesh with a little stupifying sleep Surely the design of sleep was to be the Nurse of Nature and not the enemy of Grace to Somnus aliquando voâ—atur consanguineus leti support the body and not to hazard the soul Some learned men have called sleep the kinsman of Death O let it not be the Parent of our eternal Death It is a fatal change when sleep is metamorphosed into sin And thus much for the washing away of the paint of that excuse which pretends weakness and indisposition of body It is much to be feared the hand of Joab is in all this that neglect and carelesness close our eyes when we sleep away the precious Ordinances and opportunities of Grace But now succeed some ponderous considerations to be weighed in the ballance and seriously to be digested before we give our selves the sinful latitude to sleep in Ordinances Indeed many there are who sin away their souls and how many are there who sleep away their souls Before they come to Ordinances they sleep in sin and when they come to Ordinances they sin in sleep Sleep truly in the bed is the nurse of Nature but sleep in the Sanctuary is the nurse of vanity and breeds the soul up in Ignorance and Atheisme It is very strange that when our grace should be full of activity our sences should be chained with stupidity When Jonah slept the storm came Thou sleepest at a blessed soul-awakening 1 John 5. Psalm 11. 6. 2 Chr. 26. 20. Ordinance a storm of wrath may speedily fall upon thee as the Leprosie on a sudden rose in Vzziahs forehead But let us deliberatively weigh in our thoughts Wicken men do not sleep when they are about Satans work and while they are undoing their own souls If Judas have a plot in hand out of doors he will though in the night to bring his cursed design to pass John 13. 30. Nay the proud wanton envious eye in the Congregation will not fall asleep but will pry into every corner observe every fashion take notice of every beauty Satans work shall not be done sleepily and shall the work of God of Christ of Heaven of the Soul be done with drowsinesse and stupidity Here Ministers may make their appeal Hear O Heavens and give ear O Earth Isa 1. 2. It is strange the work of a Tormentor should be more faithfully done than the work of a Pay-master that the service of Apollyon Isa 1. 2. Vtitur Isaias prosopopeiâ— ut Oratio sit gravior et plenior indignationis Cyril should be done with liveliness and activity and the work of a Saviour should be done with drosse and drowsiness It is much Ahab should be so restless for a Vineyard 1 Kings 21. 4. and we so drowsie for a Kingdome nay the Kingdome of Heaven Luke 12. 32. How will Ruffins Roysters and roaring Companions spend whole dayes nights in quaffing carowsing and gaming and we cannot spend one hour watchfully and actively for the pleasures of Eternity There are some Ordinances we will not sleep at when we come to the Lords Table it is no lesse then prodigious to fall into a sleep why then in Prayer or hearing of the Nemo potest fide credere nisi prius id quod credendum est sibi proponi et predicari audiat 2 Cor. 5 21. Word It is the preaching of the Word is the converting Ordinance Faith comes by hearing Rom. 10. 17. which faith espouseth us to Christ justifies our persons Rom. 5. 1. Seasons our Duties Heb. 11. 6. Purifies our hearts Heb. 15. 9. Unlades our guilt and layes it upon him who is mighty to bear It is faith by which we put on Christ Rom. 13. 14. and so being cloathed with the spotless robes of his righteousness we may stand with confidence before Gods tribunal Preaching is the Mother the Sacrament only is the Nurse of Grace preaching the Word of Christ fits us for feeding upon the body of Christ Paul gives preaching the preheminence 1 Cor. 1. 17. And so prayer it carries the conquest of omnipotency it self Isa 45. 11. Yet we are often Praecipuum Episcoporum munus est Evangelium praedicare Alap guilty of drowsie prayers and sleepy hearing when we tremble to think of sleeping with a Sacramental Cup in our hand Alapide observeth The predominant duty of Bishops is to preach the word And yet this Ordinance principally must be a witness of our shame This sleeping in Ordinances is a sin which Satan mightily promotes he knows of what fatal consequence it is for the soul to hear attentively to heed diligently the word of 1 Pet. 5. 8. Satanas suas infernales volucres quae sunt malae suggestiones hostium veritatis sophismata prava hominum prophanorum colloquia illusorum dicteria numquid omnia quae dicuntur credis quid vult tibi iste sermologus immittit quae sermonem auditum ex cordibus hominum ita eximant ut ne memoria quidem ejus maneat ne dum ut per illam ad fidem et pietatem et illius exercitia et fructus excitemur Lyser life and reconciliation this will batter his Kingdome and pluck Proselytes out of the paw of this roaring Lion And therefore when we come to a Sermon he either attempts to disturb and distract us and to throw in his cursed injections to procure a hurry
Jer. 3. 13. forgive the sins of our prayers that our dull ear flat heart ranging mind floating thoughts treacherous memory may be pardoned to us and that the sins of our Sabbath may not sowre the sweets of our Sabbath and so our precious priviledges become as Vriahs letters whose contents were the destruction of the bearer We let fall an Evening dew of Aliud Sabbatâ—m et alia requies relinquitur et restat populo dei popu-lo fideli et Christiano putà requies gaudium et solennitas coelestis figurata per Sabbatum Judaicum tears upon our very services on Gods holy day 2. Petitory But our sighs must not so stop our language but we must be begging as well as moaning and there are many things we must importune the Lord for the winding up of his Sabbath we must beseech him that his smiles would speak his acceptation of what we have performed that holy day that his spinit would feal upon us those instructions which we have heard that day that our lives might conform to those blessed ordinances which we have enjoyed that day that a full fruition of himself may succeed the sweet communion we have had with himself that day and that the present Sabbath may be the harbinger of an Eternal Rest which is the glorious reserve God hath made for his Saints Heb. 4. 9. We must likewise pray that every lust complained of that day may receive its deaths wound that every sin confessed and acknowledged that day may receive its full pardon that every opportunity of life possessed that Ecclesia â—â— domus orâ—tionis quia in eá a deo petimus peccatorum veniam vitiorum victoriam virtutum robur et incrementum in tentationibus constantiam in gratiâ et virtutibus progressum felicem mortem et sa lutiferam beatitudinem Alap in Is day may receive its designed end Wrestling with God is never more seasonable then on the day of God then it is both seasonable and sweet therefore let it put its last hand to our Sabbath Of all graces faith wears the Crown Eph. 6. 16. Of all duties Prayer wears the Garland Isa 45. 11. This is the favourite in the Court of heaven to whom the King of Kings can deny nothing Gods house must be called a house of Prayer Isa 56. 7. not of hearing not of singing not of receiving but of praying One letter in Gods name is he is a God hearing prayer Psal 65. 1 2. It is prayer can sanctifie afflictions it is prayer can bless provisions it is prayer can sweeten Ordinances and make them marrow and fatness to the soul Psal 63. 5. Prayer is the Porter to keep the door of our lips Prayer is the strong hilt which defends the strength of our hands Prayer is the Chymist which turns all into Gold and it is prayer can turn a Sabbath into that which is better then gold Let Prayer then bring up the rear of our services on a Sabbath 3. Gratulatory In the close of a Sabbath let us triumph 1 Thes 5. 16. and â—â—joyce in the Lord and in the cool of the evening let us Semper gaudete si non actu tamen habitu Cajet not lose the heat of the day Let not our Sabbath be as Nebuchadnezzars Image whose head was of Gold breast and armes of silver but the feet and lower parts iron and clay Let not our hearts in the morning of a Sabbath have heavenly Dan. 2. 32 33. heat and be in a golden temper and in the evening as dead and cold as the iron and the clay It is very sad when our affections on a Sabbath are like the grass the Prophet speaks of Psal 90. 6. In the morning it flourisheth Zach. 14. 6 7. and in the evening it is cut down dried up and withered Some experienced Christians can say that upon the continued 1 Chr. 23. 30. care throughout the Sabbath in the evening thereof they have received large enlivenings of soul Plutarch reports of a River which runs sweet in the morning but bitter at night Let not this be the emblem of our condition but rather as Rivers have their Evening Tides as well as their morning so let it be full water with us in the evening of the Sabbath and then we have many things to praise Jehovah for 1. We must magnifie the Name of God for the time of a Psal 92. 2. day that the candle of our life burned one day longer when Divine Justice might have snuffed it out Acts 17. 28. 2. For the sweetness of an Ordinance Ordinances are the souls Jubile the walks where we meet with our beloved the Golden Scepter of Grace which God holds out to Esth 4. 11. us now to come in and receive favour the white flag of heaven to bespeak us to yield to Christ and we shall be received into grace and favour And how many of these Jewels doth God set a Sabbath with 3. For farther tenders of life and salvation Let God be praised that still the bargain is driving for eternity every offer of pardon in the Gospel is renewed love the fresh soundings of Gods bowels his heart once more yearning towards the poor soul And is not this worthy our highest thanksgivings The Persians adore every new rising of the Sun and shall not we adore the Lord for repeated tenders of salvation 4. For the liberty of Gods Sanctuary which is his Royal Illustâ—â—t deus faciem suam i. e. lucidâ serenâ benignâ et amicâ facie respiciat ad templum suum et illud instauret Palace to entertain his Saints in where he gives his sweetest and most satisfactory discoveries Psal 73. 17. There are the goings of God Psal 68. 24. There God sheweth his power and shines in his Glory Psal 63. 2. There Gods strength is evidenced and his beauty unmasked Psal 96. 6. And there he causeth his face to shine Dan. 9. 17. which is the most beautifull sight on this side the beatifical vision 5. Let us praise God for the Riches of a Sabbath In this Psal 14. 20. blessed season we enjoy the treasure of his Word without Rom. 3. 2. which we should have been both unholy and unhappy and by its powerfull operations we are made both gracious and glorious and the giver of such a gift deserves the elevations of our praise and we should commemorate it with an Higgaion Selah The light of the Sun Moon and Stars are Gen. 1. 18. of great concernments to men they are the Governours of Joel 3. 15. day and night But the light of Gods Word is of infinite more value The Sun shall be turned into darkness and the Moon into blood Joel 2. 31. but not an Iota of Gods Word shall pass away or perish By the Word the glory and beauty Cur non potest Iota perire quia tunc periret vox et sententia legis ex Gr. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
then let not a Sermon satisfie without Christ in a Sermon let not reading a Chapter content without we read Christ in that Chapter As once Bernard despised that Book wherein he did not read Christ And let us alwayes remember that Ordinances they are the institutions of God and he that made a brazen Serpent heal Num. 21. 9. can make his own institutions effect our cure Object But the poor souls greatest Query is How shall I meet with God in Ordinances who shall open the door into the Gallery where I may be with my Beloved Answ In answer to this something we have to do as well as something to enjoy Our pain must go before our pleasure we must not be wanting to meet God if we expect that God should meet us Therefore We must be earnest in Prayer we must cry out O send out thy light and thy truth let them lead me let them bring me to thy holy Hill to thy Tabernacle then will I go unto the Altar of God unto God my exceeding joy Psalm 43. 3 4. We must make our addresses to God if we look for his approaches to us God sends a Preacher to a praying Paul God Acts 9. 11. sends an Angel to a praying Daniel God comes himself to Dan. 9. 21. a praying Solomon Prayer is an humble summons for the 1 Kings 2. 3. divine appearance it can not onely tie Gods hands Exod. Acts 10. 2 3. 32. 10. and command returns Isa 45. 10. But it can obtain Gods presence If Moses say I pray thee God presently Jam. 4. 8. replies My presence shalt go with thee Exod. 33. 13 14. If thou wilt have God meet thee in Ordinances let thy prayers be thy Harbingers to prepare room for him Be serious in preparing for Ordinances The Sun scatters the Clouds before it shines in its brightness The Bride dresseth her self to meet her Bridegroom And thou must Isa 61. 10. compose thy self with awful apprehensions Sponsa â—rnata representat ecclesiam ornamentis gratiae fortitulinis decoratam immò animam sanctam gratiis spiritu adaptatam et si debilis et imperfecta Haymo 1. Of the Divine Majesty with whom thou art to converse 2. With the solemness of Gods Ordinance thou art now going to enjoy 3. With the sweetness and advantage of the season thou art now entring upon and then God will meet thy prepared soul Joseph trimmed himself and then he goes into Pharaoh's presence The Wise man adviseth us â— keep our foot when we go into the house of God Eccles 5. 1. VVe should do well in our applications to holy Ordinances to examine our selves whether we are fit with loose thoughts to meet with a dreadful Majesty Or with filthy hearts to meet with a holy God Or with worldly and drossy minds to meet with Grn. 41. 14. our heavenly Father Let us not complain God retires when we are not fit for his presence Let us then capacitate our selves by holy care and serious preparation to enjoy God in Ordinances Let us long for Gods presence God loves affectionate Proselytes A longing David shall see a loving God Psal 63. 1 2. The Spouse is restless after her Beloved and then she meets him Cant. 3. 1 2 3 4. The thirsting soul shall be fed Fames est illa melior sanctior quae est spiritualis jam in Christo habebit saturitatem invita aeternâ omnimodam satietatem ubi deus erit omnia in omnibus Chemn with milk and wine Isa 55. 1. Grace and Righteousness shall satisfie the bungry Mat. 5. 6. The Psalmist follows hard after God Psalm 63. 8. God meets with our pursuits we shall then satisfie our selves in God when nothing but God can satisfie us Cold suitors shall not meet with Christ in his espousals VVhen the Wife longs the Husband endeavours after the thing longed for Mary Magdalen bemoaned the taking away of her Lord John 20. 2. We may expect to meet with God when his absence is our greatest moan and his presence our sweetest musique Let us come to Ordinances with all reverential humility God will look at him who is of a poor and a contrite spirit Humilitas est via ad deum Aug. and trembles at his Word Isa 66. 2. God dwells in the humble heart Isa 51. 15. God will raise those who debase themselves Augustin tells us That humility is the ready way Super quem requieseit Sp. sanctus nisi super humilem super humilem non super virginem Bern. to God It is the usher who brings the soul into the presence Chamber Bernard notably observes That the spirit of God rested on the Virgin Mary not for her Virginity but for her Humility And if Mary had not been so low in her own eyes she had not been so lovely in Gods Alapide saith Humility is a throne of Saphire where God sits in Majesty Let Humilitas est thronus Sappharinus in quo deus cum Majestate resideâ— Alap us then come to Ordinances with a submissive spirit God will cast an eye upon the soul who lies at his feet He sent an Angel to Daniel when he lay in his ashes Dan. 9. 3. 21. God rewarâ— the very counterfeit humility of Ahab 1 Kings 21. 29. though his sackcloath was but as Samuels mantle the attire of hypocrisie A dread of Gods presence brings Prov. 16. 19. a sweet sence of it and a trembling at the Word of God goes Prov. 29. 23. before a triumphing in the enjoyment of God Job abhorred himself in dust and ashes Job 42. 6. and then God hears him for himself and his friends and gives him interest upon interest for all his sufferings and tribulation Job 42. 10. A holy God will meet with an humble Saint Let us endeavour to be in the spirit upon the Lords day Direct 9. The extasies of the Apostle John were on the Lords day Revel 1. 10. the rapture was accomodated to the season Christians should study to be above themselves upon Gods holy day then they should walk in Galleries above the world Hierome professes That he sometimes found things so with himself that it seemed to him as if he had been triumphing Hieron de Virginit servand among Troops of Angels and singing hallelujahs with the Saints in Heaven and walking arm in arm with Jesus Christ And Luther reports of himself That sometimes especially on a Sacrament day the death of Christ was so full and fresh upon Luth. his spirit as if then he had been upon Mount Calvary and as if that was the day in which the Lord dyed And Beleevers should be so in the spirit upon the Sabbath as if that was the very day wherein Christ broke the bars of the Grave rowled away the stone from the Sepulchre and enfranchised himself from the restraints of the tomb The Saints should be carried out on this day and make their sallies into the suburbs of
2. 10. 3. It was pressed with the same if not greater severity with the rest 4. It was laid up in the same Ark with the other Nine Quod pronunciatum Apostolus Christianis ad quod scribit applicat cujus veritas constare nequit nisi illud sub N. T. de quorti Praecepti transgressione locum habet alioquin enâ—m si in hoc praecepto nihil morale sit qui illud non servarit is non esset reus violatae ligis sed potius legis ejus rectus observator et Christianae libertatis rectus assertor Wal. and therefore we may fairly conclude that the same casualty which befalls the fourth most inevitably overtake the other nine Commandments This likewise is demonstrated by our Saviours assertion Mat. 22. 37. in his pressing love to God and our Neighbour as the sum and scope of the law which sum is moral and perpetual and includes the fourth as well as the other Commandments for how can we love God and not keep his day And we may likewise take notice that the total sum alwayes takes in every particular figure The learned Walaeus very well observes from that text of the Apostle James Jam. 2. 10. For whosoever shall keep the whole Law and yet offend in one point is guilty of all I say this learned man observes this injunction of the Apostle James could carry no weight with it and bear no stress if the keeping of the Sabbath by force of the fourth Commandment as well as the observing of the other nine Commandments was not necessary for then Christians might break this Commandment and be innocent nay rather be observers of Gods will and faithfull assertors of Christian liberty for that Commandment which now is not moral the breach of it is no violation of any Law and so no offence but who can see how the fourth Commandment slips out of the rest of the Law how comes this Pearl to drop from the Chain that this Precept should not require our conformity as well as the other Commands of the immutable Decalogue And how can the whole Law 2 Sam. 10. be observed if so important a Command as the fourth is be left to our liberty to break and violate And I may here reassume the forementioned Text Jam. 2. 10. how solicitous and carefull should we be to keep the fourth Commandment which is so considerable apart of the whole Law for offending in this one point we shall wrap up our selves in the guilt of the whole Decalogue and sin against the dignity and authority of the whole Law we shall be lyable to the same punishment as if we had scratched every Commandement This solemn text of Scripture might over-awe our hearts to a holy Violet homo totam legem et si non totum legis Accipienda sunt decem praecepta non disjunctim sed conjunctim et completivè tanquam una lex absoluta Justitiae et sanctitatis regula Dr. M. obedience to the Commandment of the Sabbath It is a notable observation of a learned Man The precepts of God are not to be taken disjoyntly but conjoyntly not severally but altogether as they make one entire Law and rule of Righteousness the contempt reflecting upon the whole law when it is wilfully violated in any part A grave and worthy speech The Decalogue is a body he who injurieth any one member wrongeth the whole body he who slights any one Commandment suppose the fourth sheds a dishonour upon the two Tables Besides there are many things in the fourth Commanment which loudly proclaim its continuance and standing morality The working six dayes which is the indulgence of the command speaketh it mâ—st just and equitable that we Justissimum est et aequissimun ei cujus toti sumus unum diem è septem coâ—secrare sex alios nostris laboribus concessit â—ùm tamen poâ—uisset jure suo c. Riv. should consecrate one viz. that day which remains to the service of God and there is nothing more agreeable to natural reason and justice as Rivet speaks and therefore to lay all dayes open to follow the byass and sway of our wills is most fantastick and irreligious and speaks the Assertours of such an opinion an irregular Sect and salt which hath lost its savour as a holy man calls them And that rule of Zanchy is most observable and authentical It is a most wretched and wicked thing to assert there are no dayes set apart for the more special worship of God and to despise those Imptum est et iniquum aut nullos esse dies divino cultui dedicatos asserere aut eos qui sunt contemnere Zanch. which are set apart to the same intent Nor can the sanctification of the Sabbath be ceremonial or vanishing for Prayer is as needfull for us as the Jews and so hearing of the Word receiving of the Sacrament and those Ordinances which fill up the Sabbath Moreover rest and refreshing for our selves and families for our Servants and Cattle is as well accommodated to the weakness of the flesh in the times of the Gospel as in the times of the Law To all which may be added that the great end of the fourth Opus creationis eâ—t opus stupendum immò 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Commandement viz. the serious consideration of the great and stupendous works of the Creation and so to be led to admire the Creatour the great Workmaster of this admirable structure of the World is no way unbecoming Christians Ratio praecepti quarti est quia sex diebus deus fecit caelum et terram die septimo requievit jam regula est ratio immutabilis facit praeceptum immutabile ratio hujus praecepti nunquam transitura est praeceptum ergo in perpetuum durabit Dr. Andr. Epis Winton nor heterogeneous to their vivid and holy speculations which are onely heightned to us by an additional argument of the mellifluous work of mans Redemption But to draw out the Answer no further It is most remarkable and to be noted with an Higgaion Selah that in the 31 of Exod. 14. God presently after the exhibition of the Decalogue the whole body of the ten Commandements singles out the fourth Commandement alone and tells the Jewes Ye shall keep the Sabbath therefore for it is holy unto you every one who defiles it shall surely be put to death for whosoever doth any work therein that soul shall be cut off from amongst his people It is a Sabbath of Rest holy to the Lord v. 15. The Children of Israel shall keep the Sabbath they shall observe the Sabbath throughout their Generations for a perpetual Covenant v. 16. How doth the Lord again again press the keeping of the Sabbath two or three times in one Verse and one Verse after another as if this was his darling Commandement and he took the greatest care of it and did give it the primacy over all the other Precepts And indeed
proof for the Divine Authority of the Lords day nay in this text Psal 118. 24. The Psalmist proceeds to the prophetical delineation In diem solis laetitiae indulgemus Tert. of the duties of this day Let us be glad and rejoyce therein as when the Temple was finished the head stone was brought forth with shouting Zach. 4. 7. crying Grace grace so when the work of our Redemption shall be finished Dies ille quem fecit dominus est dies dominicus Arnob. and Christ exalted as head and corner stone of his Church by his triumphant Resurrection the Psalmist intimates the solemn gratulation and publick praise that the Church should offer on that day so Psal 118. 23. And indeed praise and thanksgiving is the most proper musick of our Haec dies quam fecit dominus Haec sunt verba populitrium phantis regno Davidis sed multò magis in gloriosâ resurrectione Christi omnium rerum dierum gloriosissimo Heresbach Christian Sabbath The learned Twisse observes That if ever any day deserved to be a festival surely it was the day of our Saviours Resurrection and in that day to rejoyce in the Lord according to Psal 118. 24. And the ancient Fathers saith he accommodate this place thereunto the two preceding verses carrying in their very fore-head a manifest relation unto Christ as the proprietary of that renowned prophesie for when was the stone which the builders refused made the head of the corner but when Christ gloriously rose from the dead thereby mightily declaring himself to be the Son of God And was there ever any work more marvellous in the eyes of Gods Servants then the Resurrection of Christ This scattered all the unbelief of the Disciples Luke 24. 21. This removed all the fears of the good Women all the sorrows of the Apostles this gratified the hopes of all succeeding Christians Hierome avers that all the Jews interpret this Hieronymus text Psal 118. 24. to be a prophesie concerning the Messiah the Psalmist say they Shewing his ignominious death when he should be a stone rejected of the builders and his glorious Resurrection when he should become the chief stone of the corner The Lords day waâ—â—â—stituted upon the account of Christs most glorious Resurrection What a mark of honour nay what a crown of glory is it to this day that it had favour Dies dominicus Christi resurrectione declaratus est ex illo caeâ—it habere festivitatem suam Aug. above all the dayes of the week to be Christs Resurrection day The Sun in the firmament arises and shines upon other dayes as well as this but the Sun of Righteousness never arose upon any day but this And indeed the institution of the Lords day had its foundation here The maxime of Divines here fully takes place It is the work makes the day some special work alwayes makes some special day the Lords Factum domini fecit diem dominicum deed made the Lords day and we cannot better keep alive the memory of this glorious mercy viz. The blessed Resurrection of Christ then by keeping a day weekly in the solemn commemoration of it This day brought the greatest good John 10. 25. to fallen man even a compleat Redeemer who on this day John 14. 19. redeemed us with triumph from the tyranny of Satan the domination of death and hell and restored us to life and salvation Nos observamus diem solis ex usu Apostolorum propter memoriam resurrectionis domini qui est verus Sol justitiae et pleno immortalitatis jubare illo die est exertus Alsted yea assured it unto every believer And because nothing can ever fall out in this world comparable to Christs Resurrection in glory and power therefore no day can be set up like unto this day neither can it be ever changed for any other therefore men only kick against the pricks while they oppose the Lords day It is a good saying of Augustine The Lords rising hath promised to us an eternal day and consecrated to us the Lords day or the Dominical day of the Lord that which is the Lords day seems properly to belong to the Lord because on that day the Lord rose again And it is a most significant and elegant observation of the great Athanasius Two worlds there are saith he The first ended at Christs Passion the second begins at Christs Resurrection and that blessed day is the feast of them who are in Christ a new Creature And it is observable it is not said by the Ancients that the Church took occasion from the resurrection to consecrate the Lords day but that the Resurrection it self did consecrate it the resurrection was a real consecration And if as Bishop Andrews speaks That the Acts of the Apostles as well as their sayings and writings were of Divine Authority being inspired by the Divine Spirit how much more shall the Act of of their Lord and Masters Resurrection be a divine and sufficient Authority to institute the Lords day The Reverend and Learned Hall speaks well to this purpose Because the Sun Bishop Hall Decad. 6. Epist 1. of Righteousness arose upon this day and gave a new life to the world on it and drew the strength of Gods Moral Precept viz. the fourth Commandment unto it therefore justly do 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Andr. Caesar we sing with the Psalmist This is the day which the Lord hath made But why should we mention the Authorities and Testimonies of these latter dayes Ignatius who was as a morning star in the Primitive Church speaks fully and home to this purpose Setting aside saith he the Jewish Sabbath Let every one that loves Christ keep holy the Lords day c. To the same purpose Justin Martyr Athanasius Augustine Innat Justin Mart. Athanas August c. c. who bottom the Lords blessed day on the Lords blessed resurrection that glorious work which must be outvied before any shadow of reason can be assigned for the transmutation of it into any other day Besides the Sun which rose this day will never admit a setting The Christians in the Debâ—mus plus gaudere propter resurrectionem gloriosam quà m dolere propter passiâ—nem Christ ignominiosam Lern. Primitive Church were wont when they saw one another to give this joyful salute The Lord is risen and the others ordinary answer was True the Lord is risen indeed We should not so much mâ—urn saith Bernard at Christs ignominious passion as we should rejoyce at his glorious resurrection The day therefore of Christs rising may well give being to our Christian Sabbath The Lords day was honoured with Christs frequent apparitions Christs appearing on this day was most signal and remarkable he shewed himself five times on that very day on which he arose First to Mary Magdalen in the morning Mark 16. 9. Secondly to the Women Mat. 28. 9 10. Thirdly to the two Disciples Luke
reverence and devotion honour the Lords Day and abstain from all carnal actions and all earthly labours and go to the publick Assemblies devoutly The Council of Aken which was held 800 years ago Forbids all Marriages on the Lords Day as being too often introductive of unseemly vanities most improper for that holy day In a Council at Rome it was decreed That no Market should be kept on the Lords Day no sentence should be past though the offence of the Malefactor should require it In a Council at Coy it was decreed That men should do no servile work nor take any journey on this day At a Council in Petricow it was decreed That Tavern-meetings Dice Cards and such like pastimes should be abandoned on this Holy day The Council of Eliberis decreed If any man inhabiting the City come not to Church for three Lords days together let him to kept so long from the Sacrament that he may well seem corrected for it And the famous Council of Laodicea decreed That Christians ought not to Judaize and to rest from work on the Jewish Sabbath but prefer the Lords day before it and rest thereon from labour If any be found to Judaize let him be Anathema And thus we may say with the wise man Prov. 11. 14. In the multitude of Counsellors there is safety the Governors of the Church in their grave and solemn Conventions have in all ages remembred to establish the honour and Holy observation of the Lords day The Lords day hath met with acceptance and veneration in all ages of the Church In the Primitive times it was universally Ignat. Epist ad Magnes 4. Iren. l. 4. c 19 20. Tertul. Apol. c. 39. Orig. contra celsum Ambros Serm. 62. August tract 5. in Joan. Euseb eccles Hist l 4. c. 23. Hieron Epist ad Eustochium Cyril in Joan. l. 12. c. 58. Greg. l. 11. Epist 3. Justin Mart. Apolog. 2. embraced owned and observed And Ignatius Justin Martyr Irenaeus Origen Tertullian Basil Athanasius Chrysostom Hierome Ambrose and Augustine c. were but the trumpets of its praise These famous lights in the best dayes of the Church liberally contributed to the glory of the Lords day and cast in freely to the treasury of its commendation and observance And these Orthodoxal Fathers both Greek and Latin do with one mouth testifie concerning the Christian Sabbath 1. The Original thereof which they say was first established by Christs own blessed and inspired Apostles 2. The cause and occasion of this day In memory of the resurrection of Jesus Christ our Lord who rose as upon this day and triumphed over death and hell 3. They bear honourable testimony exhibit general approbation and give notice of their continual practice in the sanctifying of the Lords day in their several times and ages 4. They effectually established it by their practice preaching Athanas de circumcis Sabbat Chrysost Serm. 5 de Resur Felis f. 292. Vaulx Cath. c. 3. Ribera in Apoc Catech. Roman part 3. f. 319. Stella in Luc. Rhem. Test in Apoc. Eccii Enchyrid tit de sestis fol. 134. Hos confess fol. 300. and writings that the memory of it might never be lâ—st nor the prefixed time be changed or altered The Papists coming between the primitive and the later purity as a Nettle between two Roses as they kept the Letter of Gods word the matter of Baptism the Doctrine of the Trinity so they kept the time and doctrine of the Lords day And they did always acknowledge 1. That the Lords day was by the Apostles themselves established and some of them say Dominico jussu by the command of the Lord himself 2. That this was done by them in the memorial of the Lords resurrection 3. That those texts of Scripture Acts 20. 7. 1 Cor. 16. 2. Rev. 1. 10. do manifestly confirm this day 4. That it is a day above all other dayes to be honoured and esteemed 5. That the observation thereof is pars cultus divini part of divine worship and so consequently jure divino of divine right All this the Papists have freely acknowledged although they are so subject to the epilepsie of errour and the spiritual falling-sickness nay although they are so byassed by interest their fundamental maxime and so closely chained to the Popes Chair But in this particular we will grant them infallibility Nay in the darkest times of the Church when the Sun of Abbas in cap. de feriis Aâ—gelus in verbo Feriae Sylvester in verbo Dominici Quaest 1. Et dicit hanc esse communem opinionem quod dies dominicus est jure divino Pisanella in verbo dominica truth shone most faintly and was behind the blackest cloud even then many School-men of note and eminency acknowledged the Divine right of the Lords day and gave in their plentiful attestations to that important truth And Sylvester one of them is bold to assert that this was the common opinion among them the Lords day was so venerable in the Church it could not be contemptible in the Schâ—â—lâ— Learning in the very worst times knew not how to become sacrilegious and to rob the Lords day of the honour of its diâ—ine original it knew not how in the very midst of the triumphs of Idolatry which was most rampant in the middle times of the Church to sink down the Lords day into An. Dom. 189. An. Dom. 822. an humane Ordinance And one thing is observable that those two famous Edicts of Charles the Great and his Son Ludovicus Pius concerning the holy observation of the Lords day were dated from those times when the Church of Christ was covered with the blackness of darkness and the Spouse had on her the thickest veil As for the times of Reformation these latter ages of the Melanct in Cateches Buâ—â—r de regno Christi Gallas in Exâ—d Jun. in â—enes Faius in Thes Zanch. in quartum praecept Chemnit harm Evangel Beza in Thâ— Geneven Piscat in observat in Gen 2 3. world have not blemished the glorious work of reformation with degrading the Lords day from its due just and Scriptural honour More then a Jury of Forraign Divines acquitting this blessed day from the mean original of an humane institution And if they shall be called in they are ready to avouch it Beza Junius Piseator Rolloche Chemnitius Walaeus Bucer Melancton Gallasius Viretus Amesus Peter Martyr Zanchius Pareus and Faius c. all concurring in their sentence That the Lords day was consecraâ—eâ—â—y the holy and infallible Apostles Nor are there deficient Divines of note of our own who give in the same verdict and joyn issue with the suffrages of those beyond the Seas what the eminent Perkins his opinion was in this cause hath already been suggested Let me now produce the testimony of the famous Mr. Joseph Meâ—e whose worth and learning was not of an ordinary sâ—â—ture and thus he expresseth him-himself I say therefore that the Christian as well as the Jew after
midwived into the world by Apostolical precept or practise The infinite distance between the Authorities must needs conclude a vast difference between the benedictions nor can the Canon of a Council tie conscience so fast or bless the obedient so much as the Canon of Scripture our enemies themselves being Judges nor can in the least any Scripture be produced to authorize the Church to set up a Sabbath for the Christian World God usually blesseth his own institutions Prayer is powerful because He commands it Preaching John 14. 15. effectual because He enâ—oyns it the Sacraments comfortable Mat. 28. 19 20. because He ordains them and so the Lords Day is often Luk. 22. 19 20. bedewed with showers of the choicest love and benediction because it was Christs institution either more immediately by his personal command or else mediately by his inspired and infallible Apostles And therefore let us fall down before the force of truth and conclude the blessings of our Sabbath speak the beginnings of our Sabbath to be in Gods breast and not in mans will God usually accepting the worship at Jerusalem and not that at Dan and Bethel he loves those festivals of which himself is the Author And let us fetch a pregnant argument from Providence What signal judgements hath God punished the prophaners of Peccatum est deiâ—idium â— Christiciâ—â—um est summum malum spomaneâ— infania somnus et mors anima ex sui naturâ mortem meretur gravâ— est onus animum deprimens cibus durus nullo stomacho digestibilis morbus pesti lentissimus putidissima corruptio Alap the Lords day with as shall be shewn more fully hereafter Now the prophaning of the Lords day must needs be a breach of the law of God or else how can it be a provocation of the wrath of God God punisheth only for sin which the Apostle saith is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a transgression of the Law 1 John 3. 4. Now if our Christian Sabbath be only a law of Man where is the positive and provoking sin in the violation of it where is the infinite evil which should so inflame divine displeasure as to pour out his fury on the violatours of it and to follow them with tremendous judgements Is it probable that God would strike so deeply and punish so fearfully and wonderfully for the breach of a Canon of the Church or a Decree of a Council It is true was the Lords day bottom'd on Ecclesiastical authority it would be a piece of disobedience to the Church to violate it but still where is the infinite evil as every sin is to stir up so much indignation in the Almighty Surely the breach of a humane constitution could never raise such storms in the world nor pelt so many untimely into their dust and oftentimes on a sudden and in a stupendous and terrible manner as shall be fully shewed hereafter And again we meet with no such tragedies in our sporting upon holy dayes and those festivals which are of the Churches appointment those dayes run waste in mirth and jollity nor do we meet with broken limbs sudden deaths fearfull diseases unexpected blindness c. the common issues of the prophanation of the Lords day to be the success and consequence of that vanity Providence then makes the distinction between dayes of the Churches appointment and that blessed day our Christian Sabbath which is of divine institution To conclude then this particular Let us cloath the Lords Quid hac die fâ—â—icius est quâ dominâ—â— judaeâ—â— mortuus est nobis resurrexit In quâ cultus Synagogae ocâ—ubuit et est ortus ecclesiae in quâ nos homines fecit surgere et vivere secum et sedere in coelestibus Haec est dies quem fecit dominus exultemus et laetetemur in illo Omnes dies fecit dominus sed caeteri dies possunt esse ju daeorum possunt esse Haereticorum possunt esse Gentilium sed dies dominica dies est resurrectionis dies Christianorum est dies nostra est Hier. day in all its royal Apparel and put on all its Jewels and Ornaments and then we shall see this Queen of dayes in all its splendour and glory A day it is of honour and renown above all dayes that ever the Sun shone in the most gloririous day that ever God created the most solemn day that ever the Church celebrated a day which Christ hath crowned with the greatest glory of any day that ever dawned upon the world It is a day of the Lords power a day of his perfection the day of his praise and glory and a day of his bâ—â—â—nty and blessings the day of his espousals and of the gladness of his heart When Christ was born the Angels celebrated that day with Songs and triumphs Luke 2. 13. When Christ rose from the dead or else why was he born Let the Saints celebrate that day with weekly solemnities and praises and not passe away their laud in a transient musick as the Angels did On this day our Christian Sabbath day there was a confluence of wonders and wonderfull transactions wrought by him whose name is wonderfull Isa 9. 6. In a word this day is the highly favoured of God a map of Heaven a taste of Glory the golden spot of time the market day of souls the day break of eternal brightness a day to be marked of thousands for their new birth day a day on which many have been redeemed from more then Aegyptian bondage a day of light of joy of love and delight a day which is truly delitiae humani generis the delight of mankind as once Titus was called Ah! how do men flutter up and down on the week dayes as the Dove on Rom. 1. 4. Luke 13. 32. John 20. 22 23. the waters and can find no rest for their souls till they come to this day as to an Arke and this day takes them in On this day the light was created the Holy Spirit descended life hath been restored Satan subdued Sin mortified Souls sanctified Cant. 3. 11. Hos 2. 19 20. Acts 13. 34. Sex praerogativae recensentur ad diem dominicum propiissimè pertinentes Beda in lib. de officiis Eccles Cap. 1. the Grave Hell and Death conquered O! the mountings of mind the ravishings of heart the solace of soul which on this day men enjoy in their dearest Saviour Our Lords day is the first day of the week was the first day of the world On it the Elements were formed the light was created the Angels were produced On it Manna was first rained down On it say the Fathers of the sixt General Council was Christ born On it did the Star first appear to the wise men who came out of the East On it was Christ baptized in Jordan by John the Baptist as the Council of Paris observe Sextum Concilium generale Constantinopoli celebratum On it saith a learned man Christ
wrought his first Miracle by turning water into wine And on this day saith Junius the Israelites passed the Red Sea on dry ground Concil Paris sub Ludovico Pio et Lothario celebratum securely by the help of a Miracle And to wind up all on this day the light of the firmament and the Sun of Righteousness first rose and appeared from darkness and death And thus the Lords day is brought to its Throne and let Jun. in Deut. all who love Christ say God save the Christian Sabbath and preserve it from the fury and rage of malevolent persâ—cutors John 2. 49. from the virulent and sophistical pens of adversaries from the fancies of familistical and enthusiastical hereticks and from the blemishes and discrediting practices of prophane persons And let our fervent prayers to the Lord of the Sabbath Mark 2. 28. be that as this blessed day had a divine institution so it may be ever honoured and celebrated with a spiritual and heavenly observation CHAP. XLVII A Plea with Christians to out-vy the Jews in Sabbath-holiness and observations HAving now bottom'd the Lords day upon its Scriptural basis and given it its due and just authority let us further consider how its original may influence our practice and how its institution running parallel with that of the Jews Sabbath may over-awe our consciences and sublimate our minds to a more holy and severe observation It is a good note of a learned man If saith he The people shall be made to believe that the Lords day stands upon humane authority all the power of Princes and all the policy of Bishop of Ely Prelates shall never be able to preserve it from the peoples prophanation as we evidently see in the Church of Charles Dow of the Sabbath p. 56. Rome But Adversaries in this point are enforced to acknowledge as much as may be learned from their confessions That seeing God did require of those stiffnecked Jews burdened with the yoke of Ceremonies one day in seven to be employed in his service how can less suffice Christians who have obtained a greater measure of divine grace and who are freed from that yoke and burden Nor must we permit this Verè dico Fratres satis durum pro priè nimis impium est ut Christiani non habeant majorem reverentiam diei dominico quam Judaei observare videntur in Sabbâ—to Caesar Arelatensis consideration that the obligation of Christians to serve God and Christ upon his heavenly promises is greater then that of the Jews In the former times of shadows and darkness the Lords people observed a weekly Sabbath then surely we should be ungrateful and negligent of our own salvation if we should fall short of the same observation nay if we should not keep our Sabbath with greater exactness and more accurate devotion Golden talents call for quicker trading and greater priviledges summon us to a more strict obedience And indeed to come closer to our purpose what can lie upon the Jews as an argument for the sanctification of the Sabbath which doth not reach us Had they six dayes granted for their own affairs to labour and work in and is it not so with us are not we indulged with the same bounty have not we an equal latitude with them for the gain and acquest of these outward things And ours is the Lords day as well as theirs nay their weekly festival was called Sabbath from its manner of observation Exod. 20. 8. Rev. 1. 10. servation ours the Lords day from its Divine Author Gods example is as strong to move us as them our Father is our pattern and his preceding practice doth tie us as forcibly to imitation as it can do them Mat. 5. 48. The blessing of God depends upon our right observation of our Sabbath as well as it did upon their faithful discharge of Sabbath-duties and holiness obtains the birth right in Longius à â—â—ebus sacris remoâ—enda sunt quae castis labem integris probrum et sin ceris corruptelam afferunt Festivitates dominicus honorate non mundanè sed divinè non instar gentilium sed instar Christianorum Ephr â—yr both And therefore what can be suggested to oblige them which doth not engage us One of the Fathers passionately cryes out Shall the Jews be so strict on their Sabbath which only is in umbra in a shadow and a type of something to come which only did presigure Christs resting in the grave and shall not we â—e seâ—ious and solemn on our Sabbath which is so in veâ—tue in truth and shall endure to the end of the world Our Sabbath saith Chrysostom is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 An unmoveable law and therefore lays claim to a greater solemnization Ephrem Syrus cryes out Let us solemnize our Lords day as Christians and he thinks then he had said enough the Apostle telling us He that names the name of Christ must depart from iniquity But if we shall discuss this point more fully the Chriâ—tians 2 Tim 2. 19. incentives to Sabbath holiness will easily be found to have a sharper edge and a stronger byass then those of the Jews We have greater measures of knowledge The Jews lived under Star light but the Sun of Righteousness arose on our Mal 4. 2. Exod. 34. 35. Col. 2. 17. Mat. 27. 51. Sabbath day Moses his face had a vail upon it 2 Cor. 3. 13. Their pedagogy was enveloped in many types and shadows ceremonies which cast it into a twilight but when our Saviour dyed not only the veil of the Temple but of the Judaeis vetus Testamentum est velamine obductum ut non videant internam ejus lucem Novo Testamento Christus hoc velamen abstâ—lit tanquâ—m à lege Novâ Alap type was rent Now here our Saviours rule takes place To whom much is given of them much shall he required Luke 12. 48. And the Apostle saith 2 Cor. 3. 14. But the minds of the Jews are blinded for until this day remaineth the same veil untaken away in reading the old Testament which veil is done away in Christ Our knowledge then is far greater then theirs our ministration of the spirit is more glorious 2 Cor. 3. 8 9. Now much knowledge as it doth amplifie guilt so it doth engage duty as it is a greater weight to sin so it is a sharper spur to service the light of knowledge most properly guides us in the way of holiness And shall we who live under the light of the most glorious Gospel be out-done Illuminatio Evangelii est sublustre quiddam et praegustus clâ—rae lucis et 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 etiam gloriae divinae quae revelabitur in caelis Theoph. in Sabbath-holiness by them who had but our dawnings who only fed upon the crumbs of the bread of life We see Christ with open face they only through the Prospective of a type or a ceremony by the light of a
and laid the foundation of a better world then this created universe this beautiful artifice of Divine Power Again in the Creation there was nothing to withstand but in the work of Redemption there was Justice against Mercy Wrath against Pity In the Creation God brought something 2 Cor. 5. 21. out of nothing but in the work of Redemption God Gal. 3. 13. brought one contrary out of another Good out of Evil Life out of Death an immortal Crown out of a shameful Cross Indeed the great discoveries of Wisdom Grace Power Justice Mercy were all seen in the glorious work of mans Redemption The Heavens are the work of Gods fingers Psal 8. 3. But Redemption is the work of his Arm Isa 53. 1. Isa 52. 9 10. So that if it shall be demanded wherein doth the work of Redemption excell the work of Creation it may be answered as the Apostle in another case much every Rom. 3. 2. way Once more let us put these two works in the scale and we shall find the work of Redemption to weigh down the work of Creation as Gold of all metals is the weightiest In Eph. 2. 4. John 3. 16. 1 Joh. 4. 9 10. Gal. 4. 4. Phil. 2. 6 7. the creation Adam was Head but in the work of Redemption Christ was the Head by the creation we have a temporal life by the work of Redemption we obtain eternal life In the creation Adam was espoused to Eve but in the redemption the poor soul is espoused to Jesus Christ By creation Non solùm de me sed de omni quoque quod factum est Scriptum est dixit et facta sunt At verò qui me tantùm et semet fecit in restituendo et dixit multa mira gessit et pertulit dura nec tantùm dura sed etiam et indigna Bern. de diligendo deo man enjoyed an earthly Paradise but by redemption we enjoy an heavenly Kingdom In the creation Gods wisdom and power was principally seen but in the work of redemption All his glorious attributes were seen in their greatest splendour In the creation man was produced out of nothing but by the work of redemption he is produced out of worse then nothing a state of enmity and opposition Rom. 8. 7. Thus the glory of the work of redemption shines with a brighter ray and glitters with a stronger beam then the work of creation And shall not this most glorious work of which our Sabbath is the weekly memorial enforce us to a more devout observation Let us consider we equally enjoy the benefit of the creation with the Jews but they nothing at all of the benefit of the redemption with us They are Strangers to the Covenant of grace and the common-weal of the true Israel Eph. 2. 12. Let us then see the beauties of free-grace in the glass of our redemption and let this put new life into us to walk closely with God upon his own day when we are remiss in the duties let us reflect upon the occasion of the day and let us remember that the conquering of Death the chaining of Satan the subduing of Sin the quenching of Divine Wrath the perfuming of the Grave these several branches made up that blessed work which calls upon us for the keeping holy of the Lords day And again if the Jews have observed their Sabbath strictly Christ came not to licentiate us and to enlarge our carnal and sensual liberty Christs people are a willing but Psal 11â— â—â— 2 Tit. 14. not a wanton people The Son hath made us free and so we are free indeed as Christ himself speaks John 8. 36. But this freedom is from burdens not from duties a freedom it is to Debitâ 〈◊〉 â—â—minicae obseâ—vatione 〈◊〉 minuitur quicquam Christiana libertas Non enim est libertas sed licentia Christina ut nos liberaâ—i putemus ab observatione illius praecepti è Decalogo Et experientia docet licentiam et rerum sacrarum non curantiam magis magisque invalescere ubi diei domâ—nicae ratio non habetur run the wayes of Gods commandments Psal 119. 24. That can be no christian freedom to indulge our ease to flatter our sense to please the flesh to pursue our sports to gratifie our fancy with dalliance and delight upon Gods holy day this kind of liberty Christ never died to purchase Christian liberty is quite another thing it is a liberty from ceremonial yokes and legal impositions Gal. 5. 1 2 A liberty of access to God to cry Abba Father Rom. 8. 15. Gal. 4. 6. A freedom it is from sins vassalage from Satans slavery from the worlds drudgery and lusts dominion and tyranny Christ did not die to make us free to sin but free from sin Tit. 2. 14. It is a harsh and injurious interpretation of Christs coming to suppose he came to make the broad way broader then before that before Christ came the people of God were tied to a strict observation of the Sabbath but since we have a latitude and liberty for sports and delights for ease and recreation on that blessed day and that now we are not so pinnion'd and shackl'd as in the times of the law This must needs be some loose construction of a carnal Gospeller who Ames is become Antinomian in the fourth Commandment Christian freedom is a dilatation and enlargedness of bea rt in holy Isa 61. 1. services when the soul can freely vent it self without contractedness Luke 4. 18. and drawing their praying breath with difficulty Gal. 5. 1 13. Sensualliberty is a priviledge which better becomes the Disciples James 1. 25. of Bacchus or Epicurus and well suits with a feast of Priapus Ruffinus pleads hard in his prescriptions for Sabbath-observation That we do not spend it carnally and in delights this is to act the Jew not the Christian And Die Sabbati nihil exomnibus mundi octibus oportet operari si ergo desiâ—â—â— ab omnibus socularibus nihil mundanum geras sed spiritualibus operibus vaces lectionibus divinis tractatibus aurem praebeas ut non respicias ad praesentia visibilia sed ad invisibilia futura haec est observatio sabbati christiani Origen in a passionate heat cryes out Let us lay aside the Jewish mode of keeping Sabbaths and let us observe them as Christians discarding all worldly acts and secular employments let us be conversant in spiritual works in reading the Scriptures in hearing the word not eying things present and visible but looking forward to things to come and invisible and this is the observation of a Sabbath which will become a Christian The Fathers of the primitive times could not bear with any carnal liberty on the Lords day well knowing how contrary it was to the mind of Christ Nor can it be supposed that it was any part of Christs purchase to procure us a freedom to handle a Bowl or
they gathered it six dayes together and ceased the seventh day being the Sabbath day without controversie it began to fall on the first day which is the Lords day and still upon our Lords day the Lord rains Manna upon his people the true Manna did not cease in the wilderness but is still showred down upon the due observers of Gods holy day Divine blessings more sweet more pleasant then Israels Manna or bread resembling wafers or Corianders seed shall enrich and refresh the devout soul on Gods holy day Exod. 16. 31. Arg. 10 No command is punished with more severity then that of the Sabbath when it is broken and disobeyed Sabbath prophanation is a sin which will be beaten with many stripes For the better discovery of this great truth we shall follow it by degrees God eyes Sabbath-prophaneness most exactly If it be but the carrying of a burden Jer. 17. 27. God takes notice of it and it sets all in a flame There are two things God is most Sabbata Dei sunt ejus delitiae sunt ejus faelicitas et illa in dei contemplatione consistunt quibus à seculi curis et laboribus vacantes divina opera et judicia contemplemur Alap jealous of 1. Of his truth 2. Of his day God will see little spots on his own day Little flaws are seen in a jewel every one takes notice of spots in the Moon which is a bright and glorious luminary the finer the cloth is the more damageable the rent is which is in it Gods Sabbath is one of his most precious things it is not said Jer. 17. 27. If any commit a gross sin upon my Sabbath But if any bear a burden Secular works are sinful works on Gods holy day every toil is a trespass and to bear a burden upon the back is to draw guilt upon the soul God threatens Sabbath-prophanness most sharply The threats of God are the drawing of his bow they are the sharpning of his sword and the fitting it for execution they Ter poenam capitalem infligendum deus exprimit vilatoribus Sabbati quam poenam certum est immò de temporali morte et supplicio infligendum transgredienti esse intelligendum quod etiam ex praxi constat 15. Num. 32. Et haec quidam 〈◊〉 infligebatur ad exemplum Obstinatis etiam aeternam mortein fuisse denunciatam non inficias imus Rivet are his warning-pieces which he shoots off to affright secure sinners they are his frowns which are the evidences of his wrath and indignation Now God surely threatens the violations of his Sabbath he threatens them not with a light affliction but with death it self Exod. 31. 14 15. The soul which shall prophane the Sabbath shall die the death nay this sin shall not only destroy the Citizen but the City too Jer. 17. 27. set the gates on fire where the safety of the City lay No Portcullis can secure that City where the Sabbath is prophaned nay God threatens Sabbath-prophanation with his consuming fury Ezek. 20. 13 21. which can lay waste all which lies before it every thing is stubble to Gods wrath no gate so strong to resist it no Person so potent to withstand it Divine fury can as easily rase as Divine Power can create a world And this fury God will poure out on those who prophane his day God complains of Sabbath-prophanation most bitterly When God was drawing up his Endictments against the people of Israel now going into captivity one of his chiof charges was Sabbath-pollution they defiled his day which he would have kept spotless and this did accent his complaints and put an Emphasis upon his grievous expostulations Sabbata domini profanant homines tùm eorum prophanationem vident non corripiunt sed oâ—ulos suos avertunt et conniventes dissimulant item cùm ea non piè observant They despise my statutes saith God Ezek. 20. 24. How doth this appear Why saith God They pollute my Sabbaths as if the contempt of Religion was wrapt up in Sabbath-prophanation And in another place Ezek. 22. 8. They despise my holy things saith God but what is the evidence of it why saith the Lord they prophane my Sabbaths this goes to the heart of God and nothing more provokes his spirit Nay which is observable God calls the prophaning of his Sabbath the prophaning of himself Ezek. 22. 26. so the text They have hid their eyes from my Sabbaths I am prophaned among them To pollute Gods day is to cast Coinquinabar Ezek. 22. 26. i. e. profanè tractabar abâ—iiâ— dirt in the very face of God himself and when men make light of the Sabbath they lose the reverence they should bear to the sacred Majesty of God Sabbath-prophanation huddles all in confusion as God complains Ezek. 22. 26. and makes men Atheists so as to have no regard of the incomprehensible and tremendous Jehovah who as the Apostle saith Heb. 12. 29. is a consuming fire And so God bitterly complains Polluitur Sabbatum cùm cujus gratiâ instituitur à plerisque non curatur Muscul Ezek. 23. 38. Moreover this they have done unto me they have defiled my sanctuary in the same day and have prophaned my Sabbaths What is done to Gods day he takes it as done to himselfe When his day is polluted and when his Saints are persecuted this is drawing against God himself Acts 9. 4 5. In a word the prophaning of Gods Sabbath makes him first poure out his complaint and then poure out his fury the smothering of his complaint quickly breaks out into the flame of his indignation God punisheth Sabbath-prophanation most severely We have already discovered the sharpness of Gods eye in the discerning the frowns of Gods brow in the threatning the totus dies dominicus ex toto animo quantum ferat humana necessiâ—as et imbeâ—illitas ritè et piè servandus est etenim ejus prophanationi et pollutioni maledictionem comminatur Deus Exod. 31. 14. Lev. 26. 2 14. Jer. 17. 27. et poenis gravissimis morte ulciscitur utpote cujus contemptus est totius legis dei et divini cultus repudiatio Leid Prof. complaints of Gods mouth in his complaining against and now we come to take notice of the strokes of Gods hand in the revenging of the violations of his blessed Sabbath The Histories of all ages do afford many dreadfull examples of Vengeance executed upon those who have prophaned this day The Reverend Mr. Walker tells us That he could relate more then thirty examples of Gods heavy vengeance upon Sabbath-breakers within the space of two years some of which were struck with suddain death by Gods immediate hand others devoured in the waters some cut off by surfets which they got by dancing and drinking on the Lords day some fired out of their houses in the midst of their quaffing and jollity and all their goods and substance consumed And these Judgements have befallen them in the
against Gods sacred Sabbath shall be condemned of the Almighty and they who regarded not the Lords Day shall not be regarded in the day of the Lord nor of the Lord of this day but shall be enforced to undergo unavoidable and intollerable calamity O how sweet would Mark 2. 28. one Sabbath of Rest be from Hell torments in ten thousand years But this drop of water shall not be granted to the Luke 16. 24. miscarrying sinner This day indeed draws near when all Hieron Epist de scient legis Tom. 4. men must appear bofore the judgement-seat of Christ 2 Cor. 5. 10. and then answer for not attending on Gods holy day O what shall we do saith Hierome In that day when the Lord shall come with trumpet sounding fire flaming sinners fainting stars falling mountanes melting poor creatures crying to graves Christus Judex appropinquat ut veniat ad judicium ut suorum gaudium compleat et inimicorum injurias vindicet et puniat Ansel to hold them to hills to hide them Let none then who abuse the Lords day suppose this day is afar off for behold saith the Apostle The Lord comes with ten thousands of his holy ones to execute judgement Jude vers 14 15. And the coming of the Lord draws near saith another Apostle James 5. 8. Nay The day of the Lord is at hand said a third Apostle Phil. 4. 5. Let all therefore who trifle away Gods blessed Sabbath fear and tremble and not like wanton Israelites Amos 6. 3. put far from them the evil day Rivet pronounces Obstinatis autem in Sabbata peccatoribus aeternum mortem suisse denunciatam non inficias imus Rivet peremptorily That to obstinate offendours on Gods holy day eternal death and damnation is denounced Shortly there comes a day when reckning must be made for all our sleepy duties cold affections dead hearts sensual meales open prophaneness and secret hypocrisie for all our wasts of time and pleasing the flesh on Gods most blessed day I might add that all our formal services on that day shall be weighed in the ballance and with Belshazzar will be found too light And then if Repentance and Faith in Christ hath not crossed the debt we shall be discharging it in terrours and torments to all Everlasting CHAP. XLIX Gods Tremendous Judgments executed upon those who have prophaned and violated his holy Day WE have already seen by Scripture light frowns in the face of God wrath in the heart of God flaming in the eye of God and a Sword in the hand of God against those who dare pollute his holy Sabbath Let us now trace the methods of Providence and still more wrath and vengeance breaks out against the same Offendors and indeed a little to preface what is subsequent The sin of prophaning of Gods day is no sin of surprisal but it is a deliberative offence a sin carried on with consultation Sometimes an Oath is sworn unadvisedly as that of Herod to Herodias her Daughter Mark 6. 26. which cost John the Baptist his life an act of intemperance is hatched by the warmth of a temptation he is brutified when reason on a sudden hath left its habitation Nay sometimes one wounds another and it is only a lightning of passion as high Feavers soon run into a distraction But now the violation of the Sabbath is a premeditated act and is the leisurely effect of a corrupt heart it is a sin accompanied with time to consider and with an enlightned mind to understand it Recreations upon a Sabbath they are no vain surprisal but studied wickedness sleeping at Ordinances is a giving way to the flesh Riots and Surfeits on the Lords day they are designed Exod. 20. 8 9. debauchery nothing but a striking hands with Hell in cold blood we consult with our ease when we trifle away the Sabbaths we neglect not Ordinances on the Lords day and court our Bed or our Belly instead of the Sanctuary without Ezek. 22. 26. advice and debate with our selves nor can the fantastick piece of pride spend hours on Gods holy day with the Glass Deut. 5. 12. and the Dressing-box nay and it may be the Box of Patches and the Perfuming-pot without concluding before hand they will appear to the worlds eye in the most flattering dress Sabbath-prophanation is a sin of knowledge and deliberation which puts it into a scarlet dye surely it must needs be a great sin to forget that which God bids us remember Exod. 20. 8. to prophane that which God biddeth us to keep holy to labour on that day when God bids us to rest and to unhallow that day which God hath blessed what is this but to throw down the Gantlet and to challenge God himself Isa 51. 6. God indeed hath punished this sin with the most stupendous revenges I shall marshal his dreadful executions into their several ranks whereby we observing the many examples 1 Sam. 3. 11. of divine fury and indignation we may carefully take the alarm and so avoid the stroke for God usually strikes Deut. 32. 42. one to awaken and warn another and hearing these thunders we may fly that guilt which is pursued with such Rom. 12. 19. Hue and Cries of divine displeasure and may write upon our hearts not our phylacteries that dreadful position of the Apostle Heb. 10. 31. It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God Sometimes God hath punished the prophanation of his Sabbath with consuming the goods of the Offendor One who carried Corn into his Barn upon the Lords day had it all consumed with fire from heaven together with his house A Miller likewise who lived at Wotton was going forth to a Wake upon the Lords day and coming home at Levit. 10. 2. Night found his house his Mill and all that he had burnt down to the ground Thus the fire of Gods wrath hath over-taken Heb. 12. 29. this sin and great transgression To add one Example more In the year 1635 a Miller at Churchdown near Glocester would needs make a Whitson Ale notwithstanding the private and publick admonitions of the Minister and all christian friends so great provision was made and Musick was set out as the Minister and people were going to Church in the Afternoon and when Sermon was done the Drum beat up the Musick played and the people fell on dancing until the Evening at which time they all resorted to the Mill But oh the Justice of God! before they had supped at nine of the Clock a sudden fire seized upon the house which was so furious that it burned down his house and Mill and the most of all his other provisions and housholdstuff â—nd most just it is that if we commit Sacriledge and 〈…〉 the time of his day he should act severely and dispoy◠〈…〉 fruits of our labour sinners make waste of his glory and most righteous it is God should make waste of their
and it had ears and chaps like the forementioned beast This monstrous sin is most justly punished with a monstrous birth to make good that of holy Job John 4. 8. Job 4. 8. Even as I have seen they who plough iniquity and sow wickedness reap the same God sometimes punisheth the prophaning of his day in the posterity of the offendor as may be seen in the ensuing stories On the Sabbath in the afternoon at Twickenham in Middlesex the people being much given to May-games they May the 14. 1626. assembled to take down the May-pole and as they were taking it down one of the Church-Wardens wives was with her young child in her arms within her own gate looking upon them But whilst she was looking on one of the greatest ropes failed and broke and the pole fell down upon the pale that parted the gate and the street and the upper end of the pole with the fall lapped over and struck the child on the head in it mothers arms and killed it Thus little children who knew not the sin yet must die for it Let this story be annexed A vain and wanton maid hired on the Lords day a fellow to go to the next town to fetch thence a minstrel that she and others might dance and be merry but she committing lewdness that night with one of her companions proved with child And at the time of its birth she murthers it and so was hanged for the murther confessing and mournfully acknowledging at the time of her death That the occasion of her great misery was her prophanation of the Lords day Thus this crimson sin oâ— Sabbath-breaking can cut off root and branch and pursue with ruine and shame the actors of it and all those who are entangled in it God overtakes those who prophane his blessed day oftentimes with sudden death and shoots no warning-piâ—ces to summon them to prepare for their departure out of this world to his own dâ—eadful and tremendous Tribunal as may be seen in these following stories A Tailor of Buntingford being a nimble and active man dwelling at the upper end of the town in a bravado would go to the other end to buy some meat before morning prayer but coming home with both his hands full in the midst of the street he fell down stark dead Dr. Teate was an eye-witness of his fall and burial Oh what swift destruction pursues this cursed sin A townsman of Watford going to gather Cherries on the Lords day fell from the tree and in the fall was battered and bruised insomuch that he never spake more but lay groaning in his bloud till the next day and then he dyed A company of prophane young men near Salisbury upon the Lords day in the morning went to Claringdon Park to cut down a May-pole and having loaden a Cart with the tree and themselves with the bitter fruits of sin they are severely punished by the hand of God for entring into the Mr. Clarks examples City of Salisbury through a place called Milners Barnes unawars the Cart turns and struck one of the Sabbath-breakers such a mortal blow that his brains flew out and there dyed on the place This story was attested by divers godly persons living in the City of Salisbury to a Reverend Minister who made enquiry about it One at Ham nigh Kingelone going on the Lords day to visit his grounds where finding some cattel grazing which were not his own and running to drive them out he fell down and dyed suddenly upon the place Thus Gods angry eye is seconded by his revenging hand he sees and strikes together and they who will not keep a day shall not live an hour God punisheth the prophanation of his Sabbath with painful and tormenting death as may be exemplified in these stories At Tidworth on the Lords day many were met in the Church-yard to play at foot-ball where one of this wicked company had his leg broken which by a secret judgement of the Lord so festered that it turned into a gangrene in despight of all means used and so in pain and terror he gave up the Ghost and dyed For the sin of Sabbath-breaking God embitters his very executions and the offendor must not only die but he must die upon the rack One gathering fruit on the Lords day fell from the tree and was so hurt That he lay in anguish and dreadful dolour all the week till Sabbath day and then he ended his miserable life Thus God puts Gall and Wormwood into the Cup of those who prophane his blessed day God sometimes stops those who prophane his Sabbath in their carier and proceeds of sin as is seen in this following story One Mr. Ameredith a Gentleman of Devonshire being recovered from a pain he had in his feet one of his friends said he was glad to see him so nimble the Gentleman replies he hoped he should not be frustrated of his expectation in dancing about the May-pole the next Sunday But behold the justice of God in his just punishments of such vain and sinful resolutions for the Lord presently smote him with such feebleness and faintness of heart ere he stirred from the place where he was and likewise with such a great and unusal dizziness in the head that he was forced to be led home and from thence to his last home before the Lords day shone upon him Thus the very intentions of acting this sin were dreadfully and strangely punished God punished this sin in the Embryo of it while it lay onely in the Womb of a resolution God punishes the most inconsiderable breaches of his holy day as may be observed in the ensuing story Two Brethren on the Lords day in the Forenoon came to an Uncle they had to dine with him they living in a Market-Town not far off after Dinner they took horse again but had not gone far but one of the horses fell down dead and these Brethren going back again to their Uncles house put the other horse into the Stable and within an hour or two that horse likewise died in the place Thus the insensible beast shall bear the burden of mans sin and Sabbath-prophanation Rom 8 22. shall be branded upon the bruit creatures We have known saith Ludovicus Pius the German Emperour Didicimus quesdam in hoc die opera ruralia exercentes fuâ—mine interemptos quosdam artuum contractione multatos quosdam visibili igne obsumptos subâ—to in cinerem resolutos oâ—cubuisse Proinde necesse est c. Lud. P. in one of his Declarations Some busied in works of husbandry on the Lords-day to have been slain with lightning some punished with contraction of Limbs some consumed with visible fire and on a sudden turned into ashes and so to have perished in a judicial way wherefore it is a necessary duty that in the first place Priests then Kings Princes and all faithful persons do most devoutly exhibit due observation and reverence unto this day We may
the strong Trace a Sabbath-work and is it any thing else but gaining knowledge treasuring up truth wrestling with God for pardon grace and assurance visiting our Beloved and driving the great Bargain of Eternity And for which of these good works must the Sabbath be prophaned John 10. 33 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or thrown away If Philosophers say of Vertue It is its own reward is it not much more true of holy worship spiritual communion converse with Heaven and those pleasing delights which are the sweet employment of a Sabbath Therefore 1 John 1. 3. to pollute this day or to trifle it away what is it but to Numb 14. 8. bring an evil report on Canaan a Land flowing with milk and honey Argum. 6 And it would be seriously considered Sabbaths are upon the wing and they will not long continue to us We cannot say of richest Sabbaths as once Christ said of poor persons the Sabbaths ye have always with you Mat. 26. 11. The Lords day is a triumphant but a transient mercy Now we enjoy these blessed Sabbaths and holy Ordinances we know not how soon the Songs of Zion may be turned into howling Lam. 1. 4 16. And Ichaâ—od may be written upon our weekly jubilies We know not how soon Gods wrath or John 12. 35. our own death may hide thâ—se things which belong to our Levit. 26. 43. peace from our eyes O then let us improve our Sabbaths Luc. 19. 42. our sweet seasons our Summer-time our divine Harvest for Prov. 6. 6 7. if we do not gather grace on this day what shall we have Jer. 8. 7. to lay out on the week-day Or what shall we have to spend Prov. 10. 5. on a death-bâ—d when we are stepping into another World Psal 32. 6. We know the Water-man must observe his wind and tyde Suus cuique constitutus est dies certum tempus quo operari possit quo elapso nihil amplius praestare queat Chemnit and when they serve then he throws off his Doublet and bestirs himself left he should fall short of his Creek or Haven It concerns us to mind Sabbaths and to sanctifie them to the Lord then the gases of the Spirit blow fair then the waters of the Sanctuary run right for the Port to which we are bound but if these heavenly Opportunities slide away without our serious improvement we must with Esau Psal 115. 17. seek the Blessing carefully with tears but it shall not accrue Heb. 12. 17. unto us The Musician plays his Lesson while the Instrument is in tune let us ripen in grace while the Sabbath shines and Sabbath showers continue Our Saviour bids us work while it is day John 9. 4. Surely this principally points at the Sabbath-day which is the Souls day It is but a few Sabbaths more nay it may be not one more and we shall go down to our silent Graves Our life is uncertain not a Sun but a Vapour Jam. 4. 14. and can our Sabbaths be sure and steddy Our Sabbaths are our Tyde for Heaven and when the Tyde is past there is no rowing to the Port. When the Traveller observes the Sun is declining and draws towards setting then he spurs up his Beast and speeds his pace lest the Night over-take him Our Sabbaths are setting and the Gospel-Sun is low is speeding to a disappearance Let us then keep holy these days and carefully make the best advantage of them let us neither stain their beauty by our prophaneness nor detract from their bounty by our neglect and formality lest the shadows of death over-take us and then who shall remember God or work for Psal 115. 17. his Soul in the Pit or the Grave where we shall be lodged and awake no more till the Resurrection Arg. 7 But though the Lords day be fleet and swift as to us yet it is permanent in its self and in its duration calls for our devotion We admire not a Candle so much as we do the Sun Gen. 2. 3. and one reason is because the Candle wastes but the Sun endures The light of our Sabbath is not a transient blaze but a constant light which will continue till the consummation of all things and God hath folded up all things in change or dissolution Now Permanency is a character of excellency Gold is only refined in the same fire where dress is consumed The Priesthood of Melchisedech was more excellent Melchisedec 400 annis sacerdotium Aaroniâ—uâ— antecâ—ssit et ejus sacerdotium Christi sacerdotium repraeseâ—tat quod usque ad finem mundi duraturum est Alap than that of Aaron because it continued for ever Heb. 7. 17. So the Sabbath of Christians is more excellent than the Sabbath of the Jews because that found a grave but this shall find none To our Sabbath it may be said in comparison with all the Jews Sabbaths They shall perish but thou remainest they shall all wax old as doth a Garment as a Vesture shalt thou rowl them up and they shall be changed but thou art the same and thy years shall not fail To our Sabbath all the Powers of Earth and Hâ—ll shall never put a period it is a durable and therefore an honourable Ordinance And shall God honour it and shall we deface it Shall he promote it and shall we prophane it Shall he make it a lasting Ordinance and set it up as a Marble Pillar in the Church and shall we write froth and vanity upon it as if it was a Tomb-stone Our Sabbath is no flying Ceremony or transient Rite which hath the worm of Judaism at the root of it which will eat it out in time but it is a stable institution which God will have sanctified with all exactness The Persians Laws Eâ—â—h 1. 19. were irrevocable and therefore the more venerable and the transgression of but one of them threw Daniel into the Lions Den Dan. 6. 8 12. So the Law of our Sabbath it is solemn and solid not subject to decay or of a perishing nature which earnestly presses the sanctification and amplifies exceedingly the pollution of it It is not so great 〈◊〉 to break a piece of glass as to break a piece of Gold 〈◊〉 â—â—â—eness is the blemish of every thing Leases the shorter 〈◊〉 are the more inconsiderable The life of nature is no wâ—y to be compared with thâ— life of grace not only in point of sweetness but duâ—ation Sin upon the Lords day is not like â—â—rase upon a picture which is a fading paint but like a flaw in a Jewel it is a more durable blemish and a more praejudicial debasement God hâ—th not only stamped his Name upon our Sabbath but something of his Nature there is a kind of eternity engraven upon it and therefore the violation of it Rev. 1. 10. by sin neglect or vanity must needs be a reduplicate impiety Arg. 8 Let us likewise take notice that this
are we in observation of other dayes If that storms of Providence drive us to a day of Humiliation we can with the Jews Zach. 7. 5. fast and mourn and reach Ahab in his deepest sorrows 1 Kings 21. 27. And if the smiles of Providence call us to a day of Purim Esth 9. 26. a festival of joy we can keep that day with spiritual rejoycing and gladness of heart Esth 9. 22. And we can delight our selves in the Lord. As Cambden reports of Queen Elizabeth when God delivered her and her Kingdom from the Caâ—bd Elizab. Spanish Armado her first work was to go to Pauls Church and there hear a Sermon of praise rejoycing greatly in the God of her and the Kingdomes salvation Now as one observes The Lords day is the proper feast of Christians our spiritual jubilee though moving in a swifter sphear and Mr. P. on the Romans shall dayes of the appointment of a state put us upon a more exact composure and find us more hearty in their observation then that special and blessed day which is the appointment of a God Or shall a passage of Providence the endurance of a loss or the gaining of a Victory or some other strok of Gods hand or smile of Gods face find us more serious 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Athanas more solemn more devout then the Resurrection of a Christ the new birth day of the world and the sole foundation of a Christians happiness Shall the deliverance from a Spanish Armado fill us with more spiritual delight in God then the deliverance from Heli and Destruction Had not Christ broke the chains of death we had everlastingly been kept in chains of darkness Our Lords day then glories in a more excellent occasion and why should it not be celebrated with a more serious Cotenae tenebrarum sunt 1 Conscientiae reatus 2. Aeternum puniendi decretum 3. Miserrima reproborum desperatio devotion One well observes That the Jews thought reverently of and acted zealously on their solemn though ceremonial festivals those bright appearances which were chased away by the rising of the Sun of Righteousness therefore to use the Apostles words a little inverted seeing all those other dayes of observation are and shall be dissolved what manner of persons ought we to be in all holy conversation and godliness upon our unalterable Sabbath whose lease expires not till the 2 Pet. 3 11. death of the Vniverse CHAP. LII A third Decad of Arguments promoting the same design viz. a due sanctification of the Lords day THat every wind may fill our sails in pursuance of this great duty I shall now turn my Arguments to another point of the Compass Arg. 1 Let us take notice of the relation which God hath to the Sabbath In the time of the law the Sabbath was called the Sabbath of the Lord Lev. 23. 3. And verily my Sabbath shall ye keep Exod. 31. 13. And in the times of the Gospel our Christian Sabbath is called the Lords day Rev. 1. 10. Now this happy interest which God hath in the Sabbath from the beginning of the world to this day is a cogent Argument for Mat. 22. 21. our severer observation of it We will keep safely the treasure Maluit deus dicere sabbatum dei tui est quà m sabbatum tuum est Hoc dicens significat omnem ejus diei respectum ad nominis ipsius sanctificationem aâ— fidem esse dirigen dum Muscul of a friend and why not keep devoutly the Sabbath of a God If our Sabbath be the Lords day let us render to Christ the things which are Christs Gerard observes That the Sabbath is the Lords Sabbath to shew us the manner of our sanctification of it viz. In the works of God those works which are required and prescribed by God And Musculus adds very pertinently God would rather call it his Sabbath then ours to intimate to us that all the respect of that day must be directed to the hallowing of his Name and to the acting of faith and trust in him It is very observable how chary God is of his Sabbath he puts it into the heart of the Decalogue that none might come at it to affront it and he stamps his Name upon it that none should make it common Do ye think we can play with the Crown of a King or sport with the Scepter of a Prince Dominus ille cujus est Sabbatum est deus tuus ergò in honorem et cultum ipsius sabbatum sanctificabis Ger. Greater boldness it is to formalize away the Lords day and to waste that time which is his peculiar treasure Our wildness often roves up and down the common of the week but if we break into the inclosure of the Sabbath we shall certainly be found trespassers and hazzard an immortal soul We must take heed that we make bold only with what is our own and not with Gods day for that is no more lawfull for us than for every common Israelite to enter into the holy Hag. 2. 8. of holies There are two things God is very tender of Lev. 23. 3. 1. His people they are the Apple of his eye Jer. 2. 3. 2. His Sabbath which is the reserve of his time And as those who shall devour his people shall offend so those who shall prophane his day shall commit sacriledge a sin of the deepest tincture The consideration then that our Sabbath is the Lords day should compose our spirits should flush our services and sublimate our performances on that blessed day Argum. 2 Let us take notice of that tittle which God hath put upon the Sabbath It is an holy Sabbath to the Lord Exod. 16. Exod. 31. 15. 23. And here that answer to Peter Acts 10. 15. is very Qui luxu deliciantes voluptatibus se dedunt ad sanctificationem sabbati non sunt idonei quia diem sanctum domini suis commâ—â—ulant voluptatibus Hieron pertinent What God hath called clean we must not look upon as common They who prophane the Sabbath would pick out the image and superscription of it which is a fruitless and destructive attempt A stamp of holiness amplifies every defilement The spirit is a holy spirit and therefore it must not be grieved Eph. 4. 30. The law is a holy law Rom. 7. 12. and therefore must not be violated Jesus Christ is the Holy one of God Psal 16. 10. and therefore he must not be wounded and crucified afresh Heb. 6. 6. The Priests garments were holy Exod. 31. 10. and therefore not to be Sanctificatio dei est quâ dies septimus post sex dierum opera statim ab iâ—itio est deputatus consecratuâ— sanctificatio hominis est diem septimum à deo quietâ— confeâ—ratuâ— pro sancto nabere religionis exercitâ—â—â— ac fidei sedulò incumbere Muscul worn by another person The vessels of the Sanctuary were holy and therefore not to be employed
20. Luke 24. 41. The day of 2 Sam. 23. 5. Christs rising from the dead was a day of joy and gladness Ille est primus dies in quo deus tenebras ut materiam cum mutasset mundum effecit quòd in codem die Jesus Christus conservator noster è mortuis excitatus est Just Mart. Psal 118. 24. No day like this since the Creation then our surety was released the Covenant and sure mercies of David fully ratified and confirmed our hope wonderfully revived heaven and eternal life plenteously assured These thoughts of Christs Resurrection might quicken our hearts and make them sparkle with life and affection It may be we never took the crown of this day into our hands to feel the weight of it and that makes our services â—â— flat and our thoughts to speak in Nazianzens phrase so chained to the ground upon this seraphical day And therefore Clemens Romanus argues sharply and pathetically What shall excuse us with Die dominico qui est dies resurrectionis Templum adite quid enim excusare poterit apud deum qui eo die ad audiendum non convenit c. Clem. Rom. God if we fill not up this blessed day with bearing the word with holy prayer with reading the Scriptures with singing the praises of the Lord and other duties seeing God makes all things by Christ and sent him into the world to die for sinners and raised him again as on this day Innocentius calls Christs Resurrection day the first day of our joy the bright lustre of heavens shine And Ambrose saith The Lords day is a day â—f joyes in the plural number to shew the Variety and the Increase of them Joy is the Shibboleth of this day the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Spring-tide and the full Sea of this weekly Festival And Tertullian professeth That on this day we indulge our selves Plus gaudere debemus propter resurrectionem gloriosam quà m dolere propter passionem ignominiosam Bern. with holy joy The primitive Christians were wont when they saw one another to have this joyful salute The Lord is risen and the others ordinary answer was True the Lord is risen indeed we should not saith Bernard so much mourn at Christs igneminious passion as we should rejoyce at his glorious Resurrection And this day is not only sweetned with joyes but enriched with gain the death of Christ Haec est illa dies quae suâ magnitudine omnia beneficia obscurat Const Apost l. 7. c. 37. was the sowing of the Corn the raising of Christ was as the springing up of the Corn the benefits of Christs death are reaped in his Resurrection The death of Christ was as the casting of Joseph into the pit the selling him into Aegypt and putting him into prison But the raising of Christ was as the preferring of Joseph by which he comes into a capacity 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to save his Family and so enrich all his Relations Clemens Romanus tells us This day is such a day of love such a day of gain that the greatness of those benefits we receive by this day ecclipse and obscure the shew and appearance of all other benefits Athanasius calls the Resurrection day The beginning of the New Creation And another learned tells us That Christs Resurrection was a great and an excellent Miracle and therefore it gave life and name to the Lords day Indeed Mans all is folded up in the triumphant success of this day Let us a little hearken to the good News that Christs Resurrection brought to the world and these Cords of love should fasten us to Holy duties and becoming carriages on the Lords day The Resurrection of Christ was the compleating of his work Indeed many fair lines were drawn before in the great work Josephus iâ— tertium usque annum in 〈◊〉 deteâ—tus sâ—â—t posteà tamen libeâ—tus est Egypti constitutus est dominus Et salvator noster ad tertium usque diem detentus est in carcere sepulchri tum resurrexit sanctorum dominus dominus dominantium Ger. of Mans Redemption every tear which dropt from Christs eye every drop of bloody sweat which fell from his sacred body contributed to our salvation but when Christ rose again then he put the last hand to the beautiful frame of this glorious work And therefore he is said then to be perfected Luk. 13. 32. when Christ breath'd out his last he cried out consummatum est It is finished John 19. 30. But that had relation to his sufferings but when he rose again he was perfected in relation to his people he then became a perfect Redeemer Christ on his resurrection-day folded up his bottom and had nothing left to do but to ascend to his Father and to take his place at his right hand and to give him an account that the glorious work of mans Redemption was now fully finished Christs dying-day was the perfection of his love but his rising-day was the perfection of his work when he sprang from the Grave he threw off the cloths of his own mortality and of our sin Thus the Sun works through the Cloud and makes its own way till it is freed from that dark incumbrance and appears to the World in its sweetest brightness And so our Saviour after a short sleep in the tenacious dust awakes and comes as a Bridegroom out of his Chamber to speak a few words to his Psal 19. 5. Disciples and to take witness of his resurrection and so to go up to his Father ever to make intercession for us And shall Christ compleat his work upon his resurrection-day Heb. 7. 25. our Christian Sabbath and shall we be defective in ours Shall he be perfected on that day and shall we be polluted Surely when we trifle and sin away our Sabbath we never think that on that day Christ put his last hand to the blessed work of our Redemption This will condemn careless Christians when they are so short and Christ so full on his Resurrection-day our blessed Sabbath The Resurrection of Christ was the Conquest of his and our Enemies On this day the seed of the woman did bruise the Gen. 3. 15. Promeruit in cruce Christus sed posteà peregit Zanch. Serpents head and Christ did triumph in his own person over Sin Death and Satan Upon the account of which the Apostle cries Victory 1 Cor. 15. 54 55. On this day Christ spoiled principalities and powers and openly triumphed over them Col. 2. 15. Christ merited Victory by his passion Acts 10. 39 40. but he executed Victory by his rising from the Grave he died a Sufferer but he rose a Conquerour not onely Mat. 28. 18. arrayed with honour and immortality but richly invested Phil. 2. 9. with power and principality and then were the Keys of Eph. 4. 8 9. Death and Hell resigned up to him as the Trophies of his Revel 1. 18.