Selected quad for the lemma: hand_n
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A26832
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Vulgar errors in divinity removed
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Battell, Ralph, 1649-1713.
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1683
(1683)
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Wing B1150; ESTC R10796
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49,392
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154
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opinion Have they never read that when it was in force according to the Letter a man was stoned for gathering sticks on the Sabbath day But if the Equity only of that Law be in force at this day why are we accounted as Transgressors by them whilst we keep it according to the Moral Equity and the Precepts of the Church The truth is they are superstitious in the one and prophane in the other Can these men see that a Day may be holy because set apart for the service of God and can they not see that a Place likewise may be holy which is consecrated to his Worship Even the light of nature taught the Heathen if once a Thing was dedicated to God if it were a gift to devour that gift was Sacriledge and brought a Curse with it witness their Proverb concerning the Gold of Tholoss if it were a Place to prophane that place was sinful Procul hinc procul este prophani Conclamat vates and that they think so still I call the Morocco Embassadour to witness If it be said those times for Publick Worship are appointed by Gods immediate command as Moral and so are not publick places and in that respect we honour one more than the other I answer it is one thing to say it and another thing solidly to prove it for the set times appointed by God in the fourth Commandment were the seventh days from the Creation which on all hands is confest we keep not Again in what time soever the Church began to omit the last day of the Week and keep only the first that Week there was no seventh day Sabbath which could not lawfully have been done if one day of seven be moral and of perpetual Equity for what is Moral is unchangeable The truth is the fourth Commandment enjoyns us to set convenient times apart for Gods Service and that is a moral duty but our Lords Day is not appointed by that but by the Traditions of the Apostles and the Precepts of the Church Now we have not only the Precepts of the Church to esteem reverently of Gods House but the Precepts of the Apostles to do all things in Gods service decently and in order and when they did not St. Paul chides them thus What have you not houses to eat and drink in If any man hunger let him eat at home The dishonour that is done to God's House reflects upon God himself When Jehu destroyed Baal out of Israel they brake down the house of Baal and made it a draught-house And so it must needs tend to the dishonour of Almighty God when we dishonour the place dedicated to his publick Worship Learned Mr. Mead did believe the instinct of nature taught the very Heathen that the Worship was dignified by the peculiarness of the place and the Magnificence of the Temple appointed for it It is likewise a Vulgar Error that possesseth the minds of many that to hear Preaching is the chief end of coming to God's House whereas joyning together in Prayer is to be preferred before it that which carries the denomination of a house is certainly the chief thing that is to be done in that house Now Gods House is not called the house of Preaching in Scripture but the house of Prayer I confess Preaching is a great Ordinance yet Prayer is a greater how meanly soever it is esteemed by many If there were nothing but Preaching they would come but if nothing but Praying they will not come But blessed Hannah was not of their mind she never refused to come to the Temple when there were Prayers there Surely the Error in this point is very great and one main cause I conceive is this people are lazy in the duties of Christianity and will not strive to enter in at the streight Gate now to hear a Sermon puts them to no great labour Nay happily the novelty of the Matter the variety of the Phrase may deceive that little toil of sitting and listening to it But Prayer is a lifting up of the Soul to God and our Souls are naturally tending downwards so that we may find it a weighty matter to lift them up long together and we are quickly weary of that work A righteous mans Prayer doth not avail much unless it be fervent now fervency cannot be unless our Hearts pant after God as the Hart after the Rivers of waters And to bring our hearts to this will cost us some pain unless we sigh and groan and so Gods Spirit helps us to do unless we mourn and weep so David often unless we wrestle with God as Jacob who wept and made his supplications unto him which things since they are so no marvel though a carnal heart had rather come to Preaching than to Praying 't is a great deal the easier duty take heed the Devil don't perswade you 't is in a manner the only duty lest he keep you with a form of Godliness without the power of it all your days When Joseph brought his two Sons to Jacob to be bless'd he thought his Father had been mistaken in preferring Ephraim before Manasses and he went to remove his Fathers hands saying Not so my Father this is the Elder lay thy right hand upon his head but he answered and said I know it my Son I know it he shall be great but truly his Brother shall be greater While some people think we are mistaken in preferring Praying before Preaching they are mistaken themselves and we may answer them We know not what we affirm we know it Preaching shall be accounted a great Ecclesiastical Ordinance but truly Prayer shall be a greater And as Publick Prayer hath a more especial promise to be heard than Private so likewise Prayers put up in Gods House have a more peculiar promise than if put up elsewhere Exod. 20.24 In all places where I record my name I will come unto thee and will bless thee All Objections to the contrary are but like those made against the waters of Jordan by Naaman Are not Abana and Pharphar Rivers of Damascus better than all the waters of Israel may I not wash in them and be clean No the Promise is made to the waters of Jordan and not to those Now as the waters cleansed not the Leprosie by any Physical operation but by way of blessing so neither do our Prayers prevail for their worthiness but are heard for his Promise sake and his gracious goodness The Jews when they prayed at home were wont still to spread forth their hands towards the Temple 1 Kings 8.38 So Daniel his Windows being open towards Jerusalem he kneeled on his knees three times a day and prayed Dan. 6.10 Neither are people less mistaken concerning their Praises than concerning their Prayers in Gods House whilst they cry out of the Organ the Lute or the Harp as if it were sinfully ceremonious to sing Praises after that manner The Ceremonial Law was given by Moses but this was not given by Moses therefore
this unmerciful opinion are such as these First that of St. Paul in the ninth Chapter to the Romans ver 11. For the Children being not yet born neither having done good or evil that the purpose of God according to Election might stand not of works but of him that calleth it was said unto her the elder shall serve the younger as it is written Jacob have I loved but Esau have J hated You see say they before Jacob or Esau had done good or evil one was loved and the other hated My answer is First these words are not spoken of Jacob or Esaus persons but by a figure the person of either is put to represent and shadow out the condition of their Posterities Secondly the Election there mentioned is meant chiefly concerning things Temporal not things Eternal That that saying The elder shall serve the younger was not meant of their persons but of their Posterities may appear from Gen. 25.23 Two Nations are in thy Womb and two manner of People shall be separated from thy bowels and the one People shall be stronger than the other and the elder shall serve the younger Esau in his own person never served Jacob nay Jacob called Esau his Lord and bowed seven times to the ground before him Gen. 33.3 and was glad by a Present to obtain his peace of him If Esau had done so to Jacob how would they have triumphed in their personal sense Secondly that the love and hatred was meant chiefly concerning things temporal see Mal. 1.2 3. from whence the words were taken Was not Esau Jacobs Brother saith the Lord Yet I loved Jacob and I hated Esau and laid his Mountains and his Heritage waste for the Dragons of the Wilderness So that you plainly see the Apostle means not personal Election to eternal life or hatred to eternal death but of choosing Jacobs Posterity to be a greater Nation than the Off-spring of Esau meerly for his good pleasure which no man can justly speak against for he may do what he pleases with his own good blessings If it be said the temporal blessings on Jacob's Posterity did shadow out spiritual 't is not denied but they might and certainly to be brought so nigh unto God as to be his peculiar People in Covenant was a spiritual blessing and if all that were in Covenant were elected the Argument were of force but seeing they are not all Israel which were of Israel it falls to the ground The truth is the words are here used by the Apostle by way of Allegory and all that he accommodates them to is to shew that God might justly cast off the Jews the People of the elder Covenant of Works and take in the Gentiles those minors and youngers into the Covenant of grace in their rooms as may appear from Rom. 9.30 What shall we say then to these things That the Ghntiles which followed not after righteousness have attained to righteousness even the righteousness which is of faith But Israel which followed after the Law of righteousness hath not attained unto the Law of rightehusness Wherefore Because they sought it not by faith but as it were by the Works of the Law And this he makes the conclusion and is the chief if not the only thing he doth infer from the whole Allegory And what he says to Moses is most equal I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy that is it belongs to me to appoint upon what terms I will shew mercy and justifie men whether by the Law of Faith or by Works For as he that builds an Hospital hath an equitable right to appoint the qualifications of the persons that shall partake in his gift whether poor Children or Widows Aged persons or the like so it belongs to God to appoint upon what terms he will justifie men whether by the Law of Works or by the Law of Faith and seeing neither Works nor Faith can deserve it at his hands Justification is not of him that willeth nor of him that runneth but of God that sheweth mercy God hath reason enough for all his doings but in distributing mercies which have no foundation in merit he need give no account or reason of it but his Will And so likewise for his judgments upon Pharaoh here used as a Type of the obstinate Jews although God had reason enough to raise him up I suppose out of the former Plague to reserve him for a more famous overthrow because the Hebrew hath it I have made thee stand The Septuagint hath it for this cause 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Thou hast been preserved till now The Chaldee Paraphrase and Junius so likewise explain it And although God had reason enough to find fault with him for hardening of his heart though now judicially hardened and he could not help it yet the Apostle waves these Reasons and says Nay but O man who art thou that repliest against God As if he had said it is intolerable presumption to quarrel at the ways of God as unequal when they clearly appear to be his You ought rather with reverence to presume there is wisdom and righteousness in them though you through ignorance cannot comprehend them For as his power in forming man ought not to be found fault withal and none ought to say Why hast thou made me thus So neither his Justice which is as infinite as his Power and renders to men only according to their Works A second Scripture is this Hath not the Potter power over the Clay of the same lump to make one vessel to honour another to dishonour Ver. 21. Whence they infer God is the Potter we the Clay the Elect are the Vessels of honour the Reprobates the Vessels of wrath and dishonour and if God make a Vessel of wrath shall the thing framed say to him that framed it Why hast thou made me thus To this I answer We are indeed in Gods Hands as the Clay in the hand of the Potter and when he framed man of the dust of the earth he might have made him the tail and not the head of the Creation he might have moulded us Dogs or Swine or loathsom Serpents and in that sense Vessels of dishonour but to make us Vessels of wrath and in that sense Vessels of dishonour so the good God could not make us no more than he can lie or be cruel or deny himself The nature of God cannot come so nigh the nature of the Devil as to be a Murtherer from the beginning There can be no Vessel of wrath without sin Ephes 5.6 For these things sake having fore-mentioned many sins he saith the wrath of God comes upon the Children of disobedience But we cannot be sinful as we come out of his hands and therefore cannot come out of his hands Vessels of wrath he like the good tree cannot bring forth corrupt fruit Jer. 2.21 God doth avouch he never made a degenerate Plant Yet I had planted thee a noble Vine wholly a right seed The