for Non-subscription to the Book and Ceremonies and to prosecute divers private Christians for Non-observation or else their opposition to the Ceremonies therein contained Insomuch that many like the children of faithfull Abraham forsook their owne country and fathers house and went into a strange Land viz. into America to the end they might have their consciences freed from these yoaks and burdens as they thought intolerable Besides in divers places the Ministers were forbidden to exercise their own gift of Prayer and others did voluntarily suffer parts and gifts to dry up for want of using because they had this book at hand in all their administrations Further it was observed many of the people did so idolize it that they judged no other way of worshipping God like it or to be allowed by men and accepted by God but that To prevent these or such like mischiefs and inconveniencies for the future as also it may be for that some judged it not necessary if tolerable that all men should be bound to use Crutches because some could not well goe without them and also that they might bring the Churches of England Scotland and Ireland to the neerest conjunction and uniformity in Religion particularly in a Directory for worship catechizing according to their Covenant newly entred into with the Kingdome of Scotland lately set all on a flame with a Service-book which in some things was more though in others lesse liable to exception than the English Liturgy sent thither from hence by the Archbishop of Canterbury I say for these or the like reasons the Assembly advised and the Parliament which the King had confirmed by Act thought good by an Ordinance to lay aside wholly the Common-prayer-book judging it as lawful to doe it as was for Hezekiah to break in pieces the Brazen Serpent made by Moses when once abused to Idolatry The Parliament having thus removed the Booke by an Ordinance or two who were we that we should resist God and them and hazard our own and the Kingdomes and Churches peace to maintain a Form when as without charity all Prayers whether with or without a Form or Book are lost If it shall be further objected that the Service-book was setled by an Act and removed or abolished by an Ordinance To this all I think good to answer here at present is this That I have heard that an Ordinance of Parliament was of validity to suspend an Act And that that Ordinance of Parliament hath not been as yet suspended nor the Act for the Liturgy hitherto revived by any other Act. Let this suffice to justifie our non-using of the English Liturgy III. I come now to my last Observation that is to justifie our continued use of the Lords Prayer And here let me minde you that the same reverend godly and learned Assembly which judged it expedient to take away the Common-prayer did yet recommend the Lords prayer to be used in the prayers of the Church because it is take their owne words in the Directory Not onely a pattern of Prayer but it selfe a most comprehensive Prayer As the same measure may be a standard to frame and try other measures by and may besides be used to measure withall So may this Prayer of our Lord be used both as a Pattern of prayer to frame our prayers by as a Standard to examine them by and as a Prayer it selfe also And truly if our Saviour had meant this Prayer onely for a pattern and that it should be unlawful to uss it as a Prayer I believe him so plain and so good a speaker for never man spake like him and in his mouth was found no guile that he would never have answered such a request Lord teach us to pray as John also taught his Disciples in such expresse language When ye pray say Our Father c. without some caution limitation or restriction to prevent mistakes For had it been possible that when our Lord said When ye pray say Our Father c. that his sense and meaning should be when ye pray ye must not say Our Father c. ye must not say these words at any time or in any case but onely pray alwaies after this patterne we may suppose the holy Ghost would have added some explanation or interpretation as in other cases viz. John 7.38 39. and John 2.20 21. the rather considering there is no room here as in other places for a figurative sense and that it is the office of the holy Ghost to lead us into all truth and so to preserve us from error and that the words are so plaine a forme of Prayer and so plain for the using of them so that plainer needed not upon supposition that it was the minde of Christ that these words should be used as a Prayer Let us reason the matter a little what can be said against using this Prayer of Christ now which might not have been objected or pretended by Aaron and his Sons for their not using the forme of blessing prescribed of old Numb 6.23 24. Yea how shall we now justifie our practice of blessing or praying for a blessing in the words of the Apostle Paul in the close of our Sermons if it be utterly unlawfull to pray unto God in the words of our Lord Jesus in the beginning of our Sermons What is the Disciple come to be above his Master and the Servant above his Lord Again how can we think that God that hears our prayers who have not the Spirit in such a measure as the Apostles had should not regard his Sons prayer should therefore not heare his childrens prayers because presented unto him in his owne and onely Son's words Yea will God the Father heare our prayers indited by the holy Spirit not hear us when we pray that which his Son made put in our hands hearts And did not the same holy Spirit that indited our prayers indite the prayer of Christ too and do not we who have the Spirit by measure receive of Christs fulnesse as all other graces so also the spirit of Grace and Supplication I dare say that the holy Ghost is not therefore out of love out of conceit with his own conceptions because they are not new Must all our prayers necessarily be put up in our Saviours name if they finde acceptance if they be heard and answered and must they in no wise at no time in any case be sent up in his owne words or will Jesus Christ the great Favourite and Master of Requests in heaven refuse to present our Petitions because of his own drawing or inditing Must we alway when we pray pray after this manner and must we never when we pray say Our Father c If one be Scripture is not the other also yea doubtlesse both and in both we have the minde of Christ for he that said that said this also Must we alway keep to Christs sense and meaning and yet never use his words but our
according to the Directory So here it doth not follow that we may not use the words of either of the Evangelists but on the contrary that we may indifferently use the words of either and so may pray either in the form of words recorded by the Evangelist Matthew or else according to this form in the text We think it not unlawfull but expedient in the celebration of the Lords Supper to retain the words of some of the Evangelists or of the Apostle Paul 1 Cor. 11. upon that occasion And so I see no sufficient reason but we may and that it is expedient to use Christs owne words either at his first or second delivery of it either as recorded by one or the other Evangelist And lastly who knowes but Jesus Christ speaking Syriack the language then commonly used by the Jewes might expresse himselfe in the same Syriack words at both times and yet the Evangelists render the same diversly in another tongue keeping still the same sense as the same Greek words may be truly translated and yet rendred in English in severall or diverse words but all to the same sense Obj. But it is our duty to pray in the Spirit in the holy Ghost and so as the holy Spirit immediately moves us or suggests to us for matter and words and method and so we are not to be tied to any form of prayer Possibly this was and might be used for a time namely till Christ was glorified and the holy Ghost given as Johns form might last till Jesus Christ gave a new one so this form of prayer might be of use untill the coming down of the holy Ghost to teach Christians to pray of themselves without this or any other form Ans To this Objection I say three things 1. That we are now to pray in the holy Ghost in a right sense but not in the sense and manner above alleadged And so to say no more did those before Christs coming 2. That we may truly pray in the Spirit according to our duty although we use the Lords Prayer 3. The coming of the holy Ghost hath not taken away the Lords Prayer but that notwithstanding it may be used in the prayers of the Church and her Members until Christ come again Of the first All Christians 't is true must pray in the Spirit as all Ministers of Christ are to preach in the evidence and demonstration of the Spirit and in words which the holy Ghost teacheth and yet this hinders not but we may and must study and premeditate for our Sermons not alway expecting extraordinary supplies from the holy Ghost so as that it should be given us always in that houre what to preach and it should not be we that preach or speak but the holy Ghost in us The holy Ghost hath made known to us the minde of God in the Scriptures we are to study them and the matters contained in them and to preach the Word of God Scripture-truthes plainly and affectionately as those who have found favour to be taught of God to have our understandings opened to understand the Scriptures to have our wills bowed to Gods revealed will and our affections warmed with love to the truth and zeale for it and as those who have in themselves experimented those things which they declare unto others Besides Ministers may and ought to read the holy Scriptures and in so doing although for the present they are tied unto words yet this doth in no wise quench the Spirit the Scriptures themselves being dictated by the Spirit so when we pray we are to pray in the Spirit that is for such things and in such a manner as the holy Ghost teacheth in the Scriptures of truth we are to pray in faith to come to God in Christs name merits mediation trusting to be heard and answered for Christs sake with earnestnesse and importunity and so with such sighs and groans which are unutterable which cannot sufficiently be expressed in words 2. As Believers before Christ particularly Moses and Aaron had the Spirit and his help and assistance in prayer so far as was requisite notwithstanding they sometimes used prescribed forms of Gods own inditing appointing And as Iesus Christ himself prayed in the spirit when he prayed in the words of David Psal 22.1 My God my God why hast thou forsaken me So those that are Christs may pray also in the spirit in the using the prayer of Christ that being a Prayer for matter method words composed by him who had the Spirit without measure recorded in the very form of a Prayer and with this preface When ye pray say c. by the holy Ghost that is by the Evangelist moved and assisted infallibly by the holy Ghost If that place be urged 1 Cor. 14.15 I will pray with the spirit and with understanding also I answer it followes I will sing with the Spirit and with understanding also So that if the former part could possibly with any good reason be expounded so as to debarre us from the use of the Lords prayer the latter will exclude Davids and all Scripture-Psalmes too out of the Church But the sense and meaning of that place is of another importance as appeares by the context and that may seem to be this I will not make use of the extraordinary gift of the Spirit inabling me to speak in an unknown or strange language either in praying to or praising of God in the Church where it is not understood by the unlearned and therefore cannot be to edification My own spirit or I may indeed pray according to the inward man and make use outwardly of the gift of Tongues that gift of the holy Ghost in praying but I make no use of my understanding to the benefit of others I resolve therefore so to pray and so to sing as I may be understood by others even as if I had no such gift of Tongues as a man would pray that hath not that gift of tongues which is an extraordinary gift of the Spirit 3. I come to my third Proposition and that is to prove that the coming of the holy Ghost doth not take away the use of the Lords Prayer as a Prayer And were it so as is presumed in the Objection that it was given onely for that time untill the coming of the holy Ghost and that it was out of date in the day of Pentecost even this Evangelical form of prayer like the legall observations I say were it so then the use of the Lords Prayer should cease both as a pattern and as a form of prayer it should neither be any more since Pentecost a Directory or Liturgy But the truth is that the promise of the holy Ghost to teach Christians to pray and the gift of the holy Ghost so promised doth not necessarily take away all helps or directions from Christ or from the Scriptures of the Prophets so that they should thenceforth be void and of none effect to all intents and
pray alwaies and not faint 3. The encouraging promises they have to this performance Ask and ye shall have seeke and ye shall finde knock and it shall be opened Mat. 7.7 Luke 11.9 Mark 11.2 4. and againe Verily verily I say unto you whatsoever ye shall aske the Father in my name he will give it you John 16.23 24. 4. If we consider how great things Prayer hath done for them wee our selves might Christians say have heard with our eares and our Fathers have told us what wonders it hath done in our daies and in the times before us How it hath like a General commanded the Host of Heaven the Sun Moone and Starres either to stand still or go back and to fight in their courses against Gods enemies They know that this is it which like the key of David opens and no man shuts and shuts and no man opens This is the key of Heaven the key of hearts the key of the barren Womb and of the Grave it opens and shuts all these I had almost said it is the key of Hell too of the bottomlesse pit for there it locks up the Devils that they cannot tempt us and this is it which some Christians have used Luther for one to unlock Hell yea the Devils Cabinet and to recover thence those bonds whereby some have in writing under hand seale given their souls to the Devil Prayer which is our famiar converse with God makes a Christians soule shine The soul of a praying Saint is sometimes whilst he is praying in a sort transfigured as Christs body was on Mount Tabor When Moses fasted and prayed forty daies and forty nights his face was not at all disfigured he did not appeare unto men to fast but on the contrary his face did shine so gloriously that the Israelites were not able to behold him but through a vaile Exod. 34.33 34 35. Observe that at the former forty daies being in the Mount with God whilst God did as it were preach to Moses in the delivery of the Law we read of no such glory abiding on Moses face when he came downe but now when Moses went up the second time und continued interceding for Israel forty days and forty nights at his coming down the skin of his face did shine so that Aaron and Israel were afraid to come nigh him Exod. 34.28 29 30. The name of a praying Christian may be like the name of the Angel which appeared to Manoah and his wife Judges 13.18 it may be Peli wonderfull for how oft have many of them done wonderously as that Angel did for many of them at their departure hence have breathed out their soules in fervent prayer When the flame of their fervent prayers went up to Heaven from the altar of their hearts their soules like the Angel of the Lord ascended in the flame of the Altar Yea as Elijah went up once in a fiery Chariot so do Christians in a sort daily sometimes seven times a day and sometimes seventy times seven times This chariot of Prayer hath foure wheeles Prayers Supplications Intercessions Thanksgiving And let me say the spirit of a living Christian is in these wheeles and when these are lift up from the earth towards heaven then are the living christians in their soules lifted up also What shall I say more of the praise of Prayer for time would faile me to tell of Abraham Isaac and Jacob of Moses Aaron and Sampson of Samuel also and of the Prophets who through prayer subdued enemies wrought righteousnesse obtained promises stopped the mouths of Lions quenched the violence of fire escaped the edge of the sword out of weaknesse were made strong waxed valiant in fight turned to flight the armies of the Aliens women received their dead also to life again c. And now Brethren to the end we may have our conversation such as becomes the Gospel of Christ to the end we may live peaceable and quiet lives in all godlinesse and honesty here on earth and see the face of God and enjoy his presence for ever in heaven I exhort that Prayers Supplications Intercessions and giving of Thanks be made by all men for this is the will of God our Saviour who would have all men to pray and to come to the experimental knowledge of this truth that Gods children or people are a praying Generation or that right Christians are praying Christians Pray therefore my beloved brethren all manner of prayer pray set or continued prayer pray continually sending up every where holy Ejaculations towards heaven Pray when thou art alone in thy closet or secret chamber pray with thy family wife children servants pray in the publick Assemblies in the great Congregation And now as the Apostle Paul to his Thessalonians chap. 4.9 10. As touching brotherly love ye need not that I write unto you for ye your selves are taught of God to love one another And indeed ye doe it but we beseech you brethren that ye increase more and more So my hearty desire is that I could say concerning all kinde of prayer in secret in the family in the congregation concerning prayer ye have no need that I preach unto you for ye your selves are taught of God thus to pray And indeed you doe it but we beseech you brethren that ye increase more and more 1. Let your closet or secret chamber be perfumed with the sweet incense of Prayer morning and evening Let God have his morning evening sacrifice at least This is but reasonable service Say not thou art so spirituall already that thou art above this and all other Ordinances Be not deceived God is not mocked except thou couldst be except thou wast better than Emanuel God-man thou oughtest to pray for so did our Lord Jesus Christ If thou dost altogether restrain prayer before God thou art so far from being of the highest forme of Christians that thou hast in this denied the Faith and art worse than an infidell thou hast denied the faith and art worse than the Devil for the Devils prayed unto Christ that he would not command them to go out into the deep and that he would suffer them to enter into the herd of Swine Luke 8.31.32 Say not I am an unregenerate person a sinner and God heareth not sinners and if you should pray your prayer would be turned into sin and therefore 't is to no purpose to pray if the sacrifice of the wicked be an abomination to the Lord then his Prayer or Incense is not like to prove a sweet savour in Gods nostrills or an odour of a sweet smell unto him I grant that it is true that God doth not heare grievous sinners impostors and Sabbath-breakers so as at their prayer to cure one that was born blinde But yet I say God that heares the cry of Nature even of the young Ravens when they cry for food he doth sometimes heare the prayers of meere natural men King Jehoahaz was one that did evil in the