The Common Principles of the Christian Religion, Sermon 11
Joh. 4. 24. GOD is a Spirit, &c.
THere are two common notions engraved on the hearts of all men by nature, That God is, and that he must be worshipped; and these two live and die together; they are clear, or blotted together. According as the apprehension of God is clear, & distinct, and more deeply engraven on the soul; so is this notion of mans duty, of worshipping God, clear & imprinted on the soul; and when ever the actions of men do prove, that the conception of the worship of God is obliterate or worn out; when ever their transgressions do witnesse, that a man hath not a live…y …otion of this duty of Gods worship, that doth al…o prove, that the very notion of a God-head is worn out, and cancelled in the soul; For, How could souls conceive of God as he is indeed, but they must needs with Moses. Exod. 34 make haste to pray and worship? It is the principle of the very Law of Nature, which shall make the whole world inexcusable, because that when they knew God, they gloriesied him not as God. A Father must have honour, and a Master must have fear, and God who is the common Parent, & absolute Master of all; must have worship, in which reverence and fear mixed with rejoycing and affection, predomines: it is supposed, and put beyond all question that it must be: He that worships him, &c. Its not simply said, God is a Spirit & must be worshipped, no, for none can doubt of it. If God be then certainly Worship is due to him, for who is so worshipfull? And because it is so beyond all question, therefore woe to the irreligious world that never puts it in practice: O What excuse can you have, who have not so much as a form of Godlinesse? Do you not know that its beyond all Controversie, that God must be worshipped? Why then do you deny it in your practice which all men must confesse in their conscience? Is not he God the Lord, a living and self-being Spirit? Then must he not have Worshippers? Beasts are not created for it, it is you O sons of men, whom he made for his own praise and it is not more suteable to your nature than it is honourable and glorious. This is the great dignity and excellency you are priviledged with, beyond the brute beasts, to have spirits within you capable of knowing and acknowledging the God of your spirits: Why then do you both rob and spoil God of his glory and cast away your own excellency? Why do you love to trample on your ornaments, and wallow in the puddle, like beasts, void of Religion, but so much worse then beasts, that you ought to be better, & were created for a more noble design. O base spirited wretches, who hang down your souls to this earth, and follow the dictates of your own sense and lust, & have not so much as an externall form of worshipping God; How farre are you come short of the noble design of your Creation, & the high end of your Immortall souls? If you will not worship God, know he will have Worshippers, certainly he will not want it, because he hath designed so many souls to stand before him, and worship him, and that number will not fail: He might indeed, have wanted worshippers; For what advantage is it to him? But in this he declares his love and respect to man, that he will not want honour and service from him: it is rather to put honour upon him, and to make him blessed and happy, than for any gain can amount to himself by it: for this is, indeed; the true honour and happinesse of man, not to be worshipped and served of other fellow-creatures, but to worship and serve the Creator: This is the highest advancement of a soul, to lye low before him, and to obey him, & have our service accepted of his Majesty: I beseech you, strive about this noble service. Since he must have Worshippers, O say within your souls, I must be one; if he had but one, I could not be content if I were not that one; since the Father is seeking Worshippers; ver. 23. O let him find thee. Offer thy self to him, saying, Lord, here am I, Should he seek you, who can have no advantage from you? Should he go about so earnest a search for true VVorshipers, who can have no profite by them? And why do ye not seek him since, since to you all the gain & profite redounds? Shall be seek you to make you happy, and why do ye not seek him, and happinesse in him? It is your own service, I may truly say, and not his so much; for in serving him thou dost rather serve thy self, for all the benefit redounds to thy self, thogh thou must not intend such an end, to serve him for thy self, but for thy names sake, else thou shalt neither honour him, nor advantage thy self. I pray you let him not seek in vain, for in these afflictions he is seeking Worshippers, and if he find you; you are found & saved indeed. Do not then forsake your own mercy, to run from him who follows you with Salvation.
As none can be ignorant that God is, and must be worshipped, so it is unknown to the world in what manner he must be worshipped: the most part of men have some form in worshipping God, & please themselves in it so well that they think God well-pleased with it; but few there are who know indeed what it is to worship him in a manner acceptable to his Majestie: Now you know it is all one not to worship him at all, as not to worship him in that way he likes to be worshipped: Therefore the most part of men are but self-worshippers, because they please none but themselves in it, it is not the worship his soul hath chosen, but their own invention, for you must take this as an undeniable ground, that God must be worshipped according to his own will and pleasure, & not according to you… humour, or invention; therefore his soul abhorres will-worship, devised by men out of ignorant zeal, or superstition, though there might seem much devotion in it, & much affection to God, as in the Israelits sacrificing their childrē, whatmore seem ing self-denyal? And yet what more real self-idolatry God owns not such a service, for it is not service & obedience to his will and pleasure, but to mens own will and humour: therefore a man must not look for a reward but from himself. Now it is not only will-worship, when the matter and substance of the worship is not commanded of God, but also when a commanded worship is not discharged in the appointed manner: Therefore, O how few true worshippers will the Father find? True worship must have Truth, for the substance, and spirit, for the manner of it: else it is not such a worship as the father seeks & will be pleased with; divine worship must have truth in it, that is plain, but what was that truth, it must be conformed to the rule & pattern of worship, which is Gods will & pleasure revealed in the word of truth, true worship is the very practise of the word of truth, it caries the Image and superscription and command upon it, which is a necessary ingredient in it, and constituent of it. Therefore if thy service have the Image of thy own will stamped on it, it is not divine worship, but will-worship. Thus all humane ceremonies and ordinances enjoyned for service of God, carry the inscription not of God, but of man who is the author and original of them, & so are but adulterated and false Coyn, that will not passe current with God, I fear there be many rites and vain customes among ignorant people in which they place some Religion which have no ground in the word of God, but are only old wives fables and traditions. How many things of that nature are used upon a religious account in which God hath placed no Religion: Many have a superstitious conceit of the publick place of worship, as if there were more holinesse in it than in any other house, & so they think their Prayers in the Church are more acceptable then in their Chamber; But Christ refutes that superstitious opinion of places, & so consequently of dayes, meats, and all such externall things: The Jews had a great opinion of their temple, the Samaritans of their mountain, as if these places had sanctified their services: But saith our Lord, vers. 21. The hour cometh when yee shall neither worship in this mountain. &c. but its any where acceptable, if so be ye worship in spirit and truth: Many of you account it Religion, to pray & mutter words of your own in the time of publick prayer, but who hath required this at your hand? If you would pray your selves, go apart shut the door behind thee saith Christ: private prayer should be in private, and secret: But when publick prayer is, your hearts should close with the petitions and offer them up joyntly to God, it is certainly a great slight of that deceitful destroyer, the Devill, to possesse your minds with an opinion of Religion, in such vain bablings, that he may with-draw both your ears & your hearts from the publick worship of God, for when every one is busied with his own prayers, you cannot at all joyn in the publick service of God, which is offered up in your name: The like I may say of stupid forms of prayer, & tying your selves to a plat-form, written in a book, or to some certain words gotten by the heart, who hath commanded this? Sure not the Lord, who hath promised his spirit to teach them to pray and help their infirmities, who know not how, nor what to pray: it is a device of your own invented by Satan to quench the spirit it of supplication, which should be the very naturall breathing of a christian. But there are some so grossely ignorant, of what prayer is; that they make use of the ten commands, & Beleef as a Prayer: so void are they of the knowledge and spirit of God, that they cannot discern betwixt Gods commands to themselves & their own requests to God betwixt his speaking to men, and their speaking to him, between their professing of him before men, and praying and confessing to him, all this is but forged imaginary worship, worship falsly so called which the Father seeks not and receives not.
But what if I should say that the most part of your worship, even that which is commanded of God, as Prayer, Hearing, Reading, &c hath no truth in it, I should say nothing amiss, for though you doe those things that are commanded; yet not as Commanded, without any respect to divine appointment, & only because you have received them as traditions from your fathers, and because you are taught so by the precepts of men, and are accustomed so to do, therefore the stamp of Gods will and pleasure is not engraven on them, but of your own will, or of the will of men; Let me pose your Consciences, many of you, what difference is there between your praying & your plowing, between your hearing and your harrowing, between your reading of the Scriptures and your reaping in the Harvest, between your Religious Service and your common ordinary actions, I say, what difference is in the rise of these? You do many civill things out of custome or because of the Precepts of men & is there any other principle at the bottom of your religious performances? Do you at all consider these are divine appointments, these have a stamp of his authority on them, and from the Conscience of such an immediat command of God, and the desire to please him and obey him, do you go about these? I fear many cannot say it. O I am sure all cannot, thogh it may be all will say it: therefore your religious worship can come in no other account, than will-worship or man-worship, it hath not the stamp of truth on it, an express conformity to the truth of God as his truth.
But we must presse out this a little more. Truth is opposed to a ceremony & shadow. The ceremonies of old were shadows, or the external body of Religion, in which the soul and spirit of godlinesse should have been enclosed, but the Lord did alwaies urge more earnestly the substance and truth, then the ceremony the weightier matters of the Law, Piety, equity, and sobriety, than these lighter external Ceremonies: he sets an higher account upon mercy then sacrifice, & upon obedience then Ceremonies, but this people turned just contrary; they summed up all their Religion in some ceremonial performance, and separated those things, God had so nearly conjoyned; they would be devout men in offering sacrifices in their washings in their rites, and yet made no conscience of heart, and Soul-piety toward God, & upright just dealing with men: Therefore the Lord so often quarrels them & rejects all their service as being adevice and invention of their own, which never entred in his heart. Isa. 1. from 10. to 16. Ier. 7. throughout. Isa. 66. to 6. Isa, 28. Now if you will examine it impartially it is even just so with us, there are some externall things in Religion which in comparison with the weightier things of faith, and obedience are but ceremonial; in these you place the most part, if not all your Religion, and think your selves good Christians, if you be baptized and hear the Word, and partake of the Lords table and such like, though in the mean time you be not given to secret prayer, & reading, and do not inwardly judge and examine your selves, that you may flee unto a Mediator; thogh your conversation be unjust and scandalous among men; I say unto such souls, as the Lord to the Jews, Who hath required this at your hands? who commanded you to hear the VVord, to be baptized, to wait on publick Ordinances? Away with all this, it is abomination to his Majesty though it please you never so well, the more it displeases him; If you say, why commands he us to hear? &c. I say the Lord never commanded these external Ordinances for the sum of true Religion; that was not the great thing which was in his heart that he had most pleasure unto, but the weightier matters of the Law, piety, equity & sobriety; a holy and godly conversation adorning the Gospell: What hath the Lord required of thee, but this, O man, To do justly, and walk humbly with thy God? So then thou dost not worship him in Truth, but in shadow; the Truth is holinesse and righteousnesse; that externall profession is but a Ceremony; while you separate these external Ordinances from these weighty duties of piety & justice, that they are but as dead body without a soul. If the Lord required truth of old, much more now, when he hath abolished the multitude of Ceremonies, that the great things of his Law may be more seen and loved.
If you would then be true worshippers, look the whole mind of God, & especially the chief pleasure of Gods mind, that which he most delights into, and by any means do not separate what God hath conjoyned, do not divide righteousness towards men, from a profession of holiness to God, else it is but a falshood, a counterfeit coyn; do not please your selves, so much in externall Church priviledges, without a holy and godly conversation adorning the Gospel; but let the chief study, endeavour & delight of your souls be about that, which God most delights into, let the substantials of Religion have the first place in the soul, Pray more in secret, that he will be the life of your souls, you ought indeed to attend publick ordinances, but above all, take heed to your conversation & walking at home, and in secret, prayer in your Family is a more substantiall worship, then to sit & hear prayer in publick, and prayer in secret is more substantiall then that: The more retired and immediate a duty be, the more weighty it is, the more it crosse thy corruptions; and evidence the stamp of God on thy affections, the more divine it is; And therefore to serve God in these, is to serve him in truth. Practice hath more of truth in it then a profession, When your Fathers executed judgement, was not this to know me? Duties that have more opposition from our natures against them: and lesse sewel or oyl to feed the flame of our self love and corruption, have more truth in them; and if you should worship God in all other duties, and not especially in those, you do not worship him in truth.
Next, let us consider the manner of Divine Worship: And this is as needfull to true Worship as true matter, that it be commanded, and done as it is commanded, that compleats true worship. Now, I know no better way, or manner to worship God in; than so to worship him as our worship may carry the stamp of his Image upon it, as it may be a glasse wherein we may behold Gods Nature and Properties: For such as himself is, such he would be acknowledged to be, I would think it were true worship indeed, which had engraven on it the Name of the true & living God, if it did speak out so much of it self, That God is, and that he is a rewarder of them that seek him diligently. Most part of our service speaks an unknown God, & carries such an inscription upon it, To the unknown God: There is so little either reverence, or love, or fear, or knowledge in it, as if we did not worship the true God, but an Idoll. It is said, that the fool sayes in his heart that there is no God, because his thoughts and affections, and actions, are so little composed to the fear and likenesse of that God, as if he did indeed, plainly deny him; I fear it may be said thus of our Worship; It sayes, There is no God; it is of such a nature, that none could conclude from it that it had any relation to the true God, our prayers denie God, because there is nothing of God appears in them; But this is true worship, when it renders back to God his own Image and Name: Unde repercussus redditur ipse sibi. As it is a poor & clean Fountain, in which a man may see his shaddow distinctlie, but a troubled fountain or myre in which he cannot be hold himself; So it is pure worship, which receives and reflects the pure Image of God, but impure and unclean worship; which cannot receive it, and retain it. I pray you Christians, consider this; for it is such Worshippers the Father seeks; and why seeks he such? But because in them he finds himself (so to speak:) His own I mage and superscription is upon them, His mercy isengraven on their faith & confidence; His Majestie & power is stamped on their humility and reverence; His goodnesse is to be read on the souls rejoicing, His Greatnesse and Justice in the souls trembling. Thus there ought to be some engravings on the soul answering the Characters of his glorious Name. O how little of this is among them that desire to know something of God? How little true Worship, even among them whom the Father hath sought out to make true Worshippers? But alas! How are all of us unacquainted with this kind of Worship? We stay upon the first principles & practices of Religion, and go not on to build upon the foundation: Sometimes your Worship hath a stamp of Gods holinesse and justice, in fear & terrour at such a Majesty which makes you to tremble before him: But where is the stamp of his mercy & grace which should be written in your faith and rejoycing? Tremble and fear indeed, but rejoyce with trembling, because there is mercy with him: Sometime their is rejoycing and quietnesse in the soul, but that quickly degenerates into carnal confidence, & makes the soul turn grace into wantonness, and esteem of it self above what is right, because it is not counterpoised with the sense and apprehension of his holinesse and justice. But, O to have these joyntly written on the heart, in worship, fear, reverence, confidence, humility and faith! That is a rare thing, it is a divine composition and temper of spirit that makes a divine soul: For the most part, our Worship savours and smels nothing of God, neither his power, nor his mercy and grace, nor his holinesse and justice, nor his majesty and glory; a secure, saint, formal way, void of reverence, of humility, of servency, and of faith: I beseech you, let us consider, as before the Lord, how much pains and time we lose, and please none but our selves, & profit none at all: Stir up your selves as in his sight; for it is the keeping of our souls continually as in his sight, which will stamp our service with his likenesse: The fixed and constant meditation of God and his glorious properties, this will beget the resemblance between our worship, and the God whom we worship, and it will imprint his Image upon it, & then it should please him, & then it should profit thee, and then it should edifie others,
But more particularly, The Worship must have the stamp of Gods spiritual Nature, and be conformed to it in some measure, else it cannot please him: There must be a conformity between God and souls; this is the great end of the Gospel, to repair that Image of God which was once upon man, and make him like God again: Now, it is the way that Jesus Christ repairs this Image, & brings about this conformity with God; by the souls worshipping of God sutable to his Nature, it is the more and more like God, and happy in that likenesse. Now, God is a Spirit, therefore (saith Christ) you must worship him in spirit & truth. The worship then of Saints must be of a spiritual nature, that it may be like the immortal divine Spirit: It is such Worshippers the Father seeks; he seeks souls to make them like himself, and this likenesse and conformity to God is the very foundation of the souls happinesse, and eternall refreshment.
This is a point of great consequence, &, I fear, not laid to heart. The Worship must be like the Worshipped. It is a Spirit must Worship the Eternal Spirit, it is not a body that can be the principle and chief Agent in the businesse: What Communion can God have with your bodies, while your souls are removed far from him, more than with beasts? All society and fellowship must be between those that are like one another: A man can have no comfortable company with Beasts, or with Stones, and Trees: It is men that can converse with men; and a Spirit must worship the self-being-spirit. Do not mistake this, as if under the dayes of the Gospel we were not called to an external and bodily Worship, to any service to which our outward man is instrumentall; this is one of the deep delusions of this Age, into which some men, reprobate … the Faith, hath fallen, That there should be no externall Ordinances, but that Christians are now called to worship all Spirit, pure Spirit, &c. This is one of the Spirits, & spiritual Doctrines (that call themselves so) which ye must not receive; for it is neither spirit of God, nor of Christ, that teacheth this: nor the spirit of God the Creator, because he hath made the whole man, body and soul, and so must be worshipped of the whole man: He hath created man in such a capacity, as he may offer up external actions in a reasonable manner with the inward affections; as the Lord hath created him so he should serve him: every member, every part in its own capacity; the soul to preceed, and the body to follow; the soul to be the chief worshipper, and the body its servant imployed in the worship: True worship hath a body and a soul as well as a true man; and as the soul separated is not a compleat man, so neither is the soul separated a compleat worshipper without the body; the external Ordinances of God is the body, the inward soul-affection is the Spirit, which being joyned together makes compleat worship. Neither is it the Spirit of Christ which teacheth this, because our Lord Jesus hath taught us to offer up our bodies and spirits both in a reasonable service, Rom. 12. 1, 2. The sacrifice of the bodily performance, offered up by the spiritual affection, and renewed mind is a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable and reasonable: That spirit which dwelt in Christ, above measure, did not think it too base to vent it self in the way of externall Ordinances: He was indeed above all, above the Law, yet did willingly come under them to teach us, who have so much need and want to come under them: He prayed much, he preached, he did sing and read, to teach us how to worship, and how much need we have of Prayer and Preaching: This was not the Spirit Christ promised to his Disciples, and Apostles, which spirit did breath most lively in the use of the external Ordinances, all their dayes; and this is not the spirit which was at the hour in which Christ spoke, The hour is come; and now is, ver. 23. in which the true worship of God shal not be in the external and Jewish Ceremonies, and rites, void of all life and inward sense of Piety, but the true worship of God shal be made up of a soul and body, of spirit and truth, of the external appointed Ordinances according to the word of truth, and the spirit of truth, and of the spirit and inward soul-affection and sincerity which shal quicken and actuate that external performance: There were no such worshippers then as had no use of Ordinances, Christ was not such, his Disciples were not such, therefore it is a new Gospel, which if an Angel should bring from heaven ye ought not to receive it.
As it is certain then, that both soul and body must be imployed in this businesse, so it is sure that the soul & spirit must be the first mover, and chiefest agent in it, because it is a spiritual businesse, and hath relation to the fountain-spirit, which hath the most perfect opposition to all false appearances, and externall shews: that part of man that commeth nearest God, must draw near in worshipping of God, & if that be removed far away, there is no real communion with God; man judges according to the outward appearance, and can reach no further than the outward man, but God is an all-searching spirit who tryeth the heart and rins, and therefore he will passe another judgement upon your worship then men can do, because he observes all the secret wandrings and escapes of the heart out of his sight, he misses the soul when you present attentive ears, or eloquent tongues, there is no dallying with his Majesty, painting will not deceive him, his very Nature is contrary to Hypocrisie & dissimulation, and what is it but dissimulation, when you present your selves to Religious exercises as his people, but within are nothing like it, nothing awaking; nothing present? O consider, my beloved, what a one you have to do with! It is not men, but the Father of Spirits; who will not be pleased with what pleases men of your own flesh, but must have a spirit to serve him. Alas what are we doing with such empty names and shews in Religion? Busied in the outside of worship only, as if we had none to do with but men who have eyes of flesh, all that we do in this kind is lost labour, and will never be reckoned up in the account of true worship: I am sure you know and may reflect upon your selves, that you make Religion but a matter of outward fashion and externall custome, you have never almost taken to heart in earnest, you may frequent the Ordinances, you may have a form of godlinesse, consisting in some outward performances & priviledges, and O! how void and destitute of all Spirit and Life; and Power? not to speak of the removall of affection, and the imploying of the marrow of your soul upon base lusts, and creatures, or the scattering of your desires abroad amongst them, for that is too palpable; but even your very thoughts & mind… are removed from this busines, you have nothing present but an ear, or eye, & your minds is about other businesse, your desires, your fears, your joyes, and delights, your affections never did run in the channel of religious exercises, all your passion is vented in other things, but here you are blockish & stupid, without any sensible apprehension of God, his mercy, or Justice, or wrath, or of your own misery and want. You sorrow in other things but none here; none for sin; you joy for other things but none here, you cannot rejoyce at the Gospel. Prayer is a burthen, not a delight, if your spiri…s were chiefly imployed in Religious duties, Religion would be almost your Element, your pleasure and Recreation, but now it is wearisome to the flesh, because the Spirit taketh not the chief weight upon it. Oh, be not deceived! God is not mocked, you do but mock your selves with external showes while you are satisfied with them: I beseech you look inwardly and be not satisfied with the outward appearance, but ask at thy Soul, where it is; and how it is: Retire within, and bring up thy spirit to this work: I am sure you may observe that any thing goes more smoothly and sweetly with you, then the Worship of God, because your mind is more upon any thing else, I fear the most part of us who endeavour to some measure, to seek God, have too much drosse of outward formality, & much scumof filthy hypocrisie and guile. O, pray that the present furnace may purge away this scum! It is the great ground of Gods present controversie with Scotland; but alas, the Bellows are like to burn, & we not be purged, our scum goes not from us, we satisfie our selves with some outward exercises of Religion, custome undoes us all, & it was never more undoing then vvhen indignation and vvrath is pursuing it: O that you vvould ponder vvhat you lose by it, both the sweetnesse and advantage of godlinesse, beside the dishonour of God: You take a formall, neglegent, and secure vvay, as the most easie vvay, and the most pleasing to your flesh, and I am perswaded you find it the most difficult vvay, because you vvant all the pleasant & sweet refreshment, & soul-delights you might have in God, by a serious and diligent minding of Religion. The pleasure and sweetnesse of God tasted and found, vvill make diligence and pains more easie, then slothfulnes can be to the slothfull; this oyls the wheels, and makes them run swiftly; formality makes them drive heavily: thus you live alwayes in a complaining humor, fighing and going backward, because you have some stirring principles or conscience vvithin, vvhichwhich bears vvitnesse against you; and your formall sluggish disposition on the other hand, refuseth to awake and work you are perplexed and tormented between the two, when thy spirit and affections goes one way, & thy body another; then thy conscience drives on the Spirit, and thy affections draw back, it must needs be an unpleasant businesse.