without all extension of parts. The body is a dreggish thing: the more spiritual God's essence is, the more noble and excellent. The spirits are the more refined part of the wine. Q. Wherein doth God differ from other | have." Bodily members are ascribed to spirits? A. It is contrary to the nature of a spirit to have a corporeal substance: Luke xxiv. 39, "Handle me, and see me: for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me 1. The angels are spirits. God, not properly, but metaphorically, and in a borrowed sense; he is only set out to our capacity; by the right hand of the Lord is meant his power; by the eyes of the Lord is meant his wisdom. Now that A. We must distinguish of spirits. 1. The angels are created, God is a spirit uncreated.-2. The angels are spirits, but they are finite, and capable of being anni-God is a spirit, and is not capable of bodily hilated; the same power which made them, is able to reduce them to their first nothing; but God is an infinite spirit.-3. The angels are confined spirits; they cannot be duobus locis simul, they are confined to a place; but God is an immense spirit, and cannot be confined, being in all places at once.-4. The angels, though they are spirits, yet they are but ministering spirits, Heb. i. 14. Though they are spirits, yet are they servants. God is a super-excellent spirit, "the Father of spirits," Heb. xii. 9. 2. The soul is a spirit: Eccles. xii. 7, “The spirit shall return unto God that gave it." shape or substance, is clear. 1. A body is visible, but God is invisible; therefore he is a spirit, 1 Tim. vi. 16, "whom no man hath seen, nor can see;" not by an eye of sense.-2. A body is terminated; can be but in one place at once; but God is every where, in all places at once; therefore he is a spirit, Ps. cxxxix. 7, 8. "God's centre is every where, and his circumference is nowhere.-3. A body being compounded of integral parts may be dissolved, quicquid | divisible est corruptibile; but the Godhead is not capable of dissolution; he can have no end, from whom all things have their beginning. So that it clearly appears that God Q. How doth God, being a spirit, differ is a spirit, which adds to the perfection of from the soul? his nature. Servetus and Osiander thought, that the soul being infused did convey into man the very spirit and substance of God; an absurd opinion, for the essence of God is incommunicable. Use 1. If God be a spirit, then he is impassible, he is not capable of being hurt. Wicked men set up their banners, and bend their forces against God; they are said to fight against God, Acts v. 39. But A. Therefore, when it is said, the soul what will this fighting avail? What hurt is a spirit, it is meant God hath made it in-can they do to the Deity? God is a spirit, telligent, and hath stamped upon it his like- and therefore cannot receive any hurtful ness, not his essence. impression; wicked men may imagine evil Q. But is it not said, that we are made against the Lord, Nahum. i. 9, "What do partakers of the divine nature? ye imagine against the Lord?" But God, ship God, and pray to him, and not believe munion with God; let us labour to recover this lost interest, and pronounce this Shibboleth, My God,' Ps. xliii. 5. It is little comfort to know there is a God, unless he be ours; God offers himself to be our God, Jer. xxxi. 33, "I will be their God." And faith catcheth hold of the offer; it appropriates God, and makes all that is in him over to us to be ours,-his wisdom to be ours, to teach us, his holiness ours, to sanctify us,-bis Spirit ours, to comfort us,―his mercy ours, to save us. To be able to say, God is mine, is more than to have all the mines of gold and silver. Use 6. Seeing there is a God, let us serve and worship him as God. It was an indictment brought in against them, Rom. i. 21, "They glorified him not as God." 1. Let us pray to him as to God. Pray with fervency, James v. 16, "An effectual fervent prayer availeth much." This is both the fire and the incense; without fervency it is no prayer.-2. Love him as God. Deut. vi. 5, there is a God, is to put a high scorn and contempt upon God. Believe that God is the only true God; such a God as he hath revealed himself in his word, "A lover of righteousness, and hater of wickedness," Ps. xlv. 7. The real belief of a Deity gives life to all religious worship; the more we believe the truth and infiniteness of God, the more holy and angelical we are in our lives. Whether we are alone, or in company, God sees us; he is the heart-searcher; the belief of this would make us live always under God's eye, Ps. xvi. 8, "I have set the Lord always before me." The belief of a Deity would be a bridle to sin, a spur to duty; it would add wings to prayer, and oil to the lamp of our devotion. The belief of a Deity would cause dependence upon God in all our straits and exigencies. Gen. xvii. 1, "I am God all-sufficient,"'—a God that can supply all your wants, scatter all your fears, resolve all your doubts, conquer all your temp-"Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all tations; the arm of God's power can never thy heart." To love him with all thy heart, be shrunk; he can create mercy for us, and is to give him a precedency in our love : detherefore can help and not be beholden to the sire to let him have the cream of our affeccreature. Did we believe there is a God, we tions,-to love him not only appreciatively, should so depend on his providence as not to but intensively, as much as we can. As the use any indirect means; we should not run sunbeams united in a burning glass, burn the ourselves into sin to rid ourselves out of trou- hotter, so all our affections should be united, ble: 2 Kings i. 3, "Is it not because there that our love to God may be more ardent.— is not a God in Israel, that ye go to inquire of 3. Obey him as God. All creatures obey Beelzebub the god of Ekron?" When men him: the stars fight his battles,-the wind run to sinful shifts, is it not because they do and sea obey him, Mark iv. 41,-much more not believe there is a God, or that he is all-should man whom God hath endued with a sufficient? Use 5. Seeing there is a God, let us labour to get an interest in him, Ps. xlviii. 14, "This God is our God." Two things will comfort us,-Deity and property. Since the fall we have lost likeness to God, and com principle of reason. He is God, and hath a sovereignty over us; therefore, as we received life from him, so we must receive a law from him, and submit to his will in all things. This is to kiss him with a kiss of loyalty, and it is to glorify him as God. QUEST. IV. GOD IS A SPIRIT. WHAT is God? ANS. God is a Spirit. 2d. The thing expressed, John iv. 24, Q. What do you mean when you say, God is a Spirit? A. By a spirit I mean, God is an immate "God is a spirit." God is essentia spiritual-rial substance, of a pure, subtile, unmixed issima. ZANCH. essence, not compounded of body and soul, without all extension of parts. The body is a dreggish thing: the more spiritual God's essence is, the more noble and excellent. The spirits are the more refined part of the wine. Q. Wherein doth God differ from other spirits? 1. The angels are spirits. A. It is contrary to the nature of a spirit to have a corporeal substance: Luke xxiv. 39, "Handle me, and see me: for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have." Bodily members are ascribed to God, not properly, but metaphorically, and in a borrowed sense; he is only set out to our capacity; by the right hand of the Lord is meant his power; by the eyes of the Lord is meant his wisdom. Now that A. We must distinguish of spirits. 1. The angels are created, God is a spirit uncreated.-2. The angels are spirits, but they are finite, and capable of being anni-God is a spirit, and is not capable of bodily hilated; the same power which made them, is able to reduce them to their first nothing; but God is an infinite spirit.-3. The angels are confined spirits; they cannot be duobus locis simul, they are confined to a place; but God is an immense spirit, and cannot be confined, being in all places at once.-4. The angels, though they are spirits, yet they are but ministering spirits, Heb. i. 14. Though they are spirits, yet are they servants. God is a super-excellent spirit, "the Father of spirits," Heb. xii. 9. 2. The soul is a spirit: Eccles. xii. 7, "The spirit shall return unto God that gave it." shape or substance, is clear. 1. A body is visible, but God is invisible; therefore he is a spirit, 1 Tim. vi. 16, "whom no man hath seen, nor can see;" not by an eye of sense.-2. A body is terminated; can be but in one place at once; but God is every where, in all places at once; therefore he is a spirit, Ps. cxxxix. 7, 8. "God's centre is every where, and his circumference is nowhere.-3. A body being compounded of integral parts may be dissolved,—quicquid divisible est corruptibile; but the Godhead is not capable of dissolution; he can have no end, from whom all things have their beginning. So that it clearly appears that God Q. How doth God, being a spirit, differ is a spirit, which adds to the perfection of from the soul? his nature. Servetus and Osiander thought, that the soul being infused did convey into man the very spirit and substance of God; an absurd opinion, for the essence of God is incommunicable. Use 1. If God be a spirit, then he is impassible, he is not capable of being hurt. Wicked men set up their banners, and bend their forces against God; they are said to fight against God, Acts v. 39. But A. Therefore, when it is said, the soul what will this fighting avail? What hurt is a spirit, it is meant God hath made it in-can they do to the Deity? God is a spirit, telligent, and hath stamped upon it his like- and therefore cannot receive any hurtful impression; wicked men may imagine evil Q. But is it not said, that we are made against the Lord, Nahum. i. 9, “What do partakers of the divine nature? ness, not his essence. ye imagine against the Lord?" But God, He that sits in the heaven shall laugh." He is | We must conceive of him as he is in Christ, a spirit, he can wound them, but they cannot touch him. Christ "is the image of the invisible God," Col. i. 15. Set the eyes of your faith on Christ, God-man. In Christ we see some sparklings of the divine glory; in him there is the exact resemblance of all his Father's excellencies. The wisdom, love, and holiness of God the Father shine forth in Christ; John xiv. 9, "He that hath seen me, hath Use 2. If God be a spirit, then it shows the folly of the papists, who worship him by pictures and images. Being a spirit, we cannot make any image to represent him by Deut. iv. 12, "The Lord spake to you out of the midst of the fire, ye heard the voice of the words, but saw no simili-seen the Father." tude." Use 3. If God be a spirit, it shows us, that the more spiritual we grow, the more we grow like to God. How do earth and spirit agree? Phil. iii. 9. Earthly ones may give for their crest, the mole or tortoise that live in the earth. What resemblance is there between an earthly heart, and him who is a spirit? The more spiritual any one is, the more like God. 1. God being a spirit is imperceptible, cannot be discerned; how then can there be any resemblance made of him? Isa. xl. 18, "To whom then will ye liken God, or what likeness will ye compare unto him?" How can you paint the Deity? Can we make an image of that which we never saw? "Ye saw no similitude." God is a spirit. It were a folly to go to make the picture of the soul, because it is a spiritual thing; or to paint the angels, because they are spirits. OBJ. Are not the angels in scripture re- fiery chariot of love to God,-this is to be presented by the cherubims? A. There is imago persona et officii,there is the image of the person, and the image that represents the office. The cherubims did not represent the persons of the angels, but their office. The cherubims were made with wings, to show the swiftness of the angels, in discharge of their office; and if we cannot picture the soul, nor the persons of angels, because they are spirits, much less can we make an image or picture of God, who is infinite and the Father of spirits. 2. God is also an omnipresent spirit; he is present in all places, Jer. xxiii. 24, " Do not I fill heaven and earth? saith the Lord." Therefore, being every where present, it is absurd to worship him by an image. Were it not a foolish thing to bow down to the king's picture, when the king is present? So it is to worship God's image, when God himself is present. Q. But how then shall we conceive of God, being a spirit, if we may make no image or resemblance of him? Q. What is it to be spiritual? A. To be refined and sublimated, to have the heart still in heaven, to be thinking of God and glory, and to be carried up in a spiritual: Ps. lxxiii. 25, "Whom have I in heaven but thee:" on which Beza paraphrased thus, Apaga terra, utinam tecum in cœlo essem! "O that I were in heaven with thee!" A Christian, who is taken off these earthly things, as the spirits are taken off from the lees, hath a noble spiritual soul, and doth most resemble him who is a spirit. Use 4. It shows what that worship is God requires of us, and is most acceptable to him, viz. such a worship as is suitable to his nature, spiritual worship.' John iv. 24, "They which worship him, must worship him in spirit and in truth." Spiritual worship is the virgin worship. Though God will have the service of our bodies,-our eyes and hands lifted up, to testify to others what reverence we have of God's glory and majesty,-yet chiefly he will have the worship of the soul, 1 Cor. vi. 20, "Glorify God in your body and in your spirit." Spirit worship God prizeth, because it comes so near to his own nature who is a spirit. Q. What is it to worship God in spirit? A. We must conceive of him spiritually: viz. (1). In his attributes,-his holiness; nies. The ceremonies of the law, which justice, goodness, which are the beams by God himself ordained, are now abrogated, which his divine nature shines forth. (2). 1 and out of date; Christ the substance being come, the shadows fly away; and therefore a sovereign elixir full of virtue may be given the apostle calls the legal ceremonies 'car- in a few drops; a little prayer, if it be with nal rites,' Heb. x. 10; and if we may not the heart and spirit, may have much virtue use those Jewish ceremonies which God did and efficacy in it. The publican made but once appoint, then not those which he did a short prayer, "God be merciful to me a never appoint. sinner," Luke xviii. 13, but it was full of life and spirit; it came from the heart, therefore it was accepted. Use 5. Of Exhortation. Pray to God, that as he is a spirit; so he will give us of his Spirit. The essence of God is incommunicable; but not the motions, the presence, and influences of his Spirit. When the sun shines in a room, not the body of the sun is there, but the light, heat and influence of the sun. God hath made a promise of his Spirit, Ezek. xxxvi. 27, "I will put my Spirit within you." Turn promises into prayers. "O Lord, thou who art a spirit, give me of thy Spirit; I flesh, beg thy Spirit, thy enlightening, sanctifying, quickening Spirit!" Melancthon prayed, "Lord, inflame my soul with thy holy Spirit!" How needful is his Spirit? We cannot do any duty without it, in a lively manner; when this wind blows upon our sails, then we move swiftly towards heaven. Pray therefore, that God would give us of the residue of his Spirit,' Mal. ii. 15, that we may move more vigorously in the sphere of religion. A. 2. To worship God in spirit, is to worship him, 1. With faith in the blood of the Messiah, Heb. xi. 9; and, 2. To worship him with the utmost zeal and intenseness of soul, Acts xxvi. 7, "Our twelve tribes instantly serving God day and night,"-with intenseness of spirit,-not only constantly, but instantly. This is to worship God in spirit. The more spiritual any service is, the nearer it comes to God, who is a spirit, and the more excellent it is; the spiritual part of duty is the fat of the sacrifice,-it is the soul and quintessence of religion. The richest cordials are made of spirits, and the best duties are such as are of a spiritual nature. God is a spirit, and will be worshipped in spirit; it is not pomp of worship, but purity, which God accepts. Repentance is not in the outward severities used to the body, penance, fasting and chastising the body, but it consists in the sacrifice of a broken heart; thanksgiving doth not stand in church music, the melody of an organ, but rather in making melody in the heart to the Lord, Eph. v. 19. Prayer is not the Use 6. Of Comfort. As God is a spirit, tuning the voice into a heartless confession, so the reward that he gives is spiritual; that or telling over a few beads, but it consists in is the excellency of it. As the chief blesssighs and groans, Rom. viii. 26. When the ings he gives us in this life are spiritual blessfire of fervency is put to the incense of ings, Eph. i. 3, not gold and silver,--he prayer, then it ascends as a sweet odour; gives Christ, his love,-he fills us with grace, that is the true holy water, not that which-so the main rewards he gives us after this the pope sprinkles, but what is distilled from life are spiritual, "a crown of glory that fadthe limbeck of a penitent eye. Spirit-wor-eth not away," 1 Pet. v. 4. Earthly crowns ship best pleaseth that God who is a spirit: fade, but the believer's crown, being spirituJohn iv. 23, "The Father seeketh such to al, is immortal, a never-fading crown. "It worship him ;" to show the great acceptance is impossible (saith Joseph Scaliger) for that of such, and how God is delighted with spirit- which is spiritual to be subject to change or ual worship. This is the savoury meat God corruption." This may comfort a Christian loves. How few mind this! Worshipping in all his labours and sufferings; he lays out him who is a spirit, in the spirit, they give himself for God, and hath little or no rehim more dregs than spirits; they think it ward here; but remember, God, who is a enough to bring their duties, but not their spirit, will give spiritual rewards,—a sight of hearts, which hath made God disclaim these his face in heaven,-white robes,-a weight very services he himself appointed, Isa. i. of glory. Be not then weary of God's ser12, Ezek. xxxiii. 31. Let us then give God vice; think of the spiritual reward, a crown spirit-worship, this best suits with his nature; of glory which fadeth not away! |