not fuch a Worship as the Father feeks and will be pleased with; Divine Worship, muft have Truth in it, that is plain, but what was that Truth? it must be conformed to the Rule and Pattern of Worship, which is God's Will and Pleafure, revealed in the Word of Truth. True Worship is the very Practice of the Word of Truth, it carries the Image and Superfcription of a Command upon it, which is a neceffary Ingredient in it, and Conftituent 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 the Service of God, carry the Infcription not of God,but of Man, who is the Author and Original of them, and fo are but adulterated and falfe Coin, that will not pafs current with God. I fear there be many Rites and vain Customs among ignorant People, in which they place fome 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 fuperftitious Conceit of the Publick Place of Worship, as if there were moreHoliness in it than in any other Houfe, and fo they think their Prayers in the Church are more acceptable than in their Chamber; but Chrift refutes that fuperftitious Opinion of Places, and fo confequently of Days, Meats, and all fuch external Things: The Jews had a great Opinion of their Temple, the Samaritans of their Mountain, as if thefe Places had fanctified their Services: But faith our Lord, Verf. 21. The Hour cometh when ye ball neither worship in this Mountain, &c. but 'tis any where acceptable, if fo be ye worship in Spirit and Truth: Many of you account it Religion; to pray and mutter Words of your own in the Time of publick Prayer, but who hath required this at your Hands? If ye would pray your felves, go apart, but the Door behind thee, faith Chrift: Private Prayer should be in private and secret: But when publick Prayer is, your Hearts fhould clofe with the Petitions, and offer them up jointly to God. It is certainly a great flight of that deceitful Destroyer, the Devil, to poffefs your Minds with an Opinion of Religion, in fuch vain Bablings, that he may withdraw both your Ears and your Hearts, from the publick Worship of God, for when every one is bufied with his own Prayers, you cannot at all join in the publick Service of God, which is offered up in your Name. The like I may fay of ftupid Forms of Prayer, and tying your felves to a Platt-form, written in a Book, or to fome 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 of Supplication, which should be the very natural breathing of a Chriftian. But there are fome fo grofly ignorant of what Prayer is, that they make use of the Ten Commands, and Belief, as a Prayer: So void are they of the Knowledge and Spirit of God, that they cannot difcern betwixt God's Commands to themfeives and their own Requests to God, betwixt His fpeaking to Men, and their speaking to Him, between their profeffing of Him before Men, and praying and confeffing to Him; all this is but forged imaginary Worship, Worship falfly fo called, which the Father feeks not, and receives not. But what if I should fay, that the most Part of your Worship, even that which is commanded of God, as Prayer, Hearing, K 2 Reading Reading, &c. hath no Truth in it, Ihould | ftance and Truth, than the Ceremony; the weightier Matters of the Law, Piety, Equity, and Sobriety, than these lighter external Ceremonies: He fets an higher Account upon Mercy than Sacrifice, and upon Obedience, than Ceremonies: But this People turned it juft contrary, they fum fay nothing amifs, for though you do thofe Things that are commanded, yet not as commanded, without any refpect to Divine Appointment, and only because you have received them as Traditions from your Fathers, and because ye are taught fo by the Precepts of Men, and are ac-ed up all their Religion in fome cerecustomed fo to do, therefore the Stamp of monial Performance, and feparated those God's Will and Pleasure is not engraven Things, God had fo nearly conjoyned; on them, but of your own Will, or of the they would be devout Men in OfferWill of Men. Let me pofe your Confci- ing Sacrifices, in their Washings, in ences, many of you, what Difference is their Rites, and yet made no Confeithere between your Praying, and your ence of Heart, and Soul-piety towards Plowing, between your Hearing, and your God, and upright just Dealing with Men: Harrowing, between your Reading in the Therefore the Lord fo often quarrels Scriptures, and your reaping in the Har- with them, and rejects all their Service as veft, between your religious Service and being a Device and Invention of their your common ordinary Actions; I fay, own, which never entered into His what Difference is there in the Rife of Heart, fa. i. from 10. to 16, Jer. vii. these? You do many civil Things out of throughout, Ifa. Ixvi. to 6. Ifa. xxviii. Cuftom, or because of the Precepts of Now if you will examine it impartially it Men; and is there any any other Princi- is even just so with us; there are fome ex ple at the Bottom of your religious Per-ternal Things in Religion, which in Comformances? Do you at all confider, thefe are Divine Appointments, these have a Stamp of His Authority on them; and from the Confcience of fuch an immediate Command of God, and the Defire to please Him and obey Him, do you go about these? 1 fear many cannot fay it. O am I fure all cannot, though it may be, all will fay 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 exprefs Conformity to the Truth of God as His Truth. parifon with the weightier Things of Faith and Obedience are but ceremonial; in thefe you place the moft Part, if not alt your Religion, and think your felves good Chriftians, if you be baptized, and hear the Word, and partake of the Lord's Table, and fuch like, though in the mean Time your be not given to fecret Prayer, and Reading, and do not inwardly judge and examine your felves, that ye may flee unto a Mediator; though your Conver fation be unjuft and fcandalous among Men: I fay unto fuch Souls, as the Lord to the Jews, Who bath required this But we must prefs this out a little more. at your Hands? Who commanded Truth is oppofed to Ceremony and Sha-you to hear the Word, to be baptized, to dow. The Ceremonies of old were Sha-wait on publick Ordinances? Away with dows, or the external Body of Religion, all this, it is Abomination to His Majesty; in which the Soul and Spirit of Godliness though it please you never fo well, the fhould have been enclofed, but the Lord more it difpleafes Him; If you fay, Why did always urge more earnestly the Sub-" com more substantial than that: The more retired and immediate a Duty be the more weighty it is; the more it cross thy Cor ruptions, and evidences the Stamp of God on thy Affections, the more Divine it is; and therefore to ferve God in thefe, is to ferve Him in Truth. Practice hath more of Truth in it than a Profeffion. When your Fathers executed Judgment, was not this to know me? Duties that have more Oppofition from our Natures a-gainft them, and lefs Fewel or Oyl to commands He us to hear? &c. I fay, the Lord never commanded thefe external Ordinances for the Sum of true Religi on; that was not the great Thing which was in His Heart, that He had moft Plea fure unto, but the weightier Matters of the Law, Piety, Equity, and Sobriety,a Holy and godly Converfation adorning the Gospel What bath the Lord required of thee, but this, O Man, To do justly, and walk bumbly with thy God? So then, thou doft not worship Him in Truth, but in a Shadow; the Truth, is Holiness and Righ-feed the Flame of our Self-love and Corteousness; that external Profeffion is but a Ceremony; while you feparate thefe external Ordinances from thefe weighty Duties of Piety and Juftice, they are but as a 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 feea and loved. · ruption, have more Truth in them; and if you should worship God in all other Duties, and not especially in thofe, you do not worship Him in Truth. Next, Let us confider the Manner of Divine Worship: And this is as need ful to true Worship as true Matter, that it be commanded, and and done as it is commanded, that compleats true Worship. Now, I know no better. If you would then be true Worshippers, look the whole Mind of God, and efpeci-Way, or Manner, to worship God in than, ally the chief Pleasure of God's Mind, that fo to worship Him as our Worship may which He moft delights in; and by any carry. the Stamp of His Image upon it, as Means do not feparate what God hath con- it may be a Glafs wherein we may behold joyned; do not divide Righteoufnefs to- God's Nature and Properties: For fuch as wards Men from a Profeffion of Holiness Himself is, fuch He would be acknow to God, else it is but a Falfhood, a coun- ledged to be. I would think it were true. terfeit Coin; do not please your felves fo Worship indeed, which had engraven on much in external Church-privileges, with-it the Name of the True and Living God. out a Holy and Godly Converfation, ador- if it did fpeak out fo much, of it felf, That ning the Gofpel; but let the chief Study, God is, and that He is a Rewarder of Endeavour, and Delight of your Souls be them that feek Him diligently. Moft. about that which God moft delights in; Part of our Service speaks an unknown fetthe Subftantials of Religion have the first God, and carries fuch an Infcription upon Place in the Soul, pray more in fecret, it, To the unknown God: There is fo that will be the Life of your Souls; you little either Reverence, or Love, or Fear, ought, indeed, to attend publick Ordinan- or Knowledge in it, as if we did not wor ces, but above all, take heed to your Con- fhip the true God, but an Idol. It is faid, verfation and walking at Home, and in that the Fool fays in bis Heart, that Secret; Prayer in your Family is a more there is no God, because his Thoughts and, fubftantial Worship than to fit and hear Affections,and Actions are fo little compoPrayer in publick; and Prayer in fecret is fed to the Fear and Likeness of that God,as if if he did indeed plainly deny Him; I fear, | Rejoycing? Tremble and fear indeed, it may be faid thus of our Worship. It fays, There is no God; it is of fuch a Nature, that none could conclude from it, that it had any Relation to the true God; our Prayers deny 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 repercuffus redditur ipfe fibi. As it is a pure and clean Fountain, in which a Man may fee his Shadow diftinctly, but a troubled Fountain or Myre in which he cannot behold himself; fo it is pure Worship, which receives and reflects the pure Image of God, but impure and unclean Worship, which cannot receive it, and return it. I pray you Chriftians confider this, for it is fuch Worshippers the Father feeks; and why feeks He fuch? but because in them He finds Himfelf (fo to fpeak :) His own Image and Superfcription is upon them, His Mercy is engraven on their Faith and Confidence; His Majefty and Power is tamped on their Humility and Reverence; His Goodness is to be read on the Soul's rejoycing, His Greatnefs and Juftice in the Soul's trembling. Thus there ought to be fome Engravings on the Soul, anfwering the Characters of His glorious Name: O how little of this is among them that defire to know fomething of God? How little true Worship, even among them whom the Father hath fought out to make true Worshippers? But alas! How are all of us unacquainted with this kind of Worship? We ftay upon the firft Principles and Practices of Religion, and go not on to build upon the Foundation : Sometimes your Worship hath a Stamp of God's Holiness and Juftice in Fear and Terror at fuch a Majefty, which makes you to tremble before Him; but where is the Stamp of His Mercy and Grace which fhould be written in your Faith and but rejoyce with trembling, because there is Mercy with Him: Sometime there is Rejoycing and Quietnefs in the Soul, but that quickly degenerates into carnal Confidence, and makes the Soul turn Grace into Wantonnefs, and efteem of it felf above what is right, because it is not counterpoifed with the Senfe and Apprehenfion of His Holiness and Juftice; But, O to have these jointly written on the Heart, in Worship, Fear, Reverence, Confidence, Humility, and Faith! That is a rare Thing; It is a Divine Compofition and Temper of Spirit that makes a Divine Soul: For the moft Part, our Worship favours and smells nothing of God, neither His Power, nor His Mercy and Grace, nor his Holiness and Juftice, nor His Majesty and Glory; a fecure, faint, formal Way, void of Reverence, of Humility, of Fervency, and of Faith. I beseech you, let us confider, as before the Lord, how much. Pains and Time we lofe, and please none but our felves, and profit none at all: Stir up your felves as in his Sight; for it is the keeping of our Souls continually as in His Sight, which will ftamp our Service with His Likeness; The fixed and conftant Meditation on God and His glorious Properties, this will beget the Refemblance between our Worship, and the God whom we worship, and it will imprint His Image upon it, and then it fhould pleafe Him, and then it should profit thee, and then it fhould edifie others. But more particularly: True Worship muft have the Stamp of God's fpiritual Nature, and be conformed to it in fome Measure, elfe 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 once upon Man, and make him like God again;Now, it is this Way that Jefus Chrift repairs this Image, and brings about the Conformity with God, by the Soul's worfhipping of God fuitable to His Nature, which as it grows more and more fuitable to God's Nature, it is the more and more like God, and happy in that Likenels. Now, God is a Spirit, therefore (faith Chrift) you must worfbip Him in Spirit and Truth. The Worship then of Saints must be of a spiritual Nature, that it may be like the immortal Divine Spirit: It is luch Worshippers the Father feeks; He feeks Souls to make them like Himself, and this Likeness and Conformity to God is the very Foundation of the Soul's Happiness, and eternal Refreshment. | Doctrines (that calls themselves fo) which This is a Point of great Confequence, and I fear, not laid to Heart. The Worfhip muft 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 Bufinefs: What Communion can God have with your Bodies, while your Souls are removed far from Him, more than with Beafts? All Society and Fellowship must be between thofe that are like one another: A Man can have no comfortable Company with Beafts, 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 Days of the Gospel we were not called to an external and bodily Worship, to any Service to which our outward Man is inftrumental; that is one of the deep Delufions of this Age, into which fome Men, reprobate concerning the Faith, have fallen, that there should be no external Ordinances but that Chriftians are now called to a Worship, all Spirit, pure Spirit,&c. This is one of the Spirits, and fpiritual breathe |