A guide to godliness or a Treatise of a Christian life showing the dutiesA guide to godlynesse or a Treatise of a Christian life shewing the duties

§. Sect. 1 That God requireth outward service to be joined with the inward.

§. Sect. 1 That God requireth outward seruice to be ioyned with the inward.

But howsoever the Lord doth chiefly require and delight in the inward service of the soul, and the integrity and sincerity of the heart; yet doth he not rest in it alone, but requireth also the service of the body and outward man, and that we should at all times, and upon all occasions, express and approve our inward piety in our external practice, and the uprightness of our hearts, which is only known to him, by our holiness and righteousness shining in the whole course of our lives and conversation, which is subject to mans view, that thereby we may be justified, that is, declared righteous before them, as by the other we are known unto our selves to be justified by faith before God, of which, that inward holiness and obedience is a principal fruit. And because every one would be ready to boast of the sincerity of the heart which cannot be discerned, God would have us to approve and make it known, by bringing forth the fruits of it in our outward and bodily service. So the Apostle exhorteth us, not to let sin reign in our bodies, that we should obey it in the lusts thereof; neither yield our ¹members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin, but yield our selves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and our members as instruments of righteousness unto God. And as we have yielded our members servants to uncleanness and to iniquity, so we should now yield our members servants to righteousness ²unto holiness. That we should present, not only our souls, but our bodies likewise, a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is our reasonable ³service, that we should possess our vessels in purity and honour, and preserve our bodies from all defilement, as it becometh the Temples of the