Reason 6. A spiritual worship is to be offered to God, because no worship but that can be acceptable. We can never be secured of acceptance without it; He being a Spirit, nothing but the worship in Spirit can be suitable to him: What is unsuitable, cannot be acceptable: There must be something in us, to make our services capable of being presented by Christ for an actual acceptation. No service is acceptable to God by Jesus Christ, but as it is a spiritual Sacrifice, and offered by a spiritual heart, 1 Pet. 2.5. The Sacrifice is first spiritual, before it be acceptable to God by Christ: When it is an offering in righteousness, it is then, and only then pleasant to the Lord, Mal. 3.3, 4. No Prince would accept a gift that is unsuitable to his Majesty, and below the condition of the person that presents it: Would he be pleased with a bottle of water for drink, from one that hath his Cellar full of wine? How unacceptable must that be, that is unsuitable to the Divine Majesty? And what can be more unsuitable, than a withdrawing the operations of our Souls from him, in the oblation of our Bodies? We as little glorify God as God, when we give him only a corporeal worship; as the Heathen did, when they represented him in a corporeal shape*; one as well as the other denies his spiritual nature: This is worse, for had it been lawful to represent God to the eye, it could not have been done, but by a bodily figure suited to the sense; but since it is necessary to worship him, it cannot be by a corporeal attendance, without the operation of the Spirit. A spiritual frame is more pleasing to God, than the highest exterior adornments; than the greatest gifts, and the highest Prophetical illuminations. The glory of the second Temple exceeded the glory of the first*: As God accounts the spiritual glory of Ordinances most beneficial for us, so our spiritual attendance upon Ordinances is most pleasing to him; He that offers the greatest services without it, offers but flesh, Hos. 8.13. They sacrifice Flesh for the Sacrifices of my Offerings, but the Lord accepts them not. Spiritual frames are the Soul of Religious services; all other carriages without them, are contemptible to this Spirit: We can never lay claim to that promise of God, none shall seek my face in vain: We affect a vain seeking of him, when we want a due temper ⟨p. 160⟩of Spirit for him:
Reason 6. A spiritual worship is to be offered to God, because no worship but that can be acceptable. We can never be secured of acceptance without it; He being a Spirit, nothing but the worship in Spirit can be sutable to him: What is unsutable, cannot be acceptable: There must be something in us, to make our services capable of being presented by Christ for an actual acceptation. No service is acceptable to God by Jesus Christ, but as it is a spiritual Sacrifice, and offered by a spiritual heart, 1 Pet. 2.5. The Sacrifice is first spiritual, before it be acceptable to God by Christ: When it is an offering in righteousness, it is then, and only then pleasant to the Lord, Mal. 3.3, 4. No Prince would accept a gift that is unsutable to his Majesty, and below the condition of the person that presents it: Would he be pleased with a bottle of water for drink, from one that hath his Cellar full of wine? How unacceptable must that be, that is unsutable to the Divine Majesty? And what can be more unsutable, than a withdrawing the operations of our Souls from him, in the oblation of our Bodies? We as little glorifie God as God, when we give him only a corporeal worship; as the Heathen did, when they represented him in a corporeal shape*; one as well as the other denies his spiritual nature: This is worse, for had it been lawful to represent God to the eye, it could not have been done, but by a bodily figure suted to the sense; but since it is necessary to worship him, it cannot be by a corporeal attendance, without the operation of the Spirit. A spiritual frame is more pleasing to God, than the highest exterior adornments; than the greatest gifts, and the highest Prophetical illuminations. The glory of the second Temple exceeded the glory of the first*: As God accounts the spiritual glory of Ordinances most beneficial for us, so our spiritual attendance upon Ordinances is most pleasing to him; He that offers the greatest services without it, offers but flesh, Hos. 8.13. They sacrifice Flesh for the Sacrifices of my Offerings, but the Lord accepts them not. Spiritual frames are the Soul of Religious services; all other carriages without them, are contemptible to this Spirit: We can never lay claim to that promise of God, none shall seek my face in vain: We affect a vain seeking of him, when we want a due temper ⟨p. 160⟩of Spirit for him:
- *Rom. 1.21.
- *Hag. 2.8, 9.
