A93248:72
The glorious feast of the Gospel. Or, Christs gracious invitation and royal entertainment of…The glorious feast of the Gospel. Or, Christs gracious invitation and royall entertainment of…
The glorious feast of the Gospel. Or, Christs gracious invitation and royal entertainment of believers. Wherein amongst other things these comfortable doctrines are spiritually handled: Viz. 1. The marriage feast between Christ and his Church. 2. The veil of ignorance and unbelief removed. 3. Christs conquest over death. 4. The wiping away of tears from the faces of Gods people. 5. The taking away of their reproaches. 6. The precious promises of God, and their certain performance. 7. The divine authority of the holy scriptures. 8. The duty and comfort of waiting upon God. / Delivered in divers sermons upon Isai.25 chap.6,7,8,9 verses, by the late reverend, learned and faithful minister of the Gospel, Richard Sibbs, D.D. Master of Katharine-Hall in Cambridge, and preacher at Gray's-Inn, London. Perused by those that were instructed to revise his writings.The glorious feast of the Gospel. Or, Christs gracious invitation and royall entertainment of believers. Wherein amongst other things these comfortable doctrines are spiritually handled: Viz. 1. The marriage feast between Christ and his Church. 2. The vaile of ignorance and unbeliefe removed. 3. Christs conquest over death. 4. The wiping away of teares from the faces of Gods people. 5. The taking away of their reproaches. 6. The precious promises of God, and their certaine performance. 7. The divine authority of the holy scriptures. 8. The duty and comfort of waiting upon God. / Delivered in divers sermons upon Isai.25 chap.6,7,8,9 verses, by the late reverend, learned and faithfull minister of the Gospell, Richard Sibbs, D.D. Master of Katharine-Hall in Cambridge, and preacher at Grayes-Inne, London. Perused by those that were instructed to revise his writings.
London: printed for John Rothwell, 1650
Title page typeset from the transcription.
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
It is not enough to have a stomach,1 but we must have a spiritual disposition of soul to heavenly things,2 as we have to outward things. Labour to have a taste of good things, and a distinguishing taste of heavenly things from other things: God is the God of nature, and hath furnished us with five senses, and as he hath given us sense to apprehend▪ so he hath furnished the Creature with varieties of excellencies, suitable to all our several senses; he will not have objects in the Creature without sense, nor sense in man without objects:3 He hath furnished man with senses, and variety of senses, and given fit and proportionable objects for those senses: The soul also hath her sense, wheresoever there is life there is sense. God having given spiritual life to the soul, he doth maintain that life with spiritual food. As in a Feast there is sight, and the eye is not only fed there with rich furniture, but with variety of dainties; the ear likewise, & the smell is satisfied, the one with Music, the other with sweet savours. So in this ⟨p. 22⟩Feast there is to delight both the ear, and the smell of the soul, the one with hearing the gracious promises of Jesus Christ, and the other in receiving the sweet savour of that sacrifice, that was offered up once for all; nothing so sweet to the soul as the blessings of Christ; he is sweet in the word, as the vessel that conveyeth him into our souls. Thus you see in this feast all the senses, the sight, the smell, the taste, and hearing, all are satisfied: and a great care had in the provision for the Feast, that our outward man may be pleased. And shall the Lord of Hosts make a Feast, and not content the whole man? he is for our sight, if we have spiritual eyes to see; the ear, if we have ears to hear; all the senses are exercised here: What is the reason why carnal men cannot relish a pardon for sin, and justification, and sanctification, and holiness, nor go boldly to God? It may be they have good sweet notions of these, but they have no spiritual taste or relish of them, and all, because they want spiritual life; None but a Christian can have spiritual taste answerable to a spiritual life. Taste is a kind of feeling, one of the most necessary senses, and a Christian cannot be without relish and feeling; yea it is the very being of a Christian to have a taste of spiritual things: