Answ. Yes: most ministers study the methodical form of their sermons before they preach them; and many write the very words, or study them: and so most sermons are a form. And sure it is as lawful to think beforehand what to say in praying as in preaching.[320]
1. That which God hath not forbidden is lawful; but God hath not forbidden ministers to study their sermons or prayers, either for matter, method, or words, and so to make them many ways a form.
2. That which God prescribed is lawful (if he reverse it not): but God prescribed public forms of prayer; as the titles and matter of many of the Psalms prove, which were daily used in the Jewish synagogues.
Object. Psalms being to be sung, are more than prayers.
Answ. They were prayers, though more. They are called prayers, and for the matter many of them were no more than prayers, but only for the measures of words: nor was their singing like ours now, but liker to our saying. And there are many other prayers recorded in the Scripture.
3. And all the churches of Christ at least these thirteen or fourteen hundred years have taken public forms for lawful; which is not to be gainsayed without proof.
[320] God gave forms of preaching to Moses and the prophets: see a large form of prayer for all true people, Deut. xxvi. 13-15. And so elsewhere there are many.
Quest. LXXIII. Are public forms of man's devising or composing lawful?
Answ. Yes: 1. The ministers afore-mentioned throughout the christian world, do devise and compose the form of their own sermons and prayers: and that maketh them not unlawful. 2. And whoever speaketh ex tempore, his words are a form when he speaketh them, though not a premeditated form. 3. And when Scripture so vehemently commandeth us to search, meditate, study the Scriptures, and take heed unto ourselves and unto doctrine, &c. what a person is that who will condemn prayer or preaching, only because we beforehand studied or considered what to say! as if God abhorred diligence and the use of reason. Men are not tied (now) from thinking beforehand what to say to the judge at the bar for estate or life, or what to say on an embassage, or to a king, or any man that we converse with. And where are we forbidden to forethink what to say to God? Must the people take heed how they hear, and look to their foot when they go into the house of God? and must not we take heed what we speak, and look to our words that they be fit and decent?
Object. Forms are images of prayer and preaching, forbidden in the second commandment?