the natural so in the spiritual body every member is in office and that the Ministry of the New Testament being the Ministration of the Spirit is common to all that have received the Spirit Wherefore if every Believer hath received the Spirit to profit withall and hath power and priviledge as opportunity serves and necessity requires to speak the word that the power and vertue of Christ may be declared through them all there is no doubt but any Community of Christians may by a common consent chuse one or mo to speak to all in the name of all Agreeable to this is that of Paul 2 Tim. 2.2 where he commands That the office of teaching be committed to faithful men who are able to teach others Where the Apostle contemning all superfluous ceremonies and pomp of ordaining onely seeks that the Ministers may be fit and able to teach and without any more ado commits the Ministry of the word unto them More particularly in this matter we shall require after these three things 1. What Officers are to be chosen 2. Out of whom they are to be chosen And 3. By whom they are to be chosen For the first What Officers are to be chosen Paul teaches us this saying They must be faithful men apt and able to teach others For as among natural men in the world they that have most natural power and abilities are fittest to be the Officers so among spiritual men in the Church they are fittest to be the Officers that have most spiritual power that is such in whom Christ and the Spirit are most manifest and of this the faithful of all sorts are Iudges Wherefore no natural parts and abilities nor no humane learning and degrees in the Schools or Vniversities nor no Ecclesiastical Ordination or Orders are to be reckoned sufficient to make any man a Minister but only the teaching of God and gifts received of Christ by the Spirit for the work of the Ministry which the faithful are able to discern and judge of 2 Out of whom these Officers are to be chosen And that is out of the flock of Christ and nowhere else Indeed Antichrist bringing in humane learning instead of the Spirit chose his Ministers onely out of the Vniversities but the right Church chuses them out of the faithful seeing it reckons no man learned and so fit to speak in the Church but he that hath heard and learned from the Father Moreover it is plain that as natural power is founded on a natural gift and he must needs be a man that is capable of humane power so supernatural power is founded on a supernatural gift and he must needs be a Believer that is capable of this spiritual power And so a man must needs first be of the Church ere he can have any power or office in it Wherefore all unbelievers and carnal men are so far from having any power in the true Church that they have no place in it and are so far from being Officers that they are not members For they that neither have nor know spiritual power themselves how can they exercise it among others 3. By whom they are to be chosen And that is by the Congregation or Community of Believers For if every free Society hath power to chuse its own Officers much more hath the true Church this power being as is said the freest Society under heaven And so the true Church is not to have Officers thrust over them by others but is to chuse them its self If any object against this that Paul commanded Timothy and Titus to appoint Elders and that Paul and Barnabas Act. 14.23 did chuse Elders in every Church with prayer and fasting And therefore it may seem that the Congregation hath not power to chuse its own Ministers but that some chief Ministers must appoint other Ministers in each Congregation To this I answer That if there were any Ministers among us that did hold the place of the Apostles living and acting evidently in the vertues of Christ and in the knowledge and power of the Spirit I would not doubt to allow them as much authority in ordaining Ministers as Paul and Barnabas or any of the other Apostles had But since it is very evident that very few of these have the Spirit of the LORD upon them how should they have Authority to appoint Ministers who cannot themselves be reckoned Believers or spiritual But secondly If they were true Ministers through the anointing of the Spirit yet could they not appoint Ministers in other Congregations without their own consent and approbation but those whom the whole Church chuses they are to commend to God by prayer and if they should refuse to do this yet he who is chosen by the Church is sufficiently its Minister through the Churches choice alone Neither did Paul or Barnabas or Timothy or Titus appoint any Minister by their own single Authority without the consent of the Church as may appear by those Scriptures 1 Tim. 3. and Titus 1. where Paul saith The Overseers or Elders as also the Deacons or Ministers should be blameless and unreproveable Now neither Timothy nor Titus knew of themselves who were blameless in those places but onely received the Testimony of the Church which chose them to that office Further we see Act. 6. that the Twelve Apostles together did not by themselves appoint any to a lower office to wit to be Deacons without the Churches own choice of them But say the Twelve to the multitude of the Disciples Look ye out among your selves seven men of honest report full of the holy Spirit and wisedom whom we may appoint over this business And those whom the Church chose the Apostles confirmed Wherefore if it were not lawful for the Apostles at their own pleasure to appoint men to minister so much as alms to the necessities of the poor without the choice and consent of the Church much less was it lawful for them to appoint any among Believers to the hard and difficult work of the Ministry without their own choice and approbation By all which it is clear that the Congregations of the faithful have power in themselves according to the doctrine of the Gospel to chuse their own Ministers And therefore seeing the true Church of God cannot possibly be without the word seeing it is born and nourished and encreased and strengthened and preserved and comforted and perfected by it And seeing the generality of the Clergy of these times are ignorant of the mystery of the Gospel and destitute of the Spirit it must come to pass that either the Church must perish for want of the word or else according to what we have heard Believers must meet together as they can conveniently up and down the Kingdom and such Meetings must chuse one or mo fit persons from among themselves to be their Elders in the Lord and then by prayer to commend them to the work of the Ministry and so to
come take heed lest by seeking your selves you have your reward here but do the work of God for God and whilst you act for God live in him and let him be your reward and not the creature And now here in this Dicourse shall you see a better Peace and Agreement then you are striving for though your work also be excellent and glorious even such a Peace and Agreement of which Christ himself is the immediate Author and Prince and which he communicates not to the world but to them he chooses out of the world even the Peace of God in Iesus Christ by the Spirit which hath its foundation in Christ and its influence into each Communion of Saints all the world over And this Peace can no more be brought about by your Sword then by the Magistrates Scepter and therefore take heed lest you now having power in your hands to another purpose should so far forget your selves as to do that your selves which you have condemned in others Therefore suffer the Word only to be both Scepter and Sword in the Kingdom of God and let the true Church remain free in the Freedom which Christ hath conferr'd upon it or else the Lord whose own the Church is will as certainly in his due time take the sword out of your hands as he hath done the Scepter out of the Magistrate's and throw you into one destruction with him But I am perswaded better things of you though I thus speak and even such things as are suitable to the light of the Gospel and to the vertues and graces of Christ and his Spirit which have been hitherto and I hope will yet still be very manifest not only in You Honorable Ones who have the chief Conduct but also in very many of the Councel and Army besides And upon such a gathering together of Gods people and Saints let the world if it please still laugh at that word who can but think he hath some choice and singular work in hand for his own glory The Lord God Almighty hath already done great and wonderful works by you and is yet doing greater if you will continue to beleeve and obey and in all these things he only is to be exalted and not You. For hath not that Day of the Lord of Hosts dawned yea the morning of it is already gone forth Which is upon every one that is proud and lofty and upon every one that is lifted up and he is to be brought low and the Lord alone is and must be exalted in this day Now the Lord cause you to dwell and continue in that Church which is the body of Christ and habitation of God and give you peace with those that are reconciled to God by Christ and to one another in Christ by the Spirit in which union and communion I remain Your assured Servant W. D. TO THE READER SUCH are the noises of waters and thundrings and earthquakes among us and so great and continued are our shakings and confusious through hatred and love hopes and fears joyes and sorrows triumphs and indignations that there is no silence in heaven for so much as half an hour Wherefore though I 〈…〉 here touching so sweet and glorious a thing as PEACE and 〈◊〉 â—eclare from the very word or else I had said nothing wherein the true peace of the true Church consists and also how the faithful and Churches may preserve that peace in their Communion with one another which they have in the Son and in the Father yet mens heads and hearts are now so full that it is to be doubted but few will regard it Notwithstanding considering that there is among us an election of grace and a flock of Christ who both know and will hear his voyce at any time I thought good to speak this in their behalf for whose profit all the creatures of God were made in the world and all the gifts of Christ are given in the Church And though I am very conscious of my rudeness of speech in this Discourse as also of my weakness and infirmity in many things having not yet attained to a perfect man and to the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ and so dare not say that every jot and tittle here is of the pure river of water of life without any humane mixture yet they that are spiritual and able to judge will own all in it that is of the word and spirit of truth and will not reject silver tryed four or five times because it is not tryed seven times And what is weak and imperfect in it the true Church of Christ for whose dear sake and love I have spoken all this seeing it is as Luther speaks The Queen of Mercy whose very bowels are meer compassions and forgivenesses of sins will easily pass it by and forgive it And as for men haughty and high in their own spirit contemning and disdaining any thing that agrees not to their palate I do as easily despise their censure as they lightly pass it It is enough that I seek the glory of Jesus Christ the Son of the living God and the welfare of that Church that is his body and for the rest let me become as vile as the Apostles were made to the world who were counted the filth and off souring of all things or as Mr Baily Rutherford Bastwick Pryn Love or any other of my old enemies in Parliament and City not worth the naming have sought to make me All whom unless God give them repentance to life I cite as once Hierom of Prague did his enemies in the like cause To appear within a few years before the most high and righteous Judge Jesus Christ to answer all that they have done wickedly if not maliciously against his Name Truth Gospel Spirit People and that under the form and pretence of godliness And now well knowing that the more any thing is of Christ the more enmity and opposition it Will meet with from the world and from the worldly Church I commit Christs own word and cause to his own care and protection who lives and reigns for this very purpose to uphold his own despised truth against the glorious but deceitful doctrines of men and to make all his enemies his foot-stool And so waiting in this assured hope if thou love Christ I remain Thine in him VVilliam Dell. The Contents THE Introduction pag. 149 The Gospel propounded is neither 1. Between the Church and the world p. 150 2. Nor between the Spiritual and Carnal children of the Church ibid. 3. But between the faithful or true children of the true Church p. 151 The true Church described p. 152 The true Church of God differs from the Churches of men in 13. particulars from p. 153 to p. 157 How this Church may be known p. 158 How we may be joyned to it p. 159 The Church a great mystery as well as Christ. p. 160 Seven bonds of this Churches Vnity viz.
one another but not masters and this same doctrine the Apostle Iames preacheth Iam. 3.1 My brethren saith he be not many Masters knowing that we shall receive the greater condemnation it is not fit for brethren who are equal among themselves to make themselves masters over one another Christ also hath spoken again so plainly to this matter Math. 20. that one would wonder that ever the Beast or his image should dare to arrogate to themselves Lordship over the People of God in so clear a light Ye know saith Christ to the twelve that the Princes of the Gentiles exercise Dominion over them and they that are great exercise authority over them but it shall not be so amongst you he speaks it peremptorily that some Believers should not exercise dominion and authority over Believers no not the greatest over the least all being fellow servants alike under one Lord. Wherefore they that are puffed up in their hearts against their fellow servants might better think thus with themselves why Christ is our Lord as well as theirs and is as much over us as over them and we are not over our fellow servants nor they under us but both of us are equally under Christ and Christ is equally over us both and so Christ hath given us the same laws he hath given them to wit that we should believe in him and love one another and he expects the same obedience from us as from them and so we are not to command one another but are all alike to be commanded by him It was the evil servant that beat his fellow servants upon hopes of the delay of his Masters coming And this is the fourth bond of the true Churches Vnity Vnity of Lord. Now they break this bond of the Churches Vnity that either make themselves or others Lords over the Church besides Christ and parcel out this one Kingdom of the Son to many Lords to the great dishonour of Christ and dis-union of the Church The Pope was the first that professed himself to be the general Master in the whole Church of God and after the Pope a general Councel took this honour to it self and by degrees this last became as hard yea a harder taskmaster to the Church then the former After when particular Kingdoms fell off from the Pope and his Antichristian Church the mystery of iniquity was not by this means wholly dissolved but only was contracted and brought into a less compass for then the Archbishop made himself general master of the Church in each particular Kingdom as the Pope before had done in all and after the Archbishop rises up a National Assembly as the General Councel after the Pope and each of these in their courses usurp Lordship over the Church of Christ to the sad dissolution of its unity Most evident then it is that during the time of the Apostasie the Church hath been most miserably Lorded even amongst us for the Priest he Lorded it over the People the Arch-deacon over the Priest the Dean over the Arch deacon the Bishop over the Dean and the Arch-bishop over the Bishop under which woful bondage the Church cried out as Isa. 26. O Lord our God other Lords besides thee have had dominion over us And is this bondage of the Church now eased by casting off those strange Lords Yea do not men rather seek to encrease it by setting yet stranger over it whose names are so full of mystery that the common people cannot understand them for now they would have the Classical Presbytery set over the Congregational and the Provincial over the Classical and the National over the Provincial for so it is Voted THAT IT IS LAWFULL AND AGREEABLE TO THE WORD OF GOD THAT THERE BE A SUBORDINATION OF CONGREGATIONAL CLASSICAL PROVINCIAL AND NATIONAL ASSEMBLIES FOR THE GOVERNMENT OF THE CHURCH Now here is mystery and nothing but a certain rising up into the old power under a new name And mark how they prove this subordination of Congregational Classical Provincial and National Assemblies to wit by that Scripture Mat. 18. where it is written If thy brother trespass against thee and will neither hear thy admonition nor councel nor the admonition and councel of other brethren TELL THE CHURCH that is the Congregation of the faithful Now from this place they prove the fore mentioned subordination of Assemblies just as the Pope once proved himself to be above the Emperour to wit because it is written Gen. 1. That God made two great lights the Sun to rule by day and the Moon by night Now if this might be brought about which they design the Church would be so far from being eased of its strange Lords that it should have them exceedingly multiplied for what is a National Assembly but an Archbishop multiplied and what a Provincial Assembly but a Bishop multiplied And a Classical but a Dean and Arch deacon multiplied And thus the former Lords being removed they would in their stead cause the Church to swarm with Classical Provincial and National Lords and would by no means suffer Christs own Kingdom to return to his own Lordship and Dominion And thus whilest they by secular power seek to enforce these Ecclesiastical Lords over the Church they absolutely break in pieces the unity of it even whilst they bear the simple people in hand that they above all other men seek to preserve it seeing the plurality of Lords is alwayes the cause of Schisms and divisions in the Church which can never be one but under one Lord the Lord Jesus Christ. The fifth bond of the true Churches Vnity is ONE FAITH The true Church of God hath but one Faith wrought by one Spirit apprehending the same Christ or the same living and eternal truth of God So that Abraham and Moses and David and all the Prophets and all the Apostles and we who now believe and all that shall believe hereafter all have and do and shall live in the same mystery of faith that is Believers in all Ages do not live their own lives but all live the life of Christ in their own soul and bodies each one receiving equally from Christ the life of Christ which they all live alike in him being one with him as the branches live equally the life of the Vine and one branch lives it not more then another Through faith then every Christian is carryed out of himself and all his own things into Christ whom he apprehends with all his fulness for his own and in this faith all Christians are equal and none hath a better or worse faith then another So that in regard of faith also there is among the true Church unity and equality For all Believers have one and the same faith of the operation of God wrought by the same Spirit which raised up Christ from the dead and that faith which the Spirit works neither sin death nor the devil can possibly prevail against and so the faith of the operation of
to presume to deny the Church this power which it hath received from him that hath all power in heaven and in earth Neither ought the true Church to suffer this power to be taken from them which they have received from so good a hand but still to use their own Christian meetings though the Powers of the world never so much oppose them as the Apostles and Believers in their time began and as Believers after for 300 years continued notwithstanding the barbarous cruelties of the persecuting Emperours 2. As the Church of the faithful hath power from Christ to meet together so secondly to appoint its own outward orders For the Church whilst it dwels in flesh and bloud uses some external Rites by which it is neither sanctified in soul or body but they are things meerly of outward Order and decency And these things each Church or Communion of Saints may order by it self according to the wisedom of the Spirit so it observe these Rules 1. That they do all things in love seeing all Laws without love are tyranny and so whatsoever is not from and for love is not to be appointed and if it be it is again to be abolished seeing no Text of the Scripture it self if it build not up love is rightly interpreted 2 They are to do all things for peace and all outward Orders in the Church must be to procure and to preserve Peace among the faithful and not to break it They are most unhappy and pernicious Orders that do not only offend a few of Christs little ones which it self is a sad thing but do grieve disquiet and prejudice the peace of the generality of the faithful 3. They must do all things after the wisdom of the Spirit and not after the manner of the world seeing the Church is not to be ordered according to the manner of the world but rather against it as the Apostle saith Be not conformed to this world 4. They must appoint nothing as of necessity For there is no more pestilent doctrine in the Church then to make those things necessary which are not necessary For thus the liberty of faith is extinguished and the consciences of men are ensnared We doubt not but Believers may order any outward things for their own good so they do not impose them necessarily on any as if the observing of them were righteousness and the omission of them sin And so the Church after all its Orders it is to leave indifferent things as it found them that is free and at the liberty of the faithful to observe or not observe as they shall see cause or judge convenient For all these kinde of things are indifferent in their own nature and God regards no more the manner and form and time and circumstances of spiritual duties then the manner and form c. of our eating and drinking and working and marrying and trading for all which it is sufficient if they be done in Christian wisdom and discretion without being tied necessarily to a set and unchangeable form 5. They may perswade their Orders if they see cause by the spirit of love and meekness but must not enforce them upon pain of secular punishment or Church censure as those use to do that make themselves Lords and Tyrants in the Church For these outward things the Church can order onely for the willing but not for the unwilling And so if some Believers shall think good upon just grounds to do otherwise in these outward things then the generality of the Church yet ought the Church to be so far from censuring them that it is to entertain Communion with them notwithstanding any such differences For when Christians are knit to Christ by faith and do receive and walk in his Spirit all other things are indifferent to them to do or not to do to use or not to use at their own freedom And Christ onely being sufficient for all his whatever is besides Christ is a perishing thing and so is so far from being to be imposed that in it self it is not to be valued Now if the Church do appoint any outward Orders these rules it is to observe yea the spiritual Church doth always observe them and never made rules in it self upon other terms then are here set down But on the contrary the carnal Church or Churches of men they especially trouble themselves about these outward things and of these they make Laws and Constitutions yea sin and righteousness and by these things they judge the Church and the members of Christ In such sort that they that will submit to their Rules and impositions shall be the Church of Christ but they that will not shall be reckoned Hereticks and Schismaticks And hereby they declare that they are fallen from the power of godliness to the form and from the substance of Religion to the circumstances inasmuch as they advance empty forms and shadows in the place of righteousness and peace and joy in the holy Spirit And to these we may say with Peter Why tempt ye God in putting such a yoak upon the Disciples and Members of Christ And though this kinde of Church will with these things still be troubling us and biting us by the heel yet in the power and prerogative of the seed of the Woman we will by degrees bruise its head till at last we break it quite in pieces Now one thing more I shall adde touching the Churches power to appoint its own Orders as conceiving it very necessary to be known and that is this That the true Church hath power to appoint these outward Orders not for it self onely but also for its Officers which also are part of it self and it is not to suffer its Officers to frame or impose such on it For the Church is not the Officers but the Officers are the Churches as Paul hath taught us saying to the Church All things are yours whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas And so the Officers are the Churches and are to be ordered by it in these things but are not to order it And if the Officers of the Church forgetting that they are servants shall presume by themselves to order outward things for the Church without the Church as now is done the Church still remains above the Officers and hath power to interpret change or wholly take away all those things as it sees occasion to wit so far as they are a stumbling block to the weak and a grief to the strong and tend to work division among the faithful Presumptuous Officers are they and know not where Christ hath set them who instead of being ordered by the Church go about to order it and make themselves the Lords of the Church being but the servants of it 3. The true Church hath power to chuse its Officers and if there be cause to reform them or depose them The Church hath power to chuse its own Officers True indeed it is that as in