Selected quad for the lemma: christian_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
christian_n	bind_v	church_n	communion_n	1,436	5	9.0889	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A42453	The papists bait or their usual method in gaining proselites answered by Charles Gataker ... ; to which is added, a letter of the Lord Viscount Falkland to the same gentleman, much to this present purpose.	Gataker, Charles, 1614 or 15-1680.; Falkland, Lucius Cary, Viscount, 1610?-1643.	1674 (1674)	Wing G308; ESTC R9378	63,487	89

discern a good tree from a bad by the fruit as our Saviour directs us to do then we must first know what is good and bad in fruit and then consider what fruit the tree bears and from thence give a judgement of the tree This is the method which we must take in the enquiring for a true Church Till we know what is Truth and that is the Faith once delivered to the Saints we cannot know what Church brings forth good or bad fruit Profession of faith is bearing of fruit The goodness of this fruit is Truth that is agreeableness to the Word of God It is therefore necessary that we know the Truth before we can know a Church to be true Now though the Truth or the holy Catholick Faith may be under doubt and debate yet hath God set it up in the Scriptures so conspicuously that if the Gospel be hid it is hid to them that perish Therefore I added to the Character of the Church by which I designed it to be known that is the profession of faith the means whereby we may know what the faith is which being professed is the sole certain mark of a true Church For the marks of the Church which Romanists commonly give are separable from the Truth and if they be taken singly without truth are false and treacherous indices whereas the true faith of it self is a sure note of a true Church And I pointed at Scripture which is the Rule of faith on purpose in mine Answer that I might not be thought to send a man to look for a thing in the dark without a light And now Sir do you judge whether I have deserved blame by my designation of the Catholick Church by professing the Catholick Faith But to make mine Answer both applicable to the Question and also useful to you I shall a little explicate and enlarge my sence It is presumed that the enquiry after a Church is made by a Christian that may be distracted in the variety of visible Societies differing one from another but every one equally pretending to be a Church but his distraction is the greater because of all Societies only the Roman Synagogue doth challenge to her self to be the Ark out of which there is no salvation There are three Reasons which may move Christians to enquire for a Church or a visible Society of Christians 1. That they may serve God and offer up the spiritual sacrifices of praise and prayer by Christ Jesus 2. That they may grow in grace and the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ 3. That they may joyn with Gods people and keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace by communicating together in Gods holy Ordinances To compass these ends a Christian is not concerned to enquire where the Catholick Church is for it is confessedly diffused through the Nations but so spread by Gods dispensation of the light that the Sun of righteousness doth not at one time arise to all parts of the world Besides the Candlestick is moveable from any place and the Kingdom of God may be transferred from one Nation to another neither hath God by any the least indication of his will and pleasure encouraged any portion of mankind or part of the world to promise to themselves a perpetual establishment of the Church in that place and in that successive body of men which at some time hath been or is now irradiated with the Gospel It is therefore not at all material to trouble our selves with delineations of the Catholick Church which hath no set or certain limits of extent That which concerns us to know is what Church pretending to be a member of the Church Universal for no men but Papists that can admit contradictions into their Creed will speak such non-sense with deliberation as that is when they call a particular society of Christians combined under one Bishop the Universal Church is fit and safe to be communicated withal that we must reap the benefits of a Christian Congregation Therefore the Question is now whether the Church wherein I was born and baptized and by Gods Providence am seated under its government or another different society of Christians which invite me to their communion be such a company as I may safely joyn with them in all publick offices of Religion For if it be I am bound to communicate with that Church as being a member of the Body of Christ the unity of which Body I am bound to maintain The Truth therefore of the doctrine taught the integrity and purity of the divine worship celebrated and the way of administring Ecclesiastical power must be examined by some Rule and known to be agreeable to the Gospel of Christ before a Christians conscience can be satisfied of the necessity of communion with that Church upon this account because it is a member of a Church Catholick Since then it is the custome to call any publick society of Christians that are compacted together by a frame of political government into one body a Church that particular Church is a member of the Catholick which holds that Faith the profession whereof constitutes the Church Catholick He that sleights this Designation would have dealt kindly with us if he had discovered unto us a better way or a clearer Light by which we might find the Church and discover a true Church from a vain pertender Till he or some other do that office for us we think it best to seek for a Church if we were now to seek by looking for the light of truth in it which alwaies shines in the house of God And because truth and peace are both the legacies of Christ bequeathed unto the Church we may do well to try what society of Christians doth follow peace and edification of the Body of Christ If the Church of Rome that sets up Images of God which are the teachers of lies in their Temples and by her Anathemaes makes divisions in Christendome be tryed by those two marks I leave the event to any one that will impartially pronounce sentence according to the evidence of fact in the whole bulk of their doctrines and Devotions and in their publick Government My fourth Answer hath the same fate with the former to be called not Categorical I must learn new Logick as well as new Theologie to understand this Gentleman But it is charged with defect because it reflects not upon the whole Question and takes no notice of the tail wherein the sting of the Scorpion lies I confess mine Answer comes short in that particular because I did not apprehend then the last clause of his question to be of any moment For I thought it enough that the Church Catholick is secured from any error that is destructive of Salvation But because I am now informed that the main force of the Querie lies in this Whether the Holy Church so designed can teach any error as matter of Faith endangering of Salvation

I now make a return to that part as well as to the former and indeed to the whole Question 1. Errors that endanger Salvation do not alwaies destroy it 2. God hath promised to preserve his Church from destruction but not from danger 3. All errors when they are discovered are to be rejected 4. No doctrines offered by any Church to her Children are to be received without examination 5. The Catholick Church as it signifies the whole Body of Christendome is too big to be a teacher that may be consulted and hearkened unto 6. The Church in this mans sense and explication that is an Assembly of chief Pastors in Council may teach errors endangering Salvation Arianism hath been taught in as large Assemblies of chief Pastors as the true Faith hath been 7. But because it is the design of this man that we should take the Roman Church for the Catholick I stick not to say that the Roman Church teaches her children errors that endanger the attaining of Salvation My fift Answer is excepted against for the interposition of these words so long as it continues so which looks like a condition and seem to suppose that the Catholick Church can cease to be so The words are capable of another construction viz. The Holy Catholick Church so long as it continues secured from teaching destructive errors cannot even for that reason abuse the world with forged Scriptures This was then my meaning who had no intention that my last Answer should contradict my first Let us now see what he draws from my Answer if it were Categorical and how rational his inference is For now we are come to the bottom of his project And he thinks he hath catched us so fast in his trap that either we must give him the Cause or be condemned out of our own mouths If mine Answer be says this new fashioned Logician that the Church can never ohtrude false Scripture c. then you must grant that the Catholick visible Church is infallible in the delivery of Scripture If so then is there an infallible Judg upon the earth concerning this point How rash this inference is and how incoherent the conclusion with the premises a few words will serve to discover It is acknowledged on both sides that the primitive Church which received the Scriptures was not and because Gods spirit guided and governed the Church in this important business could not be abused and mistaken in the receiving of Canonical Scripture The Catholick Church being quickly after enlarged and spred through many regions of the earth did together with the Gospel preached receive Copies of the Scriptures which had been communicated by the particular Churches to which they were directed at first unto their neighbour Churches These Scriptures were by all Churches reverenced and preserved as the Grand Charter of their Salvation and the Laws and Records of their Society as the Church was the Kingdome of Christ distinguished from the world The zeal of Christians for their Laws and their knowledg of them which were frequently read in the publick Assemblies according to an * Apostolical order to which we must add above all the Providence of Gods watching over the Church for the preservation of Scriptures being more pretious to God than to Man and as pretious to God as the world it self these being well considered may assure us that it was morally impossible that the whole Church of God should be cousened into the reception of any forged Scriptures And if the Church in following ages could not combine together to coyn counterfeit Scriptures then the Church universal could never obtrude any thing upon the world for Canonical Scripture which was not received from the Primitive Church at first But how doth it follow from hence that the Church is an Infallible Judg in this point A creditable witness is not presently an Infallible Judg. A faithful Depositary that keeps Records is not the same thing with an unerring Judg. The Tradition of the Church Universal which hath derived the Holy Scriptures from age to age is not an Act of Judicature The Nation of the Jews is at this day a credible witness of the divine Original and authority of the Old Testament at least at the first plantation of the Church Christian the Jevvish Church did preserve and deliver the Holy Scriptures intire so much at least as God thought necessary or expedient and if any book vvere lost that by being lost became unnecessary and vvas secured by Gods Providence in the conveyance of his Oracles to Christians Doth it hence follovv that the People of the Jews was a visible Infallible Judg in that point and if so then in all matters of Faith For thus the Papist proceeds If so I require some satisfactory reason says the Querist why the Church should be infallible in this and fallible in other points of Faith c. I have already shewed that the Case is not so as this man imagines therefore I am not bound to give him the satisfaction which he requires Yet for your further information I add this 1. The reception and tradition of Scriptures by the Church is a fact which God orders as expedient for the preservation of Religion 2. The certain number of the Books written by inspiration is not a point of faith necessary for every Christian to know and believe unto Salvation 3. The Catholick Church cannot err in any point of faith necessary to salvation 4. But any particular Church may believe and teach erroneous Doctrine for matter of Faith The Church of Rome which is not the sole keeper of Scripture may and doth err in several points of their Religion and doth impose upon her children uncanonical Books for Scripture and false Doctrines for matters of faith as is evident by the Canons of the Conventicle of Trent And yet it is not in the power of the Church of Rome to abuse the whole Christian world by the imposition of counterfeit Scriptures upon it I shall yet persist in my reflexion upon the Jews that I may shew that the keeping of Scriptures without forgery falsification and corruption is a thing distinct and separable from erring teaching errors The Jews cannot be denied to have been good keepers of the Books even then when they corrupted the Religion enjoyned by the Law written in those Books Never yet was any man so weak as to conclude that the Priests and Rabbies of the Jews were Infallible Judges of the Doctrine concerning the Messias even those who condemned Christ the Son of God to be guilty of blasphemy and worthy of death because they kept the Books of Moses and the Prophets There is now less reason why we should take the present Church of Rome which we evidently see to teach Doctrines and set up a worship as contrary to the Scriptures as darkness is to light to be an infallible Judge of faith upon this account because the Primitive Roman Church in communion with other Churches did

and also industriously mislead others as well as for the good of our fellow-travellers whose company we desire to keep in Gods wayes of truth and peace the Minister hath complied with the Gentlemans desires in this particular and both have the Christian civility to communicate the use of their Light to all travellers that may reap benefit by it whether they be in or out of the way But because we publish the Writings of a Papist we desire to assure the Reader that the Gentleman is not so void of Honour which is his particular Conscience and the Minister is not so forgetfull of his Office whereof Fidelity is the quality as that either of them should by any wilfull alteration corrupt and falsifie them in the private conveyance or in the present publishing The Minister indeed in his second pains of preparing all for the Press by transcription hath upon the review of his own Letter to his Friend added two short Considerations which for distinctions sake are inclosed within these marks Also he hath made some small alteration in a few sentences for the fuller explication of his own Answers This he thinks it necessary to advertise the Reader of because the Romanist who gave out the Questions and made the Reply may have the curiosity to peruse this Book as being concerned in it If then he shall compare my Letter as it now runs with that which was formerly imparted to him and find something altered and some things added he hath yet no reason to cavil or carp at the Ministers proceeding as unsincere or to charge him with foul play in calling this the Letter to his Friend dated June 18. 1666. For he hath unsaid nothing which was then delivered and he hath only endeavoured both to make himself to be better understood then he might have been before and also to instruct his Friend more fully concerning two particulars which he had occasion to treat of If therefore the Romanist list to read this second Edition of the Letter he will have cause to thank the Minister for his double diligence to discover his errors and to give him fuller satisfaction then formerly And this comes timely enough to prevent his Defence or to procure his Amendment Thus gentle Reader thou maist perceive the whole design of the publication of this party-coloured Discourse I shall detain thee yet a little longer with offering unto thee a Consideration that is near a kin to our Matter in hand We see the indefatigable diligence of Romanists equal to that of the Scribes and Pharisees whom our Blessed Saviour branded with the infamous character of Hypocrites and denounced a dreadfull Woe against them for their restless travels and divelish labours in compassing Sea and Land to make one Proselyte I desire my Christian Reader to observe the Parallel between them The Roman Sheep-stealers of this Age the Scribes and Pharisecs took upon them to be the Guides of Gods people in that Nation of the Jews which was the only visible Church of God at that day and had obtained great credit with the vulgar by the ostentation of counterfeit holiness boasting of knowledge and pretence of Authority The Jewish Church was then very corrupt in Religion not indeed by Idolatry as formerly before the Babylonian Captivity for the smart of Gods rod lying long on their backs made them after their return for everweary of Idols but by a tenacious adherence to humane Traditions which burden how heavy and hard to be born the Lawyers considered not but the Scribes and Pharisees bound upon the consciences of the people for religious Ordinances of divine original not written in the Law of Moses but traduced by oral tradition of the Fathers It was then as David speaks high time for the Lord to work to lay to his hand that is his Ministry when they had destroyed Gods Law and made his Commandements of none effect by the traditions of men Yea St. Peter says that Christ died to redeem his people by his blood from that vain conversation which the Jews were enslaved unto by the tradition of their Fathers The Pharisees then that took such pains to make Proselytes did not make it their business to gain strangers to the Commonwealth of Israel unto a communion with the people of the God of Abraham according to the pure Law of Moses for which Christ certainly would never have condemned them as he did But the aim of their labours was to increase their own party by captivating men under their yoke of Authority to the observance of a traditional Religion and thereby to strengthen their power and worldly interest in that Nation which was called by Gods Name Now for this inveagling of Disciples to the keeping of counterfeit Traditions some whereof were but vain and uneffectual to sanctification others were violations of Gods Law our just Master curses these seduced and seducing Guides for making their wretched followers the children of Hell even worse then themselves by engaging their new conquered Subjects to the most violent hatred and fierce opposition of the truth and the professors of it See now how the Papists tread in the steps of the Pharisees and in one particular out-act their crimes Their pretence to the Chair of Authority indowed with Infallibility their outward varnishes of sanctity laid over their covetousness and uncleanness their horrid hypocrisies I omit to speak of But their Proselytizing is that which I propound to your notice Their work is not to convert Pagans from the worship of Devils and dead Idols to serve the true and living God nor to turn Jews and Turks who abhor Idols and therefore are too rationally scandalized by Roman Idolatries and averted from Christianity by that conspicuous Mother of spiritual fornications but to pervert Christians who know and worship the only true God through and with the One Mediator Jesus Christ according to the simplicity of the Gospel and to perswade these to break off communion with all other Christians who have obtained the like precious faith with themselves and to subject their souls to the conduct of Traditionaries and so to become an accession to a potent Sect or Faction in Christendom Indeed the Roman Sectaries are in no small measure more pernicious false Teachers then the Pharisees because they not only evacuate the Authority of the Gospel and corrupt the purity of Christian Religion by novel devices some directly repugnant to Law and Gospel others vainly superstitious and all obtruded under the false title of Traditions but also have introduced into their Religion the most gross Idolatries that ever the Devil did pollute the confederate servants of God withall Since then the purple Whore hath made the Kings of the Earth and many Nations drunk with the poysoned Wine of her fornications as St. John being in the Spirit foresaw and foretold and it is the labour of Roman Emissaries to invite Englishmen to drink of her golden Cup St. John's Caution was never