is manifest from Eph. 4.14 15. compared with the Primitive practice Act. 2.42 ch 9.5 See also Eph. 2.19 6. All that profess themselves to be translated into the Kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ should walk as professed Subjects thereof and this they cannot do but in Communion with a visible Church for particular Churches are the visible parts of Christs Kingdom Here Christ rules as King Law-giver and appears as High priest and Prophet giving forth himself to the Faith of his People with all his fullness of Grace in Gospel Ordinances and Dispensations Here then it is that a Believer doth exalt the Lord Jesus Christ most eminently as to visibility in his regal Power and therefore so long as a Believer joyns not himself to a particular Church he stays in the Verge of Satans Kingdom exposeth himself at no small rate to his Temptations Rage and Tyranny and salls short of one great end of his Faith in the Salvation of his Soul which is to be a professed Subject of Christs Kingdom deals disloyally with Christ instead of promoting prejudiceth the Interest of Christ both in respect of himself and others in the World he may be a Nicodemus like Friend of Christ but why doeth he not professedly and openly practice Obedience to all the Laws and Ordinances of his House and bear witness thereto Is it not a tacite and implicite denying of Christ and will not Christ take it so and mens talking of Christs Kingdom is but a vain shew unless they do him this particular personal service as to joyn themselves actually and visibly to a Church of Christ therein espousing his Interest in giving up their Names unto him and walking in his Name as Micah 4.5 All people will walk every one in the Name of his God and we will walk in the Name of the Lord our God for ever and ever Objections that are made against this practice are very inconsiderable and should bear little weight in a Mind truely enlightned some of which are answered in the ensuing discourse others I should here remove if there were room for it I think the Naming them is the shaming of them to all men that have learned Christ and tasted that the Lord is Gracious 1. The scorn and reproach men shall fall under from the prophane World I think no wise man will be laugh't out of his Estate how much less out of his Religion and Souls Salvation 2. A Suspicion lest they should come under too strict tyes and bonds to Holy and Religious Conversation Read 1 Pet. 1.14 15 16 17 18 19. 3. Others are kept off by prejudices arisen by reason of the sins and failings of Churches and Church-Members But will wise men refuse a good Calling or Estate because there are so many abuse them And name a Church or Christian without failings and considerable ones It is your duty to choose the purest Society and you are at your Liberty to do it where you may have most Comfort and Edification Lastly Many are hindred from their ignorance or misled apprehensions concerning the Nature of a Gospel Church For their Information and Rectification especially I have published this Christian Conference that was in my hands and that it may obtain the desired end is the sincere wish and prayer of an unworthy Servant of Christ Isa Chauncy This Conference is managed by Mr. Cornelius Philomathes a Countrey Gentleman and Mr. Peter Christophilus a Minister Neighbour to him The Introduction Christophilus Mr. Philomathes I am heartily glad to see you methinks you are mightily enjoying your self in your pleasant and retired walks will not my company disturb your meditations Philomathes I take it kindly Sir you are pleased to give me a Visit for indeed I live somewhat lonely I am glad of good company especially sometimes for divertisement but there is no friend more welcome than your self to me because your chearfulness revives me and your discourse profits me Christoph Dear Sir I deserve not so great a character and commendation it is your generous disposition that leads you to speak these things for you know we use to differ pretty much in many things especially in matters of Religion and in discourse seemingly hot opponents of each other but I think never the worse Friends Phil. Sir I have so near as I know my own heart a most cordial love to every one that fears God though he be not in every thing of my mind but for you Sir I have more than an ordinary respect and esteem as having been my old acquaintance and intimate friend and neighbour in all the late Changes in Church and state for above these forty years we never had any lasting difference but for the most part a very friendly correspondence Christ And to your great honour with a grateful remembrance may I often rehearse to the praise and glory of God the marvelous Christian kindness and commiseration that you shewed to me and my wife and family in our late Persecutions that you often sheltered me from the rage of my enemies and when they haled me to Prison and plundered all my goods that my Wife and Children had not Beds to lie on Victuals to eat nor Vessels to dress any thing in left you were pleased to take them into your house and provide plentifully for them and this you did when you were in a capacity to have done us more hurt than they who did it and ran no small hazard from time to time in not doing it Phil. No no I hope God will keep me from a persecuting spirit I bless his name he hath kept me from it hitherto and it is a change in our Nation much to be admired that we have such a day of Liberty as we have that all good men may live quietly and peaceably one by another and serve God according to their Consciences Christ Ay Sir especially if we consider the stupendous circumstances of Providence these few last years past that hath wrought about matters to effect that which we so long prayed and waited for Phil. But my friend I must whisper a word in your ear things are not right yet Christ No no nor will not be yet as they shall be but blessed be God they are so well as they are and that God is going on so fast in the way of his Providence towards finishing his Mystery Phil. I see you are on your Prophetick hints still I must confess my self here Asinus ad lyram for the darkness of Prophecies and the disagreement of Interpreters and Events refuting so many that have been very confident hath quite discouraged me that as I look not into them my self so I give little heed to what others say for all men will abound in their own sense and a man may be saved whether he be right or wrong in those things Christ Well Sir then we 'll let those things alone I would not introduce any ungrateful discourse but would rather enter upon something more suitable to
ECCLESIASTICVM OR A PLAIN and FAMILIAR Christian Conference CONCERNING Gospel Churches and Order For the Information and Benefit of those who shall seek the Lord their God and ask the way to Zion with their faces thitherward SAYING Come and let us joyn our selves unto the Lord in a perpetual Covenant that shall not be forgotten My People have been lost Cheep their Shepherds have caused them to go astray they have turned them away in the Mountains they have gone from Mountain to Hill they have forgotten their resting place Jer. 50.5 6. Shew me thy ways O Lord teach me thy Paths Psal 25.3 4. 27.11 119.12 33. How goodly are thy Tents O Jacob and thy Tabernacles O Israel Numb 24.6 7. Tell me O thou whom my Soul loveth where thou feedest where thou makest thy flocks to lye down at noon for why should I be as one that turns aside to the flocks of thy Companions Cant. 1.7 LONDON Printed by T. S. for the Publisher and are to be Sold by W. Marshall at the Bible in Newgate-street 1690. THE PREFACE TO THE READER HOW small soever the stone cut out without hands now seems to be and hath been for many Ages viz. A poor afflicted People trusting in the Name of the Lord Zion whom no man regardeth a Remnant a Cottage a persecuted Woman in the Wilderness Yet it is great in the Eyes of the Lord and in the Eyes of every one that fears his Name even exalted above all Mountains and Hills in regard of it's spiritual beauty and preciousness and shall e're long in respect of Visible splendor and Prevalency be set on the top of every Mountain to fulfil those Prophecies Isa 2.2 3. Mic. 4.1 2. Zech. 8.20 21 22. When many People shall say Come let us go up to the Mountain of the Lord to the house of the God of Jacob c. Which intends the mighty and chearful gathering and assembling that should be in the last days unto a Visible Church state and Communion in the Faith and Order of the Gospel then will the Lord assemble her that halteth and gather her that is driven out and her that he hath afflicted and then he saith he will make her that halteth those who are not rightly instructed in the Order of the Gospel a Remnant i. e. of living Stones to be built up on the Corner stone in the building of Zion and her that was cast far off by Antichristian corruptions a strong Nation and the Lord shall reign over them in Mount Zion from henceforth and for ever In this Glory shall the Lord appear when he buildeth up Zion Psal 102.16 And by Gods present Providences seemingly unfolding ancient Prophecies he is now arising to have Mercy on Zion the time of the end of one thousand two hundred and sixty days of her Desolation and therefore to favour her being come yea the set time ver 13. and no less seeming to be coming out of his place to punish the inhabitants of the Earth Isa 26.21 For all their cruel Persecution and hellish Idolatry to destroy Babylon that hath wasted her and the Children of Edom Protestant Persecutors of the Egyptian race that have so long been crying aloud to Babylon and the Antichristian Fowers against the inward court worshippers Race it race it even to the Foundation Psal 137. The building of this Zion will be gradual for a Nation cannot be born in one day this Royal Nation by the accomplishment of the great Prophecies by wonderful and great Providences and those of two sorts in breaking scattering and overthrowing the Antichristian Powers the Feet and Toes of Iron and Clay and in setting up a Kingdom of Saints which shall not be left to another People The Inchoation of which hath been already by Preaching the Everlasting Gospel the auspicious augmentation and growth will be in gathering the Saints into a Visible Church-state Churches shall be multiplyed and mightily encreased as of old Act. 2. 9.21 To hasten this great and expected Glory what can we do less than contribute by our Prayers and faithful endeavours to the appearance thereof and who that loves the Lord Jesus and his glorious appearance can do less than to come to our great Corner-stone as living stones that they may be built up an Holy Temple in the Lord and thereto be edified in all holiness serving him therein Day and Night And that this may appear to be the duty of every one professing Faith viz. to joyn himself in fellowship with a particular Church Visible is all that I intend to do at this time as a brief Preface to this short Treatise 1. It was the practice of Believers in the Primitive times Act. 2.41 They that were converted to the Faith of the Lord Jesus Christ by gladly receiving the Word of Promise ver 38.39 were added unto the Church to the number of three thousand Souls And it 's most evident that their believing of it self made them not Members of the Church for the Text is express in it that they first believed and then by another Act of their own and the Churches receiving them they were added to them that were before in fellowship the hundred and twenty and became Church Members as it follows ver 47. And the Lord added to the Church daily such as should be saved i. e. Such as were in a State of Salvation by believing The Lord is said to add them by his Grace that wrought effectually upon their Hearts to believe and believing enclined them also to joyn themselves unto the Lord in Church fellowship On the judicial proceeding of Christ by the Mouth of Peter against two Hypocrites that had joyned themselves and were discovered Act. 5.13 That of the Rest i. e. of the same sort durst none to joyn himself Ananias and Sapphira having been made so eminent Examples but the people magnified them i. e. the Church and the Apostles ver 14. And Believers i. e. sincere-hearted were the more added unto the Lord Multitudes both of Men and Women So that as soon as they believed they looked upon it as their next duty to joyn themselves to a Gospel Church Likewise see the same Practice by the Apostle Paul as soon as he was converted Act. 9.26 27 28. There is also another eminent instance at Antioch where the Disciples were first called Christians they that were converted by the scattered Disciples at Sauls Persecution were exhorted by Barnabas Act. 11.23 To joyn together in Church fellowship for it 's said when he came being sent for that end by the Church at Jerusalem and had seen the Grace of God in these converted ones he was glad and exhorted them all that with purpose or readiness of Heart they would joyn unto the Lord. i. e. In Church fellowship for these phrases of joyning and adding unto the Lord do express adding or joyning to the Church because the Church is the Lords and joyned unto him by a visible Covenant and every one
admit such to Communion which are under the censure of another Church or disorderly withdrawn from it signification being made thereof 3. There is Communion of Churches in mutual advice and counsel which should be maintained by Elders frequent assembling and meeting together for this end and purpose 4. By sympathizing with each others Poverty and Afflictions by relieving and supporting as much as possible such as labour in this kind And this is a Communion in giving and receiving as the Apostle calls it Phil. Is there not a Communion of Churches in the office power of the Elders v. gr for one Pastor to administer the Lords Supper in another and for the Elders of one or more Congregations to ordain Elders in another Christ Officers have a peculiar relation to the Society that hath called them and there only they are such and that society only can constitute and ordain them and there only they can exercise their particular Office charge As a Pastor can administer the Lords Supper only in the Church to which he is overseer neither the ruling Elder can govern nor the Deacon hath power to distribute any where but where he is a Deacon or hath that Office charge committed to him for if the Officer of one Church were thereby made an indefinite Officer to all it would soon bring confusion to all and the Elders of one Church might excommunicate in another Phil. I thank you Sir for this brief account you have given me of your Church Order As for the Ordinances of Christs institution I think all reformed Churches own them more or less and the Romanists themselves in their way though with innumerable Superstitions and Idolatrous additions And for the Church Officers you insist on methinks I see there is something analogous to them remaining in our parochial Churches which hath been handed down from the primitive practice through Antichristian Darkness As in some of our Parishes we have the Parson as Pastor the Assistant in Preaching as the Teacher the Church Wardens as ruling Elders the overseers of the Poor as Deacons and though these labour under many abuses now and irregularities by Popish corruptions yet it shews that these are the Officers that do fully answer the necessity of a Christian Congregation and that if it be large none of them can well be spared Chap. VIII Of Letters of Commendation and Discommendation Phil. BEfore we break up this conference I pray inform me of the manner of translating of a Church Member from one Church to another I have heard some say there is no difference between Letters of recommendation and of dismission Christ I have told you a Letter of recommendation is but a Certificate under an Elders Hand that such an one is a Church Member and orderly walker in order to his free admission to occasional Communion with other Churches it need not be a Church Act. 2. It 's not in order to the parting with a Member 3. It need not be directed to any particular Congregation 4. When Members of each Congregation are well known to one another they are needless as the Apostle saith of himself 2 Cor. 3.1 2. we need not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Letters of Commendation to you Phil. I pray in what form doth a Letter of Commendation run Christ It may be in these or such like words To the Churches of Christ and their respective Elders to whom these presents shall come Grace Mercy and Peace c. SEeing God by his Providence hath called this our Brother A. B. to be conversant in places remote from us for a time and that he may reap the comfort of Christian Communion in Gospel Ordinances in any places whither he is lawfully called and where any Church of Christ is planted by vertue of Communion of Churches These are to certifie that this our Brother A. B. is under no censure but in actual Communion with us hath walked in all Christian and Holy Conversation as becomes the Faith and Order of the Gospel to the great honour of Christ and our rejoycing Wherefore you need not doubt to give him the Right Hand of Fellowship in occasional Communion whensoever he shall desire the same We greet you well in the Lord. C. D. Pastor Phil. Is not this sufficient for to translate a Member to another Church and make him an actual Member there Christ No this makes him not a Member of any one Church more than another 2. Here the Church to which he belongs gives up no right in him Neither doth any Church act pass to that purpose or is desired by him The end of this is but to be a Testimonial to other Churches that they may know him to be a Church Member and one under no censure but approved and therefore that no other Churches may scruple to admit him to their Communion as occasion shall require Phil. I pray then how do you write a dismission some dismiss Members but to no Church Christ It may be wrote with these or such like expressions as the matter requires for in some cases variation is required Phil. What are those cases Christ I will tell you Some dismissions cannot be wrote with so great commendation as others may some departing Members giving considerable cause of offence in their carriages toward the Church and Ministry before and in their asking dismission Phil. How do you write a dismission wit◠commendation Christ A dismission with commendation may be after this manner and it must be directed to a particular Church To the Church of Christ in such a place to which the Reverend Mr. L. P. is Pastor Grace Mercy c. Dearly beloved in the Lord WHereas F. D. a Brother in fellowship with us hath walked in all good Conscience and Holy Conversation as becometh the Gospel and his profession continuing stedfastly in attendance on all the Ordinances of Christ in this Congregation And now having consulted us and given us reasons why he apprehends it his duty to ask his dismission Which reasons being duely considered by us and approved as satisfactory we think it no less our duty to grant his said request and do hereby dismiss him unto you discharging him from his nearer relation and obligation unto us and commit him to your particular watch and care desiring you to receive him in the Lord and that you will be every way helpful to him to promote his edification and comfort For which Spiritual ends we commend you and him with you to the word of his Grace who is able to build you up and give you an inheritance among them that are sanctified Subscribed by the consent and in the name of the Church of Christ at K. by A. N. Pastor Phil. But what kind of dismission can you give without commendation Christ There must be some in every one and charity allows us to give some commendation to a Member that stands under very dissatisfactory circumstances which we hope proceed from his infirmity only and therefore can say