Selected quad for the lemma: church_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
church_n	bishop_n	elder_n	ephesus_n	3,861	5	11.6134	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A10833	A defence of the doctrine propounded by the synode at Dort against Iohn Murton and his associates, in a treatise intituled; A description what God, &c. With the refutation of their answer to a writing touching baptism. By Iohn Robinson.	Robinson, John, 1575?-1625.	1624 (1624)	STC 21107A; ESTC S114366	156,832	207

might by their Canon most faithfully perform and fulfill his office though he never preached one sermon all his life long But as all errours haue some truth either in them or nigh unto them and so are raised upon mistaking of one thing for another with which it hath some affinity So is it in this case For first the ability or gift to teach is not by the office but before it and meerly personall and so remains even in the officer and the same greater in one then in another though the office be the same in both Yet because the gift fits for the office and enables to the performing of it many unskilfully confound them Secondly there is both a liberty and duty of using the same gift in time place before and without the office But herewith the office concurring is joyned and added a bond of authority and speciall charge upon the officer to wait upon his office the Teacher in teaching the Exhorter or Pastor in exhortation as the Apostle speaks Here amongst sundry Scriptures not so much as looking towards the matter in hand but speaking of the generall liberties of Christians and graces of Christianity common to women with men and to such men as want all gifts of teaching with others they alledg 1 Cor. 14. 1 and the Apostle then commanding every beleever to covet to preach But first why put they preaching and not prophesying as the Text and all translations haue it Secondly it is their presumption that he speaks of every beleever Was every beleever to covet spirituall gifts to wit all both extraordinary and ordinary there mentioned And are there not many in all Churches who without a miracle cannot possibly attain to any competent ability to teach publiquely in the Church But let them stretch the words to their own size what follows hereupon All are to desire the gift of exhortation c. and such as haue it to use it in time and place Ergo it is not required of Pastors by vertue of their office to exhort Why not then thus It is required of every member of the Church in his place to watch for the good of the whole and to defend the same against gain-sayers in the truth and therfore it is an imagination which these men in the page before going affirm that the Pastour is by his office to watch and defend the flock against gain-sayers Or thus It concerns every Christian being able to distribute to the necessities of the Saints and therefore not to the Deacons by vertue of their office which yet for the very thing are called Distributers in the same place Every citizen and subject is bound to defend his citie and country against the enemy in his place and standing and therefore by their consequence not the Magistrate by vertue of his Magistracy Their conclusion therefore that a Pastor is not bound to teach by his office because hee mightafter a sort and in an order teach without it it is as if they should tell us that he who is bound to a post with one coard cannot be bound with two ADVERSARIES THey add that the Church may receiv in members without officers or when they are sick or in prison and so baptize them as the primitiue Churches were gathered by faith and baptism and that being without Pastors a good while which the Apostles afterwards placed amongst them DEFENCE THey oft say but never proue that Churches are gathered by baptism Baptism is an ordinance and service given to the Church as were the statutes and services of old given to Israel and Circumcision amongst the rest If the Church receiv in men by baptizing them then it is to cast them out by unbaptizing them For they are to be put out or excommunicated by the undoing of that by the doing of which they were taken in Besides receiving in and casting out of members are dispensations of Christs Kingdom Baptism of his Propheticall office Thirdly as both infants might be born in the Church and men of years received into it and both the one and other be be baptized afterwards as God affoarded fit and lawfull means so can it not be proved specially in the plenty that then was that the Apostles still left not behind them some extraordinary Officers Prophets or Evangelists to water where they had planted and to order things unperfected Lastly let be observed how in this place they make it a work of the same power to baptize and to receiv members into the Church and wherupon it must follow inavoidably that Baptism administred by one alone and without a Church power which theirs was and is is unlawfull seeing one alone is not a Church nor hath power to receiv in or cast out members To conclude the point about the Apostles successors The Apostle Paul calling unto him at Miletus the Elders or Bishops of the Church of Ephesus and charging them to feed the flock wherof they were made Over-seers by the Holy Ghost and for their direction therin propounding unto thē his own Apostolicall example to be followed by them in so many particulars shews who are the Apostles ordinarie successors in their severall charges The same also doth the Apostle Peter in calling himselfe a Sympresbyter or fellow-Elder with the ordinarie Elders And truly what man not at utter defyance with common sense will denie that a Pastor in his charge is more properly an Apostles successour then a private brother In answering mine exceptions they build amisse upon my foundation and father their bastards upon me knowing that I both put and haue proved against them elsewhere a difference between no Baptism and Baptism unlawfully administred in divers respects and that the latter though it ought not so to haue been administred or received yet ought not to be iterated specially if God haue added therunto the inward Baptism of the spirit of regeneration Now my proofs howsoever by them vilified confirm that besides and aboue the personall abilitie to teach a speciall calling is requisite for him that dispenseth the ordinance of Baptism This speciall calling ordinarie is by the Church which alone hath Christs delegated power for Ordinances The Argument I thus frame That which by many proofs of Scripture appears to haue been done by speciall calling and commission from Christ and never otherwise that not being done by such speciall calling and commission is unlawfully done But by the proofs by me brought it appears that Baptism hath still been ministred by speciall calling and commission and not otherwise therefore these mens Baptism not so administred was and is unlawfully administred and so they by their own grounds which they vainly make mine unbaptized persons Neither can they make an escape by saying that they in whom I instance had no calling by the Church nor were Pastors of particular flocks Seeing our question is not of Pastors but of such as haue a Church-calling and that Iohn Baptist Christs