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	particular_a	unite_v	2,692	5	10.4857	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A26958	A moral prognostication I. what shall befall the churches on Earth, till their concord, by the restitution of their primitive purity, simplicity, and charity, II. how that restitution is like to be made, (if ever) and what shall befall them thence-forth unto the end, in that golden-age of love / written by Richard Baxter ...	Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691.	1680 (1680)	Wing B1311; ESTC R5743	36,590	70

took up the Sword and Pride swelled the Bishops into a Secular State and way of Rule Then it shall be Church-Government to see that the People be duely taken in the Sacramental-Covenant and learn the Creed Lord's Prayer and Decalogue and be instructed in the Word of God and Live together in Sobriety Righteousness and Godlyness And the Pastors shall leave all Secular Matters to the Magistrates and be no more troubled nor corrupted by their use of any forcing Power Their Government shall be a Paternal Authoritative Exercise of Instruction and of Love and no more Like that of a Tutor to his Pupils a Physician in his Hospital a Phylosopher in his School supposing a Divine Commission and Rule The Church it self shall be all their Courts supposing the Magistrates and the People the Witnesses and the present incumbent Pastors be the Judges without Excommunicating and Absolving Lay-Chancellors Surrogates Commissaries or Officials And all the Materials of Contention being now gone they shall have nothing to do in these Courts but to try whether the People have learnt and understand their Cathechisms and consent to God's Covenant and Communicate in his Worship with the Church And when any are accused of Wicked Living contrary to Sobriety Righteousness and Godlyness to try whether these Accusations be well proved And if so to perswade the Offenders to Repent and by plain Scripture-Arguments to convince them of the Sin and with Tears or Fatherly Tenderness and Love to melt them into Remorse and bring them to confess and forsake the Sin And if this cannot be done at once to try again and again and pray for their Repentance And when there is no other Remedy to Declare such a one openly uncapable of Church-Communion and to require the Church to avoid Communion with him and him to forbear intruding into their Communion and to bind him over by a Ministerial Denunciation of God's Displeasure as against the Impenitent to answer it at the Bar of God himself as one that is under his Wrath till he do Repent And this is the utmost of the Pastoral Power that shall then be used supposing private Admonitions And this only in that Church or Congregation wherein the Sinner had before his Communion and not at a distance nor in other Churches or Parts of the World where the Pastor hath no Charge Yea this Much shall not be exercised Irregularly and at Randome to the Injury of the Flock but under the Rules and Remedies afterward here exprest 12. The Primitive-Church-Form shall be Restored And as where there are Christians enow no Churches shall be too small so none shall be greater for Number or Distance than to be one true particular Church that is A Society of Christians united as Pastor and People for Personal Communion and Assistance in God's Publick Worship and Holy Living That is so many as may have this Personal Communion if not all at once yet per vices as oft as is fit for them to meet with the Church which all in a Family cannot usually do at once So that Ignatius his Church-Mark shall be restored To every Church there is one Altar and one Bishop with his Fellow-Presbyters and Deacons And there shall no more be a Hundred or Six Hundred or a Thousand Altars to one Bishop primi Gradus and in one Church of the first Form called a Particular Church Nor shall all the Particular Churches be Un-churched for want of true Bishops nor all their Pastors degraded into a new Order of Teaching-Ministers that have no Power of Pastoral-Government Nor the true Discipline of the Churches be made a meer impossible thing whil'st it is to be exercised by one Bishop only over many hundred Congregations which do every one of them afford full work for a present Bishop Nor shall the Bishops Office be thought so little Holy any more than Preaching and Sacramental-Administrations as to be performable by a Lay-Delegate or any one that is not really a Bishop But the People shall know them that are Over them in the Lord which labor among them and admonish them and shall esteem them very highly in Love for their Work sake and shall be at Peace among themselves 1 Thes 5. 12 13. Such Bishops as Dr. Hammond in his Annot. describeth that had but One Church and Preached Baptized Chatechized Visited the Sick took Care of the Poor Administred the Lord's Supper Guided every Congregation as present in Publick Worship and privately instructed and watched over all the Flocks shall be in every Church that can obtain such 13. Where the Churches are so great as to need as most will do and so happy as to obtain many faithful Presbyters or Pastors whether they shall Live together in a single Colledge-life or Married and at a distance and whether one as the chief or Bishop shall be President and have a Negative Voice or all be equal in a Concordant guidance of the Flocks shall be left to the choise and liberty of the several Churches by mutual Consent of Pastors and People and Magistrates to do and vary as their several States and Exigences shall require And shall neither be called Anti-christian or odious Tyranny on the one side nor made of necessity to the Churches Communion or peace on the other as long as the true Pastoral or Episcopal Office is Exercised in every particular Church 14. Neither Magistrates nor other Bishops shall make the Bishops or Pastors Sermons and Prayers for him but leave it as the work of the speakers Office to word his own Sermons and Prayers and to choose a set form or no set-form the same or various as the case requireth yet so as to be responsible as after for all abuses and mal-administrations and not suffered to deprave Gods Worship by confusion or hurtful Errours or passionate and perverse Expressions But to be assisted and directed to use his Office in the most edifying ways by such kind of helps as his personal weaknesses shall require And where set-forms are used none shall quarrel with them as unlawful 15. None of the People shall have the high Priviledges of Church Communion and Sacraments bestowed on them against their Wills No more than a Man impeninent and unwilling shall be Ministerially Absolved from the Guilt of Sin For every Sacramental Administration whether of Baptism or of the Body and Blood of Christ is as full an Act of Ministerial Absolution as any Pastor can perform And what he doth to particular Persons upon their Penitence after a lapse that the Pastor doth to the whole Church at the Lords Supper And as Consent is made by Christ the Condition of Pardon and Covenant-Ben●fits which no Non-consenter hath a Title to so therefore Professed Consent is necessary to the Sacramental Collation or Investiture And those that are but constrained by the apparent danger of a Fine or Jail are not to be accounted Voluntary Consenters by the Church when the Lord of the Church will account none for Consenters

securing of a Faithful Ministry and other good Effects will countervail many such Inconveniences 22. No One Church shall have the Government of Another Church And the secular Differences of Metropolitans Patriarcks c. which was set up in one Empire upon secular Accounts and from secular Reasons shall all cease And no Differences shall be made necessary among them which Christ hath not made necessary But Christian Princes shall take warning by the Greek and Latine Churches and by all the Calamities and Ruins which have been caused in the Christian World by Bishops striving who should be the Greatest when Christ decided the Controversie long ago Luk. 22. 23. As Christians hold Personal Christian Communion in their several particular Churches so Churches shall hold a Communion of Churches by necessary Correspondencies and Associations Not making a Major Vote of Bishops in Synods to have a proper Government over the Minor Part. But that by counsel and concord they may help and strengthen one another and secure the common Interest of Christianity And that he that is a Member of one Church may be received of the Rest and he that is cast out of One may not be received by the Rest unless he be wronged So that it shall not be One Politick Church but a Communion of Churches 24. The Means of this Communion shall be 1. By Messengers 2. By Letters and Certificates Communicatory 3. By Synods 25. These Synods shall as to a few Neighbour Churches be ordinary and stated And the Meetings of Ministers in them shall be improved 1. To the Directing and Counselling of one another in matters doubtful especially of Discipline 2. To edify each other by Conference Prayer and Disputations 3. That the Younger may be Educated under the grave Advice and Counsels of the Elder 4. That the Concord of Themselves and the Churches under them may be preserved But if they would grow Imperious Tyrannical Heretical or Contentious the Magistrate shall hinder their stated ordinary Meetings that it be not accounted a thing simply necessary nor used to the Disturbance of the Church or States And all Provincial National and larger Councels shall be held by the Magistrates Consent 26. He that taketh himself to be wrongfully Excommunicated in one Church shall have a Treble Remedy 1. To have his Cause heard by the Associated Pastors of the Neighbour-Churches though not as Rulers of the Bishop or Pastor of that particular Church yet as Counsellors and such whose Judgment bindeth to Concord in lawful things 2. To be admitted by another Church if it appear that he is wronged And 3. To appeal to the Magistrate as the Preserver of Justice and Order in all Societies 27. The Magistrate shall appoint some of the most Grave and Wise and Godly and Moderate of the Ministers to have a general Inspection over many Churches and to see that they be well Taught and Ordered and that Pastors and People do their Duty who shall therefore oft Visit them and shall Instruct and Exhort the Younger Ministers and with the countenance of the Magistrate and their own Seigniority and Ability shall rebuke the Sloathful and Faulty Ministers and perswade them to Diligence and Fidelity But shall Exercise no outward Force by the Sword nor any Excommunication by themselves alone or otherwise than in the fore-said Regular way 28. All Ordinations shall be performed except in case of Necessity either in the Assembly of the Associated Pastors with their President or in the Vacant Church by some of them appointed by the rest Or by the General Visiter last mentioned with a competent Number of Assistants But still an Ordination to the Ministry in general shall not be taken to be formally the same as the affixing him to this or that Church in particular No more than the Licensing of a Physician is the same with the Affixing him to a particular Hospital 29. A Catalogue shall be drawn up of some of the greatest Verities which are not expresly found in the Creed Lord's Prayer or Decalogue which as the Articles of Confession of the Associated Churches of the Nation shall serve for these Three Uses 1. To satisfie all Forreign Churches against any Accusation that they are Orthodox 2. To examine the Knowledge of such as are admitted to the Ministry by but not to be Subscribed unless only as to a general Acknowledgment of the Soundness of their Doctrine without saying that There is nothing Faulty in them 3. To be a Rule of Restraint to Ministers in their Preaching that none be allowed publickly after Admonition to Preach against any Doctrine contained in them 30. The Usurped Ecclesiastical Power of Bishops and Presbyteries and Councils which were co-ercive or imitated secular Courts or bound the Magistrate to execute their Decrees being cast out and all Pastors restrained from playing the Bishops in other Churches out of their own Charge The Magistrate shall Exercise all Co-ercive Church-Government himself and no more trust the Sword directly or indirectly in the Hands of the Clergy who have long used it so unhappily to the Disturbance of the Christian World and the shedding of so much Innocent Blood Where it may be had there shall be a Church-Justice or Magistrate in every considerable Parish who being present shall himself hear how Ministers preach and behave themselves among their People And all Ministers and Churches shall be Responsible to the Magistrate for all Abuses and mal-Administration If any Minister Preach or Pray seditiously abusively factiously railingly against tolerable Dissenters to the destroying of Christian Love and Unity or Heretically to the Danger of the Peoples Souls or shall exercise Tyranny over the People or live a Vicious Life or be negligent in his Office of Teaching Worship or Discipline or otherwise grosly mis-behave himself He shall be Responsible both as afore-said to the Associated Pastors and Visitor or Arch-Bishop and also to the Magistrate who shall Rebuke and Correct him according to the measure of his Offence And it shall appear that the Magistrate is sufficient for all Co-ercive Church-Government without all the Clergies Usurpations which uphold the Roman and other Tyrannical Societies 31. The Question Who shall be Judge of Heresie Schisme or Church-Sins shall be thus decided 1. The Bishops or Pastors of the particular Churches shall be the Judges who is to be denyed Communion in their Churches as Hereticks Schismaticks c. 2. The Associated Churches shall be Judges in their Synods or by other Correspondence who is to be commonly denyed Communion in all their Churches and what Pastors and Churches shall have the Dextram Communionis and who not 3. The Magistrate shall be the only Judge who is to be punished for Heresie or Schism c. with Fines or any Outward Corporal Penalty And no one shall usurp the others Right 32. The Magistrate shall silence all Preachers that after due Admonition so grosly mis-behave themselves in Doctrine Worship or Conversation as to be the Plagues of the Churches

seriously Religious and the House of Christ will be filled with Guests 42. Hereupon the Scandalous and Flagitious Lives of Common Protestants will be much cured For the Number of the Flagitious will grow small and Crimes will be under common Disgrace Besides that they will be punished by the Magistrate So that gross Sin will be a Marvail 43. The Books of plain Doctrine and holy Living with the Pacificatory Treatises of Reconcilers will then be most in Esteem and Use which now are so Dis-relished by turbulent discontented siding Persons And abundance of Controversal-Writings about Church-Government Liturgies Ceremonies and many other Matters will be forgotten and cast aside as useless Things For the Swords shall be made into Plow-Shares and Pruning-Hooks 44. The happy Example of that happy Prince and Country that shall begin and first accomplish this Work will be Famous through all the Protestant-Churches and will enflame such Desires of Imitation in them all and be such a ready Direction in the way that it will greatly expedite their answerable Reformation And the Famous Felicity of that Prince in the Reformation and Concord of his Subjects will kindle in the Hearts of other Protestant-Princes and States an Earnest Desire of the same Felicity And so as upon the Invention of Printing and of Guns the World was presently possessed of Guns and of Printed-Books that never before attained any such thing So here they that see the Happyness of one Kingdom brought about and see how it was done will have Matter enough before their Eyes both to excite their Desires and guide their Endeavours in the Means to bring all this to pass 45. The Protestant Kingdoms and States being thus Reformed and United in themselves will be enflamed with an earnest desire of the good of all other Churches and of all the World And therefore as Divines have held something called General Councils for the Union of all those Churches so these Princes will by their Agents hold Assemblies for maintaining Correspondency to the carrying on of the common good of the World by the Advantage of their United Counsels and Strength And then no Enemy can stand long before them For they that Love and serve them Zealously at home will venture their Lives for them Zealously abroad if there be Cause 46. The excellent and successful use of the Magistrates Government of the Churches in their Dominions will quite shame all the usurping claims of the Pope and General Councels and their mungrel Ecclesiastick Courts and all the train of Artifices and Offices by which their Government of the World is managed And the World and especially Princes will plainly see how much they were abused by their Usurpations and that there is no need of Pope or Cardinal nor any of those Officers or Acts at all But that these are the meer Contrivances of Carnal Policy to keep up an Earthly Kingdom under the name of the Catholick Church And also the Purity and Unity of the Reformed Churches where the vulgar have more Religion and Union than their Monasteries will dazzle the Eyes of the Popish Princes States and People And when they see better and especially the happiness of the Princes they will forsake the Usurper that had Captivated them by fraud and will assume their freedom and felicity And so the Roman Church-Kingdom will fall 47. The deluded Mahometans seeing the Unity and Glory of Christendom as they were before kept from Christ by the Wicked Lives and the Divisions of Christians thinking that we are far worse than they so now they will be brought to admire and honour the Christian Name and fear the Power of the Christian Princes And one part of them will turn Christians and the rest even the Turkish Power the Christians force by the Power of God will easily break And so the Eastern Churches will be delivered and reformed and the Mahometans come into the Faith of Christ 48. The poor scattered Jews also when they see the Glory and Concord of Christians will be convinced that Christ is indeed the true Messias And being Converted perhaps shall by the Christian Powers be some of them Re-established in their own Land But not to their antient peculiarity or policy and Law 49. And then the Christian Zeal will work to the Conversion of the poor Idolatrous Heathen World And part of them will yield to Reason and Faith and the rest by just victories be subdued And so the Kingdoms of the World will become the Kingdoms of the Lord and his Christ And the Gospel shall be Preached in all the World 50. And when the Kingdom of Grace is perfected and hath had its time the Kingdom of Glory shall appear upon the Glorious appearing of Christ our King and the Dead shall Arise and they that have overcome shall Reign with Christ and sit with him upon the Throne even as he overcame and is set down with the Father on his Throne Amen Even so come Lord Jesus John 17. 20 21 22 23 24. Neither Pray I for these alone but for them also which shall believe on me through their word that they all may be one as thou Father art in me and I in thee that they also may be one in us that the World may believe that thou hast sent me And the Glory which thou gavest me I have given them that they may be One even as we are One I in them and Thou in Me that they may be made perfect in One and that the World may know that thou hast sent Me and hast Loved them as thou hast Loved Me Father I will that they also whom thou hast given Me be with Me where I am that they may behold My Glory which thou hast given Me. Object But if this World should ever become so happy it would be more amiable and so be a greater snare to our Affections and make us willing to stay from Heaven Answer No Amiableness or Pleasantness stealeth the Heart from God or keepeth it from Heaven but that which hideth the Glory and Goodness of God and Heaven from our Minds or corrupteth and diverteth the will and affections by some inconsistency or contrarity But the spiritual excellency of the Reformed Concordant Church on Earth will so much more clearly Represent Heaven to our conceptions and give our Hearts so pleasant a foretast of it that above all things it will Excite our desires of that fuller Glory and call us most Powerfully to a Heavenly Mind and Life As the first-fruits and earnest do make us desire the Harvest and the full Possession And as now those that Live in the most Heavenly Society and under the most Excellent helps and means have usually more Heavenly Minds and Lives than they that in more tempting and distracting Company never enjoy such Heavenly beams Consectary ALL the Romish-Dreams of Church-Union arise from Ignorance of the true State and Interest of the Church and the true and necessary Terms of Union And all the Plots also of the Moderating Papists that Talk of a Political Church-Catholick having a Visible Constitutive or Governing-Head whether Monarchial the Pope or Aristocratical or Democratical the Patriarchs or a General-Council And that Talk of Universal Laws of this Church made by such a Universal-Head besides the Universal Laws of Christ And falsly feign the Councils called General in a Particular Empire called or ruled by one Emperour only in his own Dominions to have been Universal as to all the Catholick Churches on Earth And that feign these Councils to have been Infallible which so often erred and crost each other And that set the World upon the undeterminable Controversie Which were true General Councils and How many we must Receive and Conform to Whether only Four or Six or Eight and till what Age. And that would perswade the Christian World that what-ever diversity of Canons Customs or Church-Laws or Ceremonies are allowed among them it must all be done or held by this same Authority of the Pope or Council or Both to which though Forreign Kings and Bishops must all be subject and from which they must receive their Christianity and by which all their Reformations must be tryed And that none must be taken as Catholicks nor any Churches tolerated that hold not such a Factious Union under such an Usurping Head Personal or Collective But as Tertullian speaketh rather than endure such Wiser and Better Societies Solitudinem facerent vocarent Pacem And as a Worldy Clergy whose Church and Kingdom is only of and in this World would banish from it all save a Lifeless-Image which hath any Kin to Heaven and suffer none to Live in this World among them but themselves I say all this is 1. From Ignorance of the True Nature of the Christian Religion Church-State and Terms of Unity and Concord which I have lately opened in a Book Entituled The true and only Terms of the Concord of all the Churches 2. And from Contention about Ambiguous Words and Self-Conceitedness in their Controversies ignorantly thence raised which I have sought to End in a Book called Catholick Theology 3. And from vicious Passions and Partiality which I have sought to Heal in a Book called The Cure of Church-Divisions All written long since the Writing of this Foregoing Prognostication FINIS