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	paul_n	timothy_n	3,899	5	10.7094	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A27001	The Quakers catechism, or, The Quakers questioned, their questions answered, and both published for the sake of those of them that have not yet sinned unto death and of those ungrounded novices that are most in danger of their seduction / by R[i]chard Baxter.	Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691.	1655 (1655)	Wing B1363; ESTC R28362	39,590	58

who knows not that one English word hath many significations There is a Beast called a Wolf and a Fish called a Wolf and an eating disease called a Wolf Are these therefore all one because they have one Name So a Sect-master is called a Master One that would be the Lord of mens faith is called a Master and a Teacher of the Church of Christ is called a Master Doth it follow that all these are forbidden because one is Your Prater also made a stirre with me for calling the sacred Languages the Originall because forsooth the Spirit of God is the Original And is not that a wise man to go cry down the Ministry that cannot discern the difference between the Original cause and the Original Language He charged me also to be empty of the Spirit because I studied and told me he did not study no not in speaking what to say I the lesse marvell at his non-sence But I pray God forgive me that I Study no more Do you think we cannot talk without study as well as you and I hope a little better and when the lazy fit overtaketh Ministers they are ready to preach without study as well as you do I can bring you a woman fit for the gumblestool that shall without any study talk it out with the best of you We do not so despise God his Word or our hearers as to speak before we consider what to say Reade 2 Tim. 2. 15. Psa. 1. 2. 1 Tim. 4. 15. Psal. 119. 15 23 48 78 97 99 148. and see whether it be not our duty to study and meditate continually day and night And whereas you call us to thresh and dig I professe if God would give me leave I should take it for a great recreation and refreshment to my body and should think it incomparably a more easie life then that which I endure Solomon knew and I know to my sorrow that much study is a wearinesse to the flesh and might I but plough and dig I should yet hope to live in some competent health who now spend my daies in continuall pain and languishing But then how shall I fulfill Gods command 1 Tim. 4. 15. Meditate on these things Give thy self wholly to them mark wholly that thy profiting may appear to all How should I watch over the Church day and night Act. 20. 31. yet whereas your Prater feared not before God to affirm that if I had no pay I would not preach I do here professe before the same God that he is a Liar and I prove it because I have long preached already without pay and been glad of Liberty and I would labour with my hands as far as my languishing body would bear to supply my necessities as Paul did to stop the mouths of your Predecessors rather then I would give over preaching the Gospel Judge therefore whether your Lying Spirit be the Spirit of God or the meet authour of Reformation or whether indeed you are perfect without sin Your 20. Qu. is Did ever the Lord of Heaven and Earth or Jesus Christ bid thee or any of you Go and Preach to a people or was any of the Apostles or Ministers of Christ made Minister by the will of man Ans. 1. I offered your Prater here to shew him my Comission from God if he would shew me his and he told me that it was invisible and why may not you take the answer that you give 2. The Lord called his first Apostles by his own voice and appointed them to call others and to establish an Order for the succeeding of others in that Office of the Ministry to the end of the world Matth. 28. 21. and till the Saints be one perfect man Eph. 4. 11 14. that they that should ever after be called might not expect a voice from Heaven to their ears but might be called in Christs appointed way And in this way I have been called by Christ The Signs of his Call are 1. My comperent qualifications 2. My thirst after the good of souls and the building of that house of God 3. The Ordination of authorized Church-Officers 4. The Call and consent of the people of Christ over whom he hath set me 5. And afterwards the successe of my labours 6. And some daily assistance of the Spirit in those labours 7. And some Testimony of the Spirit to my conscience of Gods Acceptance These seven set together are my evidence of mission shew you the like if you can 2. Neither Paul not any true Minister is called by the meer will of man nor are we the Servants of men Nor were the Apostles called by men at all but immediatly by Christ But all afterwards were to be called by Christ through the Ordnation of men Tit. 1. 5. For this end left I thee in Crete that thou shouldest ordain Elders in every City Act 14. 23. When they had ordained them Elders in every Church c. The gift was given Timothy by prophecy with the laying on of the hands of the Presbytery 1 Tim. 4. 14. Paul directeth him whom to make Bishops 1 Tim. 3. Will not all this suffice you Your 21. Qu. is Whether had any Ministers of Christan hour-glasse to preach by or took a Text and raised Doctrines Reasons Uses Motives or a carnall Bell to call people together by prove these things by Scripture or else be silent and never professe your selves to be Ministers of Christ more Ans. By your patience I must tell you that the Conclusion is but your Lordly ignorant command such as is joyned to many of the other Queries Scripture is Gods Laws and fa sufficient Rule for Doctrines and worship it self But was never intended to name to you every circumstance that is lawull about that worship Hath Scripture told you at what place you shall meet or at what hour I tell you again you speak with no more wisedom then if you should say thus Prove that ever man read the Bible with a pair of Spectacles or that ever Christ or his Apostles used a printed Bible when printing was invented but a while ago or that ever they used an English Bible when they wrote in Greek or that ever they preached in doublet breeches or stockings or else call your selves Ministers of Christ no more And why so Because you command us and yet tell us your Commission is invisible These Circumstances are purposely left by Christ to the determination of humane prudence as occasions shall require and therefore he bids us do all things to edification and decently and in order 1 Cor. 14. 26. 4. And therefore sure we must discern what is edifying decent and orderly This is plain to them that will see What came the Word of God out from you or came it unto you only If any man think himself to be a Prophet or spiritual let him acknowledge that the things that I write are the Commandments of the Lord But if any be ignorant let him be ignorant 1 Cor. 14.

such Relations or honour or respect But if you were not hypocrites you would plainly speak this out and then people would better understand you when you tail as Ministers for-being called Masters But for the sake of those among you that are not past recovery I will tell you that which it seemeth you know not The Pharisees had their severall Schools Sects as the Philosohpers had and every one gloried in his Disciples and those Disciples in their own Sect-masters One cried up such a man and another such a man insomuch as sometimes the followers of these several Sect-masters would fall together by the ears and kill each other in the Temple and in the streets while they contended for their Masters honours And look what faith the Master was of the Scholars must all be of his faith They must take their belief on trust from him These leading men that were the Masters of their Schools and sects whom none must contradict were called by the Jews Rabbi's and Fathers as the Papists now call their Bishop The Pope which signifieth A Father because as children must be wholly ruled by the Fathers so would the Pharisees have their Disciples to be by them be the matter right or wrong Just thus do the Papists require that the people beleeve as the Church beleeves that is the Pope and his Consistory whatever it be and tell us that they are infallible as being guided by the infallible Spirit and therefore we must believe them by an implicit faith Now the Lord Jesus meeteth with these Pharisees and commandeth his disciples That they call no man on earth Father or Rabbi or Master as the Pharisees were called that is To have no such absolute Master of your Religion or Lord of your faith because we have all one such Absolute Father which is God and one such absolute Master which is Christ This is the very same thing that Paul meant when he chides them for saying I am of Paul and I am of Apollo as if Christ were divided or Paul had been crucified for them 1 Cor. 1. 13. And it 's the same thing that Peter means 1 Pet. 5. 1 2 3. where he giveth Ministers the honourable Title of Elders and Overseers and Pastors and bids them oversee and feed the flock of God but yet forbids them doing it as Lords over Gods heritage because the heritage is Gods and Christ is the chief Shepherd Paul cals a Bishop the Steward of God Tit. 1. 7. One that must rule the Church 1 Tim. 1. 4 5. and 5. 17. and saith He that desires the Office of a Bishop desires a good work 1 Tim. 3. 1. But yet he would not have them taken for absolute Masters of Christs School but as Christs ushers and as Stewards in his House Let a man so account of us as the Ministers of Christ and Stewards of the mysteries of God 1 Cor. 4. 1. neither more nor lesse There are divers words in the Greek tongue which the Gospel was wrote in which we translate by one word Master but if our language be more scarce of words then the Greek it doth not follow that Christs words are all one The word here used in Matthew is {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} and elsewhere {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} which is as much as the chief Leader of the way or the Sect-master What if this be forbidden is all Mastership therefore forbidden because this one is The word {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} is translated Master too and sometime a Teacher I pray you consider here your most ignorant and sottish dealing The Gospel was not written by the Apostles in English but in Greek Because one word signifieth a Teacher and a Master such as a Schoolmaster is and our Translators sometime translate it a Teacher and sometime a Master you impudently cry out that one of them is not Scripture and yet yield that the other is When in the Greek they are the same word as you may see it used in Eph. 4. 11. Luk. 2. 46. 1 Tim. 2. 7. 2 Tim. 1. 11. Acts 13. 1. 1 Cor. 12. 28. Mat. 10. 24. Luk. 6. 40. Heb. 5. 12. Iam. 3. 1. In all which places the holy Ghost useth the word {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} though we English it sometime Masters sometime Teachers and sometime Doctors yet it is all one word in the language that the Scripture was written in and therefore Scripture alloweth one as much as another And if you will stick to the English you may finde the word Master used oft enough And if it be lawfull for another man why not for a Minister Tit. 2. 9. 1 Pet. 2 18. 1 Tim. 6. 1 2. Col. 3. 22. and 4. 1. Eph. 6. 5 9. Though the word {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} signifieth such a Mastership as Ministers of Christ will not own as Ministers though over their hired Servants they may own it It may be you think Paul crossed Christs rule and was a false Prophet because he cals himself a wise Master-builder 1 Cor. 3. 10. Or do you think that the holy Ghost did erre when he called Teachers The Masters of the Assemblies Eccl. 12. 11. That the Spirit is no enemy to Titles of honour you may see in 1 Pet. 3. 6. where Sarah is commended for obeying Abraham and calling him Lord And Act. 26. 25. Paul calleth Festus Most Noble Festus and calleth Agrippa King Agrippa Act. 26. 2 26 27. And Rom. 12. 10. We are commanded In honour to prefer one another So that it 's one mans duty to give those Titles which another may not ambitiously seek For my part I will gladly make this agreement with you I will never wish any man to call me Master nor be displeased with any that doth not on that account if this will satisfie you But then I confesse I dare not condemn them that use so much civility or respect because Gods Word is of more esteem with me then your most confident fancies and reproaches By this time me thinks I may well take leave to salute you with this Query Whether that man be not void of the fear of God and given over to a seared Conscience that dare go up and down to rail against the most faithfull and painfull Ministers of Christ whom they are not able to charge with any crime but humane frailties and that because they are called Masters and all this upon meer sottish ignorance of the Scripture that so commonly useth and alloweth the Title All that I could get to all this from your Prater Tho. Goodier that was here was but this I deny thy Greek and Hebrew if the Scripture be truly translated which is but to say I deny the words of Christ and the Apostles For ●●e translating there are many words in the Original Language which have not so many and apt in English to expresse them by Translating excludeth not the necessity of explicating And