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A61517
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Kalōs proestōtes, or, A view of church-government wherein the proper church-governors are demonstrated, their office, duty, work and employment ... is declared ... : in a sermon preached at West-Malling ... Septemb. 16, 1662 / by John Stileman ...
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Stileman, John, d. 1685.
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1663
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Wing S5553; ESTC R34609
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27,809
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36
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body natural Immedicabile vulnus ense recidendum In Politick bodies there is a power to take in and cast out of civil Societies The same reason holds in the Church where the sin and danger is so much the greater as much as the Concerns of the Soul are above the Concerns of the Body If a private person after all means may estrange himself from such an one (z) Mat. 18.16 17 as an Heathen or Publican much more may a Church where the Offence is greater as much as a wrong done to a Community transcends an Injury to a private person Yea there is an higher end in Excommunication The ends of Excommunication then there can be in cutting off a natural member or throwing one out of a civil society For in either of these the end is but to preserve the Body from death or the Society from ruine 1. To clense the Church But in this as it is 1. To free the Church from Infection because (a) 1 Cor. 5.6 A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump and thereby (b) Heb. 12.15 Many others might be defiled Grex totus in agris unius scabie cadit And 2. 2. To vindicate Christianity To vindicate the Churches Purity and Christianity from the Reproaches of her Enemies that the world may see that neither doth the Church own such rotten members nor our Religion countenance a wicked life So 3. It mainly looks to the sinner himself for though it be a Censure of the greatest severity 3. To humble und to save the sinner excluding the sinner from the Communion and Blessings of the Church yea from Heaven too until he repent What being thus bound on earth Clave non errante (c) Mat 18.18 John 20.23 being as certainly bound in Heaven Yet it carries in it the greatest Charity to the sinners Soul the end being not to destroy but to save that as by a dreadful thunder-bolt he may be stricken with fear and horror and awakened to Repentance and by this means being sensible of his desperate condition learn to sin no more For this end are (d) 1 Tim. 5.20 Hâ—mâ—neus and Alexander delivered unto Satan 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That they may learn as being by this instructed not to blaspheme The end being no other but that through the sinners Repentance x The Spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus This also may teach us My Brethren of the Clergy a double Duty I. Use To engage Governours We are as Governours of the Flock in our places to Admonish Rebuke c. How careful should we be then to keep our selves free from that which we reprove in others 1. To be holy themselves Quod dictum vis alteri dic prius tibi How can we hope that others should hear us admonish them when we shall be as the Lute making sweet Musick to others but will hear nothing our selves Unde tibi facies With what face can we reprove when our selves are more or equally guilty When we do well and preach by our Lives as well as our Doctrine we may gain (e) 1 Tim. 3.13 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 great bolduess and use freedom of speech in any Reproof when we can challenge the world as Christ doth the Jews (f) John 8.48 Which of you can convince me of Sin And as Samuel when he would effectually reprove the ingratitude of Israel [g] 1 Sam. 12.3 begins with a testification of his own Integrity challenging them to say any thing against him if they could Behold here am I witness against me before the Lord. But if that Proverb may be cast in our teeth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 When we undertake to reprove our own bad life will take off the edge and efficacy of it If we come to reform men we had need bring Digitos mundos He that comes to wipe off a spot on the face with foul fingers will make it worse Remember then that charge of the Apostle [h] 1 Tim. 5.22 Keep thy self pure II. 2. The exercise Government to its proper end Let it not be esteemed Presumption if I beseech the Reverend Fathers of the Church yet I need not they are I am confident of themselves more ready to do the same but let me obtest and adjure all those who are called to manage the Government under them that they zealously exercise it in all things to its proper enâ—â—â— The Glory of God and the real good of the Church that Innocency may appear with boldness and all Vices tremble at the presence of their Courts Let the Church-wardens conscientiously present the enormities of their Precincts Let All officers strive not to enrich themselves but to reform sins and make men better In the managing of all Ecclesiastical Censures be careful to make men see themselves confess forsake sin In matters of inferiour nature use all meekness and unto Persons the tenderness of Brethren But in case of high enormities wherein the life of Christianity or the peace of the Church is nearly concerned proceed with all just severity Then will the Church be freed of her enemies honoured of strangers beloved of her friends and reverenced of her children and the world shall see that her Courts are kept and Visitations held not only of course and custome but to the effectual reformation of Offenders restoring of Penitents encouraging of the pious and peaceable to bring sinners to a sight of and sincere sorrow for sin And in a word contrary to the too just complaint of some of olde and taken up by some as a reproach against the Church I hope unjustly still Non nummorum sed morum gratia not to empty mens purses but to reform their manners I have done with the Office or Employment Let me crave leave for a word or two of 2. The Object the Souls of men 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2 The Object of this Government The Souls of men Which sheweth They watch for your souls not to get from you nor indeed to preserve for you your lands goods estates or lives these are of secular concernment but for your souls for the furtherance and advancement of your spiritual good your consolation and salvation And this shews the Nature Worth and Weight of this work 1. The Nature of our work it is spiritual 1. The nature of their Works it is spiritual to look not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 about the things of this life or secular concerns but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 about souls and spiritual things Christ is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 [i] 1 Cor. 6.3 [k] 1 Pet. 2.25 the Bishop of our souls his Oversight as Mediator and Governour of his Church consists not in judging Law-suits or Division of Inheritances Man [k] Luke 1â— 1â— saith he who made me a judge c. This was not the end of his coming but to teach lead and rule for the spiritual and eternal
ΚΑΛΩΣ ΠΡΟΕΣΤΩΤΕΣ OR A VIEW OF Church-Government WHEREIN The proper Church-Governors are demonstrated THEIR Office Duty Work and Employment With the Object thereof is declared and the Necessity of Obedience to them asserted IN A SERMON PREACHED At WEST-MALLING at a Visitation held there by the Lord Bishop of Rochester for one Part of his DIOCES Septemb. 16. 1662. By JOHN STILEMAN M. A. Minister of the Gospel and Vicar of Tunbridge in Kent Imprimatur Novemb. 17. 1662. M. Franck. S. T. P. R. P. D. Epis Lond. à sacr Dom. LONDON Printed by T. R. for Thomas Peirpont at the Sun in St. Paul's Church-yard 1663. To the Right Reverend Father in God JOHN By Divine Providence Lord Bishop of ROCHESTER My most honoured Diocesan May it please your Lordship IT would be a Confidence very easie to be convicted of too arrogant presumption should I be so vain as to imagine any thing of mine worthy either of your Honours hands or the publick view But your Lordship having enjoyned me the meanest of my Brethren to preach before so learned an Auditory upon so solemn an occasion and my labours finding acceptance beyond their worth some of my Brethren who have set a value upon them above what I dare conceive to be in them earnestly solliciting Copies of me that I might both satisfie their importunities and withal ease my self of the trouble of Transcribing I have adventured them to the Press which being emitted must now come under the various Censures of the world wherein I can never hope that they should relish well with every Palate nor can I expect such are the different humours of men that they should generally find such candid Readers as in the Pulpit they were blessed with judicious and ingenuous Hearers And therefore they dare not go abroad unless sheltred under the wings of some honourable Patron Pardon me therefore my Lord if I presume to send them forth under the Vmbrage of your Reverend Name Whos 's many expressions of Grace and Kindness to my unworthy self have encouraged me to this Address And who may by right claim a special interest both in all my labours as mine Ordinary to whom I am bound to be accountable for all my service in the Church and peculiarly in these as being performed by your Lordships special command And if they shall be approved in your Lordships eye which all that know you know to be most clear and piercing I shall not have cause to suspect the Censures of any that are judicious and others I shall not need to value The Sermon I confess comes forth somewhat larger then it was preached but not a jot altered in any material point those who heard it and shall now read it will find it the same though increased in some expressions and explications which were prepared but the streights of time would not permit to be then spoken In this and all my labours my whole aim and design is * Ephes 4.15 to Follow the Truth in love and to assert it with sobriety It will be the rejoycing of my soul to see every one in their stations the Clergy especially to maintain the honour of their places by an holy humble peaceable and blameless conversation which is the main thing this Sermon drives at The Government and Discipline of the Church of England must be acknowledged excellent in its Constitution and for the main and substance of it exactly agreable to the Primitive Pattern It would revive me to see every particular Act and Exercise of it as blameless in all the subordinate Officers hands Piety and Peace having their full incouragement and all Sin and Impiety Schism and Prophaness meeting with their proper Censures that the Churches Judicatories may be revered of all and despised of none It hath been a sorrow to my soul to see sometimes that high Censure of Excommunication so abused on slight and very trivial occasions until I considered how an offence small in the beginning was increased much by a superadded Contumacy and the Ecclesiastical Court had no other way to vindicate it self from the contempt of such contumacious spirits or to compel men to obey And yet hath not this of late proved a sufficient remedy against the frowardness of perverse men who slight even this so far as that by their own voluntary separations they prevent the Churches Censures that the Church as it may seem shall not need to excommunicate them who are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 * Tit. 3.11 and do excommunicate themselves It is my great expectation and hope that when the right reverend Fathers of the Church the Bishops of the upper and the Reverend Clergy of the nether House of Convocation shall again assemble some such effectual course will be found out to reduce men to and preserve them in Peace and Order that by a prudent exercise of Discipline in all parts thereof the honour of the Churches Judicatories may be preserved and yet so high a Censure may not be debased to secular ends nor on low and light occasions that even those who have evil will at Sion may see and be forced to acknowledge that the Churches aim is the spiritual and eternal Advantage of her Members and not the worldly advantage of her Officers and Governours whose eyes look not so low as to a secular profit to themselves and whose pious souls are cordially affected to and only zealous for the real and proper interest of Christianity viz. Piety and Peace in the Church My Lord I have only this one thing to beg that you would not judge me in this so vain as to presume to teach or direct so venerable Fathers but only accept of this Address as a faithful expression of mine high observance of your Lordship to whose judicious and paternal Censures I readily submit my self and all my labours And as the Lord who is the * Dan. 7.9 Antient of days hath already adorned your head with that which the wisest of meer men did deservedly call [*] Pro. 16.31 A Crown of Glory Gray hairs found in the way of Righteousness So that he would add to your days a Nestors years that this little Diocess may be still happy under your Lordships prudent and grave inspection and when the time shall come that you must be gathered to your Fathers that He will then translate you from your Throne in the Church on earth to a far more glorious Throne in the highest heavens is and shall still be the unfeigned Prayer of Your Lordships in all humble and due Observance JOHN STILEMAN From my Vicaridge at Tunbridge Novemb. 10. 1662. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Heb XIII XVII Obey them that have the rule over you and submit your selves for they watch for your souls as they that must give account that they may do it with joy and not with grief for that is unprofitable for you WHen I consider the work and occasion of this meeting I cannot but with confidence presume that