Selected quad for the lemma: master_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
master_n	child_n	servant_n	wife_n	7,379	5	6.5654	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A50242	A discussion of the lawfulness of a pastor's acting as an officer in other churches besides that which he is specially called to take the oversight of by the late Reverend Mr. Nathanael Mather.	Mather, Nathanael, 1631-1697.	1698 (1698)	Wing M1263; ESTC R37635	23,058	187

A DISCUSSION Of the Lawfulness of a Pastor's Acting as an OFFICER In Other Churches Besides that which he is specially Called to take the Oversight of By the late Reverend Mr. Nathanael Mather LONDON Printed for Nath. Hiller at the Princes Arms in Leaden-Hall Street over against St. Mary Ax MDCXCVIII Academiae Cantabrigiensis Liber TO THE READER THat a Particular Congregational Church is an Institution of Christ is clear in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament Which being granted there must needs be something proper and peculiar unto every such Church which is not common to another For altho every Church hath Ministerial Officers and Ordinances which are all of the same kind yet they are not the same individual Ministry and Ordinances nor in common any more than the distinct Families of two Men each of whom has a Wife Children and Servants One is not the Husband of the other's Wife nor the Father of the other's Children nor the Master of the other's Servants And why should we speak or act less rationally about a Spiritual Corporation or Society than about a Civil one Will we allow that the Master and Wardens and Priviledges belonging to one Company may be challenged or borrowed by another May the Father Husband Master of one Family he challenged or borrowed by another As this Husband Father Master is the proper and peculiar Right of this Family in a correlation and this Magistrate Warden Governour is the peculiar Right by correlation to this Company or Corporation So it is in Spiritual Fellowships this Pastor Elder or Deacon with all his Office-power in Administrations belongs to this Church and to no other so that he is their Officer and related to them and hath no right to administer or exercise his Office in any other Church God being the God of Order and not of Confusion as in all the Churches of the Saints for if God hath not confounded natural and civil relations neither hath he those which are spiritual Since Antichristianism hath blinded the eyes of the Professing World the plainest Doctrines of Faith and Order have met with great Contradictions and Opposition Yea the minds of some who were greatly enlightned in matters of Faith have been left under much darkness about the matters of God's House the Church being still in a great measure fed in a mystical and hidden State and not yet come forth to a fulness of separation from Antichristian entanglements and pollutions as she will when the Mystery of God shall be finished And many who seem to have gone farther than others in the acknowledgment of Truths appertaining to the Churches of Christ and the Forms and Ordinances instituted by Him yet for want of fuller Illumination or being byass'd too much by Worldly Interest and men-pleasing compliance have practised not only short of the Rule but also very ungroundedly and irregularly in these sacred things Not to mention more Instances than the particular Point which is learnedly and nervously discussed in this Treatise Some even of the Congregational Persuasion having extended the Communion of Churches beyond the Bounds which Christ hath set by making it reach to Office-Power have thereby fallen into a Mistake which is in it self destructive to the nature of a Spiritual Corporation For if Ministerial Power be communicable why not the Priviledge of Church Membership much more And so he that Votes to admit a Member in one Church may also by vertue thereof Vote in the admission or rejection of Members or in the Election of Ministerial Officers all the World over and then what becomes of particular Churches and their Priviledges It is true there is such a thing as Communion of Churches in a Sisterly converse and Entertainment of one another whereby they allow of each others Church State without imposing upon one another or parting with any thing which is proper to themselves alone as Church-Membership and Office-power It is one thing to partake of the benefit of Power where it is duly and lawfully exercised and another thing to exercise Power A Man who is a Member of one Corporation may come and sue for his Right in another or have any Friendly Entertainment there But the Mayor of one Corporation cannot come and sit and act as a Magistrate in another Corporation So the Pastor of a Church may partake of the Lord's Supper in a place where he hath no power to administer it Christ's Commission to a Pastor reacheth no farther than the Charge undertaken by him and committed to him feed the Flock over which the Holy Ghost hath made thee Overseer any more than that of the Riding Elder or Deacon Again He that administers doth it as an ordinary Brother or as a Pastor If as a Brother then what becomes of the Pastoral Office Churches may do without it And this will justifie the Irregular Practices of those who call ordinary Brethren to administer the Seals as they have occasion If he administer as Pastor it must be as Pastor of the Church whereto he belongs and then one Church hath power to make a Church-Officer for another and to choose and set a Pastor over it Then also where is co-ordination of Churches Then likewise every particular Church hath power to choose a Catholick Pastor which is absurd And if the Choice of the Foreign Church do give power then a Member of their own might be a fitter Person for this Work having power in the Church as a Member already which the other has not If he administer as a Pastor in standing Office to one Church and occasional only to another then there is more required to make an occasional Officer than a standing Pastor For there 's but one Church required to the choosing a standing Pastor but two are requisite to choose an occasional Pastor there needing the Choice of that Church only to which he is primarily related to make him a standing Pastor but besides that there must be the Choice of another Church to make him an occasional Officer pro hic nunc But I shall not enlarge upon this nor need I it being the Subject of the ensuing Discourse where it is strenuously yet modestly and calmly argued and clear'd which I recommend to the Consideration of the Vnprejudiced and Impartial Inquirer after Truth It was Wrote long since and Corrected and fitted for the Press by the late Reverend and Pious Author whose Name it bears Occasioned by the irregular Practice of some Church or Churches who called in Neighbouring Pastors to administer the Lords Supper to them when they had none of their own Vpon the like Practices here of late and at the desire of some Friends who had seen it He intended to have Printed it had he lived Which Intention of his is Warrant sufficient to Publish it since his Death and indeed neither it nor the Author need any Epistle Recommendatory This Tract is able to speak for it self and as for Him his Name and Memory are savoury and