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A30804 A short treatise describing the true church of Christ, and the evills of schisme, anabaptism and libertinism ... delivered in two sermons by Mr. Richard Byfield. Byfield, Richard, 1598?-1664. 1653 (1653) Wing B6393; ESTC R14831 37,996 46

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tolerations of opinions of divers mindednesse in faith is not the conversation becoming the Gospel especially in times of terrible Adversaries and is not an evident token of the Adversaries perdition and of our salvation and that of God What is it then It is an evident token of the Adversaries prevalency and of our succumbency under the present judgement as yet And of the further wrath of the Almighty and that from a just God I have heard of some that say this is that which can never be that all Christians should be of one heart and way let such believe in him that is faithfull and hath promised and not dishonour and weary God by unbelief God hath heretofore made good this Article of his Covenant In the first primitive Christian Church they were all the multitude of them that believed of one heart and of one soul Act. 4. 32. they continued stedfastly in this holy unity Act. 2. 42. 44. 46. There were two glorious fruits and concomitants hereof Fear came upon every soul Act 2. 43. and great grace was upon them all Act. 4. 33. Now the same God that hath thus powred out his owne holy and one spirit the spirit of unity by the Preaching of the Gospel can do the same again His Covenant is the same The great God delights to do great things the fruits would be alike excellent nothing more full of Grace and amiablenesse or of terrour and dread Hence also ariseth a strong Argument that no Christian should plead for toleration for all ought to seek for Gods Church in the Reformation of it the utmost conformity to the first purest Primitive Church of Christ when she was as a heap of Wheat set about with Lillies True liberty of Conscience lieth in sweet communion in the unity of faith and in the perfect bond of love the souls of believers knit together and cleaving one to another as Ionathans did to David unanimously subject to Gods Law all other Liberty is the Liberty of lust 10. There are also that will not joyn in Prayer with any other though they be Christians unlesse they know them to be godly and that they be of their judgement and way they refuse to pray with us not only in our publique Congregations but in our private or occasionall meetings The Lords Prayer directs us to Pray Our Father Our respects the whole community of Professors of Christs name and not any Segregated part It taketh in all that call on the name of our Lord Iesus Christ What spirit are they of that can deny to pray with those that say Za. 8. 21. Come let us go seek the Lord pray before him Not of the spirit of one that is a Iew inwardly Holy Paul among Sea-men and Mariners who are none of the best among souldiers prisoners for severall sorts of wicked deeds Heathens of severall Nations and Religions prayed as the mouth of them all or with them all beseeching them all to take meat he took bread and solemnly prayed as the Text saith He gave thanks to God in the presence of them all Act. 27. 35. Christ hath broken down the partition Wall and now none are to be called common Act. 10. 11 12 14 15. or unclean The Gospel is to be preached to every creature to all Nations therefore prayer is to be made with every creature with all Nations to whom we may preach with them we may pray and ought yea prayer to God is not only an instituted worship but naturall or of the Law of Nature These Doctrines of division rent and tear the Church of Christ and this now mentioned is a pricking Bryar and grieving Thorne 11. Like to these also are those that make up Churches of those of their own opinion and separate from others that do hold the unity of Faith and the Rule of righteousnesse But who can separate from those that are of the same Faith and not break fellowship with the Lord Iesus Differences in opinions should not dissunder us in affections much lesse make divisions separate us into Church-wayes against Church-wayes the same Faith and the same Commandments for holinesse should be more powerfull to cement us in one Church then difference in opinions through petulancy to put every opinion into practice note this should be of force to loose us in the building or lay us in a frame whose cement and morter whose mould and fashion is from a conspiring in an opinion these conspiracies in opinion joyned with separation from other Churches that hold the faith of Iesus and the Commandments of God are no right gathering of Churches they are Conventions sinfull and Schismaticall and unlawfull carnall and proud separations they that hold one Faith ought in lowlinesse of minde and forbearance of one another in love to indeavour to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace Eph. 4. 2 3. 12. In like manner it is a violating of Gods Temple to separate because some wicked livers are not cast out of the Church the place abused is that in 2 Cor. 6. 14. 15. 17. To separate to come out from among them is not to separate or come out from the Church and Temple of God but from Idols from Belial from Infidels from Darknesse from Unrighteousnesse that they from whom we ought to separate are Idolaters Infidels Belialists Heathens of whom it is said ye were once Darknesse Unrighteous ones and they are not the Church and Temple of God to separate in the Apostles sense is not to touch the unclean thing that is to have no communion with them in their Idolatry in their unrighteousnesse of any kinde but other communion with them is not condemned and if he will come to the Ordinances of worship of the true God with the Church we may and ought to admit him to Communion with us in all Ordinances that are for conversion and this is not to touch the unclean thing Idolatry and unrighteousnesse is the unclean thing which we may not touch but the man is not the unclean thing the separation commanded and the coming out from them is not to be unequally yoked together with them the Greek is elegant lively significant 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it is a Simile taken from the Plough where the Teeme that drawes the same plough is by yokes and paires of Draught-cattell Oxen or horses or the like which are yoked in the same yoke and so do draw each his part of the same Plough to be yoked together is to draw one part in the same Draught which is in the sense of the Apostle to be joyned in the same communion and counsell of the wicked in which they draw the Plough of their wickednesse be the wickednesse Idolatry unrighteousnesse drunkennesse or any other to have Communion with an Idolater in his Idolatrous worship counsell to uphold that worship or such leagues of nearest conjunction voluntarily chosen and run into which may be a temptation to entice one to Idolatry this is to
guilty in a higher degree And here let me mention only those that we are most in danger of and troubled with at the present these Hereticks polluters of the Temple of God are 1. The Antinomians they over-throw the Law Morall they hold that Christ came to abolish it that a beleever hath nothing to do with keeping the Commandements that the Gospell takes away all obedience to the Commandements they are against all urging of doing of duty of Humiliations of Repentance for sins after Iustification of praying for pardon of sin by a beleever they hold that the Law ought not to be Preached to beleevers with a great deale more of the like pernicious Leaver all which savoureth of ignorance pride and conceitednesse and of affectation of licentiousnesse and lawlesse liberty the spirit of Libertinisme inspireth these men 2. The Anti-Sabbatarians They evert the fourth Commandment teaching that it is Ceremoniall and so taking away all conscience of sin against the Commandment of God though no day be kept a Sabbath in the week and thereby all preaching and attendance on duties of Gods Worship publike and private on the Lords day in conscience to Gods Commandment laid aside they at one blow lay flat all that would uphold the power of godlinesse 3. The Germane Anabaptists that hold that a Christian ought not to be a Magistrate that Christians may not take the sword nor wage war these evert the fifth Commandment I call them the Germane Anabaptists for there divers Sects of them are and have been for this hundred of yeers past through Gods just judgement their errours some of them begin to spread in England these ghosts can passe the Seas and swim thorow the billows and waves of mighty waters they are in their first spawning to be looked unto for who knows unto what destructive Principles and Practices such giddy self-willed spirits may run Bellarmine slanderously calls them Proles Lutheranismi the off-spring of Lutheranisme they are indeed the off spring of hell for hell it selfe is moved when God rents the heavens and comes down to the great work of the Reformation of his Church Satan that sent these Furies out to defame the work of Reformation which God began by Luthers glorious Ministery he is Satan still and sends these Furies among us for the very same end For the present I will name no more that are against the Commandments of God Against the faith of Iesus I shall onely mention two 1. The Arminians that teach universall grace and the falling away of the Saints and deny that the efficacious working of internall grace from Gods Spirit is necessary to conversion and to the begetting of faith in a sinner They teach that the grace of conversion is resistible that we cannot have assurance and the like 2. The Socinians which among other damnable errours run into these two First they deny the Deity of our Lord Iesus Christ who is the great God our Saviour God blessed for ever Secondly they deny that Christs death was for satisfaction Isa 53. 5 6. Gal. 3. 13. 1 Pet. 2. 24. or for merit 1 Pet. 1. 18. 19. Act. 20 28 and that it was a price 1 Cor. 6. 20. 1 Tim. 2. 6. of our redemption but onely hath in it the nature of an example how we should suffer that Christ is our Redeemer not by being a ransome or paying a price or as our Surety Heb. 7. 22. making satisfaction but onely by leaving us an example that we should follow his steps The foregoing Texts of Scripture are expresly against this most hellish heresie These and the like to these are Dogs Wolves in Sheeps-skins evill workers the Concision as those that urged Circumcision are called Phil. 3. 2. they are to be named with such names of disgrace as tell truly what they are that all may beware of them they cut themselves others that hearken to them off from Christ and from his Church● in Jucunda prosonomasia conjunxit interse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 conciditur enim quod discerpitur plan● distrahitur circumciditur quod supervacancis resectis purgatur Bullinger in locum this respect all the hereticall teachers are the Concision they are evill-workers for they should build up the Church of God but they pull it down and destroy it like dogs they bark at the truth they grin at Orthodox Ministers and fasten on the simple the fangs of their poisoned doctrine There 's the Wolfe beware and thrice beware 4. Antichrist and the Spirit of Popery which hath turned Zion into a Babylon I mean Rome-Christian into Rome-Antichristian and it is now a cage of unclean and hatefull birds a den of beasts a stie of foule spirits This Spirit of Antichrist discovers it self in four things 1. In Self-exaltation and Domination over the Church that the Pope might sit in the Temple of God as God 2 Thess 2. 4. 5. 2. In Apostacy from the faith that the man of sin might be the head of the Church thus he becomes the head of that Apostasie and of the Popish Apostaticall Synagogue farre from the Apostolicall Church of which Christ is head 3. In spirituall fornication and adultery which is Idolatry Superstition and Will-worship thus the Popish Synagogue is the Whore of Babylon 4. In lyes taught in Hypocrisie and doctrines of Devills 1 Tim. 4. 1 2 3. 5. They defile and destroy Gods Temple that by pernicious errours destroy and evert either of the two great ordinances of God the Magistracy and the Ministery the Authors the fautors cherishers or nurses the receivers abettors or applauders of such errours these strike the very Pillars of the Temple 1. For Magistracy those that erroneously teach that Magistrates have nothing to doe in the first but only in the second Table of the Law that they are to preserve the Peace and judge about meum and tuum mine and thine but for Religion and Gods Worship and Doctrine they have not to do● with their power in those But God saith I will give Kings to be thy nursing fathers Esa 49. 23. as speaking of the Church under the New Testament David saith Psal 122. 9. because of the house of the Lord I will seeke to doe thee good And againe Psa 101. 8. I will betimes cut off evill doers from the City of God Restauration of the true Worship and Religion and the demolishing and extirpation of the false were the chiefe praises of godly Princes Asa Iehosaphat Hezekiah Iosiah and of Nehemiah the renowned reformer Neh. 13. Obj. That 's the Old Testament Sol. What are the Damned Manichees again raised from Hell Shall we againe be haunted with the Ghosts of the old Heresies sentenced to the bottomlesse Pit one thousand four hundred yeares agoe for rejecting the Old Testament 2. Do● you hold the New Testament to be in force you must then receive the Old The New Testament is not to be received but as it agrees with the Old Christ bids Search the Scripture Ioh. 5. 39.