Selected quad for the lemma: state_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
state_n	christian_a	church_n	communion_n	1,593	5	9.3126	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A78437	Vindiciæ clavium: or, A vindication of the keyes of the kingdome of Heaven, into the hands of the right owners. Being some animadversions upon a tract of Mr. I.C. called, The keyes of the kingdome of Heaven. As also upon another tract of his, called, The way of the churches of Nevv-England. Manifesting; 1. The weaknesse of his proofes. 2. The contradictions to himselfe, and others. 3. The middle-way (so called) of Independents, to be the extreme, or by-way of the Brownists. / By an earnest well-wisher to the truth.	Cawdrey, Daniel, 1588-1664.	1645 (1645)	Wing C1640; Thomason E299_4; ESTC R200247	69,538	116

are still but where they were What if the Presbytery or Church will not submit to their determination or Declaration for it is no more what remedy hath the Church against their erring hereticall scandalous Presbytery If the Synod have a power of censure then againe you destroy your Independency No The Church may withdraw from them So they might before they consulted the Synod nay they were bound to doe it in your way without consulting the Synod But you may call to mind your former thoughts In your other Tract you give them full power to censure their Officers without any Officers as hath more then once been said above And thus your second answer is also answered already You say Excommunication is one of the highest acts of Rule The way p. 101. and ergo cannot be performed but by some Rulers Yet you contradict this f●●●ly in your other Tract when you say In case of offence given by an Elder or by the whole Eldership together the Church hath Authority marke that Authority which in this Booke you oft deny to require satisfaction of them and if they doe not give due satisfaction to proceed to censure according to the quality of the offence And yet which is strange me thinks here you resolve the cleane contrary The Church cannot excommunicate the whole Presbytery because they have not received from Christ an office of Rule without their Officers But now if this reason be good then on the other side it might seeme reasonable That the Presbytery might excommunicate the whole Church Apostate because they have received from Christ an office of Rule without the Church No say you They must tell the Church and joyne with the Church in that censure But this is to say and unsay For if the Church must joyne with them then the Church hath received some peece of an Office of Rule which was before denyed If you say they have not received any Office of Rule without their Officers This may imply that with their Officers they have received an Office of Rule which all this while you have seemed to deny allowing them a Liberty but no Rule or Authority And whereas you say They must tell the Church but that cannot be when the Church is Apostate I rejoyne this makes it reasonable to me That there is another Church to which they must tell the offence by way of appeale or else both an erring Presbytery or an Apostate Church have no remedy to recover them instituted by Christ and so the Church a multitude or a Presbytery is not so well provided for as one particular member But you have found a remedy The Church wants not liberty to withdraw from them Is not this even tantamount with excommunication Is it not the execution of that sentence to withdraw especially in your way Excommunication is the contrary to communion Now how doth the Church communicate their Elders Take your owne words As they set up the Presbytery The Keyes p 17. by professing their subjection to them in the Lord so they avoid them that is in sense excommunicate them by professed withdrawing their subjection from them according to God And this is as much as any people doe or need to doe to persons excommunicate unlesse you grant them a power to the very Act and decree of excommunication which as you have clearly done in your other Tract so you doe here giving them a power more than Ministeriall even a Kingly and more than a Kingly power when you say They rule the Church by appointing their owne Officers and likewise in censuring offenders not only by their Officers which is as much as Kings are wont to doe but also by their owne Royall assent which Kings are not wont to doe but only in the execution of Nobles Satis pro imperio 5. The last Liberty of the Church is Liberty of communion with other Churches which is seven wayes exercised c. To this I say in generall This is rather communion of Saints than communion of Churches because in your way every Church is independent and hath no church-Church-state in relation to any but it s owne members We suppose this communion is the liberty or priviledge of every Christian by vertue of his interest in the generall visible Church and not by any peculiar interest in a particular Congregation He that is a professed Christian and baptized hath a right to all the Ordinances of God where ever he find them As of old he that was a Citizen of Rome or so borne was a freeman through all the Romane Empire and enjoyed the priviledges of a Roman A Christian is a free Deacon in any part of the Christian world A Citizen with the Saints and of the houshold of God Eph. 2.19 And this to me seemes reasonable upon these grounds 1. Because every Christian not yet in a particular Church or Congregation is at liberty to joyne himselfe to any Church tyed by no obligation to one more than another 2. Because it is lawfull for any member of a particular Church upon just reasons to leave that Church and to joyne himselfe to another and nothing can hinder his removall or communion with another Church except he be scandalous c. 3. It was the custome of the first times before Congregations were fixed to adde them to the visible Church were their number lesser or greater and give them communion in all the Ordinances of Christ 4. Because the whole visible Church is but one City one Kingdome though for orders sake divided into severall Corporations It is not so in civill respects A Citizen of one Corporation cannot goe and set up trade in another because they have their severall Charters But in the City of God the Kingdome of Christ there is but one Charter for all and no more is required to admit a man a member of any Congregation but that he professe himselfe a Christian and live accordingly Your New Covenant to tye men to your particular Church that he may not remove without a generall leave will I feare prove a snare and a tyranny worse than yet we can imagine 1. But come we to your particulars First by way of participation of the Lords Supper the members of one Church comming to another Church c. But 1. Why doe you instance in this Ordinance only Have not their children occasionally borne there a liberty also of Baptisme Where neither of the parents can claim right to the Lords Supper there their Infants cannot claime right to Baptisme The way p. 81. Nor the childe of an excommunicate person p. 85. The rather because Baptisme is not administred with respect to this or that Church but to the generall visible Church Unlesse you hold that a man or childe is baptized to no Church but that particular and an Infidell to all the rest Yet some of your brethren will hardly baptize a childe of any but a member of their owne Church which is next doore to