A53704:267
An enquiry into the original, nature, institution, power, order and communion of evangelical churches.…
An enquiry into the original, nature, institution, power, order and communion of evangelical churches. The first part with an answer to the discourse of the unreasonableness of separation written by Dr. Edward Stillingfleet, Dean of Pauls, and in defence of the vindication of non-conformists from the guilt of schism / by John Owen.An enquiry into the original, nature, institution, power, order and communion of evangelical churches. The first part with an answer to the discourse of the unreasonableness of separation written by Dr. Edward Stillingfleet, Dean of Pauls, and in defence of the vindication of non-conformists from the guilt of schisme / by John Owen.
London: printed by J. Richardson for Nath. Ponder, 1681
Title page typeset from the transcription.
Chapter 4: The Especial Nature of the Gospel Church-State appointed by Christ.
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
And to manifest that Assemblies of the whole Church, at once and in one place, for the Celebration of Divine Worship, is of the Essence of a Church, without which it hath no real Being; when God had instituted such a Church Form, as wherein all the Members of it could not ordinarily come together every week for this end; yet he ordained that, for the Preservation of their Church-State, three times in the year the Males (which was the circumcised Church) should appear together in one place, to celebrate the most Solemn Ordinances of his Worship. Exod. 23.14. Chap. 34 23. Deut. 16.16. All those Difficulties which arose from the extent of the Limits of that Church unto the whole Nation, being removed, these Meetings of the whole Church for the Worship of Go• become a continual Duty; and when they cannot be observed in any Church, the State or kind of it is not instituted by Christ.
3. The third End of the Institution of the Gospel Church-State is the Exercise and Preservation of the Discipline appointed by Christ to be observed by his Disciples. The Ancients do commonly call the whole Religion of Christianity, by the Name of the Discipline of Christ, that is, the Faith and Obedience which he hath prescribed unto them, in Contradistinction, and Opposition unto the Rules and Prescriptions of all philosophical Societies. And it is that, without which the Glory of Christian Religion can in no due manner be preserved. The especial Nature of it shall be afterwards fully spoken unto For the use of the present Argument I shall only speak unto the Ends of it, or what it is that the Lord Christ designeth in the Institution of it; and these things may be referred unto 4 Heads.
3. The third End of the Institution of the Gospel Church-State is the Exercise and Preservation of the Discipline appointed by Christ to be observed by his Disciples. The Antients do commonly call the whole Religion of Christianity, by the Name of the Discipline of Christ, that is, the Faith and Obedience which he hath prescribed unto them, in Contradistinction, and Opposition unto the Rules and Prescriptions of all hilosophical Societies. And it is that, without which the Glory of hristian Religion can in no due manner be preserved. The especial Nature of it shall be afterwards fully spoken unto For the use of the present Argument I shall only speak unto the Ends of it, or what it is that the Lord Christ designeth in the Institution of it; and these things may be referred unto 4 Heads.