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CHAPTER I.

THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH.

MONG the Institutions of Christianity we may first consider that which embodies its essential principles, its worship, and its order, and which presents all these to the view of the world, the Christian Church. It was the plan of the Lord Jesus to establish among men a spiritual Kingdom, the subjects of which, while they surrendered themselves unreservedly to His rule, should reflect His purity and love, should openly confess Him before men, and should seek to bring all men to the acknowledgment of His authority and the experience of His salvation. He went forth,' it has been properly said, 'not to found a local school of evanescent sentiment, but to proclaim an enduring and world-wide Kingdom of Souls, based upon the culture of a common moral character, and upon intellectual submission to a common creed.'*

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In entering upon the subject of the Church of Christ, it is important for us to remember that the Church is often spoken of in Scripture as comprehending all Christ's spiritual people, whether in heaven or on earth. That Church of Christ,' says Hooker, which we properly term His body mystical can be but one; neither can that one be sensibly discerned by any man, inasmuch as the parts thereof are some in heaven already with Christ, and the rest that are on earth (albeit their natural persons be visible) we do not discern under this property whereby they are truly and infallibly of that body. Only our minds by intellectual conceit are able to apprehend that such a * Canon Liddon's 'Bampton Lectures,' Lect. III., p. 167, first edition.

body there is, a body collective, because it containeth a huge multitude; a body mystical, because the mystery of their conjunction is removed altogether from sense. Whatsoever we read in Scripture concerning the endless love and saving mercy which God showeth towards His Church, the only proper subject thereof is this Church. Concerning this flock it is that our Lord and Saviour hath promised, “I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish, neither shall any pluck them out of My hand." They who are of this Society have such marks and notes of distinction from all others, as are not objects unto our sense; only unto God who seeth their hearts and understandeth all their secret cogitations, unto Him they are clear and manifest. All men knew Nathanael to be an Israelite. But our Saviour, piercing deeper, giveth further testimony of him than men could have done with such certainty as He did, “Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile.”’*

But it is of the Church as it exists on earth-the visible Church—that we have now to speak. That Church, in its several branches, comprehends all who hold the essential truths of Christianity, who accept the Lord Jesus as their Saviour, and who openly profess, according to His plan, their subjection to His authority, their trust in His atonement, and their devotion to His service.

The Church of God, indeed, existed in former ages; and that Church is, in an important sense, one under every dispensation. The argument of St. Paul, in his Epistle to the Romans, clearly implies this. Expostulating with the Gentile believers, he compares the Church of God to a beautiful and fruitful olive-tree, whose root was to be sought in the patriarchal age; and he affirms that the Gentile Christians, though by nature belonging to a different stock, had been grafted into this tree among some of the natural branches which remained; that although many of these last had been broken off, this was on account of their unbelief; and that the excision of these was

* Ecclesiastical Polity,' Book III, s. 1.

not final, for if they continued not in unbelief God would ' graft them in again' (xi. 17-24).

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But now the Church is emphatically the Church of Christ. He Himself spoke of it as His Church which He was about to establish, and which He would build upon the immovable foundation of His personal claims. Referring to the confession of Peter, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God,' He affirmed, ‘Upon this rock I will build My Church; and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it' (Matt. xvi. 18). His personal ministry formed a preparation for the establishment of His Church; and when He was about to ascend to His heavenly glory, He made provision for its being set up by the promise of the Spirit, and by the commission which He gave to His Apostles to make disciples of all the nations,' baptizing them in the name of the Holy Trinity, and teaching them to observe all things that He had commanded.

The constitution of the Church of God, under the new dispensation is, in several important respects, different from its constitution in former periods. Under the Mosaic economy the descendants of Abraham according to the flesh, when they had received the covenant-rite of circumcision, were recognised as the people of God; and with them were associated devout Gentiles, upon their submitting to circumcision, and engaging to observe the law. But under the Christian dispensation Jews and Gentiles are placed on the same ground; the ritual law is abolished; and the only conditions of membership in the Church, on the part of adults, are submission to the authority of the Lord Jesus, an exclusive reliance on His work and sacrifice, and the open confession of Him before the world. All who really love Him, and cling to Him as their Saviour, and give themselves up to His service, and who have been baptized in His name, are members of His true, spiritual Church, at the same time that they belong to the outward fellowship of His people. These sentiments are again and again affirmed in the Apostolic writings. St. Paul, in particular, addressing the Galatians, says, 'In Christ Jesus

neither circumcision availeth any thing, nor uncircumcision; but faith working through love' (v. 6); and in a subsequent passage he enlarges on this sentiment, and shows us who are the true Israel of God':- But far be it from me to glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world hath been crucified unto me, and I unto the world. For neither is circumcision any thing, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature. And as many as shall walk by this rule, peace be upon them, and mercy, and upon the Israel of God' (vi. 14-16). In his Epistle to the Philippians, also, after stigmatising those who prided themselves on the outward rite of circumcision as 'the concision,' he adds, 'For we are the circumcision,'-the true Israel, the true covenant-people of God, who worship by the Spirit of God, and glory in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh' (iii. 3).

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Of the universal Church the Lord Jesus Christ is Himself the Head. This, as we have seen, is one of the glories which belong to Him as the enthroned Mediator. He possesses supreme authority over it; He fills it with spiritual life; and He identifies Himself with it in all its interests. But this subject has been dwelt upon in the Chapter which refers to the Mediator in His state of exaltation.

The Church of Christ, as a visible Institution, must rest on a doctrinal basis. There are certain great and fundamental truths of Christianity, which cannot be set aside without entirely changing its character, and the denial of which is inconsistent with loyalty to the Lord Jesus. So strongly did the Apostle Paul feel this, that in remonstrating with the Galatians, who had been led astray by Judaizing teachers, he affirmed that they were removing from Him that called them in the grace of Christ unto a different gospel'; and he added impressively, which is not another; only there are some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ. But though we, or an angel from heaven, should preach unto you any gospel other than that which we preached unto you, let him be anathema' (i. 6—8). We may properly appeal to the

baptismal formula, used, according to our Lord's appointment, in the formal admission of persons to discipleship to Himself, and to His words in the institution of that other sacrament in which His people are to continue to avow their faith in Him, as showing that there are certain essential principles, which every Society that claims to be a branch of the Christian Church must recognise and maintain. The Redeemer's commission to His Apostles was, 'All authority hath been given unto Me in heaven and on earth, Go ye, therefore, and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost; teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I commanded you: and lo! I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world' (Matt. xxviii. 18—20). All, therefore, who come forward to be thus admitted to His Church do, by that act, avow their faith in the Triune God, and, in particular, acknowledge the Lord Jesus as the Son, and as the enthroned Mediator, all whose precepts are binding upon the consciences of His people. In instituting the sacrament of His supper, the Lord Jesus said, as He handed the bread to His disciples. Take, eat, this is My body, which is broken for you'; and as He gave them the cup, He said, ' Drink ye all of it; for this is My blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many unto remission of sins.' Now, by appointing this sacrament, and uttering these words of institution, our Lord has taught us that all the members of His Church are to regard His death as vicarious and sacrificial, as having an important relation to the remission of sins, and as that through which they rise to the privileges of the new covenant.' Nay, more, the very act of eating that bread and drinking that cup is symbolical of an appropriation of His sacrifice, and implies, at least, that we turn away from every other refuge, and look to the crucified Redeemer alone for salvation, even if we have not yet obtained joy and peace in Him. We cannot, then, allow as valid the claim of any professed Christian Society to be a branch of the Church of Christ, which refuses to recognise the Triune Name, and which

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