fulfilling of this is not to be until the personal and second comming of Christ the three precedent verses do shew And in Ps 67. 7. God shall bless us i. e. Jews and all the ends of the earth shall fear him consonant to this is Esa 2. 2 3. Zac. 8. 23. before cited Likewise Zac. 14. informs us of the coming of the day of the Lord ver 1. of Christ's personal coming ver 3 4. of his being King over all the earth in that day ver 9. of the subjection of all Nations to Christ and their worshipping of him being then King at Jerusalem ver 16 17. even as it was foretold by the Ange to Mary Luk. 1. 32 33. That he should be great and that the Lord God would give him the throne of his Father David and that he shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever hereunto contribute Luk. 19. 11 13. and Luk. 21. 23 to 33. where when Christ had set forth his personal coming and his redeeming of the Jews out of captivity he then after all this tells them That when they see these things come to pass then they should know that the Kingdome of God will be nigh at hand Note but nigh then therefore not in being at his Ascention nor at any time since And as to his conjecture that the Christian Church in this world is the Kingdome of Christ and his only Kingdome upon earth as some imagine These conceipts are already answered and refuted in the 24 25 26 27 30 and 31. pages of the foregoing discourse And as to the phrases in Scripture which some stumble at such as these The Kingdome is neer you or in you this is to be rendred among you as the margent in King James his Bible shews and the taking the Kingdom from one people and giving it to another and the like These are to be understood of the Gospel of the Kingdom being a special means of obtaining the Kingdome and that to be neer them or preacht among them whereby they might come to inherit the Kingdome for the word Gospel or good news of the Kingdome cannot be the Kingdome it self and by the phrase of taking the Kingdom from any is only meant the taking from them the Gospel or means of their attaining the Kingdom which in effect is the taking the Kingdome it self from them It is evident therefore though Christ was a King at and ever since his Ascention yet his Kingdom is not yet nor will be until the sound of the Seventh Trumpet When the Kingdoms of this world will become the Kingdoms of our Lord and his Christ thenceforth for ever Rev. 11. 15. Then and not till then shall the Heathen and the uttermost parts of the earth be taken into his possession although his right thereunto and Lordship thereof was given him of the Father long before Psa 2. 8. The result of all which is this That as he was a King before his Kingdome was set up so might he be made Head and Saviour before his Body or Church was constituted and so may he remain whilst the Church is extinct driven or withdrawn from off the face of the earth as it must needs be when all that dwell upon the earth shall worship the Beast Rev. 13. 8. and when the way of God is not known upon earth Psal 67. 2. For although the relation between a natural head and its body be such as neither can subsist without the other yet it is not so between Christ and his Body the Church being spiritual as by and by I shall make appear And therefore to that part of the objection No body no head I shall here offer him this short Dilemma Christ being made Head of his Church at his Ascention either had a Christian Church then upon earth or he had none if none then was he a head without a body a husband without a wife and if he had one then there was one before that time for there were very many and as many baptized Disciples and beleevers before his death as there were at or after his Ascention until the powring down of the gifts of the Spirit and the conversion of three thousand mentioned in Act. 2. How else could he have been seen of more then five hundred Brethren at once and of many other of his Disciples with whom he conversed at least forty days after his Resurrection and before he Ascended 1 Cor. I would fain know of R. B. If he and his fellow-Members of his Catholick Church are any fitter or truer matter or in a better capacicy for Membership in Christs Body and Church now then these Apostles Disciples and Brethren were in before Christ Ascended these had true faith and baptism hath he and his fellow-members more or truer I think not but that it will be found upon due examination to come many degrees and in many respects short of the others How then can they be a true Church and the other none 15. 5 6 c. Act. 1. 3. And if any of these were a Christian Church before his death or before his ascension then there was a body and wife before he was made a head or husband Or else thus either these were a Christian Church before Christ ascended or they were not If he say they were then there was a body without a head if he say they were not then there was no Christian Church upon the earth for certain dayes after he Ascended and until the gift of the Holy Ghost were powred down upon the Disciples mentioned in Act. 2. And then for that distance of time between his Ascention and his powâ—ing down of these gifts there was a head but no body Let him now chuse which of these he please since either of them invalidates his objection And indeed the very truth is That these were nobody or Church of Christ until they had these gifts of the Spirit poured down upon them mentioned Act. 2. presently after which but not before they were denominated a Church being then formed into several Spiritual memberships for the several Offices and services of the whole body like as the several members of a Natural Body are serviceable to the body Now if these gifts of the Spirit formed Members and knit them together and also to their head from whom they received nourishment growth and increase of the whole body as is most evident they then neither were nor could be any body or Church of Christ until the powring down of the gifts of the spirit upon the Disciples at Pentecost ten dayes after Christs ascention when it is granted by the Objector he was invested into Headship and I suppose it must also be granted that this Head-ship was conferred upon him before that time even at his Resurrection for how else could he presently after and before his Ascention have told his Disciples That all power was given unto him both in Heaven and in Earth Mat. 28. 18. But all power had not
Jerusalem and he shall judge among the Nations and shall rebuke many people and they shall beat their swords into plow-shares and their spears into pruning hooks Nation shall not lift up sword against Nation neither shall they learn war any more Esa 2. 2 3. Mic. 4. 2 3. add to this Zech. 8. 23. And this great and general Apostacy is likewise plainly foretold in many other places of Scripture As that all the world shall wonder after the beast and worshipped the Dragon which gave power to the Beast and they worshipped the Beast and all that dwell on the earth shall worship him Revel 13. To which add that of St. Paul 2 Thes 2. 3. where he willeth the Thessalonians To let no man deceive them for that day shall not come except there came a falling away first and telleth Timothy 2 Tim. 4. 3 4. That the time will come when they will not indure sound Doctrine but after their own lusts shall heap to themselves teachers having itching ears and they shall turn away their ears from the truth and be turned to Fables Where it is to be noted That he doth not say some of them or some of you as he did when he warned the Elders of Ephesus of the beginning of this Apostacy Act. 20. but they indefinitely will not indure sound Doctrine and they indefinitely shall turn away their ears from the truth and be turned to fables And the same Apostle foretels the restitution of the truth with life and power again for writing of the rejection and restoration of the Jews Rom. 11. 15. he thus expresseth himself If the casting away of them be the reconciling of the world what shall their receiving be but life from the dead namely to the world which shall then be in darkness and in effect dead being destitute of the powerful and lively ordinances of the Gospel of Christ from which darkness and death the world shall then be delivered inlightned and revived Hence we may see that it was not for nought that our quondam Bishops continued among us the use of that common necessary prayer which begins thus Lighten our darkness we beseech thee O Lord c. And it were wel if the same were still continued that our present Rulers both civil ecclesiastical would themselves also joyn with us in the use thereof even as all our great need requireth I thought here to have raised an objection against the premises but I find one already made to my hands and that by this our Author himself in a sheet of his lately put out against the Quakers where with much confidence he thus objects viz. Object The Quakers are but of late years standing they rose from among the Papists Seekers Ranters and Anabaptists but a while agoe and if Christ had no Catholick Church before then and ever since his Ascension he ceased to be Christ in Office the head and Saviour of the Church for no Church no Saviour no body no head no School no teacher no Kingdome no King no wife no husband Answ There being a Triumphant Church in Heaven as they teach this may supply Christ with a Kingdome a Body a wife and Church to whom he may be King head husbâ—nd and Saviour when there may be no true Church amongst us mortals upon the face of the earth For the making good whereof they teach us That the Souls of the righteous ascend immediately into Heaven to God there to partake of present bliss and glory and that the Soul of the penitent thief went immediately into Paradise whither no doubt the Souls of many penitent theeves have gone since as sure as that theeves Soul went thither but now the greatest theeves crucifie hang rob and plunder men and are neither crucified nor hanged yet doe thinke upon that account to lodge their Souls there also when they die though they neither repent nor make restitution so much as Judas did wherein they will I fear at last finde themselves miserably cozened These Doctrines being both true and doubted by none but Hereticks then Christ hath a double supply of a Kingdome wife body and Church the one in the highest Heaven and the other in Paradise but and if these Doctrines should both fail of making good the proposition of a Triumphant Church in Heaven as it is feared by many they will in that they doe propose two different receptacles for the Souls of the righteous I shall mind them of one more better then both these namely The bodies of many of the Saints which slept arose and came out of their graves after Christ's resurrection went into the Holy City and appeared unto many These I conceive would much better make a Triumphant Church in Heaven then either or both of the other whereby Christ may be supplyed with a Kingdome body wife and Church and all the supposed absurdities in the objection prevented though Christ neither now hath nor never is like to have until the calling of the Jews any true Church upon the face of the earth And as to his parallels of School and Teacher King and Kingdome I say a head-School-master being lawfully established such in any place may afterward be so interrupted by reason either of war or some contagious sickness there raging as he may not have one Scholar left for him to teach doth this School-master therefore lose his right or so much as his title of being head-School-master especially he readily attending to perform that his office when ever his Scholars shall return again to be taught by him I think not And as to Christ's Kingdome I say if Christ at his Ascension was a King as is granted by the objection and then had no Kingdome he may also as well then be a head a husband and a Saviour without either body wife or Church upon earth but Christ was then a King yet had no Kingdome on earth because his Kingdome was then and is yet to come as may be thus proved Christ taught his Disciples to pray That his Kingdome might come a consequence whereof would be that Gods will would then be done in earth as it is in Heaven This prayer was by the Apostles left to following Christians and hath been ever since and yet is used in the world and the will of God not being yet done in earth as it is in Heaven shews plainly that Christ's Kingdome was not then nor is yet come The general conformity to the will of God both of Jewes and Gentiles and their subjection to Christ in the time of his Kingdome and reign is in many places of Scripture foretold as Psa 110. Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power consonant to this Moses prophesied which is by Peter repeated Act. 3. 22. thus For Moses truly said unto the Fathers A Prophet shall the Lord your God raise up unto you of your brethren like unto me him shall you hear in all things whatsoever he shall say unto you And that the
then been given to him if the Headship or Lordship over his Church had been omitted or suspended until his Ascention This Jesus God raised up and made him both Lord and Christ Act. 2. 35 36. And he was the first born from the dead of every creature that in all things he might have the pre-eminence Col. 1. 15 18. For nothing was left that should not be made subject unto him but neither then nor since are all things actually made subject unto him although he then was actually crowned with the Glory and Honour of Lordship over all things Heb. 2. 5 6 8 9. which hereafter are to be actually put in subjection unto him as these Scriptures witness Psal 110. 1. Act. 2. 34 35 36. 1 Cor. 15. 24 25 26 27 28 Phil. 2. 8 9 10 11 Heb. 1. 6 13. and 10. 12 13. All which shews the imbecility of the objection being composed meerly of non-sequiturs unto which the Apostle plainly alludes and compares the Church 1 Cor. 12. where he also tells them That they having these spiritual gifts were thereby all of them baptized into that one body of Christ by that one Spirit before which they were not of that body nor sutable matter for Membership in that spiritual body of Christ their Spiritual Head and husband Even as the Apostle writing to a true Church Rom. 8. tells them That if any of them had not the Spirit of Christ the same was none of his i. e. none of his body or Church which is as a building fitly framed together groweth to an holy temple in the Lord in whom they were builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit Eph. 2. 21 22. Rom. 12. 4 5. as we have many Members in the body and all the members have not the same office so we being many are one body in Christ and every one members one of another holding the head from which all the body by these gifts of the Spirit as by joynts and bands having nourishment ministred and knit together increaseth with the increase of God Col. 2. 19. Wherefore this learned Objector may as well and as soon truly define a Natural body without members or joynts and sinews to knit them together as to define a true Christian Church or body of Christ without these gifts of the Spirit For see we not how the most learned on all sides flounder and fall before each other in their definitions of a true Church and each different party challenging their definition to be truest and the true Church to be amongst them each crying Loe here and loe there as if the Church of Christ when and where it is will not be perspicuously and distinctly discovered as a light set upon a hill to all beholders even by her own eminency and by that divine light and power which alwayes did and will accompany her without the help of blind guides with their dark-lanthorns of humane Arts and Sciences to discover and find her out This consideration alone is sufficient to evidence That the true Church is withdrawn from the earth or at least so far removed that we know not where to find it I shall instance in the definition made by one of the best reformed Churches even the Church of England as it was most advisedly framed by the wisest and ablest of them and then publickly held forth in the Articles of the Church which they stoutly defended against the world insomuch as whosoever would not conform thereto was obnoxious to censure and being a Minister was liable to be reprobated and cast out as refuse and unsavory salt In the ninteenth Article it is thus defined viz. The visible Church of Christ is a Congregation of faithful men in the which the pure word of God is preached and the Sacraments be duly administred according to Christs Ordinance Now let a Heathen be told that by these marks he may know the true Church may he not then demand how he shall know the pure word of God when it is preached c. must he not then be told that he must know that by the true Church and then again may he not ask How he may know the true Church and must he not then again be answered That he must know the true Church by their preaching the pure word of God c. And thus may he run the round again and again to the worlds end and be never the neerer knowing the true Church until he return again into his own countrey and there or elsewhere learn undoubtedly to know what the pure word of God is when it is preached and what the due administration of the Sacraments is according to Christ's ordinance and as soon as he hath learned undoubtedly to know all these he may then return hither again if he please and find out the true Church of Christ amongst us as soon as he can But how unlike are these marks unto those which Christ himself gave to know his true Church by Mar. 16. 17 18. These signs shall follow them In my name they shall cast out Devils they shall speak with new tongues they shall take up serpents and if they drink any deadly thing it shall not hurt them they shall lay hands on the sick and they shall recover Unto this also accords St. Pauls description of a true Cburch 1 Cor. 12. 28. God hath set some in the Church first Apostles secondly Prophets thirdly teachers after them miracles then gifts of healing helps governments divers kinds of tongues And accordingly Ancient Christians judged these gifts of the Spirit to be absolutely necessary to the being of a true Church for Eusebius informs us That one Miliades disputing with certain Hereticks proves them no true Church or right Christians by the discontinuance of the gifts of the Spirit amongst them thus If that as they say after Quadratus and Ammias the Philadelphian those women of Montanus succeeded in the gift of Prophesie Let them shew who afterward succeeded Montanus and his women for the Apostle thinketh good that the gifts of Prophesie should reign in every Church even unto the end but now for the space of these fourteen yeers since Miximilla dyed they are able to shew us not one Euseb lib. 5. chap. 15. And so modern Authors likewise doe judge these gifts necessary to the being of a true Church for in a Book intituled The Doctrine of Baptisms set out 1652. by a nameless author supposed to be Mr. Dell in pag. 22. it 's asserted That as Spirit-Baptisme makes us one with Christ the head so with the Church the Body 1 Cor. 12. 13. for by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body c. And a little after he saith There are no more of that Church which is the body of Christ-then they that are baptised with that one Spirit The truth of all which our Objector himself so far acknowledgeth as in his Preface to the second Part of his Saints Rest to tell us That