Every one who has not taken for granted the perfect and unimpeachable conditions of the "denomination" in which he happens to be enrolled, must acknowledge the force of this argument.

• And when the history of Protestant divisions is duly weighed; when their origin and the circumstances that led to their formation are calmly considered; when it is remembered that not one of them can put in a claim to a divine birth
  • (for we know the pedigrees of them all, and can most accurately describe their earthly lineage),

• then must the argument be much strengthened, so that we need scarcely fear stating, that it is in the highest degree improbable that any known sect should have come to indubitable conclusions on the article of Christian Ministry.

In the great Reformation this momentous question was never fairly examined, or rather we may say it was slurred over as too delicate and dangerous to handle.

• Luther indeed saw very clearly the master-truths of the spiritual priesthood of all believers – liberty of ministry for all the saints, the total abrogation of all official priesthood in Christianity, and the vanity and absurdity of "ordination".

• He had nothing more to learn on these points; but then, as in many other instances, he did not think it necessary or politic to press his views, or to insist on them as a part of the Reformation.

• It is well known that he tolerated many absurdities in worship and ceremonies, probably because he despaired of weaning the people from them; and thus he tolerated ordination though he made a joke of it in his letters, and unmercifully, quizzed his brother reformers who had some grand doings at their* "ordinations."

  [* The imposition of hands in ordination was a perplexing question to the Protestants; thus, for some time, the whole senate of Geneva, consisting of many laymen, used, by imposition of hands, to ordain the ministers. Calvin and Farel objected to this practice. The Kirk of Scotland, a branch of Calvin's church, in the year 1560, renounced ordination by imposition of hands, as a "superstition": eighteen years later, they restored it!]

The Protestant party, headed by Melanchthon, were so little solicitous to place "ministry" on Scriptural foundation, that they rather showed a disposition to yield to all the papal decrees concerning the Priesthood.

• In the confession of Augsburg, the Protestants thus warily expressed themselves in the 14th article:–
  • "Concerning the ecclesiastical order, they [the Protestants] teach that no one ought to teach publicly in the church, or to administer the sacraments, unless he be duly called".

• To this the papal party replied:–
  • "When in their fourteenth article they confess that no one ought to administer the word and the sacraments in the church unless he be duly called, it ought to be clearly understood that he only is duly called who is called according to the form of the canon law, and the ecclesiastical sanctions and decrees, which, up to this time, have everywhere been observed in the Christian world; not called according to the vocation of Jeroboam (1 Kings 12: 20), or a tumultuous election of the people, or any other irregular intrusion: for no one taketh this honor unto himself, but he that is called of God, as was Aaron."

The Protestants, in their "Apology of the Confession", thus notice this stricture:–

• "Our fourteenth article, in which we say that the administration of the sacraments and of the word should be allowed to no one unless he be duly called, they accept, if only we make use of canonical ordination.

  On this subject we have frequently testified in the diet of Augsburg, that we, with the greatest willingness, desire to preserve the ecclesiastical polity, even the degrees of priesthood that have been made in the church by human authority; for we know that ecclesiastical discipline, as set forth by the ancient canons, was established by the fathers for a good and useful purpose; but the [papal] bishops compel our priests either to renounce and condemn the doctrine which we have confessed, or else kill them, innocent as they are, with new and unheard-of cruelties. For this cause our priests are prevented from acknowledging the bishops."

Here, then, we see the perilous position of "ministry" during the Reformation; and we can therefore well understand how, in such circumstances, there was little likelihood that the question should be investigated, as it deserves to be, with a professed and unhesitating submission to the Word of God.

But this is not all, for "ministry" must needs be produced in some form by the Protestants, and that form must of necessity be accommodated to the worldly position which the Protestant religion assumed at first, and has retained ever since.

• For it is to be remembered that the Reformers never acknowledged the heavenly calling of the saints; never confessed that the church had her polity only in heavenly places; never hesitated to draw the sword in "defence of their civil and religious liberties": never declined from power and authority in the world,

• but rather, under the auspices of princes and magistrates, sought to establish the Gospel as a handmaid of Government, and, as if a second Joshua were their leader, to drive the enemy out of the land, that they might take possession of the fertile Canaan, long defiled with papal abominations.

The world, then, being the portion of the Protestant religion, its miistry required a substantial and consolidated formation, suited for its earthly calling and its contentious life;

• and that it soon obtained on the Continent, and in England and Scotland, according to the arrangements of the different predominant sections of the reformed faith.

• Hence we everywhere find that Protestant ministry is based on the old maxims and principles of the antecedent creed. These maxims and principles may indeed be modified, and reduced in intensity,

• but as the papal system had brought to perfection the mystery of amalgamating the church and the world, the new possessors of power, whose object it was to be proficients in the same mystery, could not do otherwise than study the successful methods of their predecessor.

But in this forbidden science, the Protestants seem to forget that the old masters can always obtain an easy victory over all corivals; for in the matter of ministry, wherever it is of human institution, Popery has the means of surpassing all antagonists, and of confounding all opponents.

• It is owing to the superior claims of the papal priesthood to the obedience of man, on earthly principles, that Popery is now once more disturbing the repose of Protestants, and threatening some great crisis in ecclesiastical history.

In "ministry," as a human institution, Popery possesses incomparable advantages; for who does not see that even the ordinations of the dissenters come from Rome through the Church of England,

• and that the idea of requiring a clerical body to convey the power of "administering the sacraments" (an idea fully recognized by Protestants), is easily to be traced to the decrees of the canonists?<

The Church of England smiles with disdain on the imitation of clerisy by the dissenters, and haughtily denies the validity of their ordinations;

• but the Church of Rome, enthroned in the magnificent deceptions of many ages, and unrivaled in the perfection of every earthly principle,
  • classes the Anglican prelate with the dissenting minister, sees no difference between the preacher of the conventicle and the archbishop of Canterbury,

• and in the comprehensive category of "heretic", erases all Protestant ministers of every grade out of the clerical order.

And, indeed, if it be a question between the comparative merits of any particular clerisy, if the genus clergyman be once admitted in Christianity,

• who would not naturally prefer the type of the whole family to any of the imperfect and mongrel varieties which could be put in competition with it?

When once, therefore, an inquirer is directed to rest on human ministry, and when he comes to discover that

• the priestly college, the priestly education, holy orders, the distinction of clergy from laity, the clerical character, title, and costume, the clerical right to preach and administer the sacraments, and the clerical prerogative of conveying that right,

• are to be had at the fountain-head at Rome – that from Rome all these things were derived, and that at Rome they all flourish in native splendor, inimitable in any other communion – he must naturally incline to go direct to the fountain-head for that which he had been falsely taught is a part of Christianity.

• Neither can we doubt that Popery is triumphing now through this obvious process of thought; for I profess not to understand how, admitting the clerical character and prerogatives obtainable by clerical ordination, it is possible to rest content with the imperfect and borrowed orders of the Church of England.

• "If there is a link out of the chain, it seems to matter very little whether it is wanting at one end or the other", the Anglican priest remarks, in commenting on the "orders" of the dissenters,
  • forgetting that he is himself a dissenter from the mother church, and that it belongs to that church alone to use such a reproof, which is applicable to every Protestant that tampers with "the apostolical succession".*

• [* The Rev. S. B. Maitland, in his publication, entitled "The Voluntary System", has thus recorded a converation he had with a young dissenting minister, not yet ordained, and therefore not allowed to administer the sacraments. "Ask Mr. –. and Mr. –, the two deacons of your meeting, to ordain you". — "Well, but could they do it?" — "Why not?" — "Why, you know they are not ministers". — "Indeed, then you think it is necessary that they should have been ordained themselves?" — "Why, yes; does not everybody think so?" — "I do not know; but it appears to me that you hold the doctrine of apostolic succssion; for if there is a link out of a chain, it seems to me to matter very little whether it is wanting at one end or the other". (p. 256)]

As, then, preaching justification by faith without works, that is, asserting thato it he who does not work, but instead of working believes in that God who justifies ungodly persons, is the only method of meeting Rome in her doctrinal power,

• so the assertion of liberty of ministry for all believers is the only method of meeting Rome's pretensions to clerical pre-eminence, a pretension before which all must succumb who in any way acknowledge the clerical order.

• There is no medium, no restingplace for a candid inquirer between the two extremes – the ministry of the Spirit as revealed in the Word of God, or human ministry as exhibited by the ancient Church of Rome.

• Either take liberty of ministry for all the saints, from the supernal and free Jerusalem, "the mother of us all;" or, rejecting this, then accept the clerical order from Rome, the mother of all clerisy, and the mistress of all ecclesiastical bondsmen.

• Let not these remarks, however, be interpreted as belonging to the controversy between the Roman Catholics and the Protestants. That controversy enters not, I trust, into any part of this inquiry,
  • which, as it professes to be an examination of the Scriptures, for the purpose of vindicating certain Scriptural truths of deep value to the Church of God, can only incidentally touch on the divisions of professing Christendom.

• In vain will we seek for either Papist or Protestant in the New Testament, or for their churches under any name, or any representation.

• In God's Word we find only two antagonistic sects: that of the world and that of grace; known also by the names of the children of the devil and the children of God; of the sons of darkness and the sons of light; the body of Christ and the children of wrath.

• But wherever we find the principles of this world admitted into any system of professing Christianity, there we find a portion of that which is technically called "Popery";
  • and which is nothing but the fulness of this world's principles, and the entire satisfaction of all the desires of the carnal mind in its notions about religion.

This is a general view of the Calvinistic division of sects. And it is to be borne in mind that these divisions originated in the question of "ministry".

• On the restoration of King Charles II, the Episcopal sect was again placed in power, and again did the bishops take up arms against the Puritans, endeavoring now not merely to repress, but to exterminate their opponents.

• After a short but most sanguinary era of persecution, the overthrow of the House of Stuart, and the accession of William III, to the throne, on the principle of revolution, of necessity introduced a new policy.

• Dissent was tolerated by law, and the principle of religious liberty now became a boast of the English constitution.

• Assuredly this was a surprising event: for never since the days of the Emperor Constantine had a Christian Government entertained the idea of toleration – to preach and to persecute had, for twelve hundred years at least, being considered the inherent attributes of the clerical order, and the Governments of Christendom had all that time deemed it their duty, privilege, and policy to sustain the clergy in the full exercise of their sacred prerogatives.

In the reign of George II, and new sect, under the auspices of John Wesley, came into action, and how widely that sect has spread in a short time we all know. "Ministry" among the Wesleyans was placed on a new footing, for in that body it was never pretended* that they searched the Scriptures to recover any lost pattern, or to improve any existing plan of church government.

• [* It is well known that John Wesley ordained or consecrated by imposition of hands Dr. Coke, as superintendent (bishop) of the Methodists in the southern states of America. This took place at Bristol, A.D. 1784. At the same time he also ordained Richard Whatcoat and Thomas Vasey, "presbyters". It has since come to light, that several years afterwards Dr. Coke made application for the bishopric of Calcutta esteeming a mitre in the Establishment a higher price than a bishopric amongst Methodists. The form of Dr. Coke's ordination is given in the Appendix.]

• The desire of Wesley was to put in operation a potent body of active and industrious preachers; and if only that object could be obtained, he troubled himself very little about any antecedent arrangements.

• The Episcopal, Presbyterian, or Independent model would not have suited the government of such a sect as his: power in his own hands during his own life, and power with his successors, "the Conference" after his removal from the scene of his labours, was what he sought for.

• Nevertheless, his habits of thought and action were decidedly favourable to clerisy; and though it would have been no easy matter for him to account for the clerical character, in the way of derivation, of that anomalous and miscellaneous body, "the Conference", yet he took care that it should consist of itinerant preachers alone,
  • and by this arrangement he established a close oligarchy, which as it consisted of persons exclusively engaged in religious avocations, became, to all intents and purposes, an unmixed sacerdotal government.

• "Ministry", then amongst the Wesleyans, originates with their founder. We are not to seek for the origin of Wesleyan ministry in any theory of ecclesiastical polity, nor in any of the practices of tradition.

• Wesley was himself for a long time attached to the Established Church, its laws, government, and worship; and it was only as each came to mould his vast sect into a consistent form of life and energy, that he perceived the necessity of adopting new principles of government; and that government, for convenience sake, he resolved should be an oligarchy of preachers, totally independent of all authority in the Established Church – a daring act of nonconformity for which he would certainly have suffered death in the Elizabethan era.

• But he ventured on the experiment; and in a worldly estimate of the results, it must be pronounced to have been a successful one; for power, wealth, and popular influence is the heritage of Wesleyanism, so that nothing is wanting to the system but the dignity of a solemn antiquity and the approbation of the patrician class, to invest it with everything that clerical ambition could desire.

• The lapse of ages could alone confer on Methodism the chief ornament of the Establishment – antiquity; but the favour of the protection class is not to be purchased by the mimic ordinations, robes, ceremonies, and liturgies which the Wesleyans Conference has introduced within the last five years.

Other sects indeed there are – "many more, too long" – but thus much has been said of the principal divisions which everywhere meet us, that we may remember their origin, in our subsequent observations on "ministry".

This is a popular idea of "ministry", and with very little variation it is the same both among Churchmen and Dissenters, as it obviously is not the interest of the clerical department, in any sect, to clear up the popular mistakes

• on a subject which, if rightly understood, might tend to a subversion of all established arrangements, and restore God's order over the ruins of the order of man.

The first and most obvious duty attached to ministry by all parties, is, and must be, teaching;

• except, indeed, in the Roman Catholic persuasion, where performing the sacrifice of the mass, and executing "the sacraments", takes precedence of preaching and teaching.

• But now we are talking of Protestants, and amongst them – in all their sects – teaching and preaching constitute, of necessity, a large portion of ministerial functions.

If this be true description of the church as it was at the first, then of course it bears no resemblance to the arrangements of the sects, where the division of ministry is not by the will and appointment of the Spirit, but by the direction and choice of man.

• This is indeed so plain, that almost all commentators seem quietly to yield the point, that ministry in the Corinthian Church was of an order now lost, and that all known existing churches have adopted another method.

• They speak of the Corinthian order as a pattern known only in the Scriptures; it is, in fact, terra incognita to them, and so accustomed are they to the systems introduced by tradition, that the distribution of gifts by the Spirit, to every man in the church, they consider some strange phenomenon of the days of miracles.

• Amongst the sects we do indeed see quite another order;
  • in the Churches of Rome and England, the bishops appointed the ministry;

  • in the Kirk of Scotland, the Presbytery is the foundation of clerical functions

  • amongst the Dissenters, the people, or the church, as it is called, elect the minister, and other ministers ordain him after he has been elected;

  • and amongst the Wesleyans, the Conference, or some power deputed by the Conference, names and governs all the ministers and preachers.

• Presbytery, or Conference, are not the Holy Spirit; and beyond this, one need not push the inquiry, in order to be satisfied that all sects, from the stately Church of England, down to the lowest denomination of Dissent, are gone far astray from the order it recorded in the New Testament.

• If the Scriptures, then, are to be our guide, we have already advanced far into solution of the problem before us; and we have only to apply to statements of the New Testament to facts before our eyes, to assure us of the accuracy of our deductions.

• For instance, let us try the existing Church of Rome, by Paul's description of the Church of Rome. Paul in writing to the Romans, says:
  • "We, being many, are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another, for we have different gifts – and there are amongst us prophets, ministers, teachers, exhorters, rulers, helps, shewers of mercy, and others", chapter 12.

• But now all that can be said of the Church of Rome is, that it is entirely clerical; that the Spirit does not apply to ministry, and that everything there is under the supreme control of the Pope. The Church of Rome, therefore has lost the order set forth in the Scriptures; and so it is with others also;

• for we do not find it written; 'He gave some bishops to rule dioceses', or, 'that he gave rectors and curates for the ruling of parishes', or, 'He gave ordained ministers', etc. this is not stated, but something dissimilar in every respect.

• Protestants, therefore, as well as a Church of Rome, have departed from the Word of God in their arrangements of ministry.

• Again: supposing, for argument's sake, that such a form of the church did exist, as has been described in the twelfth chapter of the first epistle to the Corinthians – that there was no "ordained" ministry, no clerical or unofficial appointments, no clergyman or "ministers" consecrated or chosen to act as functionaries for the people,
  • but that all the people, without any recognition of official distinction, met as a gathering of the saints, to receive any "diversity of gifts" which the Spirit might raise up amongst them;

  • that "wisdom", "knowledge", "faith", we're exhibited here and there, without man's direction, and wholly independent of it, and that the saints so gathered had no idea of any other order;

• would not such a church resemble a body in active and vigorous life; every limb, every member, contributing, in proper proportion, to the life and activity of the whole body?

• Now, this is exactly the similitude selected by the apostle Paul, to describe the church of the Corinthians.
  • "The body is not one member, but many. If the foot should say, Because I am not the hand, I am not of the body; is it therefore not of the body? And if the ear should say, Because I am not the eye, I am not of the body; is it therefore not of the body? If the whole body were an eye, where were the hearing? If the whole were hearing, where were the smelling? But now hath God set the members every one of them in the body, as it hath pleased Him. And if they were all one member, where were the body? But now are they many members, yet one body. And the eye cannot say unto the hand, I have no need of thee: nor again, the head to the feet, I have no need if you … Now ye are the body of Christ, and members in particular", 1 Corinthians 12.

But let us ask, how can this portion of Scripture apply to the Church of England or other Protestant denominations?

• In those divisions out professing Christendom there is no body at all, if we are to follow the apostle's illustrations of the life and visibility of the church manifested in the acknowledged life of all the members. The apostle plainly tells us, that
  • "if they were all one member there would be no body";

• and who is there that does not see in these words a condemnation of the clerical system, which presents the body in the form of one member only – THE MINISTER, the ordained, official, and salaried minister, who, whether he be appointed to his office by a prelate for a popular and election, supersedes all spiritual gift in the church?

• In such a system as that, the saints are reduced to silence, the body is dead, all the members inanimate, the "honourable", or "feeble", are alike useless, and one individual is eye, mouth, ear, hand, foot.
  • "The eye cannot say unto the hand, I have no need of thee; nor again the head to the feet, I had no need of you".

• This is the illustration of the apostle; but applying this illustration to the customs of the sects, we see that with them, 'one member says, I will be eye, and, head, and foot. Entrust all your functions to me, ye separate members, for I will be the life of the whole body'.

• This is that figurative description of the fact, presented to us by the ministry of the one man system, and in such a system the supremacy of the Spirit cannot be owned, nor can His distribution of gift "to every man according to His will" have any place.

• Everything that the apostle says on that subject is inapplicable to a church government based on an ordained ministry.

It is just possible that a person to whom these truths were new, might seek to evade the force of them by contending, that "life" may be and is in the members of a Protestant church, as it is ordinarily constituted, and that no one can be a believer without this life, which is a gift of the Holy Spirit, and recognised as such by the evidences of saving faith.

• It is not, however, of that life that the apostle is speaking in this chapter; he does indeed lay down as a fundamental truth, that
  • "no man can say that Jesus is the Lord but by the Holy Ghost", verse 3;

• but, taking that as an acknowledged first principle in the church, and presuming that every believer does call Jesus Lord by the Holy Ghost, he goes on to show how, in addition to that spiritual life of the regenerate,
  • there is given to them another power, for the purpose of manifesting their corporate energy, which power is a distribution of gifts for ministry by the Holy Ghost:

• where there is that distribution, or at any rate where it is acknowledged, then, he says, every member is in proper place, and then it is that one member does not usurp the functions of all the rest.

Again, Paul says, "The body is not one member, but many", verse 14.

• Now, the sects practically, though unintentionally, deny this: and they ought, in keeping with their practices, to read the text thus: – 'The body is one member, and not many'; for such is the outward figure of the body which they exhibit.

  But the apostle proceeds thus:

  • "Now ye are the body of Christ, and members in particular. And God hath set some in the church, first apostles, secondarily prophets, thirdly teachers, after that miracles, then gifts of healing, helps, governments, diversities of tongues. Are all apostles? are all prophets? are all teachers?" etc.

• This is a full explanation of all he had previously urged; the proof of the life of the body is by the operation, of the members, the operation is by the gifts distributed; all the members have not all these gifts, but all are in a condition to receive any which the Spirit may impart; some may have one gift, some more, some none: teaching, helping, governing, may be separated or united, just as the Lord chooses.
  • But not one word of this could be understood if we were to suppose that one or two individuals acted officially and permanently in lieu of the whole body of believers.

• Suppose, only for argument's sake, that there was a ministry in the apostle's days, such as we see in these times, then would it be impossible to comprehend Paul's meaning;

• but if, on the other hand, we dismiss the idea of a clerical order, and admit the truth, that the whole body of believers met for such ministry as the Spirit might please to apportion to them, dividing to every man severally has He chose, then we can understand all the argument of the apostle.

In the fourteenth chapter of the same epistle, Paul incidentally lets us know the result of the church order, as it existed in the days of obedience.

• Verse 23-31, "If therefore the whole church be come together into one place, and all speak with tongues, and their come in those that are unlearned, or unbelievers, will they not say that ye are mad? But if all prophesy, and their come in one that believeth not, or one unlearned, he is convinced of all, he is judged of all.

  How is it then, brethren? when ye come together, every one of you hath a psalm, hath a doctrine, hath a tongue, hath a revelation, hath an interpretation. Let all things be done unto edifying. If any man speak in an unknown tongue, let it be by two, or at the most by three, and that by course; and let one interpret …

  Let the prophets speak two or three, and let the other judge. If anything be revealed to another that sitteth by, that the first hold his peace. For ye may all prophesy one by one, that all may learn, and all may be comforted".

The meaning of this passage is evident: Paul supposes it to be possible that in the meetings of the churches all the believers might be so injudicious as to use one gift which would be intelligible only to themselves, but wholly unintelligible to the "unlearned, or unbelievers", verse 23.

• This possible mistake he corrects by recommending that only two or three should speak in an unknown tongue (verse 27), but at the same time he mentions, with manifest approbation, the possible fact of all prophesying (verse 24); nay, he plainly says, that
  • "all might prophesy one by one, that all might learn, and all be comforted", verse 3);

• and whilst he says this, he never alludes to the existence of any official pastor, ordained minister, or clergyman, in the Corinthian church; his thoughts never go that way at all; he does not, as is the custom now, address his remarks, as a matter of course, to the "the minister", meaning thereby either the parish priest for the popularly elected preacher,
  • but he obviously directs his precepts to the whole Corinthian church, as the ministering body.

• He expects that this should be visible in the body, the gifts of knowledge, wisdom, faith, teaching, help, government, evangelizing, and the rest; and he expects that the appointment to those gifts must be by the Holy Spirit, that same Spirit by which, as he tells us in introducing this subject, every believer has been enabled to say that Jesus is the Lord (1 Corinthians 12: 3).

• And, indeed it is well worthy of observation that Paul, in writing to the Romans, Corinthians, Ephesians, Galatians, Thessalonians, Philippians, and Colossians, never directs his letter to "the minister", he never even names such an individual;

• and this fact alone, if duly weighed, would go far to settle the question of an "ordained ministry", wherever there is a disposition implicitly to believe and obey the Word of God.

In concluding the precepts concerning church order to the Corinthians, Paul says,

• "Let your women keep silence in the churches, for it is not permitted unto THEM to speak", 14: 34.

• Now, it would have been impossible for Paul to have written this sentence if he had been acquainted with the phenomenon of a regular ordained ministry;

• for taking his words, either as they stand by themselves, or in connection with the preceding matter, it is quite apparent that he supposes all the men in the Corinthian church might speak if they had received the gift; not that it was incumbent on them all so to do, but that any one was permitted if he had the gift.

• Women were the precluded class: there the line was drawn. Silence is enjoined to them, and to them only;

• and this most abundantly proves that the whole church, with the exception of the women, was deemed in those days to be any capacity "to teach all, and to comfort all".

Here is a language of hieroglyphs to the sects; it relates to facts of which they have no cognizance, and to an order of things of which they have lost all remembrance; and yet this is the language, and these the records of the New Testament.

There are, however, two other chapters in the New Testament in which the subject is fully stated. To the Romans Paul writes (chapter 12),

• "Through the grace given unto me, I say to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; but to think soberly, according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith.

  "For as we have many members in one body, and all members have not the same office; so we, being many, are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another.

  "Having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us, whether prophecy, let us prophesy according to the proportion of of faith; or ministry, let us wait on our ministering; or he that teacheth, on teaching; or he that exhorteth, on exhortation; he that giveth, let him do it with simplicity; he that ruleth, with diligence; he that sheweth mercy, with cheerfulness".

• Here Paul enumerates some of the gifts, prophecy, ministry, teaching, exhorting, giving, ruling, showing mercy. Now whatever may be our opinion about the accurate meaning of all these gifts enumerated,
  • this is certain, that ministry, exhortation, teaching, and ruling – four offices, which in these days are always assigned to one person, and which are always deemed to be the peculiar prerogatives or duties of the "minister" –

    are declared by Paul to be gifts "differing according to the grace received", and distributable amongst many or all the members of the church, but by no means to one "minister" or clergyman.

• Moreover, Paul's precepts and admonitions cannot the least be understood without perceiving this, for his remarks are to this effect:
  • 'Do not any of you in the church which is sojourning in Rome be elated with your gifts; for if you have any gift, ministry, teaching, exhortation, prophecy, or power of government, understand that it is a donation of grace, a manifestation of the Spirit dividing to every man severally as He will.

    'You are but members of one body; the members have their proper office assigned to them, and when each member performs its functions, the whole body is a harmonious and healthy vitality'.

This being the same subject as that which Paul handles in his epistle to the Corinthians, it is interesting to notice that on both occasions he enforces his thoughts by a similar illustration –

• that the subject, as it were a necessity, leads him to refer to the body and the members for an intelligible and convincing similitude.

• Again, in his epistle to the Ephesians, we find the same statements:
  • "There is one body, and one Spirit … but unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ. Wherefore, He saith, when He ascended up on high, He led captivity captive, and gave gifts unto men …

    "And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets … and some, pastors and teachers; for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ; till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, into a perfect man, into the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ …

    "that we may grow up into Him in all things, which is the Head, even Christ: from whom the whole body fitly joined together and compacted by that which every joint supplieth, according to the effectual working in the measure of every part, maketh increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in love", 4: 4-16.

In this portion, then, of the Scripture we have again the same subject in the same illustration – the Spirit divides to all as He chooses – or the church is in a capacity to receive any gifts – any believer may help in service in the church, or perhaps all may help.

• This is the body, and this the case of the members. Moreover, it deserves particular attention that "the growing up into the perfect man", and "the increase of the body", is presumed by Paul to be both possible and probable when God's order prevails.

• He brings forward these things to show the end and object of such an arrangement. If, therefore, we find professing Christians deliberately rejecting God's order, and setting up a ministry of the flesh instead,
  • can we be surprised if there is not visible amongst them any "growing up into a perfect man", and that "the increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in love", isn't ministry with which they are practically unacquainted?

And now, then, compare all this doctrine of Scripture with the practices everywhere prevalent.

• In these days we hear clergyman asserting that they hold an office which makes them a class distinct from the body of believers; that they, by their ordination, have the exclusive prerogative of evangelist, pastor, teacher, and ruler amongst the saints,
  • and that "the laity" cannot, without great irregularity, nay not without sin, interfere in functions set apart for the clerical order.

• In church and chapel we hear this either openly asserted or tacitly implied, according to the degree of clerical feeling which prevails with those who hold ecclesiastical office; and it would be easy to show that these sentiments are as broadly stated in some dissenting publications, as in the writings of the evangelical clergy at least;
  • but whenever we see at clerical order do we not at the same time see a practical contradiction of the scriptural constitution of ministry?

• How can a ministry of the flesh agree with a ministry distributed by the Spirit? How can an ordained at clerical caste comport with the free exercise of gift acknowledged in the whole body of believers?

• We must, therefore, come to no other conclusion than that "the churches" of our days do not represent the divine order in their ministerial appointments.

• The origin and history of this great perversion we need not now examine; of the fact of a perversion – of an apostasy – there can be no doubt at all in the minds of those who are resolved to be guided in this enquiry by the Scriptures rather than by tradition.

Here, then, is a formidable array of Scripture authority to establish the truths for which we plead.

• But what is the usual reply to so much and such serious evidence? Generally, an exclamation of amazement that we can propound anything so strange as that there is "no ministry, and no ordination to ministry in the New Testament".

• It behoves us, therefore, to be still more explicit, that we may show both what Scripture does and does not teach on the subject – that we may prove our point both negatively and positively.

• Here, then, let it be remembered, that we are not to be deceived by the use of words diverted from their proper meaning, and conveying with them the ideas of tradition and not of the Scriptures;
  • for there is "ministry" in the New Testament, and abundantly set forth too there, far more abundantly than we are, for the most part, prepared to receive; but it has no reference to the idea of ministry handed down to us by tradition. It is therefore important against to state the traditional before we further make manifest the scriptural idea.

• The ministry of the professing Christendom, then, has a reference to a body of men set apart by sacerdotal ceremony from the body of believers, and ordained into an office in which they have exclusive right to preach, teach, feed, and tend the flock, and "administer the sacraments".
  • We have then further to inquire if the ministry of Scripture answers to this traditionary representation of it?

Now in all these instances, we see at once that the word diaconia of the original, rendered in our English translation by these various words, has no such meaning as that with which we technically invest the word "ministry";

• but in the following instances, owing to confused notions, and the force of preconceived opinions, very many readers do attach the technical or clerical idea to the word, though it is still in the original the same diaconia.

• "Shew whether of these two thou hast chosen, that he may take part of this ministry and apostleship", Acts 1: 25. ministry here is service, service to God and to His Church, not a clerical or episcopal office, as it is to be feared the translators wished the readers to understand it, if we may judge by their unwarrantable rendering of the word "bishoprick" in the 20th verse of that chapter.

• Again, "Say to Archippus, Take heed to the ministry which thou hast received in the Lord, that thou fulfil it", Colossians 4: 17. Had diaconia been here translated "service", it would have far more faithfully expressed the meaning of the original, and would at the same time have put the extinguisher of many a bright flash of pulpit eloquence, which this text as elicited, when it suited the preachers to deliver orations on the "ministerial office".
  • Archippus had been known as one in service to the Lord and to His people: what that service was we cannot now say, but it does not at all appear that it was preaching the Gospel or the exercise of the pastoral office.

  • Archippus might have had no gift for teaching or preaching; he might have no gift for government: what his gift was is impossible for us now to determine; only this is apparent, that the service for which he was known he had "received in the Lord": but such is the force of customary notions, that his "ministry" is generally supposed to have been an officially ordained pastorate, so that ministers of the Established Church claim Archippus as one of their clergy; and dissenting* ministers, with equal confidence, that he was a minister of a congregational church.
    • [* I once heard an impressive and able sermon of unusual length, from a celebrated dissenting minister on Colossians 4: 17. Throughout the whole of his elaborate discourse, he took it for granted that Archippus was a "regularly ordained minister". The Fathers are not quite so sure of the matter. Jerome suggested he was a "bishop": Ambrose suspects he was a "deacon": but why not an archbishop or an archdeacon?

In 2 Timothy 4: 5, we have another text, which is understood in the same way: "Watch thou in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry", meaning the whole service of Timothy's redeemed life, as purchased by a price to be a servant of Christ his Lord.

• What sort of service that is, Paul explains in the following words, "I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I had kept the faith"; for this is the diaconia often on his mind. Any service, and all service, is "ministry" in the New Testament.
  • "I go to Jerusalem to minister unto the saints", Romans 15: 25.

  • "God will not forget your labour of love … if that ye have ministered to the saints and do minister", Hebrews 6: 10, diakonesantes kai diakonountes, words which the translators elsewhere turn into "the deacon's office" when it suits their purpose.

  • "As every man hath received the gift, even the so minister (diakonountes) the same one to another", 1 Peter 4: 10 – a text which not only implies a general liberty of ministry, but, according to the management of the translators in other passages, might be made to represent all believers as "ministers", which indeed is the meaning of the text went ministry is rightly understood.

We need not wonder, however, at the mistakes on this subject, commonly cherished by the uninstructed, when we see the spurious notes at the end of the Epistles, regularly printed in our Bibles as part of the Scriptures; for instance, "This second epistle unto Timotheus, ordained the first bishop of the Ephesians, was written", etc.

• Very many, readers of the Bible believe these notes to be genuine; and with such a belief, we can easily comprehend what must also be their mistakes about "ministry".

We may then conclude this part of our inquiry by this canon, that a minister never, in one single instance in the New Testament, means a clerical functionary;

• that "ministry" has the meaning of service in every instance where it is expressive of the actions of Christians;

• and that it frequently does refer to the service of all the saints to one another.

Still, however, to make the subject yet plainer, we must clear up some mistakes that had accumulated round the word diaconos, and which, in the English Bible, appears as "minister", "servant", or "deacon", as it suited the object of the translators to render it.

• Let it be be remembered, that the translators had a double task to perform; not only to give an English version of the Scriptures, but so to manage that version as not to disturb the ecclesiastical order of their own communion.

• That this necessary caution was part of their task, we know by historical record, for King James expressly commanded them not to change "the old ecclesiastical words"; and in their preface attached to the larger Bibles they thus express themselves: "We have avoided the scrupulosity of the Puritans, who leave the old ecclesiastical words, and betake themselves to others".

• The effect of this caution is most conspicuous in their management of the words "bishop, overseer, deacon, minister, church", etc., etc.; but at present we have to investigate their management of the words, "ministry, minister, service, servant, deacon"; and management which with them was almost a necessity, as in the preface "to the form and manner of making, ordaining and consecrating bishops, priests, and deacons", published in the larger prayer-books, we find this to be the first sentence,

• "It is evident unto all men, diligently reading Holy Scriptures and ancient authors, that from the apostles 'time there have been these orders of ministers in Christ's Church – bishops, priests, and deacons". Here is an appeal to Scripture, together with "ancient authors", for the validity of the three orders of the Established Church.

• We may, therefore, conjecture how tenderly the clerical translators would handle the text, when it presented difficulties in the way of their ecclesiastical system.

Diaconos, a word employed thirty times in the New Testament, has never once in the original the technical and official meaning either a deacon or a minister.

• The diaconos of the New Testament is a person who in any way is serving God, when the word is used with reference to the Church of God.

• In two instances it is applied to express an ordinary domestic servant, "His mother said unto the servants – the servants which drew the water", John 2: 5, 9. In Romans 13: 4, the ruler or magistrate is "a servant of God to the church for good".

The following instances the show the uses of the word:

• "Whosoever will be great among you let him be your diaconos, and whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant (slave)", Matthew 20: 26.

• "If any man desire to be first, the same shall be last of all, and diaconos of all", Mark 9: 35.

• "If any man would serve me (diacone) let him follow me; and where I am, there shall also my diaconos be; if any man serve (diacone) me, him will my Father honour", John 12: 26.
  • This is a very important instance of the usage of the word, as it is in fact a description of all Christ's deacons, ministers, or servants. Any one that serves Christ is His diaconos.

• "Jesus Christ was a diaconos of the circumcision or the truth of God" Romans 15: 8. "I commend unto you Phebe our sister, which is a diaconos of the church at Cenchrea", Romans 16: 1.

In the following instances, the word "servant" is, in one English translation, rendered "minister"; but the word is here changed, in order to divest it of any clerical appearance.

• "Who then is Paul, and who is Apollos, but servants (diaconi) by whom ye believed", 1 Corinthians 3: 5.

• "Our sufficiency is of God, who hath also fitted us to be servants of the new covenant", 2 Corinthians 3: 6.

• "Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light; therefore it is no great thing if his servants (diaconi) be transformed as the servants (diaconi) of righteousness", 2 Corinthians 11: 15.

• "Are they servants (diaconi) of Christ? I more; in labours more abundant etc.", 2 Corinthians 11: 23.

• "Tychicus, a beloved brother and faithful servant (diaconos)", Ephesians 6: 21. "Timotheus, our brother and servant (diaconos) of God", 1 Thessalonians 3: 2.

These instances then will be sufficient to show that the diaconos of the Greek text is a word generally expressive of service, and that to translate it deacon or minister in one passage, whilst in another it is rendered servant, is not to represent the true meaning of the original, but rather the ecclesiastical prejudices of the translator.

• And, in fact, the word "deacon", and "the office of a deacon", though making a conspicuous figure in the English Bible, have no existence in the original. This we shall soon establish.

• The origin of the deacon's office is generally traced to the transaction recorded in the sixth chapter of the Acts of the Apostles, where the whole church at Jerusalem, by the advice of the apostles, selected seven men "full of the Holy Ghost and wisdom" to superintend the service of the tables, and to silence murmurings of some, who thought that "their widows were neglected in the daily ministration".

• The church chose seven holy men for this duty; and when they were chosen, the apostles prayed, and laid their hands on them. But no mention is here made that these persons were called "deacons"*;
  • [* In "the Church Member's Guide", a book of authority amongst those to whom it is addressed, there is a curious disquisition on the deacon's office – curious it is, as showing that the dissenters are, after all, compelled to go to tradition to establish the deacon.

    The author, after stating the opinion entertained by some, that this sixth chapter of Acts does not record the origin of the deacon's office, plus this question, "If this be not the origin of the deacon's office, WHERE SHALL WE FIND THE ACCOUNT? and what is still stronger, if this be not the institution, St. Paul has given directions about this office, the duties of which are not, in that case, mentioned in the Word of God".

    The author gives them a reason for considering this the origin. "Ecclesiastical history [tradition] informs us that the office was always considered, from the very earliest ages, as designed for the relief of the poor; if so, how natural it is to trace up its origin to this circumstance, which so easily accounts for it". But this is dangerous ground for a dissenter to tread on; for what will not ecclesiastical history inform us concerning diocesan prelacy?]

  nor in any other place in the New Testament is this asserted; and we may be certain, that if this were indeed the origination of the deacon's office, the office must have ceased even before the death of some of the apostles;
  • for as it had reference to peculiar local circumstances, namely the common table of the saints at Jerusalem, and as we see no such peculiar circumstances in any of the other churches, so must it have ceased when the necessity ceased to which it owed its existence.

• This is discoverable by a close attention to the text, which from the original is thus to be read – "Look out from among you seven men of honesty report, whom we will appoint for this necessity".

• In the English Bible we read it "this business", but the word is chreia, which though it occurs upwards of forty times in the New Testament, is in every instance but this, uniformly rendered "need" or "necessity".

• Now the difference in the translation is important; let it stand "over this business", and it leaves a general impression that "the deacons" were appointed to take care of the poor in the church;

• but translated correctly, "for this necessity", and then it appears that it was a peculiar exigency – that the service of the common table at Jerusalem required peculiar attention and care; and that for that necessity, and in order to prevent a spirit of discontent arising amongst the multitude of believers, they thought it expedient to choose seven approved brethren, to whose wisdom and grace they might leave all the arrangement and ordering of a very onerous duty.

In what other place, then in the New Testament shall we find "deacon" and his "office"?

• In Paul's epistle to Timothy, our translators have given it as being, "the deacons must be grave"; let "the deacons be the husband's of one wife", 1 Timothy 3; and still more conspicuously "let them be proved, and then let them use the office of a deacon, being found blameless", verse 10.

• But as in the first instances, "the deacon" should be "the servant", or, if you will, "the minister" (taking care that no clerical meaning is attached to the word), so in this instance "the office of a deacon" is wholly imaginary: in the original it is "let them serve, or be in service", diakoneitosain.

• Again, verse 13 "They that have used the office of a deacon well purchase to themselves a good degree", read thus, "They that have served well (hoi kalos diakonesantee) secure to themselves a good step".

• So that the only passage in the New Testament where we find "the office of a deacon", wholly fails to support it; and the two pompous nouns substantive "the office of a deacon", when examined by the original, turn out to be phantoms of the translators introduced into the text to take the place of a verb expressing quite another thought!

But this may be put still clearer, for a few verses further on the translators have indeed found the word diaconos; but there they boldly given a new meaning "If thou put the brethren in remembrance of these things, thou shalt be a good minister of Jesus Christ", 4: 6.

• Why then is the word in this verse not translated deacon, when it had twice before been so presented to us? Apparently for this reason, that as Timothy is, by the Episcopalians, pronounced to be "Bishop of Ephesus" – (yea by some of them declared "Primate of all Asia") – his prelatic dignities would have disappeared if he had been called "a deacon" by the apostle Paul.

• We see then that the deacon is an arbitrary creation of ecclesiastical prejudice, that the original word means simply any servant of the Lord for the church, and that the translators introduce or keep back the official "deacon" as it happens to suit their purpose.

• If "they who serve well" (1 Timothy 3: 13) are "deacons", then assuredly was Timothy himself a deacon (4: 16); but if he was not a deacon but only a servant of the Lord in the church, then "they who served well" were not official deacons, but servants of the Lord in the church, as was also Timothy.* In 1 Thessalonians 3: 2, Timothy is again mentioned as diaconos.
  • [* Philippians 1: 1 read thus: "Paul and Timotheus, the servants [slaves, Greek] of Jesus Christ, to all the saints in Christ Jesus which are at Philippi with the overseers and ministers".]

We need not after this, tarry long to pass judgment on the mistakes of the traditional school on this subject.

• In the Church of England, in the ordination of deacons, the bishop is made to say, that "it appertaineth to the office of a deacon to assist the priests in the divine service, specially when he ministereth the holy communion; to read the Scriptures and the Homilies in the church, to teach children the church catechism, to baptize infants, in the absence of the priests; to preach, if licensed so to do by the bishop; and to point out the poor and sick of the parish to the curate, in order that the curate may exhort is parishioners to relieve them"!

• And all this we are gravely told is the office of a deacon, as appointed by the apostle, and recorded in the sixth chapter of Acts!

The Dissenters, who can discern clearly enough the errors of the Episcopalians on this question, have nevertheless themselves gone all astray in their endeavors to realize "the deacon's office".

• They are not indeed agreed amongst themselves whether "the deacon's office" is to be traced in the sixth chapter of Acts; but they pretty generally affirm that the care of the poor is the proper duty of this officer.

• "I affirm", says the author of the Church Member's Guide, "that the table of the poor is the deacon's appropriate and exclusive duty. Whatever is conjoined with this is extra-diaconal service, and vested in the individual merely for the sake of utility" (Church Member's Guide, page 130).

• "Utility", then, has with them virtually changed the office; for the same writer further says, "all the temporal affairs of the church should be confided to the deacons; their accounts ought to be annually laid before the subscribing members of the church, and to receive their approbation" – "the deacons, from their being officers in the church … will be considered by every wise and prudent minister as his privy council in his spiritual government, and should always be ready to afford him, in a modest, respectful, and unobtrusive manner, their advice".

This last sentence could scarcely be put into Scripture language; for in making the attempt we should thus read it: The diaconi, from their being officers in the church … will be considered by every wise and prudent diaconus", etc.

• Tradition has separated the deacon and the minister, but in the New Testament they are one and the same word; and indeed so fully does diaconia mean any service in the church, that it is used in the Scriptures as a synonym also for "the office of the a bishop", as the English translators have a deceitfully translated episkope. Compare Acts 1: 17 with verse 20 of the same chapter.

By this examination of Scripture we are now coming to daylight, where much darkness had been allowed to settle, and we are beginning to ascertain that "ministry" is all manner of service, in the spiritual government of the church of God;

• that "ministers" and "deacons" are simply servants; and that any believer, man or woman, who serves the Lord and His people, is a deacon or minister.

Paul was, in this sense, a deacon, minister or servant (2 Corinthians 11: 23; Ephesians 3: 7; Colossians 1: 23).

• Timothy, in this sense, was a deacon (1 Thessalonians 3: 2; 1 Timothy 4: 6).

• Phebe was a deacon (Romans 16: 1).

• Apollos was a deacon (1 Corinthians 3: 5).

• Tychicus was a deacon (Ephesians 6: 21).

• All those who were in service to the Lord in the church at Philippi were deacons (Philippians 1:1).

• And, indeed, if we may imitate the translators of the English Bible, and coin "the deacon's office" out of the verb diaconeo, then "all believers that have received the gift are to exercise the deacon's office one to another"; and Paul tells us there are diversities of deacon's offices (1 Corinthians 12: 5); and

• finally in this mode of translating the Scriptures, our Lord Himself has promised that where He is there also shall His deacons be (John 12: 26).

"Ministry", however, makes its appearance in the English Bible through the medium of another word, which must not be overlooked. That word is huperetes;

• and in four instances it is so translated as to carry with it a clerical meaning, when the Scriptures are studied under the influence of traditionary prejudices.

• Huperetes, is, in its primary meaning, an under-rower, one who sat in the rowers' bench of the ancient trireme-vessels, under the command of a superior officer;
  • but in its secondary sense, it is any inferior officer, chiefly of the civil courts, the apparitor, serjeant, or constable; also any servant, official or domestic, state-servants or house-servants; and lastly, any one who renders service in any matter or duty.

In the Gospels the word is frequently translated "officer", or "servant"; as,

• "lest the judge deliver thee to the officer", Matthew 5: 25;

• "Peter followed him even unto the palace of the high priest, and he sat with the servants", Mark 14: 54;

• but in the following instances we find it rendered minister:
  • "Who from the beginning were eye-witnesses, and ministers [servants] of the word", Luke 1: 2;

  • "And they had also John to their minister [assistant in service]", Acts 13: 5;

  • "I have appeared unto thee to make thee a minister [servant] and witness", Acts 26: 16;

  • "Let a man so account of us, as of the ministers [servants] of Christ, and stewards of the mysteries of God", 1 Corinthians 4: 1.

    This text is often read, though unconsciously, as one of the clerical passages of the New Testament; yet, when closely examined and compared with others, it appears of rather an opposite tendency.

• We do indeed often hear the clergy tell us that they are "stewards of the mysteries, and ministers of Christ"; but here the minister is simply the servant; and we must not forget that Peter gives the stewardship to all believers,
  • "as every man hath received the gift, so minister the same one to another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God", 1 Peter 4: 10.

[* In formal words the Independents do not allow that they create a clerical order; but all their practices, and their habitual language, most clearly show that they think they have a clergy; their ministers are called clergymen, and always claim the title of Reverend.

They distinguish also very accurately between "the secular" and "the spiritual" officers of their churches – the deacon's office they tell us is secular, and the minister's is spiritual.

If however "showing mercy" to the poor and miserable be a part of "the deacon's office", then assuredly is "showing mercy" reckoned as one of the distinct gifts of the Holy Spirit (Romans 12: 8).]

But granting that there is any truth in that which has been already argued, then it must be obvious that "the ministry" of the New Testament differs so widely from any existing ministerial order that we need not be very solicitous, after the preceding exhibition, to inquire about "a regular ministry, ordained by imposition of hands";

• for unless the advocates of the clerical order can succeed in setting aside these statements from the New Testament, then is there system virtually undermined.

• But let us, nevertheless, for argument's sake, waive any preceding proofs, and very briefly examine the popular notions of "an ordained ministry".

• Now according to popular notions, the regular minister has been ordained "to preach the Gospel, and administer the sacraments", by virtue of imposition of hands of a clerical body already existing.

First. As to "administering the sacraments", the term is wholly unknown in Scripture. There are no "sacraments" in the New Testament; it is only from the papal school that we hear of them.p>

• The churches of Rome and England talk much of "the sacraments"; and the dissenters, copying those churches, or rather retaining the practices which they received originally from Rome through the Church of England, enlarge on the mysterious theme;
  • but the Christian who is guided by the Scriptures need not trouble himself about any theological language which he cannot find in the word of God.

• As for baptism, which they call one of the sacraments, there is no Scripture proof that it was performed by any "minister", taking the word even in the wide sense of diaconos.

• The baptism of the converts in the house of Cornelius was not performed by any "minister", for, as far as we are informed, the only "minister" present was Peter, and "he commanded them to be baptized" (Acts 10: 48); that is, he did not baptize them himself:

• and though doubtless the traditional school would assure us that "the certain brethren from Joppa" who accompanied Peter (verse 23) were clergyman, and "administered the sacrament of baptism" on that occasion, yet no such statement appears in Scripture; and therefore it may be dismissed with innumerable other dreams of the school.

Neither is there any evidence that the presence of a minister or an elder, or a bishop, was considered indispensable in those meetings of the saints, when on the first day of the week thry assembled to break bread.

• Paul gives many directions to the Corinthians concerning these meetings; but he never once names or even alludes to any elder, bishop, ordained minister, as likely to be present on those occasions.

• If there were elders in the church of Corinth, they would of course break bread with the rest, but so little did Paul know about "ordained ministers administering the sacrament" that he neither names the minister nor the sacrament;

• and how this omission can be accounted for, if in those days there were either "ordained ministers", or sacraments, we see not. Let those who can, explain this difficulty.

The ecclesiastical phraseology of "administering the sacrament of the Lord's Supper" is in vain sought for in the New Testament: the Lord's Supper is thus described there,

• "On the first day of the week the disciples met together to break bread" (Acts 20: 7).

• And this simple statement, made if possible still more simple by Paul's allusions to the mode of meeting in the Corinthian church (see 1 Corinthians 11: 20-34), ought to be sufficient to dissipate all our visions about ceremonies and clergyman in the observance of the Lord's Supper.

• The truth is this: on the first day of the week the brethren met together to break bread; and if in those meetings ministers, that is diaconi, were present, or if elders were of the number, they would take the bread and wine amongst the rest,
  • but the sacrament and the clergymen had not then been invented. In the second century of church history, they began to make their appearance.

Then, secondly, as to "preaching the Gospel" no such faculty was conveyed by any imposition of hands or any ordination; for if that had been the case, then of course no other door to preaching the Gospel could have been opened,

• as the simultaneous existence of ordained and unordained preachers would have made it appear that ordination, for preaching the Gospel at least, was a ceremony that might be dispensed with.

• Now to the existence of unordained preachers we have a direct testimony:
  • "Saul made havoc of the church, entering into every house, and hailing men and women, committed them to prison; therefore they that were scattered abroad went everywhere preaching the Word" (Acts 8: 4).

• Was this an irregular and uncanonical proceeding? Of course all clergymen are bound to declare that it was, because these preachers had not received "holy orders"; but the Scriptures here, as in all other ecclesiastical questions, disagree with the clergy, for it is written further,
  • "Now they which were scattered abroad upon the persecution that arose about Stephen traveled as far as Antioch, preaching the Word. And the hand of the Lord was with them; and a great number believed, and turned unto the Lord" (11: 16-21).

Now if this had beeni irregular, not only would the inspired writer have marked it with disapprobation, but the then existing church would assuredly have corrected the practice, and laid down some canon against "lay preaching"; but not so;

• for the "tidings of these things came unto the ears of the church … and they sent forth Barnabas, that he should go as far as Antioch: who, when he came, and had seen the grace of God, was glad, and exhorted them all, that with purpose of heart they would cleave to the Lord: for he was a good man, and follow the Holy Ghost and of faith" (verse 22-24).

This narrative, if duly weighed, incurably ruins the whole fabric of "a regular ministry ordained to preach the Gospel"; for it brings us to acknowledge this point,

• that the sects will not tolerate those practices in which the saints of the apostolical era greatly rejoiced, and which drew forth the commendation and thankfulness of "good men who were full of the Holy Ghost and of faith".

• Would the Church of England, in similar circumstances, send forth its "lay members" to preach the Gospel? Did it do so in the time of the Commonwealth, when the hand of power bore heavily on the episcopal party?

• Has the Church of Rome ever authorized preaching to any but clergymen? or would it, under any circumstances, tolerate such an irregularity? Assuredly not.

• If laymen were allowed to assume this ministerial prerogative it would ruin their clergy, disenthrone the oligarchy of the pulpit, and bring to nought that "official distinction and authority", which we are assured is not always sufficiently valued* in their ordained ministers, though "they are appointed as living oracles to announce, and as ministers of the temple to interpret, the utterances and will of God". – (Discourses of the Rev. Robert M'All, LL.D., i. 441).

[* "It is my decided conviction, that in some of our churches the pastor is depressed far below his just level. He is considered merely in the light of a speaking brother. He has no official distinction and authority". – Church Member's Guide, page 57.]

In the pontifical Church of Rome, we find that the bishop, in the ordination of a clergyman, confers for the first time the power of preaching when he grants deacon's orders; as in the previous grades of doorkeeper, reader, exorcist, acolyte, and subdeacon, this privilege is withheld.

• In conferring deacon's orders the bishop says, "Dearly beloved son, as thou art now to be promoted to the Levitical order, deeply ponder to what a degree in the church thou art approaching, for a deacon ought to minister at the altar, to baptize, and to preach";

• and in the Church of England, the bishop says to the deacon, "Take thou authority to read the Gospel in the church of God, and to preach the same, if thou be thereto licensed by the bishop". This is man's order; but it is not so in the Word of God.

The case of Apollos (Acts 18: 24) is exactly to the point.

• "He was an eloquent man and mighty in the Scriptures … instructed in the way of the Lord; and being fervent in spirit, he spake and taught diligently the things of the Lord".

• This was his ordination, "I have believed, and therefore have I spoken"; and this is the only ordination that a Christian, instructed from the Word, is called upon to own – the ordination of faith, granted by the Holy Spirit.
  • "We having the same spirit of faith, according as it is written, I believe and therefore have I spoken; we also believe, and therefore speak" (2 Corinthians 4: 13).

This also was the ordination of others whom Paul mentions,

• "I beseech you, brethren (ye know the house of Stephanas, that it is the firstfruits of Achaia, and that they have addicted themselves to the ministry [diaconia] of the saints), that ye submit yourselves to all such, and to every one that helpeth with us, and laboureth", 1 Corinthians 16: 15-16.

• This is remarkable: "the house of Stephanas", a very wide expression, the whole family had addicted themselves to the ministry; they had not been ordained to this ministry by canonical sanctions, but had most irregularly, without the help of a bishop, or of the presbytery, taken upon themselves "the sacred functions".

• Besides this, they had not only addicted themselves; but ordained themselves; for so the translators were bound to render the word, etaxan, if they had any regard to consistency. In Romans 13: 1, they so give it. "The powers that be are ordained of God"; but here the translation is softened, and a meaning is given, which the original will scarcely bear.

• To these irregular ministers, Paul requires that the Corinthians should submit themselves, and not only to them, but to all who, like them, and helped in the service of the Gospel. Such is the ordination of the Scriptures!
  • which the translators keep back where it might appear, or bring forward where there is no authority for it, as in Acts 1: 22, "Must one be ordained to be a witness with us of His resurrection".

• The ecclesiastical phrase, "ordained to be", a phrase most important for the translators in that passage, is wholly wanting in the original. The word is simply genesthai, and we should read the passage thus,
  • "Wherefore of these men which have companied with us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out amongst us … must one be a witness with us of His resurrection".*

[* Acts 14: 23 is sometimes referred to as teaching the appointment or ordination of elders; and it is contended that the Greek word there used signifies appointment on the principle of election by a majority shown by holding up the hands.

That the word used literally means election by holding up the hands must be admitted, but that it necessarily always bears this meaning is impossible, seeing that it is used of God in Acts 10: 41.

Moreover, from the construction of the passage if there was a holding up of hands at all, it was the apostles who must have done it, and not the assembly; which is manifestly absurd.]

Then as to imposition of hands: take the following instance, which is much urged by clergymen.

• "Now there were in the church at Antioch certain prophets and teachers … and as they ministered to the Lord and fasted, the Holy Ghost said, Separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I have called them; and when they had fasted and prayed, and laid their hands on them, they sent them away", Acts 13.

• Here, then, if this instance is of any avail, it ought to be shown that Paul and Barnabas had never preached the Gospel before; that they never had been sent forth before to the ministry or service of the Lord; and that on this occasion they for the first time received a license "to preach the Gospel, and administer the sacraments".

• We find, however, an account of Paul's preaching (Acts 9: 20) some long time, not less than seven years, before this event: nay, both Paul and Barnabas had been preaching in Antioch a whole year, and had been sent by the disciples of that city to Jerusalem, with a collection made for the brethren at Judea (11: 30); so that their ministry not only elsewhere, but remarkably in this very Antioch, had been for a long time tolerated without imposition of hands.

• Again, if this was indeed an "ordination" of Paul, we find the teachers and prophets ordaining an apostle! a fact that would sadly derange the theory of the apostolical succession,which declares that our Lord alone ordained the apostles, and the apostles ordained the clergy.

• Moreover, it would reverse the order of precedence formally stated in Scripture:
  • "God hath set some in the church, first apostles, secondarily prophets, thirdly teachers", 1 Corinthians 12: 28;

• whereas, in this narrative, supposing Paul and Barnabas to have been ordained by imposition of hands for the ministry, the order must have been "first prophets and teachers, secondarily apostles".

Again, this is sending forth of Paul and Barnabas was by the Holy Ghost (Acts 13: 4); and where is that power of ordination now?

• The bishops in the Romish and English communions do indeed pretend to convey the Holy Ghost in their ceremonies and ordination; but we know that it is only a pretense.

• And as for the Presbyterians and Dissenters, they do not now profess to convey any spiritual gift, ordinary or extraordinary, by their imposition of hands; and therefore they pracatise a ceremony without power or meaning – a mere nullity;

• but it was not in the days of the apostles that empty ceremonies were performed. The apostles did not observe customs to perpetuate a delusion or to consecrate a phantom of forfeited power.

Again, the apostle Paul, in his Epistle to the Galatians, takes pains to make them understand that he did not owe his ministry to any ordination or appointment of man:

• "I neither received the Gospel of men, neither was I taught it … but when it pleased God … to reveal His Son in me, that I might preach Him among the heathen; immediately I conferred not with flesh and blood [that is, I consulted not with any man, nor did I follow any man's advice, order, or direction]: neither went I up to Jerusalem to those which were apostles before me; but I went into Arabia … Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to see Peter, and abode with him fifteen days. But other of the apostles saw I none, save James the Lord's brother".

• This is indeed a plain statement; and it is manifest thereby that Paul thought nothing of any appointment of man, though that man might be an apostle. When he believed, he spoke; and having received an ordination of God's grace, he was content with it:
  • "I went not up to Jerusalem to them which were apostles before me".

• According to the opinion of the traditional school, the apostles were the fountain of all lawful authority for ministry; but Paul sought not that fountain; nay, he takes pains to inform us that he kept clear of it;

• therefore, as he was not ordained by the apostles, we may be quite sure he was not ordained several years afterwards by the prophets and teachers of Antioch when he had been long engaged in the ministry.

Another passage in the Scriptures is frequently wrested from its true meaning to prove ordination by imposition of hands. It is in Paul's Epistle to Timothy:

• "Neglect not the gift that is in thee, which was given thee by prophecy, with the laying on of the hands of the presbytery" (1 Timothy 4: 14); and again

• "Wherefore I put thee in remembrance that thou stir up the gift which is in thee by the putting on of my hands", 2 Timothy 1: 6.

• What then was this gift? The gift of preaching the Gospel and license to administer the sacrament? Certainly not: it was a special gift – karisma – of the Holy Ghost, which was conveyed to Timothy, as it would appear, by the laying on of hands of Paul and the elders:

• and we know that this power did exist in those days; for we find that Peter and John, after praying that the Samaritan converts might receive the gift,
  • "laid their hands on them and they receive the Holy Ghost; and when Simon saw that through laying on of the apostles' hands the Holy Ghost was given, he offered money, saying, Give me also this power, that on whomsoever I lay hands he may receive the Holy Ghost", Acts 8: 18.

• And again, at Ephesus, Paul found certain disciples who knew only of John's baptism; on these Christians, after they had been baptized in the name of Jesus, Paul laid his hands, and then
  • "the Holy Ghost came upon them, and they spake with tongues and prophesied", Acts 19: 6

• It was therefore some such gift as this which Timothy had received: perhaps the gift of tongues or of prophecy, or the power of working miracles, "signs and wonders", any or all of these, or some other gift, of which perhaps there is no record left:

• and this word karisma, which Paul uses in allusion to this gift imparted to Timothy, is the appropriate term for the gifts which the Holy Ghost then conferred on the church. (See Romans 1: 11; 12: 6; 1 Corinthians 1: 7; 12: 4, 9, 28, 30).

If then Timothy was ordained into the clerical caste by imposition of hands, so also were the Samaritan converts and the "certain disciples" at Ephesus: for they also received a gift by imposition of hands;

• and indeed the advocates of the clerical order ought boldly to assert that the Samaritan and Ephesian disciples were ordained either priests or deacons, if they would build anything on the case of Timothy.

But in all this question we do not find Paul's first ordination is ever brought forward, which, after all, but for one inconvenient circumstance, might be more positively referred to than any other, as an instance required. Thus it is recorded: –

• "Ananias … entered into the house; and putting his hand on him [Paul], said, Brother Saul, the Lord, even Jesus, that appeared unto thee in the way as thou camest, hath sent me, that thou mightest receive thy sight, and be filled with the Holy Ghost. And immediately there fell from his eyes as it had been scales; and he received sight forthwith, and was baptized", Acts 9: 17.

This instance is full to the point that Paul received the Holy Ghost by the imposition of hands, and that it was at the very beginning of his service in the church; this therefore looks much like "ordination by imposition of hands";

• but then, unfortunately, if this be allowed, it would follow that Paul was ordained before he was baptized, an uncanonical irregularity wholly unknown in clergymen's law;

• and moreover, the person who then "ordained him by imposition of hands" was not a bishop or elder, but simply "a certain disciple at Damascus, named Ananias" (verse 10); in fact, according to the Papal ideas of these days, a mere laymen;
  • and yet this "lay-man", without the assistance of any of the clergy, without the presence of any bishop, lays his hands on Paul, and so confers on him the Holy Ghost!

• We can therefore well understand how the advocates of the "regularly ordained ministry" are disposed to pass over this remarkable occurrence, and prefer rather to quote the imposition of hands by the church at Antioch (Acts 13), which has been already examined.

Having been seen that imposition of hands does not, according to the Scripture record, confer the power of "preaching the Gospel and administering the Sacraments",

• and having seen also that in many cases the imposition of hands took place, where confessedly no clerical designation or privilege was intended, and that this is conceded even by clergymen,
  • we need not feel any remnant of perplexity on this question, but we may conclude by stating;

(1) that imposition of hands sometimes means simply benediction:

• "Then were brought unto Him little children, that He should put His hands on them and pray; and He laid His hands on them", Matthew 19: 13;

(2) sometimes recognition of service in the church, as in the case of the seven brethren chosen "to serve tables", which certainly was not ordination to the "ministry",

• as a serving of tables on that occasion was markedly and avowedly kept distinct from "ministry of the Word", Acts 6: 4-6;

(3) sometimes commendation to a particular work, and that by express command of the Holy Ghost (Acts 13);

(4) sometimes an act whereby the gift of the Holy Ghost was imparted,

• as when Ananias, "a certain disciple", laid his hands on the apostle Paul (Acts 9: 27);

• or, as when the apostles gave this gift to others (Acts 8: 18; 19: 6);

• or, as in the case of Timothy and the elders – a case which is moreover peculiarly designated, as having been obedience to prophecy, or,

(5) a visible sign of performing a miracle, as when the disciples to whom the power was given "laid their hands on the sick, and they recovered", Mark 16: and 18.

One word perhaps may be requisite on the theory of orders. Rome and the Anglican Church are nearer the truth in their theory than the Presbyterians and the Congregationalists;

• for although it is a standing practice of impiety perpetuated from age to age in the Romish and Anglican communions, to pretend to convey the gift of the Holy Ghost in orders, when they have no such gift to bestow,

• yet still there is in this practice the acknowledgment of a principle which can alone give validity to ministry, and which is utterly wanting in the institutes of the other parties.

• That principle is this that the Holy Spirit is the Author of ministry in the Christian Church, and consequently that without the gift of the Spirit no ministry is valid.

The churches of Rome and England* refer to this principle continually in their rituals; and, in order to authenticate their office of a human priesthood, feign that it is imparted, consecrated, and sealed, by a direct and immediate gift of the Lord the Spirit of life.

[* Pontifex cam mitra sedens super faldistorium, ante medium altaris, imponit ambas manus super capita singulorum coram eo genuflectentium, dicens cuilibet, "Accipe Spiritum Sanctum, quorum remisseris peccata, remittuntur eis; et quorum retinueris, retenta sunt". – Pontificale Romanum.

"Almighty God, giver of all good things, who by thy Holy Spirit hasr appointed divers ministers of the church" … etc.

"The bishop with the priests present shall lay their hands severally upon the head of every one that receiveth the order priesthood; the receivers humbly kneeling on their knees, and the bishop saying, 'Receive the Holy Ghost for the office and work of a priest in the Church of God now committed unto thee by the imposition of our hands. Whose sins thou dost forgive, they are forgiven; and whose sins thou dost retain, they are retained" – Book of Common Prayer. The Ordering of Priests.]

xxxThis, however is so palpably a fiction, and so notoriously wanting in any reality, that it of old excited the indignation of those Dissenters who existed ages before the Puritans.

• In the year 1395, the Lollards made a great stir with "twelve conclusions", which they diligently published and posted in conspicuous places in the metropolis. One of these conclusions is thus expressed:
  • "We do not see that the Holy Ghost doth give any good gift through any such signs or ceremonies: because He, together with all noble and goodly gifts, cannot consent to be in any person with deadly sin. The corollary of this conclusion is, that it is a lamentable and dolorous mockery unto wise men to see the bishops mock and play with the Holy Ghost in the giving of their orders; because they give crowns and characters instead of white hearts, and this is mark of Antichrist".

• Two centuries later we find Calvin, in his Commentary (Acts 8: 16), exclaiming,
  • "It is not tolerable, seeing the symbol (of imposition of hands) was only for a season that the Papists should have coined a perpetual law for it in the church, as though the Holy Ghost were always at their fingers' ends; for we know that when the testimony and pledge of the grace of God is vainly set before us, and without the reality, it becomes a jest too bad to be borne – nimis ludibrium".

• Now they that can see so much ought to be able to see the whole truth; for though it is deeply and scandalously profane thus to enact a solemn fiction, yet it is but another divergence into error to appoint to ministry without reality of this power.

• The one party owns the right principle; but not having the power, which it deems to be requisite, pretends that it has it.

• The other party, shrinking from so daring a fiction, does not acknowledge that this power is requisite, and therefore by human elections and by imposition of hands, without any pretended power, virtually denies and rejects the true principle.

• And this is, in fact, conceded by Calvin (1 Timothy 4: 14), who, in his Commentary, never as far as I can perceive, intentionally perverts or evades the truth before him: –
  • "It was customary for the apostles to ordain ministers by imposition of hands; and Timothy, when called to the ministry by the voice of the prophets, and then ordained by a solemn rite, was at the same time furnished by the grace of the Holy Spirit to execute its functions: from whence we collect that the rite was not then a vain one, because God fulfilled by his Holy Spirit the consecration which men figured by the imposition of their hands".

So that we come to this conclusion –

• If the church has the power of conveying the gift of the Holy Ghost for ministry, by imposition of hands, then and then only may this rite be observed;

• but if the power is forfeited and gone, and if it is ascertained that no spiritual gift is conveyed,

• then must men, on the one hand, cease their vain attempts to perpetuate by falsehood "an unbroken chain" of spiritual succession:

• and on the other refrain from the exercise of mere human will, creation, and assignment, in order to supply the place of a higher authority.