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ham. There was no other from which the Jews could be cast off. The ceremonial law was superseded. It was no excision at all to be cut off from a church which did not exist; nor could the Gentiles be introduced into it. But what says the apostle? That the "olive tree" was cut down or rooted up? That it had withered trunk and branch? Or was no longer the care of the divine planter? Nothing like it! He asserts the continuance of the olive tree in life and vigour; the excision of some worthless branches; and the insertion of new ones in their stead. Thou," says he, addressing the Gentile, " partakest of the root and fatness of the olive tree." Translate this into less figurative language, and what is the import? That the church of God, his visible church, taken into peculiar relations to himself by the Abrahamic covenant, subsists without injury through the change of dispensation and of members. Branches indeed may be cut off, but the rooted trunk stands firm, and other branches occupy the places of those which are lopped away. The Jews are cast out of the church, but the church

There was still left the

perished not with them. trunk of the olive tree; there was still fatness in its roots: it stands in the same fertile soil, the covenant of God: and the admission of the Gentiles into the room of the excommunicated Jews, makes them a part of that covenanted church;

as branches graffed into the olive tree and flourishing in its fatness, are identified with the tree. It is impossible for ideas conceived by the mind of man, or uttered in his language, to assert more peremptorily the continuance of the church under that very covenant which was established with Abraham and his seed. And this doctrine, understood before the apostleship of Paul, was maintained by John the Baptist; "Think not," cried he to the multitudes who crowded around him, "think not to say within yourselves, We have Abraham to our father: for verily I say unto you, that God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham." The hearers of the Baptist, like many modern professors of Christianity, supposed that the duration of the covenant with Abraham, and of the prerogative of the Jews as God's peculiar people, were the same. It is a mistake, replies the second Elijah; you may all be cast off; you may all perish; but the oath to Abraham shall not 'be violated. God will be at no loss to provide

seed" who shall be as much within his covenant as yourself, even though he should create them out of the stones of the earth. The threat was vain: it was empty noise; it was turning the thunders of God into a scarecrow for children, if the covenant with Abraham was not to survive the law of peculiarity, and be replenished with other seed than that which sprung from his loins according to the flesh.

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CHURCH OF GOD.

No. III.

On the mode of perpetuating the Visible Church.

It has been shown, in the preceding number, tnat the covenant with Abraham and his seed, was an ecclesiastical covenant; i. e. was made with the visible church, and is of equal duration. We proceed to another and very important part of our inquiry. How were the covenant character and privilege to be transmitted from one age to another, till the consummation of all things? Or, which is the same, how was a succession of the "seed" to be preserved?

This was to be accomplished in two ways.

1st. In all cases of original connexion with the church; that is, where the individual was without the bond of the covenant, previous to his being of adult age, he was to be admitted on his personal faith in that religion which the covenant was instituted to secure, This term of communion with the people of God has never varied. It remains, at the present hour, precisely what it was at the

formation of the Abrahamic covenant. They who do not enjoy, or have not embraced, the gospel, are "without." They are "strangers," "foreigners," "aliens," "afar off," and must continue such till they come to the knowledge of the truth. No Jewish or Pagan foot must cross the threshold of the church, without "repentance toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ." About this there is no dispute. About the qualifications requisite in adults for their admission to the privileges of the church, there is not the same agreement.

Some think that a general profession of Christianity is all which she may exact; alleging in support of their opinion, the example of the apostles, who demanded, say they, nothing more than a confession that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and therefore they conclude that nothing more ought to be demanded now.

But it is not to be denied that this proposition contains the substance of all the doctrines and predictions of the Old Testament, concerning the Redeemer's person and work. No man could give it his intelligent assent, without a knowledge of those doctrines and predictions; nor repose his hope upon their truth, without that divine faith which receives the whole testimony of God, and operates, with a purifying influence, upon the heart and life. The scriptures refer the existence

of such a confession, when not hypocritical, to a much higher cause, and attribute to the confession itself much stronger effects, than are even thought of by those who, at this day, would establish it as the all-comprehending term of Christian fellowship. "I give you to understand," says Paul, 1 Cor. xii. 3. " that no man can say that Jesus is the Lord, but by the Holy Ghost."-And John 1, Ep. v. 1. 5. "Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ, is born of God."—"Who is he that overcometh the world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God." It is evident, upon the very face of these passages, that nothing was further from the mind and the practice of the Apostles, than the recognizing as Christians and the admitting into Christian fellowship, all or any who barely assented to the general proposition, that "Jesus is the Christ." Much less can such an admission be justifiable now, when millions learn, from mere habit, to repeat that proposition without weighing its sense, or even comprehending its terms. Christianity is not a thing of rote. And there can be no doubt, that multitudes would flock to the church, reiterating as often as you would wish, their belief that "Jesus is the Christ;" who should, nevertheless, be found, upon a strict examination, to be either ignorant, or enemies, of every truth comprehended in their own creed. This cannot be. Christianity is not chargeable

Vol. IV.

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