Church of the Laodiceans," and would consequently not have enjoyed a share in hearing the Epistle read; which, no doubt, the Apostle intended they should do, in common with all the other members of " the Church of the Laodiceans." Another of the four passages alluded to, is in the second verse of the Epistle to Philemon:-" the Church in thy house." Philemon lived at Colosse, and the Epistle to him, and that to the collective Church at Colosse, were sent by the same messenger, and at the same time; the one to a particular believing inhabitant, and the other to the whole Church at Colosse. There were consequently at least two Congregational Churches at Colosse, except all the Christians at Colosse met in the house of Philemon; which certainly was not the case, otherwise St. Paul would never have described them to Philemon so particularly, as "the Church in thy house." But as there were more than one, St. Paul describes the one which he meant particularly, as "the Church in thy house," in distinction from all others. It was, therefore, not Independent, but a constituent part of the Church, or whole body of believers, at Colosse. With this, agrees the learned Dr. Gill, himself a Dissenter, and an enemy of the Church of England, though not worth considering as such, compared with the degenerate political Dissenters of the present day, who are so madly desirous of showing us some of their old Cromwellian tricks. The Doctor comments upon the words, "the Church in thy house" thus:" in the house of Philemon, and designs NOT the Church at Colosse as though it met at his house, but his own family, which for the great piety and religion which were among them, &c. were like a Church of themselves."* The next of these passages which I introduce to you is, "Greet the Church which is in their house." * Vide Dr. Gill's Exposition of the Passage: The house of Priscilla and Aquila is meant; and as they dwelt at Rome, the little Church which met at their house was one of the Congregations which constituted the Church of Rome, or body of faithful Christians in that famous city. Nothing can be more certain than that all the Christians at Rome did not meet in this house, because the persons to whom this Epistle is addressed, were commanded to greet this Church in the house of Priscilla and Aquila; and if they had. been the members of it, the Apostle would actually, have been desiring them to be so kind as to greet themselves the bare supposition of which is not a little absurd. Moreover, the Apostle requested those to whom, he addressed the Epistle, to salute above thirty other persons besides those who met in the house of Priscilla and Aquila, which very naturally leads us to suppose that they, as well as those to whom he wrote, were distinct from those who did there meet. And, consequently, that there must have been more than one Congregational Church at Rome; and most probably there were several-not one of which was independent; but each, like the Church in the house of Priscilla and Aquila, forming a constituent part of the body of the faithful or Church at Rome; for we no where read of the Churches at Rome. I come now to the only remaining passage in which the word Church' signifies no more than a single congregation: "Aquila and Priscilla salute you much in the Lord, with the Church that is in their house." This Epistle was sent from Ephesus, where of course, Aquila and Priscilla then lived; and as they were but working tent-makers, it is not even probable that they occupied a large house,-for rents would, unquestionably, be very high in so populous and celebrated a city as Ephesus then was. And indeed, had they occupied the largest house in the city, it could not have contained the "much people" whom St. Paul "had persuaded and turned away" from their idolatries. For" so mightily grew the word of God and prevailed" over conjuring books, conjurors, and others, that Demetrius and the craftsinen, fearing" that the temple of the great Goddess Diana, should be despised, and her magnificence destroyed,* raised a great uproar in the city, and filled it with confusion, vainly thinking to stop the mighty progress of Christianity. Now all this would never have been done had there not been, in reality, a very great number of people converted to the faith of the Gospel-a number much greater than could possibly have assembled in the small private house of Aquila and Priscilla. Besides, when St. Paul was at Miletus, "he sent to Ephesus, and called TOUS TRECUTEgous the Elders, Presby-, ters, or Priests of the Church." And to Timothy he writes "I besought thee to abide still at Ephesus, that thou mightest charge some that they teach no other doctrine." But if the Church of Ephesus consisted of but one Congregation, and was otherwise constituted like your modern pretendedly scriptural Independent Churches, why had it so many Elders or Ministers, for surely one would have been quite as sufficient for a single Congregation then, as you consider it, now? And why did Timothy remain at Ephesus to charge some to preach sound doctrine; for had the Church of Ephesus consisted of no more than one Congregation, Timothy could, and undoubtedly would, have ministered to it himself? The truth is simply this: the Church of Ephesus, like the Church at Jerusalem and others, not having a building suffici ently large to assemble in, for Divine Worship, formed themselves into several Congregations or House, Churches, each requiring an Elder to minister unto them. And so far were either Congregations or Ministers from being Independent, that they all constituted together but one body " the Church of Ephesus," governed by Timothy their Ruler or Bishop, who was without their election or advice, placed over them to *Vide Acts 19. + Acts, xx. 17. 1 Tim. i. 3. teach the Elders or Presbyters what doctrine to preachto receive accusations against them, and judge them, and to rebuke them that sinned before all, that others also might fear his judgment and rebukes. That the Church of Ephesus was Independent is certainly true, but it is equally as true that it consisted of several Congregations, or that at least it was not Congregational. Prove to the contrary if you can. Having thus made it sufficiently clear, for any unbiassed mind, that these four House-Churches, the only Churches which can be proved to have consisted of no more than one Congregation, were not Independent, I pass on to the consideration of my third definition of the meaning of the word Church in the Sacred Scriptures, which is, that it signifies-The Christians of some one town, district, or province, consisting of several Congregations, but constituting at the same time only one Church; as in these quotations" The Church of Ephesus,' "The Church at Jerusalem," "I persecuted the Church." To establish my point, then, I have only to prove that the word Church in these passages, includes more Congregations than one; a task indeed, extremely easy. As I have already examined the case of the " Church of Ephesus," I take "the Church at Jerusalem," the first Christian Church that was formed. And if any man in his senses, can possibly believe that the many thousands who composed this Church, assembled for Divine Worship in one place, he may justly be considered as an extraordinary character, and a fit subject for Dissent, for he will readily enough believe all the remaining absurdities of the Dissenting system. St. Paul tells the Corinthians, that Christ, after his Resurrection, "was seen of above five hundred brethren at once ;' "* and after St. Peter's ever memorable sermon on the Day of Pentecost," there were added unto them about three thousand souls.'t Immediately afterwards, we read that " many of them which heard the word believed, and the number of the men was about five thousand."* On these words, the learned and honest Dissenter before quoted says, "there were so many persons converted at this time, for this number does not include the three thousand that were converted under the first Sermon, but regards those who now became true believers, and were added to THE CHURCH, So that there were now eight thousand persons added to it."+ And as women are not included in the five thousand, for avdęwv is used and not avę, nor the five hundred who saw Christ after his Resurrection in the three thousand, there could not be less than ten or twelve thousand persons belonging to "THE CHURCH at Jerusalem at this time. And directly after this, we read, that still the number of the disciples multiplied in Jerusalem greatly, and a great company of the Priests were obedient to the Faith." Again, when St. Paul paid his third visit to Jerusalem, and went in unto James and the Elders, they "said unto him, Thou seest brother how many thousands of Jews there are which believe."§ The word here translated thousands is pugiadis, and signifies "myriads" or 66 TENS OF THOUSANDS," and in Acts xix. 19. it is thus translated. The words are 66 αργυριου μυριαδας πεντε, five myriads-five tens of thousands-fifty thousand pieces of silver." The words in the former passage are ποσαι μυριάδες εισιν Ἰουδαίων των πεπιστευκότων, how many myriads-HOW MANY TENS OF THOUSANDS of Jews there are which believe." Now considering the import of the words HOW MANY," it may very safely be concluded that there were not less than fifty or sixty thousand believers, and very probably a hundred thousand or more. And making every possible allowance, is it possible that there is a man in existence, so utterly destitute of common sense, as to believe that such an immense multitude of persons either did, or • Acts iv. 4. 66 |