3. Nor were they the only people that professed to worship the true God; neither was holiness and salvation confined to them; but were found in other nations. Therefore though we have but little notice of the state of other kingdoms in their times, and scarcely know what national churches (that is, whole nations professing saving faith) there were, yet we may conclude that there were other visible churches besides the Jews. For, 1. No Scripture denieth it; and charity then must hope the best. 2. The Scriptures of the Old Testament give us small account of other countries, but of the Jews alone, with some of their neighbours. 3. Shem was alive in Abraham's days (yea, about 34 years after Abraham's death, and within 12 years of Ishmael's death, viz. till about An. Mundi 2158). And so great and blessed a man as Shem, cannot be thought to be less than a king, and to have a kingdom governed according to his holiness; and so that there was with him not only a church, but a national church, or holy kingdom. 4. And Melchizedec was a holy king and priest; and therefore had a kingdom holily governed; and therefore not only a visible but also a national church (supposing that he was not Shem, as the Jews and Broughton, &c. think; for the situation of his country doth make many desert that opinion). 5. And Job and his friends show that there were churches then besides the Jews. 6. And it is not to be thought that all Ishmael's posterity suddenly apostatized. 7. Nor that Esau's posterity had no church state (for both retained circumcision). 8. Nor is it like that Abraham's offspring by Keturah were all apostates, being once inchurched. For though the special promise was made to Isaac's seed, as the peculiar holy nation, &c. yet not as the only children of God, or persons in a state of salvation. 9. And the passages in Jonah about Nineveh give us some such intimations also. 10. And Japheth and his seed being under a special blessing, it is not like that they all proved apostates. And what was in all other kingdoms of the world is little known to us.
We must therefore take heed of concluding, (as the proud Jews were at last apt to do of themselves,) that because they were a chosen nation privileged above all others, that therefore the Redeemer under the law of grace made to Adam, had no other churches in the world, and that there were none saved but the Jews and proselytes.[407]
[404] Rom. ii.; i. 20, 21; Exod. xii. 19, 43, 48, 49; xx. 10; Lev. xvii. 12, 15; xviii. 26; xxiv. 16, 22; Numb. ix. 14; xv. 14-16, 29, 30; xix. 10; Deut. i. 16.
[405] Psal. cxlv. 9; ciii. 19; c. 1; Rom. xiv. 11; Judg. xiv. 15.
[406] Deut. xiv. 2, 3; vii. 2, 6, 7; Exod. xix. 5; vi. 7, 8; Lev. xx. 24, 26; Deut. iv. 20, 33; xxix. 13; xxxiii. 29; Rom. iii. 1-3.
[407] It is this Jewish pride of their own prerogatives which Paul so much laboureth in all his epistles to pull down.
Quest. CLVII. Must we think accordingly of the christian churches now, that they are only advanced above the rest of the world as the Jews were, but not the only people that are saved?
Answ. This question being fitter for another place, what hope there is of the salvation of the people that are not christians, I have purposely handled in another treatise, (in my "Method. Theologiæ,") and shall only say now, 1. That those that receive not Christ and the gospel revealed and offered to them cannot be saved.[408] 2. That all those shall be saved (if such there be) who never had sufficient means to know Christ incarnate, and yet do faithfully perform the common conditions of the covenant of grace as it was made with Adam and Noah; and particularly all that are truly sanctified, who truly hate all known sin, and love God as God above all, as their merciful, reconciled, pardoning Father, and lay up all their hopes in heaven, in the everlasting fruition of him in glory, and set their hearts there, and for those hopes deny the interest of the flesh, and all things of this world.[409]
3. But how many or who doth this abroad in all the kingdoms of the world, who have not the distinct knowledge of the articles of the christian faith, it is not possible for us to know.
4. But (as Aquinas and the schoolmen ordinarily conclude this question) we are sure that the church hath this prerogative above all others, that salvation is incomparably more common to christians, than to any others, as their light, and helps, and means are more. The opinions of Justin, and Clem. Alexandr. Origen, and many other ancients, of the heathens' salvation, I suppose is known. In short: