IX. Have you a measure of spiritual knowledge and discerning of spiritual things? Do you understand the nature and concerns of the house of God, and the work and duties, the privileges and enjoyments thereof, and what you have to do there; together with the ends of God in instituting and erecting gospel churches?
X. Do you intend and resolve, in the light, life, and power of Christ, to seek for, and endeavor unfeignedly to obtain, and prosecute the ends of church fellowship, when you shall he accepted among them? and do you desire and aim at the holy ends appointed by God in desiring communion with them? as, 1. To enjoy God and communion with him in all his ordinances. 2. To worship God there in spirit and truth, and to give him your homage and service in his house. 3. To show your subjection and obedience to him, and to make a public and open profession of him, and of his truths before men. 4. To receive of his grace, to enrich your souls with his fulness, and to be sealed by his Spirit unto the day of your redemption. 5. That you may walk orderly and beautifully, and shine as lights in the Church, and in the world, before saints and sinners. 6. That you may be established in the truth, live under the watch and care of Christ's ministers, and of fellow-members; that by their inspection and faithful dealings with you you may be kept, or brought back from sin to God, by their wise reproofs and holy instructions. 7. That you may yield up yourselves in holy obedience to Christ, and do all things whatsoever he commands you, that you may have the right use and enjoyment of all your purchased privileges, and be secured against the gates of hell. Are these and such like ends in your hearts and minds, in your walk and in church fellowship, and can you find the forementioned signs of grace in you in some suitable measure, though not so clearly and fully as you would wish? Then I may venture to assure you, that you are qualified for being actual members of the Church of Christ, that you are called and invited into his house, and that you are indispensably bound to answer to the call of God, and to enter into his holy temple.
I say that church privileges are yours, the doors of God's house stand open for you, Christ stands at the door and waits for you, he invites you to come in and to sit down at his table, and you shall be most freely and heartily welcome to your Lord, and to his people.
Quest. What are those qualifications, which the rulers of a church, for their own satisfaction, should look for, and find in such persons, as they admit into full communion with the Church of Christ?
Ans. It is certain that all that profess the name of Christ and his ways, ought not, and may not be admitted into the Lord's holy temple, because many, if not the most of them, are very ignorant of Christ and his ways, and notoriously scandalous in their lives, as sad and woful experience shows. If church rulers should admit known hypocrites, they betray their trust, and defile Christ's holy temple, by taking in such persons as they know, or ought to know, he would not have there: and that they ought to try and prove persons, that they may know their fitness, before they admit them in, is clear in Acts ix. 26, 27, and because Christ hath committed the keys of his house to take in and exclude according to his will and appointment.
As to satisfying qualifications in persons desiring admission into the church, when they appear to be real sound-hearted believers, according to the judgment of charity, by the rules of the word, the church ought to receive them in the Lord.
I. If they can satisfy the church, by giving Scripture evidence of their regeneration, conversion, repentance, and faith in Christ; of their knowledge of Christ, his laws and ordinances; of their lost and perishing state by reason of sin, and of their sincere desires and resolutions to become the Lord's, and to walk with him unto all well-pleasing in all his ways.
II. If they are sound in the faith of the gospel; I mean in the chief and principal doctrines thereof, although they may be ignorant of, or mistaken in matters of less importance. If they have some distinct knowledge and faith concerning these, and other such truths and matters contained in the word of God; as of the state and condition in which man was at first created; how he lost that holy and blessed estate, and the misery into which he brought himself and all his posterity thereby. Concerning themselves, that they are by nature children of wrath, dead in trespasses and sins, and condemned to eternal death; that they are enemies to, and at enmity with, God; that they have neither will nor power by nature to will and to do that which they ought, and which is well-pleasing to God; that they have forsaken God, and are under the curse of the law; and that they are the children, subjects, and servants of the devil, the world, and their own lusts; that God left not all men in this lost state and condition, but provided an all-sufficient remedy, namely, Jesus Christ, and that by an everlasting covenant, entered into with him, in the behalf of men, before the foundation of the world, Tit. i. 2; 2 Tim. i. 9; Prov. viii.: and that, in pursuance thereof, he elected and gave some to Christ, that he might save them out of his mere grace and love. John vi. 37, 40:—That God the Father gave and sent his Son, the second person of the Trinity, to mediate peace between God and man, and to reconcile them to God, by his active and passive obedience;—that Jesus Christ gave himself, and became a propitiation for their sins;—that he assumed our nature into a personal union with himself, whereby there are two natures in one person, by which he was made capable of his mediatorship;—that he, being God and man in one person, took upon himself our guilt and punishment, obeyed the whole law of God, that men had broke, and did always the things that pleased God;—that, when he had finished his active obedience, he became obedient unto the death of the cross, to the wrath of God, and to the curse of the law, Gal. iii. 13; Phil. ii. 8;—that he really died and was buried, lay in the grave, and rose again the third day; and after forty days he ascended into heaven, and sat down at the right hand of God; and that he will come again to judge the quick and the dead;—that he is king, priest, and prophet; a king to give laws unto men, and to command their obedience to him, to rule and govern his subjects, and to reward the obedient, and to punish the disobedient;—that all power in heaven and earth is committed unto him; and that he is coequally and coeternally God with the Father and Holy Spirit;—that as a High Priest he died and made atonement for the sins of his people, and sits in heaven to make intercession, and to appear in the presence of God for them, Heb. vii. 25, and ix. 24;—that there are three persons in the Godhead, yet but one God;—that the Holy Ghost is eternally God, was sent into the world, and came from the Father and Son, for the elect's sake;—that it is he that regenerates persons, works effectually in their hearts, applies Jesus Christ and all his benefits to men, and savingly convinces his elect of sin, righteousness, and judgment. That all that rightly believe in Christ shall be saved, but those that believe not shall be damned; and that all that believe in him must be careful to perform good works. That believers are made righteous, through the righteousness of Jesus Christ, and that they have none of their own to commend them unto God. That God hath made Jesus Christ unto his chosen, wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption; and that they are made the righteousness of God in him. That God imputed their sins to Christ, and imputes the blood and righteousness of Christ to them; and that they are justified thereby, and not by inherent holiness and righteousness. That God loves, pardons, justifies, and saves men freely, without any respect unto their good works, as any cause thereof; but that all the moving cause (without himself) is Jesus Christ in his mediation. That the ground and reason of their obedience, in performing good works, is the revealed will and pleasure of Christ commanding them, and the ends of them are to express their thankfulness to God for his grace and love, to please and honor him, to meet with God, and to enjoy communion with him, to receive of his grace and the good of many promises; to shine as lights in the world, and to be useful unto men; to declare whose and what they are, and to lay up a reward in another world; to keep their lusts under, and their graces in use and exercise; and to manifest their respect and subjection to Jesus Christ, his authority, and law. That the law, for the matter of it, as in the hand of Christ, is the rule of all obedience; and that all are bound to yield subjection to it. That there shall be a resurrection of the just and unjust. That regeneration is absolutely necessary to salvation, and that without it none can enter into the kingdom of heaven. That the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments contain, and exhibit unto men, the whole revealed will of God, and are sufficient to make the man of God perfect, thoroughly furnished unto every good work; and that whatsoever they are to believe and do is contained therein; and that it is the ground of their faith, hope, and practice. That Jesus Christ hath instituted and appointed many ordinances of worship, for his own glory and his people's good, and that all are bound to observe and to wait on God in them. That all persons are indispensably bound to mind, and carefully to observe the principal manner and end of all their duties, and to see that they be right, holy, and spiritual indeed, and not to please themselves with the matter of them alone. That no man can serve God, or do any work acceptable unto him, until he be regenerated, and brought into a state of grace.
These are some of the matters of faith that they should in some measure be acquainted with and believe, that are admitted into full communion with the Church of Christ. And these and other truths must not be known and believed in a general, notional, light, and speculative manner; but heartily, powerfully, and particularly: not for others, but for themselves; otherwise their faith and knowledge will no way profit their souls to salvation.
III. They must be qualified also with a blameless conversation. Their conversation must be as becometh the gospel, otherwise they are not meet for communion with the gospel church. Carnal walking will not suit spiritual temples: for they will greatly pollute and defile them, and stain and obscure their beauty and glory. Therefore they must not be brawlers and contentious persons, covetous and worldly-minded, vain and frothy. They must not be froward and peevish, nor defraud others of their right. Nor must they neglect the worship of God in their families, nor be careless in governing and educating them in good manners, and in the things of God. They must not be such as are known to omit the duties and ordinances of religion in their proper seasons, or to have vicious families through their neglect: nor to have any other kind of conversation hateful to God and to his people. And therefore, whatever their profession be, they may not be admitted into the Church of God, until they have repented of these, or any other scandal in their life and conduct.