Chapter 4.

CHAPTER 4.

A second objection argued against.

THEY who follow the example of Diotrephes rather than that of St. Paul, add to the preceding another objection, to discredit, if possible, the imitators of this great apostle. “Do you pretend,” say they, “to be the successors of St. Paul, and the other apostles, whom you presumptuously cite as your models?”

To such objectors the following reflections will serve as a sufficient reply:—

1. We have heard St. Paul, in the character of a believer, proposing himself as an example to all believers; and, as a minister of the Gospel, exhorting every pastor to tread in his steps, 1 Corinthians 11:1; Philippians 3:17.

2. John the Baptist preached repentance. The apostles proclaimed remission of sins in the name of Jesus Christ, “who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification,” Romans 4:25; and every true minister still continues to insist upon these important doctrines. Now, as he who takes the place of a person deceased, is accounted the successor of such person; so these faithful pastors should be regarded as teachers appointed to succeed both the forerunner and apostles of Christ. It must be allowed that the apostles, as elders in the family of our Lord, were in possession of privileges which we are not permitted to enjoy. But if the Gospel is unchangeable, and if the kingdom of God still remains under its ancient form of government, the priesthood must, for the most part, of necessity continue the same.

3. There was a time in which the Jewish priests had lost the Urim and Thummim with which Aaron and his sons were at first invested. There was a time in which God no longer manifested himself to his own appointed priests, as he had been accustomed to do. But as, notwithstanding the loss of that glory which formerly rested upon the Jewish Church, every pious priest, such as Zacharias, was a true successor of Aaron; so, during the eclipse of that glory which once illuminated the Christian Church, every pious minister may justly be accounted a true successor of St. Paul.

4. The word apostle signifies one who is sent, and answers to the term angel or messenger. “Our brethren,” says St. Paul, who accompany Titus, “are the messengers,” or apostles, “of the Churches,” 2 Corinthians 8:23. Every minister, therefore, who carries with sincerity the messages of his Lord, may, with propriety, be ranked among his angels or messengers. Nor do such immediately lose their title when they neglect to perform the duties of their office. They may, like Judas, go under the name of apostles even to their death, though utterly unworthy of such an honourable appellation. Thus, after the pastors of Ephesus and Laodicea had outlived the transient fervours of their charity and zeal, they were still addressed as the angels of their several Churches. And thus St. Paul gave the title of apostles to the worldly ministers of his time. In quality of ministers they were apostles; but in quality of worldly ministers they were false apostles.

5. As the name of Cesar is ordinarily applied to the twelve first Roman emperors, so the name of apostle is ordinarily applied to the twelve first ministers of the Gospel who had been permitted to converse with their Lord, even after his resurrection, and to St. Paul who was favoured with a glorious manifestation of his exalted Saviour. In this confined sense it is acknowledged that the name of apostle belongs, in an especial manner, to those who were sent forth by Christ after having received their consecration and commission immediately from himself. But as the name of Cesar, in a more general sense, may be given to all the emperors of Rome, so the name of apostle may be applied to every minister of the everlasting Gospel. Thus Barnabas, Andronicus, and Junia, who were neither of the number of the twelve, nor yet of the seventy, were denominated apostles as well as St. Paul, Acts 14:14; Romans 16:7.

6. It is the invariable opinion of slothful Christians that the zeal of ministers, and the piety of believers in the present day, must necessarily fall far below what they were in the apostles’ time: as though the promises of Christ were unhappily limited to the primitive Church. This error has been frequently refuted in vain by a variety of Christian writers, since nothing can be more conformable to that spirit of incredulity which reigns among us, than to renounce, at once, the most important promises of the New Testament. Had the same promises been made respecting temporal honours and profits, we should see a different mode of conduct adopted; “For the children of this world are, in their generation, wiser, than the children of light,” Luke 16:8.

Mons. Roques bears the following testimony to the truth contended for in this place. “The ministers of the Gospel esteem themselves, and with reason, the successors of the apostles. Their employment is essentially the same; though the apostles were honoured with many glorious prerogatives, as being the first to lay the foundation of the Church.”

“The minister of Christ,” says the same writer, “cannot be said vainly to flatter himself when he counts upon the gracious assistance of his Master. He takes the promise of that Master for the solid foundation of his hope. ‘I am with you alway,’ said Christ to his apostles, and, in their persons, to all those who should succeed them in the ministry, ‘even unto the end of the world,’“ Matthew 28:20.

“It was this Divine promise,” continues he, “a promise more steadfast than earth or heaven, that filled the apostles with such an ardent zeal, as enabled them to rejoice evermore; placing them above the fury of tyrants, and beyond the reach of fear; assisting them to endure excessive fatigue and toilsome journeys, the inclemency of the seasons, and the resistance of obdurate hearts.” Impressed with a just sense of this important promise, the venerable writer concludes with this fervent prayer: “Holy Jesus! who hast promised to continue for ever with thine apostles, and to give them that wisdom which no man shall ever be able to resist, give me to experience a participation of these signal favours, that, animated by the same spirit with which thy first disciples were inspired, I may lead some soul a happy captive to the obedience of thy word.” These beautiful quotations will make their own apology for appearing in this place.

7. If any are disposed to condemn Monsieur Roques as an enthusiast in this point, they consider not how many great and honourable names they disgrace by such a precipitate judgment; since all those pious fathers who are looked upon as the reformers of corrupted doctrines and degenerate manners, were unanimously of the same opinion.

From the preceding reflections it seems but reasonable to conclude, that all the true ministers of Christ in every nation are to be considered as the true successors of the apostles, and particularly of St. Paul, who, by way of eminence, is entitled the apostle of the Gentiles, and who, on that account, may, with the greater propriety, be proposed to them as a model.