Six Letters to a Mother on Church Questions - 5th Letter

SIX LETTERS TO A MOTHER ON CHURCH QUESTIONS

by Richard Holden 

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Fifth Letter

Bath, 30th January, 1873

DEAREST MOTHER,

There are few things about "Brethren" more generally distasteful to those from whom they withdrew (especially the clerical portion of them) than the repudiation of an "ordained" ministry. If "Brethren" be guilty in this of despising a divine appointment, it were, indeed, a most serious crime; but, if, as they (and I) most fully believe, an "ordained" ministry is in the present day "the baseless fabric of a vision," without an atom of Divine reality, then the guilt is on the part of those who set up and sustain such inventions in the name of the Lord.

The systems may be divided under two heads: successional, which claim that in the ministry itself is invested the power of ordaining its successors; and congregational, which hold that in the Church or congregation resides the power of appointing, ordaining, or formally recognizing ministers.

These systems are mutually destructive, and the advocates of either side are admirably successful in demonstrating the groundlessness of the opposing theory, and equally unsuccessful in the attempt to establish their own.

The only two passages I know of in all the New Testament that so much as seem to speak of succession are Acts 20:29-30 and 2 Tim. 2:2, the former of which intimates that "grievous wolves" would be the apostle’s successors, while in the latter the thing to be transmitted is not authority or office but truth, a widely different affair. The pretension of which Episcopalians so much rely, that Timothy and Titus are examples of ordaining bishops, is utterly worthless, as Presbyterians show very clearly in their controversies.

Three passages, which might be supposed to lend colour to congregational theory (Acts 1:15-26; 6:1-4; 13:1-3), are just as wide of the mark on that side. The first is an entirely exceptional case; it occurred before the Holy Ghost descended, and the Church was formed, and was, moreover, a direct appointment of the Lord, to whom the choice was directly referred. In the second case, the appointment made was neither for rule nor for any ministry of the Word, but "to serve tables”; and, although the selection of the individuals was left to those whose alms were to be distributed, the appointment was expressly retained in the hands of the apostles, and as there are no apostles now, the example is useless to us. In the third case, it was the Holy Ghost Himself who directly commanded the action, and selected the persons. These were, moreover, persons already recognized as prophets or teachers (verse 1, with Eph. 4:11), which shows that ordination to ministry was not the thing in question; and one of them distinctly denies that the office he held was given him through any human agency (Gal. 1:1).

Now observe, it is not denied that in the Apostolic Church there were elders (called also presbyters, bishops, or overseers) and deacons. The fact stands patent on the pages of Scripture. I am sure, however, it cannot be shown from Scripture that "ordained" officers of either character were found in every Church, or deemed indispensable to all: the reverse can, I think, be made evident. What has been too readily taken for granted is, that because such "ordained" officers were then, they must also be now. The fact is, the must be is no must be at all, but the reverse, there is not a word in the New Testament from one end of it to the other that so much as hints at the perpetuation of an order of “ordained” ministers. Not one word. The whole thing is simply taken for granted: there is not so much as a shadow of Scripture provision for it. When, however men’s minds are once possessed of the notion, that because there was an "ordained" ministry at the first, it must of course have been God's purpose to perpetuate it, they set about piece together what scraps of Scripture seem to them to indicate the form it should have, and as such meagre and misapplied materials afford scope for different theories, discord and confusion is the perfectly natural result. It does not seem ever to occur to them to ask whether it be not possible that God really intended to do just what He did, and that His silence is as much an expression of His mind as though He had spoken. Who shall doubt that He who so carefully provided for the perpetuation of the line of priests and Levites of old, and has been so seemingly uncareful as to any perpetuation of office under the New Testament, had not as definite a purpose in the omission in the one case, as in the prescription in the other? And whether is it wiser or more reverend to go about trying to make out that He has done what He has not done; or to accept His action as it stands, conform to it, and endeavour to discern, in dependence on His Spirit, His reason and object? May it not have been so that what His wisdom deemed advisable in the nascent condition of the Church, the same wisdom may have deemed undesirable for its subsequent stages? I think I can discern enough in the practical working of the two modes to render this, to say the least, not improbable.

Another reason, which may have had its influence, is found, I think, in the attitude in which He placed, and desired to keep, the Church, in reference to the Lord’s coming. Having set her “to wait for His Son from heaven" (I Thess. 1:10), and having been careful to introduce nothing into the language of prophecy demanding the delay of that coming for a single hour, it would hardly have consisted with this to have made provision for the perpetuation of a ministry through a succession of generations. By those who, through close examination of Scripture, have learnt to appreciate the difference between the “coming of the Lord” and the “day of the Lord”, and whose hearts have learnt to respond to that "blessed hope” and to accept with joyfulness the position corresponding to it, this reason would in itself seem sufficient.

Another motive meets us, however, the moment we have become alive to the early introduction of the failure, as traced in a former letter. If it be indeed true that before the Scripture canon was complete, and years before the apostles were removed from the scene, the Church had already failed in the testimony committed to her and broken down morally in His sight, one can readily understand why He should stayed His hand. To have perpetuated official authority under such circumstances would have been to impress His own sanction on the ruin. We know from experience the power which priestcraft has exercised, and the bondage in which it has been able to hold the souls of men, even with the bubble pretensions it has succeeded in setting up. What then would have been the state of the case, could the would-be priest of modern days have pointed to a title as clear and incontrovertible as that of a priest of the house of Aaron? The Reformation would have been, in such a case, an impossibility or a crime. My soul bows to-day in adoration of the wisdom which has left things as they are, and learns anew the all-important lesson, that, whenever anything in the ways or works of God seems upon the surface defective, the fault is in the eye that scans; and careful search will reveal wisdom and order, even where confusion may have seemed to reign.

Though the above view of the case is, of itself alone, sufficient justification of the action of “Brethren”, there is yet another of similar import.

Though the apostles did appoint elders and deacons in the early Church, there is nothing in Scripture to connect, much less to limit, ministry of the Word and doctrine to those officials. Elders were appointed to rule, oversee, or shepherd the flock of God (1 Tim. 5:17; Acts 20:28), deacons to "serve tables" in the distribution of alms (Acts 6:1-11). Of the men selected for these purposes, some possessed gifts of the Spirit for the ministry of the Word, and, having these, exercised them, as a matter of course, in conjunction with, though not in virtue of, their office.

The qualifications for rule were also the result of gift, for we see “helps and governments” in 1 Cor 12:28, and pastorship in Eph 4:11, so enumerated (see also Rom. 12:6,8); and where the gifts were, they were of themselves not only to fit for, but to confer the rule, even in the absence of apostolic ordination, as we see quite evidently from 1 Thess. 5:12: "Know them that …. are over you in the Lord and admonish you”.

Paul had spent but three weeks in Thessalonica (Acts 17:1-10), and had evidently not had time to select and ordain from among the new converts, and hence he urges them, on their own responsibility, to "know" them that had the rule; mark, not to respect or obey, still less to choose or ordain, but to know or discern them: an exhortation that would have been meaningless, had they been already pointed out to them by an act of ordination, but perfectly intelligible when they were cast upon their own spiritual discernment to recognize the persons among them on whom the Holy Ghost, by imparting His gifts, had conferred the rule.

And observe that the absence of such "ordained" office-bearers did not prevent the apostle from addressing them as an organised assembly or Church, not a mere company of believers (1 Thess. 1:1). It is also evident from the Epistle to the Romans that there was no ordained ministry in Rome at the time.

It is true that aptness to teach was among the qualifications for eldership (1 Tim. 3:2; Titus 1:9); but that does not by any means imply the possession of the gift of a teacher, as in Eph. 4:11. I have in my eye a case that admirably illustrates the difference. In a Church which I know there are (besides the "minister") three elders. I have not a doubt that they are the very men an apostle would have chosen from among the flock for ordination to the office. Of these three, two have a measure of gift for ministry in the Word and doctrine; the other has not a particle of gift for ministry, in public, either as evangelist or teacher, and yet and admirable aptness for teaching individuals, and for exhorting with sound doctrine, and convincing gainsayers. It is an instance to which Paul's language completely adapts itself: "Let the elders that rule well" (which might be said of all three) "be counted worthy of double honor, especially those who labor in the word and doctrine".

Office for rule or distribution of alms is one thing; gift for ministry of the Word quite another: the former was sometimes practised by the apostles themselves (or by Titus or Timothy as delegates); the latter is never once referred in Scripture to any other authority than that of God, Christ, or the Spirit (1 Cor. 12:28; Rom. 12:3, 6-8; Eph. 4:7-13, 16; 1 Cor. 12:4-11).

Timothy, indeed, received some sort of gift (its nature unspecified) in connection with the laying on of the hands of a presbytery and an apostle; but it was done "by prophecy," and, therefore, can be no example for us who have no prophecy to direct.

An ordained ministry, set up in the face of such facts, is not merely a pernicious sham, but a rebellious sin and a hindrance to God’s own working in God’s own way; and “Brethren” could not maintain a good conscience before God were they in any way to have fellowship with it. Nor do they in rejecting it fall short one single whit, so far as ministry of the Word is concerned, of the Church of the New Testament, since they enjoy ministry by gift, and that had nothing more. If in the matter of rule the gifted men are there, they can thank God for these, and profit by their gift, even though deprived of the benefit of formal ordination; and they find it more profitable to go on gratefully, humbly, and dependently with what God has graciously given, than to pretend to the possession of what He has withheld.

I cannot leave this point of my subject without pointing out to you, in the history of Israel, a most instructive parallel in principle in the matter of the kingship. God had put them in Canaan without what men would call a regularly-organized government. They were on their good behaviour. When they walked aright, God was with them, and all went well. When they strayed, He let enemies in upon them: they were cast on Himself, they humbled themselves, cried unto Him, and He raised up deliverers. This direct dependence on God grew irksome to them. They would have a king, like the nations (1 Sam. 8:5); they got him in God’s wrath (Hosea 13:11); and the final result was Babylonish captivity. If the two typical reigns of David and Solomon be excepted, there is no comparison between their prosperity under the judges and under the kings.

Just so with the Church. Ministry in the Spirit casts her entirely on God and keeps her ever on her good behaviour; the adversary will get the advantage, and she will get into confusion, if she walk in the flesh - which is just the best thing that can happen her. Better a thousand-fold that any assembly should come to a dead-lock, when departing from God and grieving His Spirit, than that a decent exterior should veil a corrupt inner life, and a name to live remain where death is reigning.

That which system vaunts as its glory is its deepest condemnation: it can run on smoothly without God; while that which it points to as the supposed demonstration of the unwisdom of open ministry in dependence on the Holy Ghost is its highest excellence: it cannot go on a day without God, and if it were of man alone would break down in a trice. How truly in this, as in all else, "The foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is stronger than men (1 Cor. 1:25) !”

One more thought. It was a question that met myself, and that now, I believe holds many souls back from what they would otherwise recognize as the right path: Are there not many earnest, godly souls to be found in the "systems", and does not God meet and bless them there: would He do so if they were all walking in error? That question is met, for me, fully and conclusively in another passage of Jewish history. Turn to chap. 12 of Deuteronomy and read it. Observe three things in it: unity of worship distinctly prescribed (vers. 5-11); strict prohibition as to setting up high places for the worship of the Lord their God (ver. 4), and a warning against doing in these things what was right in their own eyes (vers. 8, 32). Now follow their subsequent history, from the Judges to the captivity, and remark how completely they seem - even the best men among them - to have forgotten the very existence of such a chapter in the Word. The evil begins early and runs along the whole line. Even Samuel the prophet was mixed up with it like the rest, and Solomon, Jehoshaphat, Jehoash, Uzziah, Jotham, Jehoiada, repentant Manasseh, Solomon, Jehoshaphat, Jehoash, Jotham, Jehoiada, repentant Manasseh; it seemed right in their eyes to approve or to let it alone. Expediency, no doubt, pleaded hard for the time-honoured abuse. 

Just such arguments might have been advanced in its favour as are urged in favour of human systems now; for, bear in mind, it is not idol worship, but the worship of God in high places I speak of. God met these good men, honoured and blessed them, as He does thousands in the systems now, and the argument is just as good in the one case as in the other, and the explanation is the same in both. These pious men had so grown up and been educated in the evil, that the question of its propriety had never been raised in their consciences; and so God blessed and owned their faithfulness up to the light they had, in exact accordance with the principle of 2 Cor. 8:12. Did He therefore approve, sanction or even wink at the direct violation of His own word? He has answered this Himself with unmistakable clearness: "Nevertheless the high places were not taken away”, or the like, again and again qualifies the approval expressed of the otherwise faithful acts of His servants, and shows that He never lost sight of the sin, however they might have grown up in unconsciousness of it (1 Kings 3:2; 2 Chron. 20:33, etc.). Had you and I lived in those days, what would have been our duty? To go on worshiping in the high places, because Samuel and the others did; or walk with God on His own prescribed ground of Deut. 12? Which would have been most honouring to Him, and most loyal in us? God deals in grace: shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? 

I remain,

Your ever-affectionate son,

RICHARD HOLDEN