Owen - BX5085 O84x 1681

(io) fo declares the Grounds of it , why it mull be fo , and whence it is fo,as alfo,wherein his doing of it Both confift. i. Three things amongft others, are eminently neceffary in, and untohim, who is toconftitute this Church State with all that belongs thereunto.And asthe Scripture dotheminent- ly and expreflyafcribe them all unto Chriff, fo no man, nor all the men of the World, can have any fuch Intereft in them,as to render them meet for this work, or anypart of it. The firft ofthefe is Right and Title. He who inftitutes this Church-State, mutt haveRight and Title todifpofe ofall men, in all their Spiritual and Eternal Concernments, as feemeth Good unto him : For unto this Church-State , namely, as it is purely Evangelical, no man is obliged by the Law of ,Nature , nor hath any Creature power to dif- pofe ofhim, into a condition whereon all his Concernments,. Spiritual and Eternal,fhall depend.This Right andTitle to the SovereignDifpofal ofMankind, or of his Church,Chrift bath alone;andthat upon a treble account.(i)Of Donation from the Father. He appointed him the Heir of all things, Heb. r. 2,3, He gave him Power over all Flefh. Joh, 17. 2.. Efpecially: he bath given unto him, and put into his abfolute difpofal all thofe who are to be his Church ; ver. 6. (z) By vertue ofParchafe; he bath by the price of his moft precious Blood, purchafed them unto his own Power and Difpofal. He purchafed his Church with his own Blood ; A&. zo. 28. which the Apolllemakes the Ground of that care which ought to be had ofit.And this is pleaded as a fufficient Reafon, why we Mould be wholly at his Difpofal only, and be free from any Xmpofition of men in things Spiritual. r Cor. 7. z3. .Tie are sought with a Price, be _ye not the Servants of men. The Furchafe of this Right and Title was one great end of the principal Mediatory Aas of Chrift. Rom. 14 . g, io. For to this end, &c. (3) Of Conquef : For all thofe who were thuss to be difpofed by him,, were both under the. Tower cf his:

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