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enjoyment of gospel privileges; and the perfor mance of every fcriptural duty.

Though the apoftle faw caufe for adminiftering the fharpeft rebukes to thefe churches, for giving heed to falfe, anti chriftian teachers; he, by no means, thought the teachers themfelves inculpable, nor meant that they fhould be unpunished: on the contrary, he found fault with them once, again, and again, chap. i. 7. and v. 10, 12.-With regard to the reproofs fuch teachers had expofed themselves to, Paul wrote, probably, as a prophet in the tenth verfe; "He that troubleth you fall "bear his judgment, whofoever he be :" and, in the words of our text, expreffed his wifh towards the accomplishment of that prediction or threatening. From that verfe, fome imagine the apoftle had one particular heretic in his eye: but, as they are fpoke of in the plural every where elfe through the epiftle, we apprehend it is much more probable, that the churches of Galatia were pestered with many fuch blind, or defigning, guides.

The grand error, into which they drew the Chriftian converts, will appear in the fequel; and, therefore, we fhall. only now obferve, that it was, in the apostle's estimate, ruining to fouls; and fo mif. chievous to the interefts of the gospel, as extorted, from his holy foul, a wifh, which, at first sight, would feem inconfiftent with the Chriftian gentlenefs and forbearance, fo eminently examplified in Paul's whole character -at first fight, we faid; because, in profecution of this fubject, we hope to make it appear, in how many refpects the wifh, under confideration, may, confiftently with a gospel meeknefs and benevolence, be both adopted and justified.

Our method, through divine affistance, shall be,

I. To

1. To confider in what refpects, particular office-bearers in the church may trouble the church.

II. To fhow in what view their excision may be wifhed and prayed for by Chriftians.

III. To apply what fhall be faid, fuitably to the occafion of this meeting.

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That office-bearers may be troublers of the church, is fo evident from this epiftle, that he who runs may read :-nor evident from this epistle only, but from various other notices alfo, through the facred records.-Were not Hophni and Phineas troublers of the church of Ifrael? Sam ii. not Judas Iscariot a troubler of the original apoftolic church? Matth. x. 4. Were not certain men, who went out from Jerufalem, troublers of the church at Antioch? Acts xv. 24. Were there not many, especially they of the circumcifion, who troubled the Cretians? Tit. i. 10, 11. Doubtless. -The holy fcriptures, having tranfmitted their feveral hiftories, put the truth of this. hypothefis beyond doubt.--But if recourfe is had to prophane hiftory, the amount of fuch characters would fwell far beyond due bounds. Valentinus *, Cerdon, and others, during the three first centuries;

Arius

* VALENTINUS was an Egyptian, who flourished between the years 1 40 and 166. He reduced the doc. trines of the Gnoftics into a regular system; and, enraged by a disappointment from the church, propagated them with an inflamed zeal, first in Egypt, and then at Rome. His fcheme chiefly confifted in realizing the divine attributes, or Platonic ideas; making different perfons of them, to compofe his pleroma, or complete Deity. See Dupin's church hiftory, vol. II. p. 42,

etc.

G

As

Arius, Prifcillian, and others, in the fourth cen-. tury *; Pelagius, and others, in the fifth §; So

As for CERDON, he came from Syria to Rome, between the years 139 and 143, under the pontificate of Hyginus. His notions, which he fpread with no less fuccefs than zeal, were, That the God of the law was a malignant, and the Father of Chrift a good being; that Jefus was neither born, nor poffeffed of a true body; that his Father fent him to deftroy the ty ranny and works of the Lawgiver ;-that there was no refurrection;-and that the law and the prophets merited no regard. See Dupin's church hiftory, vol. II. p. 47, etc.

*ARIUS, a native of Lybia Cyrenaica, was a priest of the church of Alexandria. The error by which he was diftinguished, and for which his bishop condemned him in the 320, confifted in the grofs notion he had of the ho Logos, or word; counting Jefus Christ a mere creature, of a different fubftance from the Father; one who had a beginning, and was capable of change. He began to publish that error in the 318; and continued to dogmatize until after the 334, when his repofition by the bishop of Conftantinople was prevented by his fudden death. See Dupin's church hiftory, vol. II. p. 104, etc.

The errors of PRISCILLIAN, which began to make a noife in the 379, were a complication of many former herefies, with additions and improvements of his own and his followers: they are reduced to fifteen heads. See Dupin's church hift. vol. II. p. 123, 125, etc.

PELAGIUS, a native of our own island, began to teach his errors at Rome, in the 400: They confifted chiefly of thefe three,-That man's merit procured grace; that man in a prefent ftate, may arrive at perfect freedom from paffions and fin;-and that there is no fuch thing as original fin at all, but that men are naturally inclined to good, with out the afliftance of grace. Ibid. p. 188, etc.

cinus,

cinus, and many others, in later centuries +; are all Itanding proofs that the churches have never wanted troublers within their own bofoms, nor wounds received from the hands of profeffedfriends.

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Taking this hypothefis then for granted, "That "office-bearers may trouble the church," the inport of the term, here ufed by the apostle, may be illuftrated, as an useful preliminary to what follows. It properly fignifies, "thofe who shake the foun. "dation upon which you ftand, in fuch a manner, as to make your confidence in it to totter; "and put the fuperftructure you raised upon it, in a falling posture §." Or, may not the phrafe be a figure borrowed from the agitation given to any fluid, by fhaking the veffel in which it is contained? If fo, it is a lively defcription of-what perturbation of mind, to particular Christians; and of what distractions, in particular churches, fuch troublers may be the occafion.-Secret doubtfulness, inftead of a firm belief;-heart anxiety, instead of holy compofure ;-jealoufy alfo, instead of confidence ;-divifions, inftead of harmony ;— alienation, instead of fervent love amongst Christians;-fliding, moreover, into errors, both in fpeculation and practice, inftead of leaving to the G 2 Lord

SOCINUS taught, that Jefus Chrift was not God; and that the Holy Ghoft was not a perfon, but a fimple virtue. He began to vent his errors in Italy about 1546, and died in Poland, May 1604. See Dupin's church hiftory, vol. IV. p. 124.

Hoi anaftatountes umas.

Vide Pafor. Lexicon, in verbum anaftatoo.

Thus the verb tarafo, which is ufed by this apostle, chap. i. 7. and v. 10. in the fame fenfe with anaflatoo here, is a figure borrowed from that yery thing. Vide Pafor, Lexicon, p. 474.

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Lord and his truths with full purpose of heart are but a part of the troubles brought upon Chriftians and churches, by perfons of the character under view: For these things, being the fins as well as fuffuings of church members, deferve and draw down judgments, whereof thofe who trouble them. are, at leaft, the indirect causes. Thus, when the church of Ifrael was finitten by the men of Ai, Achan's tranfgreffion having procured that stroke, "Joshua faid unto him, why haft thou troubled "us?" Joh. vii. 25. And when many in that church were drawn, by the example of their kings, from the worship of God, to the fervice of idols, and had thereby brought down the fword of famine upon the land of Ifrael; in an addrefs to Ahab, a moft idolatrous prince, Elijah faid, "I have "not troubled Ifracl, but thou and thy father's "houfe," 1 Kings xviii. 18. Which brings us to the main purpofe of the

I. Head, To confider, namely, in what respects particular office-bearers in the church of Chrift may trouble the church.

They may do fo in the following views,—by the following means.

1. By a groveling, mercenary temper of mind, 2. By unfcriptural doctrine.

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3. By laxness in communion, and oppreffive measures in the exercife of difcipline and government. And,

4. By untenderness in their lives and converfations.

1. Office-bearers may trouble the church by a groveling, mercenary, temper of mind.-The views which determine one's choice of the minifterial function, must be chiefly profecuted, through his whole labours in the golpel. If "zeal for the ho"nour of God, love to Jefus Chrift, and defire of

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