In the church thus organized, the common ancestor was the priest to instruct his descendants and uphold the divine worship. The life of the patriarch, extending in the first ages to nearly a thousand years, rendered a written revelation less important, and gave to his precepts and example, authority for the maintenance of truth and the instituted worship of God.

The next form of the visible church was one, which was accommodated to the exigencies of a nation. The progress of society from the pastoral to the agricultural and commercial state, amalgamated tribes and constituted nations. By these changes, and the reduction of human life to an hundred and twenty years, the efficacy of patriarchal instruction and authority was destroyed, and families having no common head, scattered abroad, and soon exchanged the knowledge and worship of the true God, for the fictions and impurities of idolatry.

To counteract this propensity of man to depart from God, and to provide a substitute for the patriarchal system, the Jewish church was organized—an extended association of families, each of which was made responsible to the community for its fidelity, in upholding the inr stituted worship, and for the fidelity of each the whole community is made responsible to God. To the church of God thus organized was given a territory, to be held upon the condition of constancy in the maintenance of the true worship; and to aid the church in her work, a written revelation was committed to her care, and forms of worship were prescribed. When the temporary purpose of this dispensation was answered in the preservation of religion until the time of the Messiah, and the desire of nations had come, and by the offering of himself had made propitiation for sin, intending to give to his atonement a more extended operation in the salvation of man, the external form of the church was again changed, in accommodation to the exigencies of the world. This was done, by requiring individuals in all nations, possessing the requisite qualifications, to associate under the laws of Christ, for the advancement of the great designs of his kingdom. Wherever, therefore, a number of individuals, possessing the required qualifications, associate to maintain the ordinances of the gospel, they become a society incorporated by the God of heaven with specific chartered privileges. This is the foundation of local churches. Each church is a body corporate for the exclusive purpose of promoting the benevolent designs of the Most High God, with reference to the salvation of man.

The organization is such as may embody, and ultimately will embody, the population of the faorld.

It will be the object of this discourse, to illustrate the prominent designs of the Most High in the organization of local churches, and the requisite qualifications for membership.

One obvious design of local churches is the consummation of holiness in believers and their preparation for heaven. Christians are imperfect; and though God in a moment, could efface every stain of sin, it pleases him to accomplish the work progressively by the interposition of moral influence. The church is the society where this influence is to be exerted, the school of instruction and discipline. There, is the sacred light of truth to shine, restraint to operate, and impression to be made upon the heart. There, are the prayers of the saints and their praises and confessions to be offered. There, is to be enjoyed, mutual fellowship, watchfulness, exhortation and aid: and there, the Lord commandeth his blessing even life forever more.

In accordance with this primary design of the church, apostles and prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers, are said to be given for the perfecting of the saints, for the edifying of the body of Christ.

Local churches are designed also, to secure the purity and perpetuity of revealed truth. The propensity of man to change the truth of God into a lie, is notorious. To counteract this determination of a rebel world to forget God, the reiterated miraculous interposition of Heaven has been steadily required, until the sacred canon was complete. When that event was accomplished, the lively oracles were committed to the church, with the responsibility of contending earnestly for the doctrines, precepts and ordinances, contained in them. It is in reference to the agency of the Church in maintaining the doctrines of the bible that she is called the salt of the earth, the light of the world and the pillar and ground of the truth.

Local churches are organized also for the preservation of the Sabbath and the maintenance of the public worship of God.

It is not enough to secure the salvation of man, that truth is revealed, and continued from age to age in the bible. To be made effectual, it must be communicated; and for this purpose, a system of moral administration must interpose its instrumentality. But in a world lying in wickedness, the besetting influence of sloth, the temporising of fear, the craving of avarice, and the repellency of a heart, averse from God, will prevent among men the spontaneous formation of any abiding measures, for the religious instruction of mankind; or even, for the

preservation of the system, which God has instituted. The tide of worldliness, unobstructed, would roll over the Sabbath, and extinguish the fire upon the altar of Jehovah. To churches therefore is committed the work of preserving the Sabbath, and of perpetuating the worship of God;—Not by physical power, but by that moral influence, which the word and institutions of heaven, continued by the church, exert upon the consciences of men, and upon the laws and habits of civil society.

Another design of heaven in the organization of local churches is, the continued existence of these religious corporations themselves, by means of an efficient system of religious instruction, for the rising generation. The saints are not permitted to continue, by reason of death. If the God of mercy intended the salvation of but one generation of men, no prospective arrangements, for the salvation of succeeding generations would be needed. But, as the work of redemption is to be continued, the appropriate means must be transmitted. The pious of one generation pass off the stage, in about thirty years. In that short period were no precautionary measures employed to prevent, might the cause of God become extinct. The church however will live: the gates of death will not prevail: but it will be continued, as seed time and harvest are continued, by appropriate enterprise, for that purpose. This enterprise is to be directed, primarily, to the education of the children of the church, and of such others, as are voluntarily committed to her care. To every church is committed the superintendence of that education of children, upon which her continued existence depends. As fellow workers with God, the members of every local church are bound to raise up another generation of believers to serve him when they are dead; and no church has answered the end of her existence, which does not accomplish this.

But to uphold the worship of God, and to lead in the great work of religious education, professional instructors are required, qualified by piety and knowledge, for their employment, and devoted exclusively to their work.—In secular concerns, the demand in the market, will produce a supply. But it is not so, in relation to competent instructors in religion. If none were intrusted with the work of rearing up ministers for the sanctuary, and no forethought were exercised, and no systematized exertion, brought into steady operation, the wastes of death, and the demands of accumulating population, could not be supplied—churches would mourn the bereavement of pastors without a prospect of having their loss repaired, and the regions of the shadow of death, would every year become more extended, hopeless and dark. The public instruction, by means of which the church of God has hitherto been continued, has not been the result of a common course of nature; but rather, of the deliberate prospective labours of the church herself, for that end. The Jewish church supported one tribe out of twelve to be dedicated to the purposes of her religion; and in this tribe maintained her schools of the prophets. The primitive churches regarded it as a primary object of their organization, to thrust laborers into the vineyard, and as soon as they obtained a settled rest, reared institutions for the education of pious youth for the ministry. All the seminaries of modern Europe, were founded with a primary reference to the preparation of men for the ministry. And, scarcely had the Fathers of New England escaped the edge of the sword, in this new world, before, anticipating the wants of future