Page:The Net of Faith.pdf/371

82* in perfection, and in equality. Like members of one body, they, too, must have equality in grace, obedience, mutual help, long-suffering befitting those who have one God, one Lord and Father or all, one faith, and one law for all their doing.

When all are one the things of God belong to all; otherwise they could not be one, dividing the things which are of God, usurping to themselves special divine rights, and elevating themselves at the expense of others, in violence.

Such a unity we are given in Christ's faith, for our conduct. Anything that deviates from that faith is sin. The above mentioned hordes which distinguish themselves from one another by peculiar laws and pagan administration, are not included in Christ's prayer, not one of them, because they are not united in his spirit and in his law, with him.

To be sure, the wicked men have entered into all kinds of unions, but Christ's disciples cannot be in them, since these unions cannot bear comparison with the law of Christ which is based on true honest goodness and in which the people of God are ruled by the truth of his word, in faith and in grace, like the household of one husbandman, standing in true obedience before God aside from whom there is no other lord. There can be no greater unfaithfulness to the rule of God than the division and sundering caused by these factions and their arrogation to themselves of