Page:Tracts for the Times Vol 1.djvu/359

 So that you see, whosoever makes a jest of Church Discipline, makes a jest of an ordinance of ; and a man may as well despise the whole Christian Religion, as this power, which is as much the ordinance of, as preaching, or the use of the Sacraments.

The most unlearned Christian will understand this, when he is asked, For what end he was baptized? He will answer, That he might thereby be made a member of, a child of , and an inheritor of the kingdom of Heaven.

But why does he believe that Baptism does give him a right to these blessings? Why; because gave power to His Ministers to baptize all nations; that such as are baptized into, have put on ; that is, are members of  body, which is His Church.

Now, will not our, who has promised to own you for His children when His Ministers have admitted you into His Church by Baptism, will He not also disown you, when the same Ministers, acting in His name, shall by the same power of the keys, shut you out of His Church?

For if you believe that they receive you into Church by Baptism, you must believe that they shut you out as effectually by excommunication.

In short, every Christian, when he is baptized, is admitted into the Church upon a most solemn promise to live as a Christian ought to do; if he does not do so, those very Ministers who admitted him are bound to exhort, to rebuke and to censure him; and if these methods will not do, to excommunicate him; that is, to cut him off from the body of , and from favour and mercy:—not that he may be lost for ever, but that he may see his sad condition, and repent, and be saved.

The form of excommunication made use of by the Apostles of our Lord, was, by delivering offenders to Satan. Now, because this is laughed at by profane persons, who do not know the Scriptures, I will show you what that means. The Spirit and the Word of has told us, that the devil has a kingdom and