The Church is built upon "this rock''—-" Thou art Peter," (continued)
Church 53 the Church either rises or falls. This is the main hinge on which the door of salvation turns. Those who let go this do not hold the foundation. And though they may call themselves
Christians, they give themselves the lie. For the Church is a sacred society, incorporated upon the certainty and assurance of this great truth—and great it is and has prevailed.
4. THE CHuRCH's DEFENCE
Christ promises here to preserve and secure His Church when it is built. "The gates of hell shall not prevail against it." The gates of hell shall neither prevail against this truth nor against the Church which is built upon it. This implies that the Church has enemies that fight against it, and endeavour its ruin and overthrow. Here these enemies are represented by the gates of hell. That is, the city of hell, which is directly opposite to 'this heavenly city, this "city of the living God". 'The gates of hell" are the powers and policies of the devil's kingdom; the dragon's head and horns, by which he makes war with the Lamb. All that comes out of hell's gates has been hatched and contrived there.
These fight against the Church by opposing Gospel truths, corrupting Gospel ordinances, persecuting good ministers and good Christians—drawing or driving, persuading by craft or forcing by cruelty, to that which is inconsistent with the purity of religion. This is the design of the gates of hell, to root out the name of Christianity (Ps. Ixxxiii. 4), ''to devour the man child"' (Rev. xii. 4), to raze this city to the ground.
This assures us that the enemies of the Church shall not gain their point. While the world stands Christ will have His Church in it, in which His truths and ordinances shall be owned and kept up, in spite of all the opposition of the powers of darkness. "They shall not prevail against it" (Ps. cxxix. 1, 2). This gives no security to any particular Church, or Church governors, that they shall never err, never apostatize, or be destroyed, but that somewhere or other the Christian religion shall have a being, though not always in the same degree of purity and splendour, yet so that the entail of it shall never be quite cut off. The woman lives though in a wilderness (Rev. xiv. 12), cast down, but not destroyed (2 Cor. iv. 9); as dying, and, behold, we live. Corruptions will be grieving, persecutions grievous,