John Owen On Schism
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JOHN OWEN ON SCHISM
D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones
I am going to speak, as you have been told, on “John Owen on the subject of Schism.” Why am I dealing with this? I have a number of reasons for doing so. One is, and I make no apology for this, that it is a kind of postscript to what I was trying to say last year about 1640–1662. I have not finished with that in my mind yet, and I do not think any of us should, because, as I tried to indicate then it has a great deal to say to us at the present time. We are again in a stage of transition, in an age when these great fundamental questions are thrust before us once more; and I believe that we can obtain real guidance and help from these men of three hundred years ago who had to face a similar situation.
The term schism was, obviously, one that was bandied about a great deal three hundred years ago. That is not at all surprising, and the term was used by all sorts of people. The Roman Catholic Church, of course, used it with respect to all Protestants, the Church of England included. Then, the Church of England began to use it with respect to the Presbyterians. And then both the Church of England and the Presbyterians used it with respect to the Independents. In other words, this is a term that is almost invariably used by any church or body from whom a number go out to form a new church. It is a term that is bandied about freely and loosely, and it was because of that that John Owen took up the subject.
I call attention to it because it is already being bandied about, and we can be quite certain that if the Ecumenical Movement ever develops “the great world church” that they so delight to talk about, well then this is the term that will be hurled against everybody who refuses to be part and parcel of that mammoth organization. I feel therefore that it is our duty to prepare our own minds beforehand. Whatever may be the truth now, it will certainly be the case then that we shall be charged with schism, and it is right that we should be clear about it, and that we should instruct the people to whom we are privileged to minister concerning this all-important matter. Schism is a very great sin, it is a very serious matter. Nobody should be guilty of the sin of schism, and it is very vital therefore that we should be clear in our minds as to what exactly it is.
John Owen dealt with this subject many times. I propose to deal with the main treatises in which he did so. There is one which is just called Of Schism. Then he had to defend that—A Review of the True Nature of Schism. Then he had to answer various people who attacked him very bitterly on this subject. There is also a very interesting treatise of his called A Brief Vindication of the Nonconformists from the Charge of Schism. That was Owen’s reply to a sermon preached by Dr. Stillingfleet, who was at that time Dean of St. Paul’s and later became the Bishop of Worcester. Stillingfleet charged Nonconformists with being guilty of schism in a sermon which he preached on Philippians 3:15–16. Owen, having here a foeman worthy of his steel, and not merely a carping critic like a certain Mr. Cawdrey, a Presbyterian, who simply abused him and vilified him—produced this most interesting treatise in answer to that sermon. But then, in addition to that, there is one called A Discourse Concerning Evangelical Love, Church Peace and Unity. Another has the title An Inquiry into the Origin, Nature, Institution, Power, Order, and Communion of Evangelical Churches. Again there is An Answer to Dr. Stillingfleet’s Book of the Unreasonableness of Separation. And finally—and greater, perhaps, than all of them—was his treatise on The Nature of a Gospel or a New Testament Church. John Owen, you see, was very concerned about this matter because he regarded schism as being a most serious charge in view of the character of the sin involved in it.
His main object was to defend himself and the Independents from this particular charge, and as he does so, he incidentally helps to clear the Presbyterians also from the charges of the Church of England, and the Church of England in turn from the charges of the Roman Catholics. But he had a deeper motive than that; he was concerned about the truth concerning the nature of the Church. That was the thing that, ultimately, was his great concern. And that, I suggest, should be our great concern also at the present time.
I have decided that Owen himself should do the speaking, and if I can succeed somehow in conveying the spirit and the method of John Owen to you I shall be more than satisfied. With such a wealth of material, selection has been difficult, but I have tried to distill the essence of his teaching.
Owen’s Approach to Schism
We start with Owen’s method, his whole approach; and I am really more concerned about this than about any particular thing that he said. Owen never dealt with a problem, as it were, immediately and directly, he always put it into its context. He did not “rush” at a question that was put to him, or at a charge that was brought against him, and just answer immediately and directly with a kind of “quid pro quo.” He was not interested in polemics as such, his whole nature indeed rebelled against that.
In dealing with any problem his first question always seems to have been—“Well now, what is the principle involved here? Where does this come in in the whole doctrine and teaching of the Bible? Let us settle that first.” So Owen did not meet this charge of schism directly and merely in and of itself. He could hear people hurling this charge against each other, bandying it about, and each one feeling that he was right in doing so. But it was obvious on the surface that they could not all be right, because they were all bringing the charge against one another. There was something wrong therefore, and Owen came to the conclusion that it was all due to the fact that none of them had really stopped to ask the question—“How do we decide what schism is? What is our authority and what are our terms of reference?” So he turns to the Scriptures and he sees at once that certain great questions are involved.
But even before we examine his particular method, let us look at the spirit in which he approached the question. Here is no bitter partisan or narrow-minded sectarian or dry-as-dust academic theologian. Out of his heart he writes,
I confess I would rather, much rather, spend all my time and days in making up and healing the breaches and schisms that are amongst Christians than one hour in justifying our divisions, even therein wherein, on the one side, they are capable of a fair defence. But who is sufficient for such an attempt? The closing of differences amongst Christians is like opening the book in the Revelation—there is none able or worthy to do it, in heaven or in earth, but the Lamb: when He will put forth the greatness of His power for it, it shall be accomplished, and not before. In the meantime, a reconciliation amongst all Protestants is our duty, and practicable, and had perhaps ere this been in some forwardness of accomplishment had men rightly understood wherein such a reconciliation, according to the mind of God, doth consist. When men have laboured as much in the improvement of the principle of forbearance as they have done to subdue other men to their opinions, religion will have another appearance in the world.
Let us say, “Amen.”
Now that is the sort of thing I am anxious to convey to you. Many people think of this man as a dry-as-dust theologian. It is a foul aspersion upon him. Listen to this further quotation in which Owen shows us how he ever became an Independent. For John Owen was not born an Independent, he was born into the Church of England. He says about his father, interestingly enough: “As I was bred up from my infancy under the care of my father, who was a Nonconformist all his days”—that does not mean that he was an Independent, remember—“and a painful labourer in the Vineyard of the Lord, so ever since I came to have any distinct knowledge of the things belonging to the worship of God I have been fixed in judgment against that which I am calumniated withal. . . .”
Owen, in his younger days, had once published a book on the whole question of the nature of the Church and in it he was favorable to the Presbyterian point of view. When he published this treatise on schism, therefore, a certain Mr. Cawdrey, a Presbyterian from Northampton, attacked him violently, saying that he was contradicting entirely what he had said in that previous book. Owen felt this charge very deeply. He does not however reply in any spirit of bitterness, but he does take the trouble, in replying to Cawdrey, to tell us how he ever became an Independent. In looking at this we shall see something of the greatness of this man. The trouble, as he points out repeatedly, over the whole question of schism is that people will defend the position that they are in. They shut their minds, they are not ready to listen, to be instructed, and to change. Owen was big enough to change his opinion and to move from one position to another.
This is his account of how it came about: “Indeed, not long after, I set myself seriously to inquire into the controversies then warmly agitated in these nations. Of the congregational way I was not acquainted with any one person, minister or other; nor had I, to my knowledge, seen any more than one in my life. My acquaintance lay wholly with ministers and people of the presbyterian way. But sundry books being published on either side, I perused and compared them with the Scripture and one another, according as I received ability from God.” What an excellent way that is! You read right around the subject and compare it with the Scripture.
Owen continues, “After a general view of them, as was my manner in other controversies, I fixed on one to take under peculiar consideration and examination, which seemed most methodically and strongly to maintain that which was contrary, as I thought, to my present persuasion.” Of the multiplicity of books he picks out one which he regards as the best, to see what it has to say to him. “This was Mr. Cotton’s book of the Keys,” he tells us. That is a reference to the famous John Cotton, a Church of England clergyman and a godly man. For many years Cotton was vicar of Boston in Lincolnshire and then moved over, about 1634 if I remember rightly, to Boston in Massachusetts. As the result of his thinking and meditation and reading in this country—and still more after his arrival in New England—he became a convinced Independent, and so wrote his book The Keys.
This is how John Owen describes the effect that the reading of this book had upon him:
The examination and confutation hereof, merely for my own particular satisfaction, with what diligence and sincerity I was able, I engaged in. What progress I made in that undertaking I can manifest unto any by the discourse on that subject and animadversions on that book, yet abiding by me. In the pursuit and management of this work, quite beside and contrary to my expectation, at a time and season wherein I could expect nothing on that account but ruin in this world, without the knowledge or advice of, or conference with, any one person of that judgment, I was prevailed on to receive that and those principles which I had thought to have set myself in an opposition unto. And, indeed, this way of impartial examining all things by the Word, comparing causes with causes and things with things, laying aside all prejudicate respects unto persons or present traditions, is a course that I would admonish all to beware of who would avoid the danger of being made Independents.
I trust that we get the full implication of that. If you approach this subject quite honestly, comparing and contrasting all teaching with the Scriptures and especially “laying aside all prejudicate respects unto persons or present traditions,” you will find it very difficult to avoid becoming an Independent, says Owen. However, that is the way in which he approached it. He set out to read this book in order that he might answer it, but he was so honest that, comparing it with the Scripture, he was persuaded. The result was that he became a convinced Independent.
Now that is surely one of the great lessons we learn from this man. Whatever else we may think, whatever our disagreements, surely we must all agree with this spirit and with this method. Most of our differences, I think, arise from the fact that we, all of us in one way or another, are unprepared to do that. The first thing you must do is to bring everything to the bar of Scripture. Here, Owen lays down the rule with respect to Scripture that we have been reminded of several times already in this Conference. He says, “And by the Scripture as our rule, we understand both the express words of it, and whatever may, by just and lawful consequence, be educed from them.”
In other words he says that the whole trouble, in a sense, arises in this way, that men start from fixed positions, from things as they are, and then regard any departure from that as schism: and so hurl that charge at any who disagrees with them. We must not do that, says Owen, but go back to the fount and to the origin. We must start with Scripture itself—which is the rule we find taught in the Scripture. When we thus go to the Scripture, what do we find? How do they define what is meant by “schism”? This is how he puts it: “The thing whereof we treat being a disorder in the instituted worship of God, and that which is of pure revelation, I suppose it a modest request, to desire that we may abide solely by that discovery and description which is made of it in Scripture,—that that alone shall be esteemed schism which is there so called, or which hath the entire nature of that which is so called. Other things may be other crimes; schism they are not, if in the Scripture they have neither the name nor nature of it attributed to them.”
Having arrived at it in that way, this is now Owen’s definition of schism.
He points out that this is really only dealt with actually in 1 Corinthians. It is very interesting to observe how he works. He gives a good general bird’s-eye view of the whole subject as it is dealt with there, and then points out that the other document dealing with more or less exactly the same subject, that comes down to us from the early ages, is an epistle from Rome to the Church at Corinth by Clement at a later date. But to continue: “The schism, then, here described by the apostle, and blamed by him, consists (and here is the vital definition) in causeless differences and contentions amongst the members of a particular church, contrary to that exercise of love, prudence, and forbearance, which are required of them to be exercised amongst themselves, and towards one another.”
His whole point is this: that the only schism that is described in the New Testament is division, causeless divisions, within the Church. The people guilty of schism in the Church of Corinth had not left the Church of Corinth. The New Testament definition of schism is “causeless divisions” within the body of a particular church. Having laid that down he then goes on to indicate in various ways what is meant by schism. But listen to this: “But now this foundation having been laid, that schism is a causeless difference or division amongst the members of any particular church that meet together, or ought so to do, for the worship of God and the celebration of the same numerical ordinances, to the disturbance of the order appointed by Jesus Christ, and contrary to that exercise of love in wisdom and mutual forbearance which is required of them, it will be easy to see wherein the iniquity of it doth consist, and upon what considerations its aggravations do arise.”
Schism then, means this: “Despising of the authority of Jesus Christ. It is an offence against His wisdom, whereby He hath ordered all things in the Church on set purpose that schism and divisions may be prevented.” They despised that. Thirdly: “The grace and goodness of Christ are also ignored and are offended.”
That, then, leads him to say this: “Let, then, the general demand be granted, that schism is ‘the breach of union,’ which I shall attend with one reasonable postulatum—namely, that this union be a union of the appointment of Jesus Christ.” He keeps on repeating that—it must be the breaking of a union appointed by the Lord Jesus Christ.
The consideration, then of what or what sort of union in reference to the worship of God, according to the gospel, is instituted and appointed by Jesus Christ, is the proper foundation of what I have farther to offer in this business. Let the breach of this, if you please, be accounted schism; for being an evil, I shall not contend by what name or title it be distinguished. It is not pleaded that any kind of relinquishment or desertion of any church or churches is presently schism, but only such a separation as breaks the bond of union instituted by Christ.
Now, this union being instituted in the church, according to the various acceptations of that word, so it is distinguished. Therefore, for a discovery of the nature of that which is particularly to be spoken to, and also its contrary, I must show—
1. The several considerations of the church wherein and with which union is to be preserved.
2. What that union is, and wherein it doth consist, which, according to the mind of Christ, we are to keep and observe with the church, under the several notions of it respectively.
3. And how that union is broken, and what is that sin whereby it is done.
The Nature of the Church
You notice that he approaches his subject in such a way, that you come at once to the great doctrine of the nature of the Church. You cannot decide what schism is until you have decided what the Church is. That must be the first great question. Roman Catholics say that “all Protestants are schismatics.” Why? “Because they have left us.” But then the question to ask them is, “Who are you?” “What are you?” “Are you a church?”—and this question must always be asked. You cannot define schism unless you are clear about your doctrine of the nature of the Church; and Owen, of course, gives the definition of the Church that we would expect of him as an Independent.
In this connection he says a very interesting thing which some of us need to remember at this present time: “Let none mistake themselves herein; believers are not made for churches, but churches are appointed for believers.” That is reminiscent, is it not, of what our Lord said about the Sabbath. There are many people, it seems to me, who think that believers are made for churches. They are not. Churches are made for believers. “Their edification, their guidance and direction in the profession of the faith and performance of divine worship in assemblies, according to the mind of God, is their use and end; without which they are of no signification. The end of Christ in the constitution of His churches was, not the moulding of His disciples into such ecclesiastical shapes as might be subservient unto the power, interest, advantage, and dignity, of them that may in any season come to be over them, but to constitute a way and order of giving such officers unto them as might be in all things useful and subservient unto their edification; as is expressly affirmed in Ephe-sians 4:11–16.” The Church was made for us, not us for the Church.
Now there he lays down a great postulate. Again, his whole point is, that that is the Church which was instituted by the Lord Jesus Christ Himself, and by Him alone. Owen brings out this point:
There is, indeed, by some pleaded a subordination of officers in this church, tending towards a union on that account; as that ordinary ministers should be subjected to diocesan bishops, they to archbishops or metropolitans, they again to patriarchs, where some would bound the process, though a parity of reason would call for a pope: nor will the arguments pleaded for such a subordination rest until they come to be centred in some such thing.
The logical end of that argument, he says, is to have a pope of some sort or kind.
But first, before this plea be admitted, it must be proved that all these officers are appointed by Jesus Christ, or it will not concern us, who are inquiring solely after His will, and the settling of conscience therein. To do this with such an evidence as that the consciences of all those who are bound to yield obedience to Jesus Christ may appear to be therein concerned, will be a difficult task, as I suppose. And, to settle this once for all, I am not dealing with the men of that lazy persuasion that such affairs are to be ordered by the prudence of our civil superiors and governors; and so seeking to justify a nonsubmission to any of their constitutions in the things of this nature, or to evidence that the so doing is not schism. Nor do I concern myself in the order and appointment of ancient times, by men assembled in synods and councils; wherein, whatever was the force of their determinations in their own seasons, we are not at all concerned, knowing of nothing that is obligatory to us, not pleading from sovereign authority or our own consent: but it is after things of pure institution that I am inquiring. With them who say there is no such thing in these matters, we must proceed to other principles than any yet laid down.
The great point is that we are only to be concerned about that which is instituted by the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. In this connection we have got to look for a moment at what he says about the general councils, because they have come so much into this argument. Owen says that we must be concerned about nothing but that which we can establish has been instituted by the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. But then the argument comes in—What about the authority of the general council? Owen takes that up and this is what he says:
The Church of England, as it is called (that is the people thereof) separated herself from the Church of Rome. To free herself from the imputation of schism in so doing, as she (that is, the learned men of the nation) pleaded the errors and corruptions of that church, under this especial consideration of their being imposed by tyrants; so also by professing her design to do nothing but to reduce religion and the worship of God to its original purity, from which it has fallen. And we all jointly justify both her and all other reformed churches in this plea.
In her design to reduce religion to its primitive purity, she always professed (this is the Church of England) that she did not take her direction from the Scripture only, but also from the councils and examples of the first four or five centuries, to which she laboured to conform her reformation. Let the question now be, whether there be not corruptions in this Church of England, supposing such a national church-state to be instituted? What, I beseech you, shall bind my conscience to acquiesce in what is pleaded from the first four or five centuries, consisting of men that could and did err, more than that did hers which was pleaded from the nine or ten centuries following? Have not I liberty to call for reformation according to the Scripture only? or at least to profess that my conscience cannot be bound by any other? The sum is—the business of schism from the Church of England is a thing built purely and simply on political considerations, so interwoven with them, so influenced from them, as not to be separated.
That is his attitude toward the general councils; but he has something still more drastic to say about them, and as we are likely to hear a good deal about this sort of thing in the coming years I think we must pay heed to what he says:
But a general council is pleaded with the best colour and pretence for a bond of union to this general and visible church. In consideration hereof I shall not divert to the handling of the rise, right use, authority, necessity, of such councils; about all which somewhat in due time towards satisfaction may be offered to those who are not in bondage to names and traditions—nor shall I remark what hath been the management of the things of God in all ages in those assemblies; many of which have been the stains and ulcers of Christian religion—nor yet shall I say with what little disadvantage to the religion of Jesus Christ I suppose a loss of all the canons of all councils that ever were in the world since the apostles’ days, with their acts and contests might be undergone—nor yet shall I digress to the usefulness of the assemblies of several churches in their representatives, to consider and determine about things of common concernment to them, with their tendency to the preservation of that communion which ought to be amongst them—but as to the present instance only offer—
That such general councils, being things purely extraordinary and occasional, as is confessed, cannot be an ordinary standing bond of union to the catholic church. And if any one shall reply, that though in themselves and in their own continuance they cannot be so, yet in their authority, laws, and canons they may; I must say, that besides the very many reasons I have to call into question the power of law-making for the whole society of Christians in the world, in all the general councils that have been or possibly can be on the earth, the disputes about the title of those assemblies which pretend to this honour, which are to be admitted, which excluded, are so endless; the rules of judging them so dark, lubricous, and uncertain, framed to the interest of all contenders on all hands; the laws of them, which “de facto” have gone under that title and name, so innumerable, burdensome, uncertain, and frivolous, in a great part so grossly contradictory to one another, that I cannot suppose that any man upon second thoughts can abide in such an assertion. If any shall, I must be bold to declare my affection to the doctrine of the Gospel maintained in some of those assemblies for some hundreds of years, and then to desire him to prove that any general council, since the apostles fell asleep, hath been so convened and managed as to be enabled to claim that authority to itself which is or would be due to such an assembly instituted according to the mind of Christ.
He is challenging the whole authority of these general councils, but he admits with his customary honesty, his intellectual honesty and his largeness of heart:
That it hath been of advantage to the truth of the Gospel that godly learned men, bishops of churches, have convened and witnessed a good confession in reference to the doctrine thereof, and declared their abhorrence of the errors that are contrary thereunto, is confessed. That any man or men is, are, or ever were, intrusted by Christ with authority so to convene them, as that thereupon and by virtue thereof they should be invested with a new authority, power, and jurisdiction, at such a convention, and thence should take upon them to make laws and canons that should be ecclesiastically binding to any persons or churches, as theirs, is not as yet, to me, attended with any convincing evidence of truth. And seeing at length it must be spoken, I shall do it with submission to the thoughts of good men that are in any way acquainted with these things, and in sincerity therein commend my conscience to God, that I do not know anything that is extant bearing clearer witness to the sad degeneracy of Christian religion in the profession thereof, nor more evidently discovering the efficacy of another spirit than that which was poured out by Christ at His Ascension, nor containing more hay and stubble, that is to be burned and consumed, than the stories of the acts and laws of the councils and synods that have been in the world.
He continues with his denunciation of these general councils, and especially of the claim that they had authority and power to legislate with regard to these various additions in the matter of offices and forms of worship in connection with the life of the Church. Owen rejects all these claims and having done so, he makes the following positive statement:
I now descend to the last consideration of a church, in the most usual acceptation of that in the New Testament—that is, of a particular instituted church. A church in this sense I take to be a society of men called by the Word to the obedience of faith in Christ, and joint performance of the worship of God in the same individual ordinances, according to the order by Christ prescribed. This general description of it exhibits its nature so far as is necessary to clear the subject of our present disquisition.
But he not only contends that the general councils are not to be authoritative in this matter, he goes further. He says:
We deny that the apostles made or gave any such rules to the churches present in their days, or for the use of the churches in future ages, as should appoint and determine outward modes of worship, with ceremonies in their observation, stated feasts and fasts, beyond what is of divine institution, liturgies or forms of prayer, or discipline to be exercised in law courts, subservient unto a national ecclesiastical government. What use, then, they are or may be of, what benefit or advantage may come to the church by them, what is the authority of the superior magistrate about them, we do not now inquire or determine. Only we say, that no rule unto these ends was ever prescribed by the apostles; for—
1. There is not the least intimation of any such rule to be given by them in the Scripture.
2. The first churches after their times knew nothing of any such rule given by them: and, therefore, after they began to depart from the simplicity of the Gospel in any things, as unto worship, order, and rule, or discipline, they fell into a great variety of outward observances, orders, and ceremonies, every church almost differing in some thing or other from others, in some such observations, yet all “keeping the unity of the faith in the bond of peace.” This they would not have done if the apostles had prescribed any one certain rule of such things that all must conform unto, especially considering how scrupulously they did adhere unto every thing that was reported to be done or spoken by any of the apostles, were the report true or false.
Then he goes on to say something that is most interesting at the present time, because of the proposal to fix Easter. His third argument is this:
3. In particular, when a difference fell out amongst them in a business of this nature, namely, in a thing of outward order, nowhere appointed by the authority of Christ—namely, about the observation of Easter—the parties at variance appealed on the one side to the practice of Peter, and on the other to the practice of John (both vainly enough): yet was it never pretended by any of them on either side that the apostles had constituted any rule in the case; and therefore it is not probable that they esteemed them to have done so in things of an alike nature, seeing they laid more weight on this than on any other instance of the like kind.
4. It is expressly denied, by good and sufficient testimony among them, that the apostles made any law or rule about outward rites, ceremonies, times, and the like.
The Nature of the Union
Now there again is something that is of importance for us to bear in mind. But I must hurry on, and, leaving out much interesting material, let me quote Owen on the nature of the union. The Church he defines in terms of that which is clearly instituted by Christ, which is this particular church that meets together for the ends and the objects that he has been indicating. Now he comes to deal with the nature of the union that should obtain in these churches, and how this union is to be maintained. His great point is that it is always a spiritual union, it is a union in the Spirit. He quotes, to that end, the familiar passage in Ephesians 4, and he works it out and shows how this is the controlling principle. Let me just give you his headings.
“First, that unity which is recommended unto us in the Gospel is spiritual.
“Secondly, unto this foundation of Gospel unity among believers, for and unto the due improvement of it, there is required a unity of faith” —(It is a spiritual union; secondly, it is a unity of faith)—“or of the belief and profession of the same divine truth; for as there is one Lord, so also there is one faith and one baptism unto believers.” So he emphasizes these two.
“Thirdly, there is a unity of love”—and
“Fourthly, the Lord Christ, by His kingly authority, hath instituted orders for rule, and ordinances for worship, Matthew 28:19–20; Ephesians 4:8–13 to be observed in all His churches.”
That is the nature of the union. Next the question arises: How is this union to be preserved? Here he has some excellent things to say.
“Now, that this union be preserved, it is required that all those grand and necessary truths of the Gospel, without the knowledge whereof no man can be saved by Jesus Christ, be so far believed as to be outwardly and visibly professed, in that variety of ways wherein they are or may be called out thereunto.” There is no union unless there is agreement about the truths of the Gospel. It is a spiritual union, but it is also a union of faith. If there is disagreement about the faith, there is no union. There can be no union, therefore, between an Evangelical and a man who denies the essentials of the Evangelical faith. It is impossible.
“Secondly, that no other internal principle of the mind, that hath an utter inconsistency with the real belief of the truths necessary to be professed, be manifested by professors.” Not only must there be no open, explicit disagreement, there must be no implicit disagreement either.
“Thirdly, that no thing, opinion, error, or false doctrine, everting or overthrowing any of the necessary saving truths professed as above, be added in and with that profession, or deliberately be professed also. This principle the apostle lays down and proves, Galatians 5:3–4. Notwithstanding the profession of the Gospel, he tells the Galatians that if they were bewitched to profess also the necessity of circumcision and keeping of the law for justification, Christ or the profession of Him would not profit them.”
Breaking the Union
In that way he lays down his great cardinal principles as to the nature of the union and how it is to be preserved. Then, he proceeds to deal with the question of how this union can be broken. Here, in a very wonderful way he quite conclusively proves without any difficulty at all, that on these principles, the first church to be guilty of schism was the Roman Catholic church. By additions, and innovations, and contradictions of basic New Testament teaching involved in, and implied by, teaching concerning the sacraments and other matters, the Roman Catholic church has been more guilty of the sin of schism than any other church that the world has ever known.
Owen has some very wonderful things to say on this whole subject of the preservation of union. Here is something of what he has to say:
We do confess, that because the best of men in this life do not know but in part, all the members of this Church are in many things liable to error, mistakes, and miscarriages; and hence it is that, although they are all internally acted and guided by the same Spirit in all things absolutely necessary to their eternal salvation, and do all attend unto the same rule of the Word, according as they apprehend the mind of God in it and concerning it, have all, for the nature and substance of it, the same divine faith and love, and are all equally united unto their Head, yet, in the profession which they make of the conceptions and persuasions of their minds about the things revealed in the Scripture, there are, and always have been, many differences among them. Neither is it morally possible it should be otherwise, whilst in their judgment and profession they are left unto the ability of their own minds and liberty of their wills, under that great variety of the means of light and truth, with other circumstances, whereinto they are disposed by the holy, wise providence of God. Nor hath the Lord Christ absolutely promised that it shall be otherwise with them; but securing them all by His Spirit in the foundations of eternal salvation, He leaves them in other things to the exercise of mutual love and forbearance, with a charge of duty after a continual endeavour to grow up unto a perfect union, by the improvement of the blessed aids and assistances which He is pleased to afford them. And those who, by ways of force, would drive them into any other union or agreement than their own light and duty will lead them into, do what in them lies to oppose the whole design of the Lord Christ towards them and His rule over them. In the meantime, it is granted that they may fall into divisions, and schisms, and mutual exasperations among themselves, through the remainders of darkness in their minds and the infirmity of the flesh.
This is most important. It explains the differences even among us in this very conference. That is a perfect account of it. Our Lord, he says, as it were makes provision for this, anticipates that it is going to happen: “In the meantime, it is granted that they may fall into divisions, and schisms, and mutual exasperations among themselves, through the remainders of darkness in their minds and the infirmity of the flesh, Romans 14:3; and in such cases mutual judgings and despisings are apt to ensue, and that to the prejudice and great disadvantage of that common faith which they do profess. And yet, notwithstanding all this (such cross-entangled wheels are there in the course of our nature), they all of them really value and esteem the things wherein they agree incomparably above those wherein they differ.” (Thank God we can still say that!) “But their valuation of the matter of their union and agreement is purely spiritual, whereas their differences are usually influenced by carnal and secular considerations, which have, for the most part, a sensible impression on the minds of poor mortals.”
Let every man examine himself! That is my interjection. But you notice what Owen says: “Their evaluation of the matter of their union and agreement is purely spiritual, whereas their differences are usually influenced by carnal”—What church were we born in? where were we brought up?—“and secular considerations”—What happens to me if I make a change?—“and secular considerations, which have, for the most part, a sensible impression on the minds of poor mortals.” We are all guilty! That is also my comment, not John Owen’s. We are all guilty. He proceeds:
But so far as their divisions and differences are unto them unavoidable, the remedy of farther evils proceeding from them is plainly and frequently expressed in the Scripture. It is love, meekness, forbearance, bowels of compassion, with those other graces of the Spirit wherein our conformity unto Christ doth consist, with a true understanding and the due valuation of the “unity of faith,” and the common hope of believers which are the ways prescribed unto us for the prevention of those evils which, without them, our unavoidable differences will occasion. And this excellent way of the Gospel, together with a rejection of evil surmises, and a watchfulness over ourselves against irregular judging and censuring of others, together with a peaceable walking in consent and unity so far as we have attained, is so fully and clearly proposed unto us therein, that they must have their eyes blinded by prejudices and carnal interests, or some effectual working of the god of this world on their minds, into whose understandings the light of it doth not shine with uncontrollable evidence and conviction.
Then in another place he points out that in Philippians 3 Paul says: “Nevertheless, whereto we have already attained, let us walk by the same rule.” “And if,” he says (in v. 15) “in anything ye be otherwise minded, God shall reveal even this unto you.” They were not to quarrel or part over minor matters. “Go on together,” he says, “and pray together, and God will reveal the truth concerning those matters also.” Paul teaches that that is the way in which this union is to be maintained.
Schism and Separation
Now there is one other aspect of the subject that we must just notice. Owen draws a distinction between schism and separation, and teaches quite definitely that at times separation is demanded of us, that it is indeed a duty at such times: “What may regularly, on the other hand, be deduced from the commands given to ‘turn away from them who have only a form of godliness,’ 2 Timothy 3:5; to ‘withdraw from them that walk disorderly,’ 2 Thessalonians 3:6; not to bear nor endure in communion men of corrupt principles and wicked lives, Revelation 2:14; but positively to separate from an apostate church, Revelation 18:4; that in all things we may worship Christ according to His mind and appointment; that is the force of these commands.”
Then he gives these commands. In so doing he gives a very good account of the reasons which led the Church of England to leave the Church of Rome. Here he again has a command with regard to this question.
I deal, as I said, with them who own reformation; and I now suppose the congregation, whereof a man is supposed to be a member on any account whatever, not to be reformed—in this case, I ask whether it be schism or no for any number of men to reform themselves, by reducing the practice of worship to its original institution, though they be the minor part lying within the parochial precincts, or for any of them to join themselves with others for that end and purpose not living within those precincts? I shall boldly say this schism is commanded by the Holy Ghost, 1 Timothy 6:5; 2 Timothy 3:5; Hosea 4:15. Is this yoke laid upon me by Christ, that, to go along with the multitude where I live, that hate to be reformed, I must forsake my duty and despise the privileges that He hath purchased for me with His own precious blood? Is this a unity of Christ’s institution, that I must for ever associate myself with wicked and profane men in the worship of God, to the unspeakable detriment and disadvantage of my own soul?
I suppose nothing can be more unreasonable than once to imagine any such thing.
He continues his argument along those same lines.
It is usually objected about the church of Corinth, that there was in it many disorders and enormous miscarriages, divisions, and breaches of love; miscarriages through drink at their meetings, gross sins, the incestuous person tolerated, false doctrine broached, the resurrection denied;—and yet Paul advises no man to separate from it, but all to perform their duty in it. But how little our present plea and defensative is concerned in this instance, supposed to lie against it, very few considerations will evince:
First, the church of Corinth was undoubtedly a true church, lately instituted according to the mind of Christ, and was not fallen from that privilege by any miscarriage, nor had suffered anything destructive to its being; which wholly differences between the case proposed, in respect of many particulars, and the instance produced. We confess the abuses and evils mentioned had crept into the church, and do thence grant that many abuses may do so into any of the best of the churches of God.
An argument is often brought forward at this point in these terms, that if you do act on these principles, how long would it last? We cannot guarantee absolute purity even if we separate, and then even the new church may go wrong. According to Owen you must not expect anything different:
Nor did it ever enter into the heart of any man to think that so soon as any disorders fall out or abuses creep into it, it is instantly the duty of any to fly out of it, like Paul’s mariners out of the ship when the storm grew hazardous; it being the duty of all the members of such a church, untainted with the evils and corruptions of it, upon many accounts, to attempt and labour the remedy of those disorders, and rejection of those abuses to the uttermost, which was that which Paul advised the Corinthians and some others unto; in obedience whereunto they were recovered. But yet this I say, had the church of Corinth continued in the condition before described—that notorious, scandalous sins had gone unpunished, unreproved, drunkenness continued and practised in the assemblies, men abiding by the denial of the resurrection, so overturning the whole Gospel, and the church refusing to do her duty, and exercise her authority to cast all those disorderly persons, upon their obstinacy, out of her communion—it had been the duty of every saint of God in that church to have withdrawn from it, to come out from among them, and not to have been partaker of their sins, unless they were willing to partake of their plague also, which on such an apostasy would certainly ensue.
Now, there, he points out that in certain conditions and circumstances separation is actually a duty, and he goes on in this immediate context to point out that this has reference to the reason why the Church of England left the Church of Rome.
We turn now to a very interesting point, the relevance of which will be obvious: “It may be some will yet say (because it hath been said often), ‘There is a difference between reforming of churches already gathered and raised, and raising of churches, out of mere materials. The first may be allowed, but the latter tends to all manner of confusion.’ ” In other words, he imagines a possible objection might be made to this effect: It is all right to reform an existing church, but that does not justify you in forming, as it were, a new church, as he puts it, “out of mere materials.”
I have at present not much to say to this objection, because, as I conceive, it concerns not the business we have in hand; nor would I have mentioned it at all, but that it is insisted on by some on every turn, whether suited for the particular cause for which it is produced, or no. In brief, then—
1. I know no other reformation of any church, or any thing in a church, but the reducing of it to its primitive institution, and the order allotted to it by Jesus Christ. If any plead for any other reformation of churches, they are, in my judgment, to blame.
And when any society or combination of men (whatever hitherto it hath been esteemed) is not capable of such a reduction and renovation, I suppose I shall not provoke any wise and sober person if I profess I cannot look on such a society as a church of Christ. . . .
Let me repeat that—“And when any society or combination of men is not capable of such a reduction” (that is to say, to the primitive institution) “and renovation, I suppose I shall not provoke any wise and sober person if I profess I cannot look on such a society as a church of Christ.” A church that cannot reform itself in that way is not a church of Christ. He goes on:
. . . and thereupon advise those therein who have a due right to the privileges purchased for them by Christ, as to Gospel administrations, to take some other peaceable course to make themselves partakers of them.
2. Were I fully to handle the things pointed to in this objection I must manage principles which, in this discourse, I have not been occasioned to draw forth at all or to improve. Many things of great weight and importance must come under debate and consideration before a clear account can be given of the case stated in this objection, such as:
(1) The true nature of an instituted church under the Gospel, as to the matter, form, and all other necessary constitutive causes, is to be investigated and found out.
(2) The nature and form of such a church is to be exemplified from the Scripture and the stories of the first churches, before sensibly infected with the poison of that apostasy which ensued.” [I urgently commend the consideration of those words at this present time. We must study the Scriptures and also the history of the first three centuries of the Christian Church.]
(3) The extent of the apostasy under Antichrist, as to the ruining of instituted churches, making them to be Babylon, and their worship fornication, is duly and carefully to be examined. Here lie our disorder and division; hence is our darkness and pollution of our garments, which is not an easy thing to free ourselves of: though we may arise, yet we shall not speedily shake ourselves out of the dust.” [That is the chief difficulty for every one of us; we are all bound by what has gone before us.]
(4) By what way and means God begat anew and kept alive his elect in their several generations, when anti-christian darkness covered the earth and thick darkness the nations, supposing an intercision of instituted ordinances, so far as to make a nullity in them as to what was of simple and pure institution; what way might be used for the fixing of the tabernacle of God again with men, and the setting up of church worship according to His mind and will.
(5) What was the way of the first Reformation in this nation, and what principles that godly learned men of those days proceeded on; how far what they did may be satisfactory to our consciences at the present, as to our concurrence in them, who from thence have the truth of the Gospel derived down to us; whether ordinary officers be before or after the church, and so whether a church-state is preserved in the preservation of officers, by a foreign power to that church whereof they are so, or the office be preserved, and consequently the officers inclusively, in the preservation and constitution of a church—these, I say, with sundry other things of the like importance, with inferences from them, are to be considered to the bottom before a full resolution can be given to the inquiry couched in this objection, which, as I said, to do is not my present business.
All that means this: Before you rush off to start a new church, consider all these subjects very seriously and very deeply. It is not a matter to be rushed into, it is all to be examined in the light of Scripture and the early history of the Christian Church.
What then is the conclusion of all this? Owen sums it up himself in these words:
Let us now see the sum of the whole matter, and what it is that we plead for our discharge as to this crime of schism, allowing the term to pass in its large and usual acceptation, receding, for the sake of the truth’s farther ventilation, from the precise propriety of the word annexed to it in the Scripture. The sum is, we have broken no bond of unity, no order instituted or appointed by Jesus Christ—have causelessly deserted no station that ever we were in, according to His mind; which alone can give countenance to an accusation of this nature. That on pure grounds of conscience we have withdrawn, or do withhold ourselves from partaking in some ways, engaged into upon mere grounds of prudence, we acknowledge.
And thus, from what hath been said, it appears in what a fair capacity, notwithstanding any principle or practice owned by us, we are in to live peaceably, and to exercise all fruits of love towards those who are otherwise minded.
He feels that he has thus clearly absolved himself from the charge of schism.
Owen’s Appeal to Us
Finally, let me put before you the great appeal which, it seems to me, Owen addresses to us who are here gathered at this pres-ent time as reformed evangelical Christians. Let us listen to his moving words:
The truth is, if God would be pleased to help us, on all hands, to lay aside prejudices, passions, secular interests, fears, and every other distempered affection, which obstruct our minds in passing a right judgment on things of the nature treated on, we should find in the text and context spoken unto a sacred truth divinely directive of such a practice as would give peace and rest unto us all; for it is supposed that men, in a sincere endeavour after acquaintance with the truths and mysteries of the Gospel, with an enjoyment of the good things represented and exhibited in them, may fall, in some things, into different apprehensions about what belongs unto faith and practice in religion. But whilst they are such as do not destroy or overthrow the foundation nor hinder men from pressing “toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus,” that which the apostle directs unto them who are supposed to be ignorant of or to mistake in the things wherein they do differ from others, is only that they wait for divine instruction in the use of the means appointed for that end, practising in the meantime according to what they have received. And as unto both parties, the advice he gives them is, that “whereunto they have attained,” wherein they do agree—which were all those principles of faith and obedience which were necessary unto their acceptance with God—they should “walk by the same rule, and mind the same thing”; that is, “forbearing one another” in the things wherein they differ: which is the substance of what is pleaded for by the Nonconformists.
But consider further:
It is not impossible that some may, from what hath been spoken, begin to apprehend that they have been too hasty in judging other men. Indeed, none are more ready to charge highly than those who, when they have so done, are most unable to make good their charge. What real schisms in a moral sense have ensued among brethren, by their causeless mutual imputation of schism in things of institution, is known. And when men are in one fault, and are charged with another wherein they are not, it is a ready way to confirm them in that wherein they are. There is more darkness and difficulty in the whole matter of instituted worship than some men are aware of; not that it was so from the beginning, whilst Christianity continued in its naked simplicity, but it is come occasionally upon us by the customs, darkness, and invincible prejudices that have taken hold on the minds of men by a secret diffusion of the poison of that grand apostasy. It were well, then, that men would not be so confident, nor easily persuaded that they presently know how all things ought to be, because they know how they would have some things to be, which suit their temper and interest. Men may easily perhaps see, or think they see, what they do not like, and cry out schism! and separation! but if they would a little consider what ought to be in this whole matter, according to the mind of God, and what evidences they have of the grounds and principles whereon they condemn others, it might make them yet swift to hear, but slow to speak, and take off from the number of teachers among us. Some are ready to think that all that join not with them are schismatics, and they are so because they go not with them; and other reason they have none, being unable to give any solid foundation of what they profess. What the cause of unity among the people of God hath suffered from this sort of men is not easily to be expressed.
In all differences about religion, to drive them to their rise and spring, and to consider them as stated originally, will ease us of much trouble and labour.
We have to go back beyond the seventeenth century, beyond the sixteenth century; we have got to go back to the beginning. Now that is an exhortation we all need. We all suffer from the tendency to defend inherited positions and our own particular history. We must go back to the very beginning, to the rise and spring of it all in the first century. He then goes on to say:
Perhaps many of them (i.e. the differences) will not appear so formidable as they are represented. He that sees a great river is not instantly to conclude that all the water in it comes from its first rise and spring; the addition of many brooks, showers, and land-floods have perhaps swelled it to the condition wherein it is. Every difference in religion is not to be thought to be as big at its rise as it appears to be when it hath passed through many generations, and hath received additions and aggravations from the disputings and contendings of men, on the one hand and on the other engaged. What a flood of abominations doth this business of schism seem to be, as rolling down to us through the writings of Cyprian, Austin, and Optatus, of old, the schoolmen, decrees of popish councils, with the contrivances of some among ourselves, concerned to keep up the swelled notion of it! Go to its rise, and you will find it to be, though bad enough, yet quite another thing than what, by the prejudices accruing by the addition of so many generations, it is now generally represented to be.
The great maxim, “To the law and to the testimony,” truly improved, would quickly cure all our distempers.
May I be allowed to say that this is my profound belief also. I believe our present day distempers also could be cured if only we obeyed this injunction. Owen felt that. He proceeds:
In the meantime, let us bless God that though our outward man may possibly be disposed of according to the apprehension that others have of what we do or are, our consciences are concerned only in what He hath appointed. How some men may prevail against us, before whom we must stand or fall according to their corrupt notion of schism, we know not. The rule of our consciences in this, as in all other things, is eternal and unchangeable. Whilst I have an uncontrollable faithful witness that I transgress no limits prescribed to me in the Word, that I do not willingly break or dissolve any unity of the institution of Jesus Christ, my mind as to this thing is filled with perfect peace. Blessed be God, that hath reserved the sole sovereignty of our consciences in His hand, and not in the least parcelled it out to any of the sons of men, whose tender mercies being oftentimes cruelty itself, they would perhaps destroy the soul also, when they do so to the body, seeing they stay there, as our Saviour witnesseth, because they can proceed no further! Here, then, I profess to rest, in this doth my conscience acquiesce: Whilst I have any comfortable persuasion on grounds infallible, that I hold the head, and that I am by faith a member of the mystical body of Christ; whilst I make profession of all the necessary saving truths of the Gospel; whilst I disturb not the peace of that particular church thereof by my own consent I am a member, nor do raise up nor continue in any causeless differences with them, or any of them, with whom I walk in the fellowship and order of the Gospel; whilst I labour to exercise faith towards the Lord Jesus Christ, and love towards all the saints —I do keep the unity which is of the appointment of Christ. And let men say, from principles utterly foreign to the Gospel, what they please or can to the contrary, I am no schismatic.
Perhaps the discovery which hath been made, how little we are many of us concerned in that which, having mutually charged it on one another, hath been the greatest ball of strife and most effectual engine of difference and distance between us, may be a means to reconcile in love them that truly fear God, though engaged in several ways, as to some particulars. I confess I have not any great hope of much success on this account; for let principles and ways be made as evident as if he that wrote them carried the sun in his hand, yet whilst men are forestalled by prejudices, and have their affections and spirits engaged suitably thereunto, no great alteration in their minds and ways, on the clearest conviction whatever, is to be expected. All our hearts are in the hand of God; and our expectations of what He hath promised are to be proportioned to what He can effect, not to what of outward means we see to be used.
Last of all here is a very beautiful passage from Owen’s treatise on Christian love and peace:
Herein, therefore, lies the fundamental cause of our divisions; which will not be healed until it be removed and taken out of the way. Leave believers or professors of the Gospel unto their duty in seeking after evangelical unity in the use of other means instituted and blessed unto that end—impose nothing on their consciences or practice under that name, which indeed belongs not thereunto; and although, upon the reasons and causes afterward to be mentioned, there may for a season remain some divisions among them, yet there will be a way of healing continually ready for them, and agreed upon by them as such.
Oh, that we might all give that a hearing and our careful attention! “Where, indeed, men propose unto themselves different ends, though under the same name, the use of the same means for the compassing of them will but increase their variance: as where some aim at evangelical union, and others at an external uniformity.” There is our exact position at the present time. Some of us are aiming at evangelical union; others are aiming at “external uniformity”: “ . . . both under the name of unity and peace, in the use of the same means for these ends, they will be more divided among themselves.” (If the aim is different, we are only going to increase the division). “But where the same end is aimed at, even the debate of the means for the attaining of it will insensibly bring the parties into a coalition, and work out in the issue a complete reconciliation.”
If we all as evangelicals are out to defend the faith, and to show men clearly the way of salvation, then, Owen says that we shall be brought together. If that is our real objective.
. . . In the meantime, were Christians duly instructed how many lesser differences, in mind, and judgment, and practice, are really consistent with the nature, ends, and genuine fruit, of the unity that Christ requires among them, it would undoubtedly prevail with them so to manage themselves in their differences, by mutual forbearance and condescension in love, as not to contract the guilt of being disturbers or breakers of it; for suppose the minds of any of them to be invincibly prepossessed with the principles wherein they differ from others, yet all who are sincere in their profession cannot but rejoice to be directed unto such a managery of them as to be preserved from the guilt of dissolving the unity appointed by Christ to be observed. And, to speak plainly, among all the churches in the world which are free from idolatry and persecution, it is not different opinions, or a difference in judgment about revealed truths, nor a different practice in sacred administration, but pride, self-interest, love of honour, reputation, and dominion, with the influence of civil or political intrigues and considerations, that are the true cause of that defect of evangelical unity that is at this day amongst them; for set them aside, and the real differences which would remain may be so managed, in love, gentleness, and meekness, as not to interfere with that unity which Christ requireth them to preserve. Nothing will from thence follow which shall impeach their common interest in one Lord, one faith, one love, one Spirit, and the administration of the same ordinances according to their light and ability. But if we shall cast away this evangelical union among the disciples and churches of Christ—if we shall break up the bounds and limits fixed unto it, and set up in its place a compliance with, or an agreement in, the commands and appointments of men, making their observations the rule and measure of our ecclesiastical concord—it cannot be but that innumerable and endless divisions will ensue thereon. If we will not be contented with the union that Christ hath appointed, it is certain that we shall have none in this world. . . .
I believe that evangelicalism is being challenged in these days along that very line. If we do not face the challenge of the ecumenical movement at the present time and achieve this evangelical union, I prophesy that we shall never have it. Our divisions will only be greatly increased:
If we will not be contented with the union that Christ hath appointed, it is certain that we shall have none in this world; for concerning that which is of men’s finding out, there have been, and will be, contentions and divisions, whilst there are any on the one side who will endeavour its imposition, and on the other who desire to preserve their consciences entire unto the authority of Christ in His laws and appointments.
There is none who can be such a stranger in our Israel as not to know that these things have been the great occasion and cause of the divisions and contentions that have been among us near a hundred years, and which at this day make our breaches wide like the sea, that they cannot be healed. Let, therefore, those who have power and ability be instrumental to restore to the minds of men the true notion and knowledge of the unity which the Lord Christ requireth among His churches and disciples; and let them be left unto that liberty which He hath purchased for them, in the pursuit of that unity which He hath prescribed unto them; and let us all labour to stir up those gracious principles of love and peace which ought to guide us in the use of our liberty, and will enable us to preserve Gospel unity—and there will be a greater progress made towards peace, reconciliation, and concord, amongst all sorts of Christians, than the spoiling of the goods or imprisoning the persons of dissenters will ever effect. But it may be, such things are required hereunto as the world is yet scarce able to comply withal; for whilst men do hardly believe that there is an efficacy and power accompanying the institutions of Christ, for the compassing of that whole end which He aimeth at and intended—whilst they are unwilling to be brought unto the constant exercise of that spiritual diligence, patience, meekness, condescension, self-denial, renunciation of the world and conformity thereunto, which are indispensably necessary in church guides and church members, according to their measure, unto the attaining and preservation of Gospel unity, but do satisfy themselves in the disposal of an ecclesiastical union into a subordination unto their own secular interests, by external force and power—we have very small expectation of success in the way proposed. In the meantime, we are herewith satisfied: Take the churches of Christ in the world that are not infected with idolatry or persecution, and restore their unity unto the terms and conditions left unto them by Christ and His apostles, and if in any thing we are found uncompliant therewithal, we shall without repining bear the reproach of it, and hasten an amendment.
May God grant unto us, every one of us, the spirit of John Owen in this matter.
I trust that I have been able to show that John Owen speaks very directly and immediately to our situation at this very moment. May God give us grace to ponder these things. But above all may He give us great wisdom, and beyond everything, may He give us great love and charity in our hearts, and patience with one another, so that, as men professing the same faith, we may present it together to an apostate church, though she be “a world church,” and to lost men and women everywhere.