APOSTOLIC SUCCESSION,
AND
CHURCH POSITION
When Bossuet, in 1682, drew up the famous declaration of the French clergy, the Pope threatened him with the thunders of the Vatican; and when the Bishop of Meaux heard of the threat, he said of the Pope that “good intentions combined with slender enlightenment were a great misfortune in so exalted a position.”
Had Bossuet lived in these days, he might have had to repent of his temerity.
But, perhaps, amongst Protestants, also, parties may be found to whom this sentence might not be inapplicable.
We find extreme parties in all communities, and at this moment there are before us two extreme parties—one amongst Episcopalians, another amongst Dissenters, which assert themselves and make a noise altogether beyond their numerical value, or the value of their views and doctrines. Of whom the most charitable thing that can be said is, that “good intentions combined with slender enlightenment were a great misfortune in so exalted a position.”
The parties to which we allude are the High Church party, or Puseyite party amongst Episcopalians, and a section of the Plymouth brethren known as the Darbyite party; for this body is divided, like the Episcopalians, into two sections.
Now, the High Church position is this—it claims apostolic succession. Wherever the succession is, the true Church must be, and to be outside of it is to be outside the true Church. This is their position.
But those who go in for apostolic succession seem to be oblivious of the fact, that St. Peter, St. Paul, St. Jude, and St. John take the opposite view, or a view wholly irreconcileable with such a position. See the Epistles to Timothy, those of St. Peter, St. Jude, St. John, in which nothing can be more disastrous than the evils which these apostles contemplate in the Church after their decease. And when we come to the seven Churches of Asia, what do we find? The Lord Himself taking the divine government of the Church into His own hands, and walking in the midst of those Churches in an attitude and form of government of a most fearful character. His eyes, like to a flame of fire, His feet like burning brass, and a sharp sword out from His mouth—one Church threatened to be removed out of its place, and another threatened to be spued out of His mouth, and so on. Such are the facts which the Scripture furnishes. That is, divine government had so failed in the bishops, elders, or presbyters appointed or ordained to keep things right, that the Lord Himself takes up the government into His own hands, and addresses the Church for the last time in Scripture, to see if it will, as a collective body, hear His voice. If not, then He addesses the individual in such words as—“He that hath ears to hear, let him hear;” and “to him that overcometh will I do so and so,” etc. Now, how does all this comport with the notion of apostolic succession ? Apostolic suc cession supposes that divine government is always present to keep things right ; whereas the Lord’s own apostles testify that nothing would be kept right in the Church after their decease, and com mend the Church to God and the word of His grace. (Acts, xx. 32.) These facts are so forcible, that when put lately before an intelligent Romanist priest, he felt obliged to say that “the apostles did not always understand their own writings.” And, certainly, if apostolic succession or infallible jurisdiction were to keep things right after their departure, this answer of the Romanist priest is not so grotesque after all.[1] But it may be somewhat more difficult to show how those who came after understood the apostolic writings better than the apostles themselves. However, those writings testify in like manner that faithful ones would be found amid the organized failure of the Church—a remnant, so to speak, that would have to contend for the faith once delivered to the saints. (Jude, iii.) These have continued, as all know, down to the present, and will emerge by-and-bye and appear with the Lord in glory; and thus will the Lord’s words be fulfilled, that “the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” Such, beyond all question, is the gist and the drift of those apostolic epistles above referred to, viz., that while profession and confusion prevail all around, His people are in the midst.
But there is a proverb, that “extremes often meet;” and so we find amongst Dissenters another party—a party of Plymouth brethren. The exclusive section of that body known by that name, who go in, not for apostolic succession , but for “Church succession.” They have “recovered the Church.” The Church is the “only solid divine rock”—“the city of refuge;” and to be outside of their meetings is to be “outside the Church of God on earth.” Such is the language of the heads and chiefs of this party;[2] and when asked what it is which gives this exalted position to them, we are referred to Matt. xviii. 19, 20: “Again I say unto you, that if two of you shall agree on earth as touching anything that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father which is in heaven: for where two or three are gathered together in (unto eis) my name, there am I in the midst of them.”
That the Lord, in this paragraph, makes provision for Christians to the end of time, amid all vicissitudes, and under all circumstances, is admitted—in fact, it is a provision that survives “the power of the keys” mentioned in the preceding paragraph. But what is the nature of it? It is a provision supplied by prayer, and the power which prayer gives at the throne of grace, on the part of any who gather together to the name of the Lord Jesus. “It shall be done for them of my Father which is in heaven.” Such is the nature of the passage and the promise attaching to it, as any attentive reader can see; and if any claim a right to it, par excellence, or a monopoly of the promise to themselves, they can prove the claim in one way, and in one way only. If the exclusionists amongst the Plymouth brethren can bring forward any evidence whatsoever to show that their prayers only at the throne of grace prevail, or that they are more efficacious than the prayers of other Christians; then their claim and right to a monopoly in this privilege will be conceded, and readily conceded, and that they only gather to the name of the Lord. For the passage and promise are quite capable of being tested in this way. But if they refuse the test, then the claim runs parallel with the claim of “apostolic succession”—a mere vapid assertion, having not only no foundation in fact, but the opposite of fact. Certainly, if they only gather together to the name of the Lord Jesus, their prayers must prevail beyond all others; and if this can be proved in any way, all other Christians should join them at once.