A Short Account of the Rise and Progress of the African Methodist Episcopal Church in America/A View of the subject of Church Government
a
VIEW OF THE SUBJECT
of
CHURCH GOVERNMENT.
A
VIEW OF THE SUBJECT
of
CHURCH GOVERNMENT.
We now proceed, according to promise in the Preface, to give a view of our thoughts and knowledge of Church Government, as an Episcopal Church; showing, for the information and satisfaction of the ministers and members of our connection especially, and the public in general, that our present mode of Church Government, as an Episcopal Church, is established upon as good a basis as any other church, according to the custom of ancient Christians, and the expressions in Scripture of some of the Apostles of our Lord. And in order to be understood by the reader, we will endeavour to do it in as plain a manner as we can, and proceed after the following order, viz. 1. The Bishop, or Superintendent, and his powers or authority in the Church.
2. The Elder and his duty, and
3. The Deacon and his duty.
In order to take up the first proposition, we shall begin with the word Episcopacy, or Episcopal, appertaining to the Bishopric. As we, from our commencement, took this Title, we have been judged, by some unfriendly persons, to claim a name that did not belong to us, according^ to our present mode of government by a Superintendent elected, and not particularly or especially ordained for a Bishop ; and with this view, those persons endeavour to invalidate our connexion, as having no Bishop, and therefore have no right to the name of Episcopal, and in consequence of this unfriendly practice, many of our brethren have been much annoyed, being not able to confute them by contrary information. In order to meet this objection, and stop the mouths of these gainsayers, it will be necessary to inquire into the origin of a Bishop, and thereby find out from whence the term Episcopal arose.
We proceed then to say, that Buck's Theological Dictionary informs us that the word Bishop comes from the Saxons, and that they derived it from the Greeks, and that these people used it as a title for the chief clerk of the market, who inspects all that is bought and sold therein. James Wood brings it from the Hebrew, Greek, and Latin, and agrees with the above information; and when the title was brought into the Church, Lord King shows that the man who bore it, was only a Priest, a Presbyter, or Elder; and examining the New Testament, we find nothing therein which makes him any thing more, as to ordination, than an Elder. How then does he become a Bishop, or Superintendent, as he is called among us? He is virtually elected by the church. How does the church elect him? They have granted this power to the Yearly Conference, according to our Discipline, which consists of a body of itinerant ministers, and by them he is actually elected for a certain term of years, by ballot, and at the expiration of that term he is re-elected, or another person elected in his stead, if the Yearly Conference think proper, at one of those meetings which the Discipline designates for making new rules and regulations.
In confirmation of the foregoing, relative to the origin of the word Bishop, and to there being originally but two orders in the church, see Buck's and Wood's Theological Dictionaries; also, Lord King's account of the same, and Scripture references: see St. Paul's Epistle to the Philippians, 1st chap, and 1st verse—1 Peter, 5th chap. and 1st verse—the Acts of the Apostles, 20th chap. 17th and 28th verses—Titus, 1st chap. 5th and 7th verses—1 Timothy, 3d chap. 1st and 8ih verses—making but two orders of ministers in the primitive church: and as the Rev. John Wesley, the founder of the Methodist Church, was a regular ordained priest of the Protestant Church of England, we see no difficulty nor impropriety in claiming the name of Episcopal; although the venerable Wesley refused to do so for himself, because he would not interfere with the established order of the church of which he was a member; but he submitted to the term Superintendent, which we arc satisfied to claim; and with these views we fellow John Wesley's mode of government, with some slight alterations, in consequence of being under a Republican government.
We shall now proceed to give some extracts from the writings of Lord King, who has given us a view of church government, from the days of the Apostles, down for three hundred succeeding years, so that we may be informed how Bishops were made by the ancient churches. We have said, relative to our own method, that a Bishop was virtually elected by the church and actually by the Yearly Conference; and now see Lord King: "When the Bishop of a church was dead, all the people of that church met together in one place to elect a new Bishop—so Sabinus was elected Bishop of Emerita, by the suffrage of all the brotherhood, which was also the custom throughout all Africa, for the Bishop to be chosen in the presence of the people, and so Fabianus was chosen to be Bishop of Rome by all the brethren, who were met together in one place to that very end." 37th page and 7th verse.
And now a reference to our Discipline, as having given to the Yearly Conference, by the whole church, the power of election, will satisfy us on this head; and what is now to the point, this Bishop, so elected by the church, being but an Elder or Priest, is evidently called an Episcopalian. But that all concerned may be satisfied, we give an extract in the author's own words, as follows:
"Now the manner of electing a Bishop I find to be thus: When a Parish or Bishopric was vacant, through the death of the incumbent, all the members of that Parish, both of the clergy and laity, met together in the church, commonly to choose a fit person for his successor, to whom they might commit the care and government of their church. Thus, when Alexander was chosen Bishop of Jerusalem, it was by the compulsion or choice of the members of that church. And as to the Bishopric of Rome, we have a memorable instance of this kind in the advancement of Fabianus to that See.
"Upon the death of Bishop Anterus, all the people met together in the church to choose a successor, proposing several illustrious and eminent personages as fit for that office, whilst no one so much as thought upon Fabianus, then present, till a dove miraculously sat upon his head, in the same manner as did the Holy Ghost formally descend on our Saviour; and then all the people, guided as it were with one Divine spirit, cried out with one mind and soul that Fabianus was worthy of the Bishopric, and straight way taking him, they placed him on the Episcopal throne. And as was Fabianus, so likewise his successor Cornelious was elected by the suffrage of the clergy and the laity." See Lord King, pages 55 and 56, and 3d verse. The titles given to this supreme personage by Cyprian, is Bishop, President, Pastor, Governor, or Superintendent. And having given the origin of the Bishop, we shall now proceed to speak something of his duty in a very brief manner, and for this purpose we shall make another extract from the writings of Lord King, in his own words:
"The Bishop's flock having been so largely discussed, it will now be necessary to speak something of the Bishop's duty towards them, and the several particulars of his honourable office. I shall not be tedious, since about this there is no great difference, only briefly enumerate the several actions belonging to his charge. In brief, therefore, the particular acts of his function were such as these, viz., preaching the word, praying with his people, administering the two sacraments of Baptism and the Lord's Supper, taking care of the poor, ordaining of ministers, governing his flock, excommunicating of offenders, absolving penitents, and, in a word, whatever acts can be comprised under those three general heads of preaching, worship, and government, were part of the Bishop's function and office." See Lord King, page 53 and 1st verse. Having thus given our views of primitive Bishops from the first three hundred years succeeding the Apostles, we will here briefly show the difference between their manner of government and ours.
The primitive church formed no connection of several societies as we do, for every Pastor of a congregation was a Bishop and had the control of his own society; but with us it is essentially necessary to form a connexion of our several societies, and they being located in different parts of the United States, it becomes needful to have one central point where our ministers may have interview from time to time; hence our Yearly Conference is formed for that purpose, and, therefore, our Bishop or Superintendent must travel and oversee the whole, that every branch of our church may harmonize.
The next to be noticed is an Elder and his duty; but, as we find him so nearly like our present mode, we judge it needless to say much on that point, only that he was the same in order, or ordination, but not in degree with a Bishop, because he is not so advanced to that office by the suffrage of the church. We will, therefore, only transcribe one verse from Lord King:
"The Presbyters ruled in those churches to which they belonged; else this exhortation of Polycurpus to the Presbyters of Philippi would have been in vain: let the Presbyters be tender and merciful, compassionate toward all, reducing those that are in errors, visiting those that are weak, not negligent of the widow and orphan and him that is poor; but ever providing what is honest in the sight of God and men, abstaining from all wrath, respect of persons, and unrighteous judgment, being far from covetousness, not hastily believing a report against any man, not rigid in judgment knowing that we are all faulty and obnoxious to judgment." See Lord King, 4th chap, and 4th verse.
Having thus spoken of Elders, we next proceed to speak of Deacons and their duties, and in doing this, we shall only make an extract from our author, as follows:
"Next to the Presbyters were the Deacons, concerning whose office and order I shall say very little, since there is no great controversy about it, and had it not been to have rendered this discourse complete and entire, I should in silence passed it over. Briefly, therefore, their original institution, as in Acts, 6th chapter and 2d verse, was to serve tables, which included these two things—a looking after the poor and an attendance at the Lord's table. As for care of the poor, Origen tells us that the Deacons dispensed to them the church's money, being employed under the Bishops to inspect and relieve all the indigent within their diocess. As for their attendance at the Lord's table, their office with respect to that consisted in preparing the bread and wine, in cleansing the sacramental cups and other such like things; whence they are called by Ignatious, Deacons of meats and cups; assisting, also, in some places at least, the Bishops or Presbyters in the celebration of the Eucharist, delivering the elements to the communicants; they also preached,&c, and in the absence of the Bishops and Presbyters, baptized. In a word, according to the signification of their name, they were, as Ignatious calls them, the church's servants, set apart on purpose to serve God and attend to their business, being constituted, as Eusebius terms it, for the service of the public." See Lord King, page 82, 5th chap, and 1st verse; also, page 84, 5th chap, and part of the 3d verse. "The Bishops in those days not usually arriving per saltum to that dignity and honour, but commonly beginning with the most inferior office, and so gradually proceeding through the others till they came to the supreme office of all, as Cornelious, Bishop of Rome, did not presently leap into the Episcopal throne, but first passed through all the Ecclesiastical offices, gradually ascending to that sublime dignity."