Position 4

Those who are in the doctrines and bodies of divinity which have been formed since, are not in the true doctrine. Those who are in the rules of life which wise church-men or synods or councils have given, or which they themselves have gathered by their industry out of the Scriptures, are not in the true, living, and everlasting rule. Those who are in the worship, or under the ministry, or of any church which has been set up since by the power of man, or from the inventing wisdom, (though this wisdom has founded its inventions upon the Scriptures), are not in the true worship, in the true church, or under the true ministry. Those who are in the faith, which has since been gathered into the understanding, and did not spring up from the mystery of life in the heart, are not in the true faith. The same may be said of love, hope, joy, peace, and all the rest mentioned before; yes, and all other things in religion; for all have been corrupted, even the inward part. And while here has been a great contention about the forms of worship and church-government, the power of godliness, and the government of Christ in the heart, have been lost.

Observe diligently what we have now to say. When the apostles, who had the true ministry, preached the gospel, they stirred and raised up the power of God in the heart; and the power of sin, corruption, and deceit sunk down, and was under foot, and trampled upon by the power. But when antichrist and the false prophets arose, they raised up the corruption again, and fed it with doctrines of deceit; but the power sunk down, and was not felt, but was buried all that time of the prevailing of the corruption and deceit. Now the power was not lost all this while in itself; but only lost to man, so that he knew not where to find it. Yet this power, in this time of loss, did stir and move, and make them in some degree sensible of the loss, causing them to pant and seek after the living truth. And this was good; this was of God.

But then there was an evil spirit, which was near to the good, and lay lurking in the serpentine wisdom of the heart, and that drew the mind, (which was bent towards the seeking of a right thing), a wrong way, that cried, Mark 13:21, Luke 17:21; Lo here! lo there! look into the Scriptures; the church was so and so; go, get into such a thing; the Christians there did so and so; go, do such a thing; there is the way; there you shall meet with the life and the power. And thus it drew from what stirred within, into an imitation of a form without, and there they came to a loss. I dare appeal to all honest hearts, was there not a good thing stirring in you, when you went into your church forms? Were you not led in simplicity, hoping to meet with life and power there? No, did you not lose it there, and become deader? Did you meet with the life and power there? I know, if you have not forgotten the taste of life, you will confess to me, that what now you have is not life, but far short of what you had when you entered into your form.

Ah! poor hearts, the whore bewitched you. The harlot in your bosoms, and the false prophets without, helped to increase the witchery, crying Luke 17:20-21; Lo here! and lo there! but you knew not that the kingdom of heaven was within, from where that stirring of life was in you, where you should have kept, and not have gone forth; but now you are dead, and buried in your graves, lying there without sense, and are now gotten into the spirit of the world, and into the enmity against that life in others, which was then your life. And do you know where you are, and what you are doing? Can you bear to hear it?

Of a truth you are in the snare of the enemy, in the enchantment from the life, in the whore's bed, in the strumpet's bosom, and not in the bosom of our beloved. And your practices are branches of the fornication, parcels of the whoredom, inventions which have been gathered in by that understanding, and set up by that will, which whored from God. They are the effects and products of the whore's cup, which gets new dresses, new habits, new forms, new ways to cozen and deceive the simple with; but still she remains the whore; and those who are seduced by her are led into her whoredom. For when God discovers and hunts her out of one form, then she decks herself with another, perhaps more seemingly spiritual, more scripture-like, and so more likely to take with the simple heart; and then she lies in wait for the young man to entrap him again, saying, Come in here; this is the true way of God without doubt.

Did not the saints meet with life here formerly? Come you here also. Here is the bed of your beloved; take your fill of life, your fill of love. And thus the poor, honest, simple heart follows her, going like a fool to the correction of the stocks, not knowing that it is for his life, until he comes to feel the loss of life. And then if she find she cannot keep him there, but fresh stirrings of life spring up in him again, and withdraw him from what had deceived him, then she paints again, and lies in wait for him again, to catch him in some more refined appearance, or in some elevated notion, or at least in the shadow of what is true. For the whore has not only are and power to invent forms and likenesses of what is true, and make idols and images of them; but it has power also given it over the outward court; so that what is found there, it can make idols and images of; what is corruptible, it can get into and corrupt, and make an enemy to that life which lived in it before it was corrupted; and when it is corrupted, then there is no more truth or life to be found there, but the idol and the idolatry.

The Apostle John, who forewarned of antichrist, and gave a mark by which it might be known; namely, by his not confessing Christ come in the flesh, 1 John 4:3, (which he that sets up anything of the old covenant, or any invention or imitation of anything within, does not), told them also beware of idols: "Little children keep yourselves from idols." 1 John 5:21. Now, what is an idol? The Apostle Paul said, 1 Corinthians 8:4; "An idol is nothing in the world."

An idol is no true thing in its place; but a false thing set up instead of the true. A false conception of God in the mind is an idol: a false church or temple is an idol: a false minister, who is not made according to the appointment of God, and by the gift of his Spirit, but came in another way, by the appointment of man, is an idol shepherd; and the worship in this church, and by this ministry, is public idolatry; and all the worship in families, which has been erected after the same manner, without the guidance of the Spirit of God, is private idolatry. Were the heathens' temples, altars, priests, sacrifices, and other inventions of theirs, (in imitation of the Jews), idolatrous? And are not the inventions of the heathenish spirit, or antichristian nature in man, are not they also idolatrous?

(Every spirit that does not confess that Christ has come in their flesh is antichrist. The correct translation is 1 John 4:3: every spirit that does not confess Jesus Christ is antichrist; which means, they must confess like Paul confessed: It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. Gal 2:20.) Objection: But is praying idolatry, preaching idolatry, singing idolatry, baptizing of infants idolatry, breaking of bread idolatry?

Answer: The praying which God appointed is not idolatry. Praying in the Spirit of God, when he moves, and according to the will of God, which is only known in the Spirit, is not idolatry; but your praying in your own spirit, and at your own times, and according to your own will, (perhaps in way of imitation of the Jewish morning and evening sacrifices), this is idolatry. This is what you have set up, instead of what God set up; and so it is not the true thing that God set up, but an idol of your own making; and so you do not worship God with that, but worship that spirit which helped you to invent and set up the idol. The same might be said concerning preaching, singing, washing with water, breaking of bread, and whatever else is practiced in religion upon these terms.

(Notice! Pennington is saying that unless your worship is in words supplied by the Holy Spirit, you are worshiping in your own will and not even worshiping God; instead you are worshiping the spirit that created the form. People worshiping according to a plan, with words from their carnal minds, without words from the Holy Spirit, are worshiping Satan and don't realize it.)

Objection: But does not the scripture mention these things? And did not the saints practice these things? Surely they were not idolaters! Can I be an idolater in practicing what they practiced?

Answer: No, you are mistaken; they are not the things which they practiced The stress of their religion lay in the life of it, in the presence of the Spirit of God in it; it was his breath made it the truth. Now, if you could have the same things that they had, yet without the same living breath, they would be but dead things; but idols. But you have not the true form of things either; you have not the true church, the true ministry, the true ordinances, according to the form; but things set up in their stead, by the invention of man, in the time of the apostasy from the true things; and what can these be but idols?

Rev 13:3-4; "The world wondered after the beast; and they worshipped the dragon, which gave power unto the beast, and they worshipped the beast." Rev 13:3-4. Behold, what was worshipped at the time of the apostasy! what arose from the beastly invention of man, and not from the true Spirit of life. And the inventing and setting up of these, and worshipping according to these inventions, is worshipping the dragon, (for he gets in, and lodges in man's inventions), and not the living God. And therefore God, at the end of this apostasy, raises up a new ministry, to recall the nations from worshipping the dragon to the worship of God again, Rev13:6-7; of that chapter, "what the Gentiles sacrificed" of old, "they sacrificed to devils, and not to God." 1 Cor. 10:20.

And what the late Gentiles sacrifice, (I mean Christians in the heathenish nature, Christians to whom the outward court was given, Rev 11:2 and who have a profession of the saints' words and practices, but without life), they sacrifice not to God either; but to that spirit that helped them to invent and form a likeness or image of the truth. Transgressing the principle of God within, they go from God, and from his worship; and the devil, who went out from the truth, gets in, and they go into his power; and whatever they perform in worship there, is to him (the devil;) for when they go from the principle of God in them, the devil gets into their hearts, and God goes out; and his true life, power, and worship are not known, but an image or likeness, which the devil sets up instead of the true thing. So then, in that state, let men consider what they worship; for there they cry up ordinances and duties, and kill one another about them, thinking that they worship and honour God thereby; but know not, nor are come to, that in which God alone can be worshipped and honoured. "I know the blasphemy of them, which say they are Jews, and are not, said the Spirit." Rev 2:9.

Is this blasphemy? For a man to call himself a Christian, who is not, what is that? To call that a church, which is not, what is that? To call him a minister of Christ, who is not, what is that? To call those the ordinances of Christ, which are not, what is that? To call that faith, which is not, that justification which is not, etc., what is that? Can you spy out the blasphemer? You have made a great outcry against him long; are you willing now he should be put to death? The Lord has lighted his candle; he is searching for him, and he will find him out; and as we have desired, so it shall be; the Lord will not spare him. Oh be awakened, be awakened, you heathenish Christians! Open the eye that can see, and behold where you are, and what you are doing, and how fast you are running into the pit.

You have forgotten God; you have lost the true line of judgment; you have lost the key of knowledge; and the light that is in you is darkness, and leads to darkness, though you cannot possibly believe it. Oh! come back to the remembrance of God, and to true holiness, without which no man shall see him. For the wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God; and you have forgotten him days without number.