Introduction

Few doctrines have suffered as much as the doctrine of the Church, and from opposite extremes. The Church of Rome has exalted the Church to the altars, putting her in the place that belongs to Christ alone: it has made her mistress of Scripture and dispenser of salvation. A good part of the evangelical world has fallen into the contrary extreme: it has scarcely any doctrine of the Church, reduces her to a gathering of believers at the service of individual faith, and considers her government a secondary matter, of organisation or of taste, which each community settles as it finds most practical. The Westminster Assembly followed the way of Scripture between the two: the Church is mistress of no one, but neither is she dispensable, for she is the kingdom of Christ, and her King has not left her without law: "The Lord Jesus, as king and head of his Church, hath therein appointed a government in the hand of Church officers, distinct from the civil magistrate" (WCF 30.1).

It is no accident that the churches born of this tradition do not bear the name of a man, but that of a biblical office. They are called presbyterian because they are persuaded that government by presbyters, that is, by elders, is the one Christ established for his Church. The underlying question is not who rules in the Church, but whether Christ reigns in her. That is why the Preface to the Form of Government does not begin by speaking of the Church, but of him: "JESUS CHRIST, upon whose shoulders the government is".

No matter took up so much of the Assembly's time, nor divided it so much. The divines had to defend presbyterian government on two fronts at once. Against prelacy—what we now call episcopal government—the government of the Church by bishops which had dominated the Church of England and which Parliament had just rejected. And against independency—today, congregational government—of a group of members of the Assembly itself, the so-called "dissenting brethren", among them Thomas Goodwin and Philip Nye, who held that each congregation is fully autonomous. The Assembly concluded the Form of Government after long debates, and the Church of Scotland approved it in 1645.

Against prelacy, the Form of Government shows that in the New Testament "elder" (presbyter) and "bishop" are two names for the same office, not two degrees of a hierarchy. Paul sends for "the elders of the church" of Ephesus and tells them that the Holy Ghost hath made them "overseers", that is, bishops (Acts 20:17, 28); he charges Titus to ordain elders in every city and, in describing their qualifications, calls them bishops (Titus 1:5-7). There is not in Scripture a bishop who governs over the presbyters, much less a visible head of the whole Church: her only Head is Christ (Eph. 1:22). Peter himself, far from claiming a primacy, presents himself as one "who am also an elder" with them, and charges the elders to feed the flock "neither as being lords over" it (1 Pet. 5:1-3).

Against independency, the Form of Government shows that congregations are not islands. When a controversy arose at Antioch that divided the Church, it was not resolved there, but carried to Jerusalem, where "the apostles and elders came together for to consider of this matter" (Acts 15:6); and what they decided was not a counsel that each church might accept or reject, but the decrees "that were ordained of the apostles and elders", which were delivered to the churches "for to keep" (Acts 16:4). Hence the Form of Government affirms that "It is lawful, and agreeable to the word of God, that there be a subordination of congregational, classical, provincial, and national assemblies, for the government of the church". Nor is the congregation governed by vote of all its members: Christ has set in it elders that rule (1 Tim. 5:17) and whom the people must obey in the Lord (Heb. 13:17).

It is not a matter of denying the godliness of those who have thought otherwise: many Independents were godly men, and the Assembly debated with them as with brethren. It is a matter of asking what Christ has established in his Word. And the question is not theoretical. Where biblical government is lacking, the Church ends up subject to the will of a single man, be it a bishop or a charismatic pastor who gives account to no one, or broken into isolated congregations, with no one to appeal to when an injustice is committed and without a discipline that protects the flock and its pastors. Presbyterian government offers what Scripture teaches: a plurality of elders, equality among ministers, assemblies to which appeal can be made, and the subjection of all to the Word.

The Form of Government treats of the Church and her officers (pastors, teachers, ruling elders and deacons), of particular congregations, of the assemblies that govern the Church and of the ordination of ministers. It is preceded by the Preface with which the Assembly presented it.