CHAP. III.
_Of the Qualifications of their Ministry_. _Eleven marks that it is
Christian_.
I. They were changed men themselves, before they went about to change
others. Their hearts were rent, as well as their garments; and they knew
the power and work of God upon them. And this was seen by the great
alteration it made, and their stricter course of life, and more godly
conversation that immediately followed upon it.
II. They went not forth, or preached, in their own time or will, but in
the will of God; and spoke not their own studied matters, but as they
were opened and moved of his Spirit, with which they were well acquainted
in their own conversion: which cannot be expressed to carnal men, so as
to give them any intelligible account; for to such it is, as Christ said,
like the blowing of the wind, which no man knows whence it cometh, or
whither it goeth. Yet this proof and seal went along with their
ministry, that many were turned from their lifeless professions, and the
evil of their ways, to an inward and experimental knowledge of God, and a
holy life, as thousands can witness. And as they freely received what
they had to say from the Lord, so they freely administered it to others.
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