Seeking_Thy_Kingdom
Puritan Board Sophomore
“Although we do not hesitate to show respect for those who first introduced such things into places of worship, nevertheless the frightening, raging love for idols with which the world still seethes should have been sufficient warning that absolutely no images ought to be tolerated in the churches. That deed of Epiphanius is well known, who chopped in pieces a cloth on which there was an image of the crucified Christ, even though (as I think, at any rate) it had not been set there for worship. From this deed alone it behooved us to recognize how the church appeared when she still resembled a pure virgin. We ought to shape what is useful for the church according to this pattern rather than according to the mere inventions of our own brains! And of course the very subject shouts that those who thought they could dress up the church better than her first groomsmen, the apostles, have thereby introduced a sham. If Hezekiah, with full justification, destroyed the bronze serpent that had been set up at the Lord’s express command, should we be charged with some crime for having cleansed our churches of the very wet nurses of idolatry? In the meantime, which of us ever tossed out the idols except under the direction of the magistrate? And, just as ministers work faithfully to tear the roots of idolatry from the minds of men, would that Christian princes also would completely remove all the objects of idolatry from before the eyes of the faithful!”
Excerpt From
A Clear and Simple Treatise on the Lord's Supper
Theodore Beza
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https://www.heritagebooks.org/products/a-clear-and-simple-treatise-on-the-lords-supper-beza.html
