E. G. Robinson: “Christ founded a church only proleptically. In _Mat. 18:17_, ἐκκλησία is not used technically. The church is an outgrowth of the Jewish synagogue, though its method and economy are different. There was little or no organization at first. Christ himself did not organize the church. This was the work of the apostles after Pentecost. The germ however existed before. Three persons may constitute a church, and may administer the ordinances. Councils have only advisory authority. Diocesan episcopacy is antiscriptural and antichristian.” The principles mentioned above are the essential principles of Baptist churches, although other bodies of Christians have come to recognise a portion of them. Bodies of Christians which refuse to accept these principles we may, in a somewhat loose and modified sense, call churches; but we cannot regard them as churches organized in all respects according to Christ’s laws, or as completely answering to the New Testament model of church organization. We follow common usage when we address a Lieutenant Colonel as “Colonel,” and a Lieutenant Governor as “Governor.” It is only courtesy to speak of pedobaptist organizations as “churches,” although we do not regard these churches as organized in full accordance with Christ’s laws as they are indicated to us in the New Testament. To refuse thus to recognize them would be a discourtesy like that of the British Commander in Chief, when he addressed General Washington as “Mr. Washington.” As Luther, having found the doctrine of justification by faith, could not recognize that doctrine as Christian which taught justification by works, but denounced the church which held it as Antichrist, saying, “Here I stand; I cannot do otherwise, God help me,” so we, in matters not indifferent, as feet‐washing, but vitally affecting the existence of the church, as regenerate church‐membership, must stand by the New Testament, and refuse to call any other body of Christians a regular church, that is not organized according to Christ’s laws. The English word “church” like the Scotch “kirk” and the German “_Kirche_,” is derived from the Greek κυριακή, and means “belonging to the Lord.” The term itself should teach us to regard only Christ’s laws as our rule of organization.