The efficiency of God may be understood as either creation or providence.

Theology is the doctrine or teaching of living to God.

The inward offer is a kind of spiritual enlightenment, whereby the promises are presented to the hearts of men, as it were, by an inward word.

Hearing the word is the devout receiving of the will of God.

Therefore, the church is not absolutely necessary as an object of faith, not even for us today, for then Abraham and the other prophets would not have given assent to those things which were revealed to them from God without any intervening help of the church.

This subsistence, or manner of being of God is his one essence so far as it has personal properties.

The ordinary ministry is that which receives all of its direction from the will of God revealed in the Scriptures and from those means which God has appointed in the church for its continual edification.