What do you think?
Rate this book
The Glory of a True Church
What is a church? How should it be ordered and governed? What makes a church disorderly or orderly, fit or unfit? Does the Bible have anything to say about how churches should be constituted? The Glory of a True Church is arguably the first work on church polity from a Baptist ever. Keach writes in the preface, “Many revered divines of the Congregational way have written most excellently upon this subject….but the books are so voluminous that the poorer sort can’t purchase them, and many others have not time or learning enough to improve them to their profit. And our brethren, the Baptists, have not written (as I can gather) on this subject by itself. Therefore, I have been earnestly desired by our members and also by one of our pastors to write a small and plain tract concerning the rules of the discipline of a gospel church, that all men may not only know our faith, but see our order in this case also.” This book is a helpful introduction to the basic tenets of Baptist congregational polity, not only because of its brevity and readibility, but because it is written by one of the finest pastor-theologians of the Baptist tradition, Benjamin Keach. Attached to this book in part three is the articles of faith Keach wrote for his congregation shortly before his death.
127 pages, Paperback
Published October 20, 2022
16 people are currently reading
76 people want to read
About the author
Benjamin Keach
137 books11 followersBenjamin Keach (1640-1704) was a Particular Baptist preacher in London whose name was given to Keach’s Catechism.
Originally from Buckinghamshire, Keach worked as a tailor during his early years. He was baptized at the age of 15 and began preaching at 18. He was the minister of the congregation at Winslow before moving in 1668 to the church at Horse-lie-down, Southwark where he remained for 36 years as pastor (1668-1704). This congregation later became the New Park Street Church and then moved to the Metropolitan Tabernacle under the pastorship of Charles Spurgeon. It was as representative of this church that Keach went to the 1689 General Assembly and subscribed the 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith. Keach was one of the seven men who sent out the invitation to the 1689 General Assembly. The signing of the confession was no mute doctrinal assent on the part of the church, for in the same year they entered into a Solemn Covenant which reflected, at the practical and congregational level, some of the doctrines of the confession. There was a secession from Horse-lie-down in 1673 and the Old Kent Road congregation was formed. Spurgeon later republished the 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith for use in the congregation.
Keach wrote 43 works, of which his “Parables and Metaphors of Scripture” may be the best known. He wrote a work entitled “The Child’s Instructor” which immediately brought him under persecution and he was fined and pilloried in 1664. He is attributed with the writing of a catechism commonly known as “Keach’s Catechism”, although it is most likely that the original was compiled by William Collins. (From The Digital Puritan)
Originally from Buckinghamshire, Keach worked as a tailor during his early years. He was baptized at the age of 15 and began preaching at 18. He was the minister of the congregation at Winslow before moving in 1668 to the church at Horse-lie-down, Southwark where he remained for 36 years as pastor (1668-1704). This congregation later became the New Park Street Church and then moved to the Metropolitan Tabernacle under the pastorship of Charles Spurgeon. It was as representative of this church that Keach went to the 1689 General Assembly and subscribed the 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith. Keach was one of the seven men who sent out the invitation to the 1689 General Assembly. The signing of the confession was no mute doctrinal assent on the part of the church, for in the same year they entered into a Solemn Covenant which reflected, at the practical and congregational level, some of the doctrines of the confession. There was a secession from Horse-lie-down in 1673 and the Old Kent Road congregation was formed. Spurgeon later republished the 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith for use in the congregation.
Keach wrote 43 works, of which his “Parables and Metaphors of Scripture” may be the best known. He wrote a work entitled “The Child’s Instructor” which immediately brought him under persecution and he was fined and pilloried in 1664. He is attributed with the writing of a catechism commonly known as “Keach’s Catechism”, although it is most likely that the original was compiled by William Collins. (From The Digital Puritan)
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 32 reviews
November 11, 2023
Very good book by one of the early Particular Baptist pastors on the nature and life of the church, especially the duties of officers to members and of Christians to each other.
July 15, 2023
Really good! Fairly easy to read and understand, perhaps down to the doctrinal clarity I’ve been blessed with at Church. I particularly enjoyed the emphasis on the duties of the congregation, as well as the biblical handling of Church discipline, sin, and repentance; something that is sadly lacking in churches today. Overall, a very convicting read that reinforces the necessity of order and structure for the sake of upholding the purity of Christ’s bride.
March 22, 2025
This is a good primer on church government. It reads much like a church constitution, with its focus on the conduct of pastors & church members. Therefore, this short book interacts often with the structure of church discipline, how we are to live at peace with one another, & how we are to conduct ourselves in the household of God, as we seek to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.
June 27, 2022
Classic and extremely important!
March 10, 2024
Why can’t your average Joe Christian explain what a church is today? Allow me to answer with a historical narrative.
In England during the seventeenth century, the Puritans arose as an informal movement concerned with the lack of purity in the Church of England. While the 39 Articles had formally brought a significant amount of right doctrine to the Church of England, practice throughout the country still retained large holdovers from Rome. When the Westminster Assembly was convened, it was commissioned to revise the 39 Articles in order to reform church polity. Despite the insistence of Congregationalists, Presbyterians had the day and eventually drafted a new document entirely, the Westminster Confession of Faith. At the same time, another unrepresented group was growing in England, namely Baptists. While this group found much agreement with Congregationalists, they disagreed as to what the Bible taught in regard to baptism. One of the leaders of these 17th Century Baptists was none other than Benjamin Keach. Keach with others taught against the pragmatism and tradition that defined Anglican church governance and order, and he instead insisted that God had prescribed a polity for church’s in His word. For roughly another two hundred years, Keach’s understanding was basic to Baptists.
Yet at the beginning of the twentieth century, things began to change. Modernism, otherwise known as Liberalism, was on the rise. In America, every large denomination with the exception of Southern Baptists would eventually split over the lines of Orthodox Christianity and the novel religion wearing the old Orthodox trappings. In the second half of the century with wars being waged over defending Evangelical Christianity from parasitic liberalism, something happened…at least I’m suggesting that it did. Secondary and tertiary doctrines became less important including the doctrine of the church. At the same time, churches and leaders like Robert Schuller, Bill Hybels, and Rick Warren offered new ways to “do church” that were designed to attract the masses. When Baptist evangelicals saw the apparent “success” of these “new measures“ (sorry, the ghost of Charles Finney just appeared), they un-discerningly embraced them as a method of conveying the historic faith in new modern vestments. Unfortunately now, like in Finney’s New England, what was once basic has been lost to a generation or generations not knowing a world in which such novelty didn’t exist in churches.
What then is there to be done? Return to God’s word? Absolutely. And maybe, read old books that witness to how former generations understood the Scriptures. A starting place (for church polity)? The First London Baptist Confession (1646) and Keach’s The Glory of a True Church (1697). Notice what Keach says about regenerate church membership, the assembling of the saints, church discipline, members responsibilities to one another and the elders, elders responsibility for members, and more. It may at times sound foreign to many churches, but it may sound peculiarly New Testament-y. So, “tolle lege.”
In England during the seventeenth century, the Puritans arose as an informal movement concerned with the lack of purity in the Church of England. While the 39 Articles had formally brought a significant amount of right doctrine to the Church of England, practice throughout the country still retained large holdovers from Rome. When the Westminster Assembly was convened, it was commissioned to revise the 39 Articles in order to reform church polity. Despite the insistence of Congregationalists, Presbyterians had the day and eventually drafted a new document entirely, the Westminster Confession of Faith. At the same time, another unrepresented group was growing in England, namely Baptists. While this group found much agreement with Congregationalists, they disagreed as to what the Bible taught in regard to baptism. One of the leaders of these 17th Century Baptists was none other than Benjamin Keach. Keach with others taught against the pragmatism and tradition that defined Anglican church governance and order, and he instead insisted that God had prescribed a polity for church’s in His word. For roughly another two hundred years, Keach’s understanding was basic to Baptists.
Yet at the beginning of the twentieth century, things began to change. Modernism, otherwise known as Liberalism, was on the rise. In America, every large denomination with the exception of Southern Baptists would eventually split over the lines of Orthodox Christianity and the novel religion wearing the old Orthodox trappings. In the second half of the century with wars being waged over defending Evangelical Christianity from parasitic liberalism, something happened…at least I’m suggesting that it did. Secondary and tertiary doctrines became less important including the doctrine of the church. At the same time, churches and leaders like Robert Schuller, Bill Hybels, and Rick Warren offered new ways to “do church” that were designed to attract the masses. When Baptist evangelicals saw the apparent “success” of these “new measures“ (sorry, the ghost of Charles Finney just appeared), they un-discerningly embraced them as a method of conveying the historic faith in new modern vestments. Unfortunately now, like in Finney’s New England, what was once basic has been lost to a generation or generations not knowing a world in which such novelty didn’t exist in churches.
What then is there to be done? Return to God’s word? Absolutely. And maybe, read old books that witness to how former generations understood the Scriptures. A starting place (for church polity)? The First London Baptist Confession (1646) and Keach’s The Glory of a True Church (1697). Notice what Keach says about regenerate church membership, the assembling of the saints, church discipline, members responsibilities to one another and the elders, elders responsibility for members, and more. It may at times sound foreign to many churches, but it may sound peculiarly New Testament-y. So, “tolle lege.”
May 26, 2023
Solid little book on the doctrine of the church and all therein.
Heavy Congregationalist emphasis, but to be expected with a solid particular Baptist such as Keach.
It was good to read in detail on the ‘causes of discord’ within the church in the section on Church discipline particularly. I found this helpful.
It is a great tragedy that the church today, indeed a good many conservative churches do not insist vigorously on church membership and enacting church discipline.
It seems that many men in ministerial positions do not know how to do so, and are too busy affirming sola scriptura and other glorious doctrines, to the complete neglect of the very gritty and practical need of church discipline.
Perhaps their tithes might drop, perhaps they might lose their reputation for winsomeness (topical just now), perhaps they would be perceived as tyrannical!
What folly and how sad this is. It is a necessity for the purity, beauty and glory of Christ’s bride.
Heavy Congregationalist emphasis, but to be expected with a solid particular Baptist such as Keach.
It was good to read in detail on the ‘causes of discord’ within the church in the section on Church discipline particularly. I found this helpful.
It is a great tragedy that the church today, indeed a good many conservative churches do not insist vigorously on church membership and enacting church discipline.
It seems that many men in ministerial positions do not know how to do so, and are too busy affirming sola scriptura and other glorious doctrines, to the complete neglect of the very gritty and practical need of church discipline.
Perhaps their tithes might drop, perhaps they might lose their reputation for winsomeness (topical just now), perhaps they would be perceived as tyrannical!
What folly and how sad this is. It is a necessity for the purity, beauty and glory of Christ’s bride.
April 22, 2023
Great little book on the church that was timely written during its day for the edification of many English Congregationalists and Baptists. Keach describes what a church is, how it ought to function, how it ought to disciple and discipline, and what it’s built on. This is a quick and easy read that’s worth the time.
June 3, 2024
Very helpful and convicting. Some excellent points on the duties of church members to one another and to their leaders, the practice of church discipline and the importance of maintaining the purity of the church. Definitely one I’ll come back to in the future for reminders of these important matters.
January 6, 2023
Great book on how church membership and discipline should happen in Christ’s church. Practical and easy to apply. A tad bit difficult to understand in the older language.
June 19, 2023
Great and challenging!
December 1, 2023
Very edifying short read
August 19, 2024
An interesting work on early Baptist polity. I found the discussion on church leadership helpful, but the majority of this book is dedicated to church discipline and the causes for such discipline. This makes for dry and at times perplexing reading. Gregory Wills shows historic Baptist fixation on church discipline and its decline in America after the civil war in his “Democratic Religion.” I am intrigued by the over fixation on discipline in this work. For example, telling people outside of the church about church meetings can be a cause for rebuke and discipline. One is also unable to leave a church unless granted permission by the church. Such practices are un-replicable today, and it’s understandable why many Baptists abandoned such rigorous discipline. All in all, it is an interesting work in the name of historical interest, but many readers may find some of his prescriptions extreme and even off-putting.
December 19, 2022
Keach is one of the most important figures in English Baptist history. He was one of the authors of 1689 London Baptist Confession, and the authors it The Baptist Catechism.
In this little book he lays out a very practical Particular Baptist ecclesiology. He offers a basic articulation of what a church is, how it ought to function, the duties of elders and members, the meaning and practice of church discipline, and the biblical pattern for maintaining peace and unity in the church.
I strongly recommend this book especially for young pastors and church planters. It stands head and shoulders above almost every popular book on the church that has been recently published. Definitely worth a pastors time to read this book.
June 17, 2023
A neat, tidy little timely book. This is a book that may/must be returned to, despite some of its concepts being completely alien to the modern church. Keach reminds his readers of the vital roles that each part plays in the glory of the church, and what those role look like. Though few in pages, each packs a dose of wisdom and Biblical truth. Recommend.
January 3, 2020
An excellent booklet from Benjamin Keach written in the 1600s. Baptists would do well to examine such old writings, particularly in the subject of discipline. He even covers some “new” questions like the question of the plurality of elders. Definitely recommended.
Read
January 15, 2023Good read
Very informative about how church should be done. It seems that in this day and time church is not anything but a social club. But in an earlier time, church was your life and there is a specific order to the keeping in it.
Very informative about how church should be done. It seems that in this day and time church is not anything but a social club. But in an earlier time, church was your life and there is a specific order to the keeping in it.
March 28, 2018
Concise look at the church through the lens of a Particular Baptist.
January 7, 2019
A wonderful and convicting book challenging how seriously you take your church membership. A must read for ever believer.
September 13, 2019
I could see this proving useful as a helpful supplement for the topic of Church Discipline and the purity of the church.
March 7, 2020
A good look at Baptist polity in the seventeenth century. Spoiler alert: he does mention dismembering people and loose livers. Probably not what you're thinking.
March 2, 2022
Excellent little book on Baptistic, congregationalist church polity.
September 13, 2023
This is the best primer on church polity I’ve ever read. I’d love to get every member of every church to read and and apply it.
February 10, 2024
This is a helpful introduction to Baptist polity. The old language has been updated and it's quite easy to read.
March 29, 2024
Simple and straightforward manual-like work for the church and church membership. It lays out good practices and ways in which the church should be overseen and cared for.
October 25, 2024
This good, short, but dense, book by Keach is a great example of what a properly ordered, godly, church is like.
March 9, 2025
As modest yet rich as it gets covering congregational Baptist ecclesiology.
September 17, 2025
Must have for any pastor. His advice and procedure on church discipline haven't aged.
September 27, 2024
Great little book on Baptist ecclesiology.
February 8, 2023
Read for Baptist History class and loved.
November 27, 2024
First reading: essential Baptist reading (09.22.23)
Good quote: "But tho a Church be rightly built in both these respects, i.e. of fit Matter and right Form, yet without a regular and orderly Discipline, it will soon lose its Beauty, and be polluted" (64).
Second reading (11.13.24)
"Public worship ought to be preferred before private" (43).
Good quote: "But tho a Church be rightly built in both these respects, i.e. of fit Matter and right Form, yet without a regular and orderly Discipline, it will soon lose its Beauty, and be polluted" (64).
Second reading (11.13.24)
"Public worship ought to be preferred before private" (43).
Displaying 1 - 30 of 32 reviews