master of the family.  Such, in the Hebrew phrase, are said to be over the house, Gen. xliii. 18; Isa. xxii. 15; 2 Kings xviii. 18:  and the keys of the house are committed to them as a badge of their power.  So that when God threatens to put Shebna out of his office in the king’s house, and to place Eliakim, son of Hilkiah, in his room, he saith, “I will commit thy government into his hand—­and the key of the house of David will I lay upon his shoulder,” Isa. xxii. 21, 22, parallel of that phrase, “and the government shall be upon his shoulder,” Isa. ix. 6.  Hence, as key is in the Old Testament used for stewardly power and government, Isa. xxii. 21, 22; (only twice properly, Judges iii. 25; 1 Chron. ix. 27;) so in the New Testament, key is always used, metaphorically, to denote power, and that about ecclesiasticals or spirituals, viz. in Matt. xvi. 19; Luke xi. 52; Rev. i. 18, and iii. 7, and ix. 1, and xx. 1.  So that keys, &c., are metaphorically the ordinances which Christ hath instituted, to be dispensed in his church, preaching the word, administrations of the seals and censures:  for it is not said key, but keys, which comprehendeth them all:  by the right use of which both the gates of the Church here, and of heaven hereafter, are opened or shut to believers or unbelievers; and Christ promising or giving these keys to Peter and the apostles, and their successors to the end of the world, Matt. xxviii. 20, doth intrust and invest them with power and authority of dispensing these ordinances for this end, and so makes them stewards in his house of the mysteries of God, 1 Cor. iv. 1, so that we may conclude: 

Conclusion.  Therefore the church guides are the immediate subject and receptacle of that ecclesiastical power, and of the exercise thereof.

Argum.  II.  Jesus Christ our Mediator did institute ecclesiastical offices for church government under the New Testament before any Christian Church under the New Testament was gathered or constituted.  Therefore those persons that were intrusted with those offices must needs be the first and immediate receptacle or subject of the power of the keys.  Thus we may argue: 

Major.  All those whose ecclesiastical offices for church government, under the New Testament, were instituted by Christ, before any formal visible Christian Church was gathered or constituted, are the first and immediate receptacle or subject of the power of the keys from Jesus Christ.

Minor.  But the ecclesiastical offices of Christ’s own officers for governing of the Church, now under the New Testament, were instituted by Christ before any formal visible Christian Church was gathered or constituted.

Conclusion.  Therefore Christ’s own officers for governing of the Church now under the New Testament are the first and immediate receptacle or subject of the keys from Jesus Christ.