---
title: 'Samuel Miller on the Ministerial Authority of Christian Pastors'
type: post
author: 'R. Andrew Myers'
date: 2023-10-13
url: https://confessional.org/blog/2023-samuel-miller-on-the-ministerial-authority-of-christian-pastors
---

# Samuel Miller on the Ministerial Authority of Christian Pastors

“It is the glory of our system as Protestants, that we regard the Bible as ‘the only infallible rule of faith and practice;’ that we consider the authority of those who bear the sacred office as wholly *ministerial*; that is, that they are authorized to declare nothing but what the Master has said; to dispense nothing but what He has instituted; and, in judicial decisions, to apply no laws but those which he has promulged for the government of his spiritual family.” — [**Samuel Miller**](/authors/samuel-miller), *The Sacred Office Magnified* (1836), p. 17