The church is also often compared in Scripture to a family. Can a child live in his father’s house without acknowledging his parent? May he receive the blessings of a mother’s love, and not acknowledge her to be his mother? May he pass her in the street without recognition, and then steal, under cover of the night, to be fed at her table and to be protected by her care? As every one feels that no child, with proper filial feelings, could hesitate to acknowledge his parents, so we may be assured that we are not the children of God, if we are afraid or ashamed to acknowledge him as our Father, and our obligations to honour and obey him.

It is still further to be considered that Christians are the worshippers of Christ. The apostle salutes the Corinthians as those who call upon the name of the Lord Jesus; and from the beginning, in Jerusalem and at Damascus, Christians were designated as those who called on the name of Christ.⁸ But what kind of a worshipper is he who is ashamed or afraid to acknowledge his God? All the relations, therefore, in which a Christian stands to Christ, as his king, as the head of the family of God and as the object of divine worship, involve the necessity of confessing him before men; and we practically reject him in all these relations by neglecting or refusing this public profession of him and his religion.

A moment’s consideration of the nature of the religion of Jesus Christ must convince us of the impossibility of being a secret Christian. Not the heart only, but the whole external deportment must be regulated by that religion. It forbids many things which the world allows; it enjoins many things which the world forbids. Obedience to its precepts of necessity includes a public profession; because such obedience draws a line of distinction between its disciples and the people of the world. This is one of the reasons why the people of God are called saints. They are distinguished, separated from others and consecrated to God. When they cease to be thus distinguished from those around them, they cease to be saints. If their inward temper and outward conduct do not mark them out as a peculiar people, they are not Christians. A city set on an hill cannot be hid. It cannot be that those who deny themselves and take up their cross and daily follow Christ; whose affections are set upon things above; who walk by faith and not by sight; who live unto God and keep themselves unspotted from the world, should not visibly differ from those whose spirit, principles and objects are all worldly. Nor is it possible that this difference should exist, without an avowal, on the part of the Christian, of the cause of it. He must appeal to the authority of Christ as the justification of his conduct, and, therefore, cannot live as a Christian without confessing Christ.

Besides the general temper and deportment required by the gospel, there are many specific duties enjoined by Christ which imply a public profession of his religion. The organization of his church as a visible society, supposes the separation of a people recognising his authority, and professing to act in obedience to his laws. The commission which he gave to his disciples was, that they should go into all the world, preaching his gospel, making disciples, baptizing them in his name, gathering them into distinct societies and appointing officers over them for conducting public worship and for the exercise of discipline. All this supposes that his followers should constitute a body publicly acknowledging him as their head, and confessing him as their Lord and Saviour before the world. How can a man keep the fact of his being a Christian a secret, when Christianity is, by its author, made to assume this visible, organized form? It is specially enjoined upon every believer to associate himself with the church, to assemble with his fellow Christians for public worship, and to unite with them in celebrating the Saviour’s death? If a Christian is one who obeys Christ, and if obedience includes those external acts which involve this public acknowledgment of him, then no man can be a Christian who does not make this acknowledgment.

There are few duties (and those founded on positive precepts) commanded in the word of God, which right feelings do not, of themselves, urge us to discharge. If we are required to forsake sin, to serve God, to love the brethren, to live for others rather than ourselves, to be instant in prayer, to join in the public and social worship of God; these are things in which the renewed heart instinctively delights. The external command guides and sanctions the performance; but the motive to obedience is not mere regard to authority. In like manner, while the public confession of Christ is enjoined in Scripture as a necessary duty, it is, at the same time, the spontaneous tribute of every Christian heart. If no subject requires to be urged to acknowledge a sovereign whom he loves; if no child needs to be commanded to confess a parent whom he reveres, much less does the believer need to be forced to confess the Saviour whom he regards as the brightness of the Father’s glory; to whom he feels indebted for redemption, and whom he hopes to worship and serve with saints and angels in heaven. It is not meant to be asserted that no believer is ever ashamed of Jesus; nor that under circumstances of peculiar trial he may not fear to acknowledge his truth or to assume his name. Peter once denied his master. But it is certainly true that no man can have right views of Christ and right feelings towards him, without habitually, openly and gladly acknowledging him as his God and Saviour. He will esteem the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures of Egypt, and choose rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season.

It is not difficult to understand the nature of the duty now under consideration. To confess Christ is to recognise his character and claims. It is to acknowledge that Jesus is the Christ. It is to admit the truth of the doctrines which he taught. It is to profess our allegiance to him as our Lord and Saviour. This confession must be public; it must be made before men; it must be made with the mouth, and not left to be inferred from the conduct. It should be remembered that this includes more than the mere assumption of the name Christian, in distinction from Pagan or Mahommedan. If men misconceive or misrepresent the character of Christ, a profession of such erroneous views is not the confession which he requires. To acknowledge Christ merely as a good man, or an inspired teacher, is in fact to deny him in his true character as the Son of God, as the propitiation for sin, as the only mediator and the sovereign Lord of the living and the dead. And to acknowledge the gospel merely as a code of morals, is to reject it as the revelation of the grace of God. The confession which is required is the public acknowledgment of Christ in his true character, and of his gospel in its real nature. It will not do to strip the gospel of every thing offensive to human pride and to acknowledge the rest. The very thing to be done is to take the shame of professing what is a scandal to the Jews and foolishness to the Greeks. It is to acknowledge our faith and confidence in a Saviour despised and rejected of men, and in doctrines which human reason can neither discover nor comprehend.

There are several ways in which this public confession is to be made. As already remarked there is a confession included in the obedience rendered to the commands of Christ. Obedience, therefore, is one form of confession, and can never be rendered without distinguishing those who yield it as the followers of Christ. Again, occasions frequently occur in which Christians are called upon to avow the truth, to defend it against gainsayers, to urge it upon those over whom they have influence or authority, or to give a reason of the hope that is in them, with meekness and fear. But the chief and most important mode of confession is attendance upon the ordinances of Baptism and the Lord’s supper. So much prominence is given to these institutions, in the word of God, that every Christian should have clear ideas of their nature and of his own duty in regard to them.

SECTION II. Baptism and the Lord’s Supper. The nature, design and efficacy of these ordinances.

That Baptism and the Lord’s supper, whatever other important ends they may be intended to serve, were appointed as a mode of publicly professing our faith in the gospel, is clearly taught in the Bible. The public participation of the rites of any religion is, in its nature, a profession of that religion. It is on this ground the apostle charges with idolatry the Corinthians who, within the precincts of the heathen temples, partook of the sacrifices offered to idols. I speak as to wise men, judge ye what I say. The participation of a Christian ordinance, is it not an act of Christian worship? The participation of a Jewish sacrifice, is it not an act of Jewish worship? and by parity of reasoning, is not the participation of a heathen ordinance an act of heathen worship? This is the purport of the apostle’s argument in 1 Cor. x. 15—21, and it is obviously founded on the admitted truth, that joining in the celebration of the ordinances of the gospel, is, from the nature of the act, a profession of the religion of Christ. The recipient thereby places himself in communion with the object of worship and with all his fellow-worshippers. For we being many are one bread and one body; for we are all partakers of one bread. Hence the apostle adds, Ye cannot drink of the cup of the Lord and of the cup of devils; ye cannot be partakers of the Lord’s table and the table of devils. It is impossible to be in communion with Christ and Satan at the same time, and, therefore, it is the grossest inconsistency to partake at the same time of the ordinances of Christ and of the sacrifices of devils. All this supposes that a participation of Christian ordinances is a profession of the Christian religion. When Christ commanded the apostles to make disciples, baptizing them, &c., he obviously intended that baptism should be a badge of discipleship, or that by that rite his followers should acknowledge their relation to him. This, indeed, is the prominent idea in the formula, To baptize in the name of any one. And hence Paul reminded the Corinthians that they were not his disciples or followers, by asking them, Were ye baptized in the name of Paul? It is, however, unnecessary to dwell upon this point, as it is universally conceded that the participation of the ordinances of the gospel is the appointed mode of confessing Christ before the world. As it is the duty of every Christian to confess Christ, and to confess him in this particular way, it is necessary to inquire more particularly into the nature and design of these ordinances. It has long been customary in the church to call these institutions sacraments. Little light, however, can be derived from the use of this term, because it is not a scriptural word, and because it is employed by ancient writers in a very comprehensive sense. As it comes from the word meaning to consecrate, any thing sacred was called a sacrament. The Romans applied the term to a sum of money deposited in the hands of the High Priest to abide the decision of a suit. They also called the oath by which soldiers consecrate themselves to the military service a sacrament; and in the Latin church, (whence we have borrowed the word), it was used as synonymous with mystery, not only as applied to things which had a hidden meaning, but in its wider sense as signifying what was undiscoverable by human reason. In this sense the Gospel itself, the calling of the Gentiles, the future conversion of the Jews are sacraments. It is not from a word of such latitude of meaning that the nature of the Christian ordinances can be learned; but, on the contrary, the Christian sense of the word must be determined from what the Scriptures teach concerning the ordinances to which the word is now applied.

They are, in the first place, rites of divine appointment, and not of human institution. When Christ was about to ascend into heaven, he said, Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost; teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you; and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world. The rite of baptism was, therefore, instituted by Christ, and is to be continued as long as there are disciples to be made, even unto the end of the world. And on the night in which he was betrayed, he instituted the Lord’s supper, saying, This do in remembrance of me, with the command that it should be observed until he comes. The New Testament furnishes abundant evidence that the apostles enjoined, both by precept and example, the observance of these ordinances, agreeably to the Saviour’s directions. No rite, therefore, is a sacrament in the Christian sense of the term, which is not a matter of divine appointment, and of perpetual obligation.

In the second place, the Bible teaches us that the sacraments are the signs of spiritual blessings. They are designed by outward, significant actions, to represent inward, spiritual gifts. The great blessing offered in the Gospel is union with Christ, and the consequent participation of his merits and spirit, by which we are freed from the condemnation and pollution of sin. And this is the blessing which baptism and the Lord’s supper are designed to represent. Hence it is said, As many as have been baptized into Christ, have put on Christ; which implies union with him.⁹ Believers are said to be baptized into one body.¹⁰ That is, by baptism they are constituted one body; but they are one body only in virtue of their union with their common head. Know ye not, asks the apostle, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ, were baptized into his death? i. e. so as to be united with him in his death.¹¹ As union with Christ is the great blessing signified by baptism, and as pardon and sanctification are the consequences of that union, this ordinance is also represented as symbolizing these two great blessings of the covenant of grace. Thus on the day of Pentecost, Peter said to the people, Repent, and be baptized every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of sins.¹² And Ananias said to Paul, Arise and be baptized, and wash away thy sins, calling on the name of the Lord.¹³ In many similar passages the reference of baptism to pardon is very clearly expressed.

No less clear is its intended significancy of sanctification. This is plainly taught in the passages from the epistles to the Galatians and Romans, quoted above, in which baptism is declared to represent our union with Christ, and our death to sin and our living unto God. And in the epistle to Titus,¹⁴ it is called “the washing of regeneration;” and in the epistle to the Ephesians,¹⁵ Christ is said to sanctify his church “with the washing of water by the word.” It need hardly be remarked that the ordinance is appropriately significant of these great truths. Water is the common means of purification. Both the guilt and pollution of sin, are represented in Scripture as a defilement, and hence they are said to be washed away by the blood and Spirit of Christ. It is this two-fold purification that is so appropriately represented by the ordinance in question.

The same truths, under a different aspect, are exhibited in the Lord’s supper. That the bread represents the body of Christ, and the wine his blood, is expressly declared by our Saviour when he said, “This is my body, this is my blood.” And by our participation of the bread and wine, our participation of that of which they are the symbols, is clearly represented. The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ? For we being many are one bread, and one body, for we are all partakers of that one bread.¹⁶ Here, as in the passage quoted above in reference to baptism, believers are declared to be one body, because by partaking of the Lord’s supper their communion with the Lord Jesus is expressed. These ordinances, therefore, though in different ways, set forth the same great truth. They are both divinely appointed symbols of our union with Christ, and of our participation of the benefits which flow from his mediation and death.

We should greatly err, however, if we supposed they were merely signs. We are taught that they are seals; that they were appointed by Christ to certify to believers their interest in the blessings of the covenant of grace. Among men a seal is used for the purpose of authentication and confirmation. It is intended to assure the party concerned that the document to which it is attached, is genuine and binding. In condescension to our weakness, God has been pleased not only to promise pardon and purity to believers, but to appoint these ordinances as seals of his promises. The simple assurance given to Noah that the earth should not a second time be destroyed by a deluge, might have been a sufficient foundation for confidence; but God saw fit to appoint the rainbow to be a perpetual confirmation of his covenant; and throughout all generations when that bow appears, men feel that it is not merely a sign of the returning sun, but a divinely appointed pledge of the promise of God. In like manner God willing more abundantly to show unto his people the immutability of his promise, has confirmed it by these seals, which are designed to assure the believer that as certainly as he receives the signs of the blessings of the covenant, he shall receive the blessings themselves.

That these ordinances were really intended to confirm the promises of God, is plain from the fact that Paul says that circumcision was the seal of the righteousness of faith; that is, it was designed to assure Abraham and his descendants that God would regard and treat as righteous all who believed his words. And that something similar is intimated by the ordinance of baptism, may be inferred from the manner in which the apostle speaks of the spiritual import of circumcision, and then of baptism, in Col. ii. 10. 12. And in reference to the Lord’s supper, the Saviour said, This cup is the New Testament in my blood; that is, the new covenant was ratified by his blood. Of that blood the cup is the appointed memorial, and it is, therefore, at the same time, the memorial and confirmation of the covenant itself; it is the assurance to us that God has promised the blessings of that covenant to all believers. Baptism and the Lord’s supper are, therefore, visible pledges or confirmations of the fact that Christ has died, that his death has been accepted as a propitiation for sin, and that God, for his sake, will grant pardon, sanctification and eternal life to all them that believe.

If, however, the sacraments are seals on the part of God, the reception of them implies a voluntary engagement on the part of the Christian to devote himself to the service of Christ. The gospel is represented under the form of a covenant. It is so called by Christ himself. But a covenant implies mutual stipulations. God promises to his people pardon and salvation; in his strength, they promise faith and obedience. The sacraments are the seals of this covenant. God, in their appointment, binds himself to the performance of his promise; his people, by receiving them, bind themselves to trust and serve him. This idea is included in the representation given in Romans vi. 3, 4, where believers are said to have been buried with Christ in baptism, that as he rose from the dead, they also should walk in newness of life. It is included also in the very formula of baptism; for to be baptized in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, implies a voluntary dedication of ourselves to God, as our Father, Redeemer and Sanctifier. The same thing is taught in all the passages in which a participation of Christian ordinances, is said to include a profession of the gospel; for the gospel imposes duties as well as promises blessings.

It is probably in this view of these ordinances that the name, sacraments, was so generally applied to them. For as the oath by which the soldier consecrated himself to the military service, was called a sacrament, so the ordinances in which the believer binds himself to the service of Christ, was appropriately designated by the same term. The phrase sacramental host is, therefore, not inaptly applied to the people of God, considered as a great multitude, who have solemnly bound themselves by sacraments to live to his glory.

Baptism and the Lord’s supper being ordinances of divine appointment and perpetual obligation, designed to distinguish the followers of Christ from the world; to exhibit the truths of the gospel; to seal to believers the divine promises, and to bring them into covenant with God, the interesting question arises, What good do they do? What benefits are we authorized to expect from them? The answer commonly given to this question by the great body of evangelical Christians is, that the sacraments are efficacious means of grace, not merely exhibiting to, but actually conferring upon those who worthily receive them, the benefits which they represent. As they are divinely appointed to set forth Christ and his benefits, and to assure the believer of his interest therein, they have, even as moral means, a powerful influence to confirm his faith, to excite his gratitude and love, and to open the fountains both of penitence and joy. But as the word of God has not only its own moral influence, as truth, in the sanctification of the soul, but also, when attended by the demonstration of the Spirit, a divine and effectual power; so the sacraments have not only the influence due to the lively exhibition of truth, but as means of God’s appointment, and attended by his Spirit, they become efficacious signs of grace, communicating what they signify. Nothing less than this can satisfy the strong language of the Scriptures on this subject, or the experience of God’s people. When the Christian, in the exercise of faith, sees in the water of baptism the lively emblem of the purifying influence of the blood and Spirit of Christ, and in the bread and wine the memorials of the Saviour’s death, and knows that they are appointed to be a pledge of the salvation of all believers, he receives Christ, in receiving the appointed symbols of his grace; he receives anew the forgiveness of his sins; he enters into fellowship with God, and his soul is filled with the Holy Ghost. Hence it is that believers so often find their strength renewed, their faith confirmed, their purposes invigorated, their hearts filled with joy and love, while attending on these ordinances.

As the efficacy of the sacraments is a subject of great practical importance, it is necessary to examine more particularly what the Scriptures teach on this subject. Baptism is called the washing of regeneration; it is said to unite us to Christ,¹⁷ to make us partakers of his death and life,¹⁸ to wash away our sins,¹⁹ to save the soul.²⁰ The bread and wine, in the Lord’s supper, are said to be the body and blood of Christ; to partake of these emblems, is said to secure union with Christ and a participation of the merits of his death.²¹ These and similar passages must be understood either with or without limitation. If they are to be limited, the limitation must not be arbitrarily imposed, but supplied by the Scriptures themselves. We have no right to say that the sacraments confer these benefits in every case in which no moral impediment is interposed, because no such limitation is expressed in the passages themselves, nor elsewhere taught in the Scriptures. The limitation which the Scriptures do impose on these passages is the necessity of faith. They teach that the sacraments are thus efficacious, not to every recipient, but to the believer; to those who already have the grace which these ordinances represent. If it be asked how they can be said to confer the grace which is already possessed? let it be remembered that he who has been sprinkled with the blood of Christ, needs the application to be often repeated; he who has received the Holy Spirit needs to receive him again; he who has received Christ needs to receive him day by day that he may live upon him. That the Scriptures teach that the passages in question are to be understood with the qualification just stated, is clear because otherwise they would teach that every one who is baptized is a child of God, renewed by the Holy Spirit, united to Christ and made a partaker of the saving benefits of his death. But this cannot be true, first, because the Bible abundantly teaches that those who are renewed and receive the Holy Spirit, have the fruits of the spirit, love, gentleness, goodness, and faith. Where these are not, there the Spirit is not. But these fruits do not uniformly, nor even generally attend the reception of the outward ordinance. We know that although Simon Magus was baptized, he remained in the gall of bitterness and in the bond of iniquity. We know, from Paul’s epistles, that many of the baptized Galatians and Corinthians were the enemies of the cross of Christ. We know from our own daily observation that multitudes of those who are baptized and received to the Lord’s supper, do not differ in temper or life from the world around them. God, therefore, in the actual administration of his kingdom, contradicts that interpretation of his word which makes it teach that the sacraments always confer the benefits which they represent. It is to degrade the renewing of the heart and the gift of the Holy Ghost, into things of no account, to represent them as the portion of the unholy multitudes who in every age and church have been admitted to baptism and the Lord’s supper.

In the second place this interpretation is opposed to what the Scriptures elsewhere teach of the nature of sacraments. The opinion that such ordinances uniformly convey grace and introduce the recipient into favour with God, was one of those false doctrines of the Jews which Paul so earnestly combatted. Great is the virtue of circumcision for no circumcised person enters hell, was the confident and destructive persuasion of the formalists of that age. In opposition to this doctrine, the apostle assured them that circumcision would, indeed, profit them, if they kept the law; but if they broke the law, their circumcision became uncircumcision. For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh; but he is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter.²² We have here a very explicit statement of the nature and efficacy of a sacrament. It has no efficacy in itself considered; its value depends on the presence or performance of the condition of the covenant to which it is attached. If the Jews kept the law, their circumcision secured to them all the blessings of the covenant under which they lived. But if they broke the law, their circumcision was of no avail. It was, therefore, not external circumcision that made a man a Jew; but the circumcision of the heart, of which the external rite was the sign. In like manner it is not external baptism that makes a man a Christian, but the baptism of the Spirit, of which the washing with water is the appointed symbol. The two are not necessarily connected, and where the latter is wanting, the former can be of no avail. And, lest it should be supposed that we have no right to apply what is said of the sacraments of the old dispensation to those of the new, the very same doctrine is taught in reference to the New Testament sacraments themselves. The apostle Peter says, We are saved by water; not ordinary water, but by baptism; not mere external baptism, however, but by the sincere turning of the heart to God, that is, by the inward change of which baptism is the outward sign.²³ This passage, in its doctrinal import, is precisely parallel to that referring to circumcision just quoted. Neither rite, therefore, necessarily conveyed the grace of which they were the signs, and to neither is any value ascribed apart from the spiritual change which they are appointed to represent. In like manner, in reference to the Lord’s supper, the apostle teaches that, so far from the mere external act being necessarily connected with the reception of the benefits of Christ’s death, those who ate and drank unworthily, ate and drank judgment to themselves. Nothing, indeed, can be more opposed to the whole spirit of the religion of the Bible, than the doctrine that external rites are necessarily connected with spiritual blessings; that the favour of God is to be obtained by mere unresisting submission to religious ceremonies. A man may be baptized, or circumcised on the eighth day, he may belong to the purest and most apostolic church, he may be blameless as touching all the external prescriptions of the Gospel, and still be destitute of the grace of God and unprepared for his presence. It is not by works of righteousness, much less by ceremonial observances, that we are to be saved, but by the righteousness of Christ and the renewing of the Holy Ghost. He is not a Christian who is one outwardly, nor is that baptism which is outward in the flesh; but he is a Christian who is one inwardly, and the baptism which is unto salvation, is of the heart, in the spirit and not in the letter.

In the third place, that the sacraments are not designed to convey grace to those who have it not, is plain because the Scriptures require those who are admitted to these ordinances to make a profession of their faith and repentance. When the apostles began to preach, we are told that, Those that gladly received the word were baptized.²⁴ When the eunuch desired to be baptized, Philip said to him, if thou believest with all thy heart, thou mayest.²⁵ Cornelius did not receive the Holy Spirit, in the first instance by baptism, but when Peter had evidence that he had already received the Spirit, he asked, Can any man forbid water, that these should not be baptized, which have received the Holy Ghost as well as we?²⁶ Paul was a penitent believer before his baptism; and thus in all other cases when men were baptized, they professed to be Christians. They were not made Christians by their admission to the sacraments; but their Christian character or standing was thereby acknowledged. It has accordingly been the custom in all ages to require a profession of faith on the part of those who are received to sealing ordinances. But faith is an exercise of a renewed heart; and if faith supposes regeneration, and baptism supposes faith, then by the voice of the church as well as of Scripture, baptism also supposes the renovation of the heart.

Finally, God bears his testimony against the doctrine which teaches an inseparable connexion between these ordinances and spiritual blessings, by granting these blessings to those who have not received any sacramental rite. Abraham was justified before he was circumcised; Cornelius was a just man, and accepted of God, and a recipient of the Holy Ghost, before he was baptized; the penitent thief was assured of his admission into paradise though he was never born of water. If then the Scriptures require the evidence of regeneration in those who would acceptably attend upon the sacraments; if they teach that many who receive the outward sign do not receive the inward grace; and on the other hand, that many receive the inward grace, who have not received the outward sign, then do they also teach that these ordinances are not appointed to convey, in the first instance, pardon and sanctification, but to be signs and seals of these blessings to the penitent believer, and that to him, and to him only are they efficacious means of grace.

It is, therefore, obvious that those passages in Scripture which refer our salvation to baptism and the Lord’s supper cannot, consistently with the plain teaching of the Bible, be understood strictly according to the letter. At the same time it must not be supposed that they are to be perverted, or taken in any other than their natural sense; that is, in any other sense than that which the universally received rules of interpretation justify and require. It is agreeable to the common language of men and to the usage of the Scriptures, that when any declaration or service is the appointed means of professing faith and obedience, making such declaration or performing such service is said to secure the blessings which are promised to the faith thereby professed. It is said, whosoever confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is born of God; and again, with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. This is said because confession implies faith; and no one supposes that an insincere, careless, heartless confession will secure the salvation of any man. Thus also we are said to be saved by calling on the Lord, because invocation implies trust. In like manner we are said to be saved by baptism, because baptism implies faith. If this faith be wanting, baptism can do us no more good than a heartless confession. There is no more difficulty in understanding why the Scriptures should connect salvation with the use of the sacraments, than in understanding why they should connect the same blessing with invocation or confession. There is no difficulty in either case, if we allow the Scriptures to explain themselves, and interpret them as we explain all other writings.

Again, it is according to scriptural usage to ascribe to a sign the name and attributes of the thing signified. Thus circumcision is called the covenant of God, because it was the sign of that covenant. Christ called the cup the new covenant; the wine he called his blood and the bread his body. Those who partake of the wine are, therefore, said to receive his blood, and of course the benefits which it purchased.

It is to be remembered, also, that the sacraments are seals, and that it is common to attribute to any ceremony, by which an engagement is ratified, the efficacy which belongs not to the ceremony, but to the engagement itself. The ceremonial of inauguration is said to induct a man into the office, the right to which it merely publicly declares and confirms. Even in the strict language of the law, a deed, with its signature and seal, is said to convey a right of property, although it is simply the evidence of the purpose of the original possessor. It is that purpose which conveys the right, and if it can be shown that the man who holds the deed was not the man intended by the grantor, the deed would be regarded as worthless. If a man deeds an estate to A, on the assumption that he is the son of B, should it be proved that A was not the son of B, the deed would convey to him no valid title. But the blessings of the Gospel are declared to be intended for penitent believers; the sacraments are the external means of recognising the conveyance of these blessings; to those who are really what they profess to be, they do in fact convey and secure these blessings; to others they confer no such benefits. When an unbeliever receives these ordinances, he no more obtains a title to the blessings which they represent, than a man obtains a title to an estate by falsely assuming the name of the person for whom it is intended.

There is nothing, therefore, in the language of the Scriptures on this subject which is not perfectly consistent with the common protestant doctrine that the sacraments have no inherent efficacy of their own, but become efficacious means of grace to those who believe; the Holy Spirit thereby communicating to believers the blessings of which those ordinances are the significant representations.

SECTION III.

Obligation to attend upon the Sacraments. Qualifications for the proper discharge of the duty.

The obligation which rests upon all Christians to attend upon the ordinances of Baptism and the Lord’s supper, arises clearly from what has been shown to be their nature and design. We have seen that they are institutions appointed by Christ himself. He has commanded all his followers to be baptized and to commemorate his death, in a prescribed manner. As obedience to Christ is necessary, so is a participation of these ordinances. As, however, it is a necessity arising out of a positive command, it is a qualified necessity, since such commands are not binding under all circumstances. It is impossible that a sinner should be saved without faith and repentance; but it is not impossible that he should be saved without the sacraments. As we are bound to keep the sabbath as part of our obedience to God, and yet may innocently labour on that day when necessity or mercy requires it; so although bound to present ourselves at the table of the Lord as an act of obedience, we may be innocently absent, whenever that absence is not the effect of a wilful or disobedient spirit. As, however, the command of Christ on this subject is express, the obligation which it imposes is of the strongest character.

In the second place, it has been shown that to confess Christ before men is an indispensable duty, and that the sacraments are the appointed means for making this confession; it follows, therefore, that attendance on the sacraments is also an indispensable duty. When in human governments the laws prescribe a particular mode in which we are to acknowledge allegiance to our country, it is not competent for us to neglect that mode; nor have we a right to adopt a different method of acknowledgment, or to suffer our allegiance to be inferred from our conduct. If we wish to be recognised as citizens, we must in the prescribed form acknowledge ourselves such. And if Christ has prescribed a particular way in which he will be acknowledged by his followers, intelligently and wilfully to refuse obedience to his command, is to renounce our allegiance to him and to forfeit the benefits of his kingdom.

Again, as the sacraments are the seals of the covenant of grace, to reject these seals is to reject the covenant itself. It is not meant that they are in such a sense indispensable that if a man perform the conditions of the covenant, he will be excluded from its benefits, for the want of the seals. Among men, indeed, we often see that the want of the prescribed number of witnesses to a signature, the want of a seal, or even a clerical error in a document, is sufficient to set aside a solemn engagement. Nothing of this kind can occur under the government of God, where justice is never embarrassed by technical formalities. The apostle expressly teaches that as circumcision becomes uncircumcision, if the law be broken, so, on the other hand, if a man keep the law, his uncircumcision shall be counted for circumcision. It is admitted, therefore, that if a man has the faith, repentance and obedience required by the gospel, his salvation is secure. But no man has a right to assume that he has this faith and repentance, who neglects to obey the commands of Christ. The essential conditions of salvation have been the same under every dispensation. If any man, under the old economy, had the faith of Abraham, he was entitled to the blessings promised to Abraham. Nevertheless, as circumcision was the appointed means of expressing that faith, and of accepting the covenant of which it was the condition, it was expressly declared, that the uncircumcised man-child, whose flesh of his foreskin is not circumcised, that soul shall be cut off from his people; he hath broken my covenant.²⁷ Is it not equally true that those who intelligibly and wilfully neglect baptism and the Lord’s supper, break the covenant under which the church is now placed? It will not do for us to say, if we have the substance, the form is of little account. We all know that if an ancient Israelite had repentance toward God and faith in the promised Messiah, his sins were forgiven; and yet unless he expressed his faith by bringing the appointed sacrifice to the altar, he was not forgiven. God saw fit that the mode of pardon should be thus exhibited and recognised. In like manner he now requires that the method of salvation should be publicly acknowledged and set forth in the ordinances of baptism and the Lord’s supper. We do, therefore, as really reject the covenant of God by neglecting these ordinances, as did the Israelites who rejected circumcision or the offering of sacrifices.

Another illustration of this subject may be borrowed from the marriage contract. The essence of the covenant is the mutual consent of parties. But in all civilized countries some public manifestation of that consent is essential to the validity of the engagement. Thus, also, the essence of our covenant with God is repentance and faith; but baptism and the Lord’s supper being the divinely appointed means of signifying and ratifying the engagement, they can no more be neglected than the public recognition of the marriage covenant.

It was a fatal perversion when the Jews imagined that circumcision and sacrifices without faith and obedience, were effectual to salvation, and it is no less a fatal delusion to imagine that baptism and the Lord’s supper without those inward graces can secure the favour of God. But in avoiding one extreme, we must not run into the opposite. Though the ancient sacrifices without faith were an abomination to the Lord; the sacrifices were still, by divine appointment, necessary; and although the Christian ordinances, without the grace which they represent, are empty forms, they too by divine appointment are obligatory and, in their place, essential.

No Christian, however, needs to be forced by stress of authority to yield obedience to the commands of Christ. It is enough for him that it is the will of his Saviour that the truths and blessings of the Gospel should be exhibited and commemorated by the perpetual observance of the ordinances of baptism and the Lord’s supper. Though he were unable to see any fitness in such observance, or though experience taught him nothing of its value, yet would he cheerfully obey. Much more may he be expected to yield a ready obedience, when he knows both from Scripture and experience, that these ordinances are made to the believer the channels of divine blessings; that they are means of grace and sources of the purest spiritual enjoyments; that they bring him into communion with Christ and unite him in holy fellowship with all his brethren. He knows that to neglect these divine institutions is not only to violate a command of God and to break his covenant; it is to refuse to be fed at his table and to reject the provision which he has made for the life of our souls.

If the sacraments are such important means of grace, and if attendance upon them is a duty so plainly enjoined in the word of God, it is important to enquire what are the proper qualifications for the acceptable discharge of this duty.

In considering this subject we must not confound the qualifications which the church has a right to demand of those who present themselves as candidates for Christian communion, with those which such candidates are bound to seek in themselves. The church cannot judge the heart; she can only require a credible profession. It is her duty to explain the nature of the gospel, with its promises and commands, and to state clearly what is the nature of the service in which those engage, who profess to embrace the offers of salvation. Those who, when thus instructed, declare that they accept the offers of divine mercy, and purpose to live in obedience to the divine commands, she receives into communion, unless there be some tangible evidence of the insincerity of their professions. This she does, not because she judges them to be true Christians, but because they possess the qualifications which alone she has a right to demand. No priest under the old dispensation ever ventured to debar a man from the altar, because in his own mind, he might judge him to be destitute of the faith and penitence implied in the act of presenting a sacrifice. If the offerer had the external qualifications prescribed by the law, he was admitted. To Him who searches the heart, it was left to decide upon his spiritual state. Thus also, under the gospel dispensation, we find the apostles baptizing and admitting to the Lord’s supper all who made the requisite profession and against whom no visible evidence of insincerity could be produced. Whatever was considered a sufficient reason for excommunicating a church member, was of course regarded as sufficient to exclude an applicant for admission. It is of importance to remember that the church does not profess to believe all those to be true Christians, whom she admits to her communion. Of their inward sincerity she cannot judge; to their own master they must stand or fall. Many are no doubt confirmed in a false judgment of themselves, because they consider their admission to the church to be an expression of the judgment of their pastor, or brethren, that they are what they profess to be. It is natural for them to think well of themselves, when they consider experienced Christians as pronouncing a favourable judgment of their spiritual state. But they should remember that it is not the prerogative of the church to judge the heart; she must receive all who have the external qualifications which the Scriptures require.

But though the church is obliged to confine her demands to a credible profession of faith and repentance, it is the duty of those who seek admission to her communion, to see that they have all the qualifications which the nature of the service demands. These qualifications may all be reduced to knowledge and piety.

Did the Scriptures teach that the sacraments had an inherent efficacy of their own; that the water of baptism had power to wash away sin, and the bread and wine a virtue to sustain spiritual life, then indeed they might be administered to the ignorant, the insensible, or the dying. But if we are taught that the efficacy both of the word and ordinances depends not on them, nor on those who administer them, but on the Holy Spirit, revealing and applying the truth thereby exhibited, then it is plain that they must be understood in order to be beneficial. It is one of the most important doctrines of the Bible that God sanctifies his people through the truth. But truth is not truth to him who does not understand it. If you repeat to an ignorant man a mathematical formula, although it may contain a proposition of the highest value, to him it is nothing. It communicates no idea to his mind, and can produce no effect upon it. Or if you tell him that God has set forth his Son to be a propitiation for our sins through faith in his blood; if he does not understand the meaning of the words, it is as though he never heard them. We, therefore, do not preach in an unknown tongue; nor do we send Hebrew Bibles to the Hindoos, or the Greek Scriptures to the Hottentots. Unless the truth is understood, it is not present to the mind, and cannot operate upon it. In like manner, unless the sacraments are understood by those who receive them, they are, for them, an unmeaning ceremony. They either exhibit nothing, or they excite erroneous views and apprehensions. We degrade the Scriptures into formulas of incantation, and the sacraments into magical rites, if we suppose a knowledge of their meaning to be unnecessary. God is a Spirit, and they who worship him must worship him in spirit—intelligently as well as sincerely and inwardly. It is, therefore, essential to a proper attendance on the sacraments that we should know what they are designed to represent, what benefits they confer and what obligations they impose. When they are thus understood; when the believer sees in them the clear exhibition of the truths and promises of the gospel, and knows that they were appointed to be the means of his confessing Christ before men, and to ratify the gracious covenant of God with his soul, he then really receives the spiritual blessings of which the sacraments are the outward signs.

The knowledge requisite to a proper understanding of the sacraments includes a knowledge of all the essential doctrines of the Gospel. When a man is baptized in the name of the Father, of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, unless these sacred names represent to his mind some definite idea; unless he knows them to be the names of the persons of the Godhead, he cannot know what he does in submitting to be baptized. He does not acknowledge Jehovah; nor does he receive him as his covenant God, Redeemer and Sanctifier. As baptism is designed to signify and seal our union with Christ, and our deliverance through him from the guilt and dominion of sin, unless we know ourselves to be sinners, and know that it is necessary for us to be united to Christ, and by his blood and Spirit, to be pardoned and renewed, the ordinance for us loses all its significancy. Thus a knowledge of the truth concerning God, concerning sin, atonement and regeneration is essential to a proper participation of this ordinance. And as the Lord’s supper is intended to be a memorial of the death of Christ, unless we know who he was, why he died and what benefits his death secures, we are incapable of profitably joining in this service. All the affections must have an appropriate object. If we love, we love something; if we fear, we fear something; if we desire, we desire something. There can be neither faith, nor love, nor penitence, nor hope, nor gratitude, but as objects suited to these exercises are present to the mind; and the nature of these exercises depends upon the nature of the objects which call them forth. If they are excited by the truth, they are right and good; and just in proportion to the clearness with which the truth is spiritually discerned, will be the purity and strength of the religious emotions. Knowledge, therefore, is essential to religion.

We must not suppose, however, that knowledge and learning are synonymous terms, or that all knowledge is derived from without, through the medium of the understanding. Very far from it. A large part of our knowledge is derived from our own consciousness or inward experience. The same external revelation may be presented to two equally intelligent men; if the one is made, by the Spirit of God, to feel in accordance with the truth, and the other is destitute of such feelings, the former will possess a knowledge of which the latter has no conception. He will have an insight into the nature of the things revealed, and into their truth and value, which is due entirely to what passes within his own bosom. These men, although they may be equal in learning, will differ greatly in knowledge. We accordingly find that the ignorant, among God’s people, have often far more knowledge of religious truth, than many learned men. They have more correct views of its nature; and the words by which it is expressed excite in their minds far more definite conceptions of the real objects of the religious affections. As, however, God does not reveal new truths, but sanctifies his people by his word, there must be external instruction in order to this inward spiritual knowledge; hence ignorance of the truths revealed in the Scriptures, as it is inconsistent with the existence of right religious feeling, or in other words, with religion itself, so it is inconsistent with the proper participation of those ordinances by which those truths are set forth and confirmed.

The other qualifications for an acceptable participation of the sacraments are naturally suggested by the view given of their nature. As they are the appointed means for making a public profession of religion, it is of course requisite that we should be and believe what we therein profess. The substance of this profession is that we are Christians; that we believe in Christ as the Redeemer of sinners; that we accept of the terms of salvation proposed in the Gospel and purpose to live in obedience to its commands. If we have not this faith; if we do not thus purpose to renounce our sins and live unto God, then do we make a false profession, and our service must be unacceptable to God.

Viewing the sacraments as seals of the covenant of grace, it is plain that they require the qualifications just mentioned in those who receive them. That covenant relates to deliverance from sin. God therein engages to grant us salvation; and we engage to accept of his mercy on the terms on which it is offered. If he promises to be our God; we promise to be his people. But how can those who love sin and are determined not to forsake it, enter into this solemn engagement with God? How can those who have no sense of their need of pardon, no desire for holiness, no sorrow for past transgressions, thus covenant with God for forgiveness, sanctification and eternal life?

With regard to the Lord’s supper we are taught that it was specially designed to be a memorial of Christ’s death. If we join in celebrating his death, we profess to believe not only that he died, but that he was all that he claimed to be; that his death secures the benefits which the Scriptures attribute to it; and that we are bound to aid in keeping this great event in perpetual remembrance. The proper discharge of this duty requires that we should have a due sense of our obligations to Christ for having loved us and given himself for us. It requires that we should reverence and love him in some measure in proportion to his excellence and the value of the blessings which we receive from him. It requires that we should be prepared to own him, who by wicked hands was crucified and slain, as our Lord and Saviour, and as such to obey and trust him.

In whatever light, therefore, the sacraments are viewed, whether as the means of publicly confessing Christ, or as signs and seals of spiritual blessings, or as commemorative of the work of redemption, no man can profitably, or acceptably attend upon them, without adequate knowledge of their nature, without faith in the truths which they represent and confirm, or without the penitence, gratitude and love which those truths, when really believed, necessarily produce. Where this knowledge, faith and love are found, there are the requisite qualifications for acceptable attendance on the sacraments; where they are wanting, such attendance must include false professions and insincere promises.

We must not, however, suppose that the want of these qualifications frees us from the obligation to obey the command of Christ to be baptized and to commemorate his death. We are certainly bound to worship God though destitute of the reverence, faith and love which such worship requires; and the plea of unfitness for the service cannot justify us in absenting ourselves from the ordinances which Christ has appointed. If we fear to assume the responsibility of a public profession of religion, we should remember that we make such profession every time we join in the public worship of the sanctuary. If we say we should offend God by approaching his table, without due preparation, let us remember that we offend him every time we pray, or hear the gospel without faith, penitence and obedience. It is in vain to attempt to introduce consistency into a half religious life. If men will renounce all claim to be of the number of God’s people, and reject his service entirely, they may so far be consistent. But they cannot choose one part of his service and reject another; they cannot profess to be penitent and believing by joining in the worship of God, and declare themselves impenitent and unbelieving by absenting themselves from the sacraments. They do not place themselves on neutral ground by such inconsistency. Their only safe and proper course is to repent and believe. Then will they be acceptable worshippers and acceptable communicants. If they frequent the temple of God with a sincere desire to do his will, and seek his favour, let them, in the same state of mind, obey all his commands. If they come to the Lord’s table to please Christ, to obey his will, to express their gratitude for his death, let them come. As their day is, so shall their strength be.

From the review of this whole subject, it is clear that the public confession of Christ is an indispensable condition of discipleship; that this confession must be made by attending on the ordinances which he has appointed; that these ordinances are not only the signs and seals of spiritual blessings, but are made, by the Holy Spirit, to the believer, effectual means of grace; that attendance upon them is, therefore, an indispensable duty, requiring no other qualifications than such as are necessary for the acceptable worship of God; and, consequently that it is incumbent on all those who sincerely desire to serve and honour Christ, and to partake of his salvation, to receive the sacraments, in obedience to his will.

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Footnotes

1. Mark x. 32. ↩

2. Mark viii. 38. ↩

3. 2 Tim. i. 8. ↩

4. 2 Tim. ii. 12. ↩

5. Rom. x. 9, 10. ↩

6. Mark xvi. 16. ↩

7. Acts ii. 38. ↩

8. Acts ix. 14, 21. ↩

9. Gal. iii. 27. ↩

10. 1 Cor. xii. 13. ↩

11. Rom. vi. 2. ↩

12. Acts ii. 38. ↩

13. Acts xxii. 16. ↩

14. Titus iii. 5. ↩

15. Eph. v. 26. ↩

16. 1 Cor. x. 16, 17. ↩

17. Gal. iii. 27. ↩

18. Rom. vi. 4, 5. ↩

19. Acts xxii. 16. ↩

20. 1 Pet. iii. 21. ↩

21. 1 Cor. x. 16, 17. ↩

22. Rom. ii. 25—29. ↩

23. 1 Pet. iii. 21. ↩

24. Acts ii. 41. ↩

25. Acts viii. 37. ↩

26. Acts x. 47. ↩

27. Gen. xvii. 14. ↩