Baptismal Regeneration

Baptismal Regeneration

A Sermon

(No. 573)

Delivered on Sunday Morning, June 5th, 1864, by the

Rev. C. H. SPURGEON,

At the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington

"And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel
to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved;
but he that believeth not shall be damned."–Mark 16:15-16.

IN the preceding verse our Lord Jesus Christ gives us some little
insight into the natural character of the apostles whom he selected to
be the first ministers of the Word. They were evidently men of like
passions with us, and needed to be rebuked even as we do. On the
occasion when our Lord sent forth the eleven to preach the gospel to
every creature, he "appeared unto them as they sat at meat, and
upbraided them with their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they
believed not them which had seen him after he was risen;" from which we
may surely gather that to peach the Word, the Lord was pleased to
choose imperfect men; men, too, who of themselves were very weak in the
grace of faith in which it was most important that they should excel.
Faith is the conquering grace, and is of all things the main requisite
in the preacher of the Word; and yet the honoured men who were chosen
to be the leaders of the divine crusade needed a rebuke concerning
their unbelief. Why was this? Why, my brethren, because the Lord has
ordained evermore that we should have this treasure in earthen vessels,
that the excellency of the power may be of God and not of us. If you
should find a perfect minister, then might the praise and honour of his
usefulness accrue to man; but God is frequently pleased to select for
eminent usefulness men evidently honest and sincere, but who have some
manifest infirmity by which all the glory is cast off from them and
laid upon Himself, and upon Himself alone. Let it never be supposed
that we who are God's ministers either excuse our faults or pretend to
perfection. We labour to walk in holiness, but we cannot claim to be
all that we wish to be. We do not base the claims of God's truth upon
the spotlessness of our characters, but upon the fact that it comes
from him. You have believed in spite of our infirmities, and not
because of our virtues; if, indeed, you had believed our word because
of our supposed perfection, your faith would stand in the excellency of
man and not in the power of God. We come unto you often with much
trembling, sorrowing over our follies and weaknesses, but we deliver to
you God's Word as God's Word, and we beseech you to receive it not as
coming from us poor, sinful mortals, but as proceeding from the Eternal
and Thrice Holy God; and if you so receive it, and by its own vital
force are moved and stirred up towards God and his ways, then is the
work of the Word sure work, which it could not and would not be if it
rested in any way upon man.

Our Lord having thus given us an insight into the character of the
persons whom he has chosen to proclaim his truth, then goes on to
deliver to the chosen champions, their commission for the Holy War. I
pray you mark the words with solemn care. He sums up in a few words the
whole of their work, and at the same time foretells the result of it,
telling them that some would doubtless believe and so be saved, and
some on the other hand would not believe and would most certainly,
therefore, be damned, that is, condemned for ever to the penalties of
God's wrath. The lines containing the commission of our ascended Lord
are certainly of the utmost importance, and demand devout attention and
implicit obedience, not only from all who aspire to the work of the
ministry, but also from all who hear the message of mercy. A clear
understanding of these words is absolutely necessary to our success in
our Master's work, for if we do not understand the commission it is not
at all likely that we shall discharge it aright. To alter these words
were more than impertinence, it would involve the crime of treason
against the authority of Christ and the best interests of the souls of
men. O for grace to be very jealous here.

Wherever the apostles went they met with obstacles to the preaching of
the gospel, and the more open and effectual was the door of utterance
the more numerous were the adversaries. These brave men who wielded the
sword of the Spirit as to put to flight all their foes; and this they
did not by craft and guile, but by making a direct cut at the error
which impeded them. Never did they dream for a moment of adapting the
gospel to the unhallowed tastes or prejudices of the people, but at
once directly and boldly they brought down with both their hands the
mighty sword of the Spirit upon the crown of the opposing error. This
morning, in the name of the Lord of Hosts, my Helper and Defense, I
shall attempt to do the same; and if I should provoke some
hostility–if I should through speaking what I believe to be the truth
lose the friendship of some and stir up the enmity of more, I cannot
help it. The burden of the Lord is upon me, and I must deliver my soul.
I have been loath enough to undertake the work, but I am forced to it
by an awful and overwhelming sense of solemn duty. As I am soon to
appear before my Master's bar, I will this day, if ever in my life,
bear my testimony for truth, and run all risks. I am content to be cast
out as evil if it must be so, but I cannot, I dare not, hold my peace.
The Lord knoweth I have nothing in my heart but the purest love to the
souls of those whom I feel imperatively called to rebuke sternly in the
Lord's name. Among my hearers and readers, a considerable number will
censure if not condemn me, but I cannot help it. If I forfeit your love
for truth's sake I am grieved for you, but I cannot, I dare not, do
otherwise. It is as much as my soul is worth to hold my peace any
longer, and whether you approve or not I must speak out. Did I ever
court your approbation? It is sweet to everyone to be applauded; but if
for the sake of the comforts of respectability and the smiles of men
any Christian minister shall keep back a part of his testimony, his
Master at the last shall require it at his hands. This day, standing in
the immediate presence of God, I shall speak honestly what I feel, as
the Holy Spirit shall enable me; and I shall leave the matter with you
to judge concerning it, as you will answer for that judgment at the
last great day.

I find that the great error which w e have to contend with throughout
England (and it is growing more and more), is one in direct opposition
to my text, well known to you as the doctrine of baptismal
regeneration. We will confront this dogma with the assertion, that
BAPTISM WITHOUT FAITH SAVES NO ONE. The text says, "He that believeth
and is baptized shall be saved;" but whether a man be baptized or no,
it asserts that "he that believeth not shall be damned:" so that
baptism does not save the unbeliever , nay, it does not in any degree
exempt him from the common doom of all the ungodly. He may have
baptism, or he may not have baptism, but if he believeth not, he shall
be in any case most surely damned. Let him be baptized by immersion or
sprinkling, in his infancy, or in his adult age, if he be not led to
put his trust in Jesus Christ–if he remaineth an unbeliever, then this
terrible doom is pronounced upon him–"He that believeth not shall be
damned." I am not aware that any Protestant Church in England teaches
the doctrine of baptismal regeneration except one, and that happens to
be the corporation which with none too much humility calls itself the
Church of England. This very powerful sect does not teach this doctrine
merely through a section of its ministers, who might charitably be
considered as evil branches of the vine, but it openly, boldly, and
plainly declares this doctrine in her own appointed standard, the Book
of Common Prayer, and that in words so express, that while language is
the channel of conveying intelligible sense, no process short of
violent wresting from their plain meaning can ever make them say
anything else.

Here are the words: we quote them from the Catechism which is intended
for the instruction of youth, and is naturally very plain and simple,
since it would be foolish to trouble the young with metaphysical
refinements. The child is asked its name, and then questioned, "Who
gave you this name?" "My godfathers and godmothers in my baptism;
wherein I was made a member of Christ, the child of God, and an
inheritor of the kingdom of heaven." Is not this definite and plain
enough? I prize the words for their candour; they could not speak more
plainly. Three times over the thing is put, lest there should be any
doubt in it. The word regeneration may, by some sort of juggling, be
made to mean something else, but here there can be no misunderstanding.
The child is not only made "a member of Christ"–union to Jesus is no
mean spiritual gift–but he is made in baptism "the child of God" also;
and, since the rule is, "if children then heirs," he is also made "an
inheritor of the kingdom of heaven." Nothing can be more plain. I
venture to say that while honesty remains on earth the meaning of these
words will not admit of dispute. It is clear as noon day that, as the
Rubric hath it, "Fathers, mothers, masters, and dames, are to cause
their children, servants, and apprentices," no matter how idle, giddy,
or wicked they may be, to learn the Catechism, and to say that in
baptism they were made members of Christ and children of God. The form
for the administration of this baptism is scarcely less plain and
outspoken, seeing that thanks are expressly returned unto Almighty God,
because the person baptized is regenerate. "Then shall the priest say,
Seeing now, dearly beloved brethren, that this child is regenerate and
grafted into the body of Christ's Church, let us give thanks unto
Almighty God for these benefits; and with one accord make our prayers
unto him, that this child may lead the rest of his life according to
this beginning.'" Nor is this all, for to leave no mistake, we have the
words of the thanksgiving prescribed, "Then shall the priest say, We
yield thee hearty thanks, most merciful Father, that it hath pleased
thee to regenerate this infant with thy Holy Spirit, to receive him for
thine own child by adoption, and to incorporate him into thy holy
Church.'"

This, then, is the clear and unmistakable teaching of a Church calling
itself Protestant. I am not now dealing at all with the question of
infant baptism: I have nothing to do with that this morning. I am now
considering the question of baptismal regeneration, whether in adults
or infants, or ascribed to sprinkling, pouring, or immersion. Here is a
Church which teaches every Lord's day in the Sunday-school, and should,
according to the Rubric, teach openly in the Church, all children that
they were made members of Christ, children of God, and inheritors of
the kingdom of heaven when they were baptized! Here is a professedly
Protestant Church, which, every time its minister goes to the font,
declares that every person there receiving baptism is there and then
"regenerated and grafted into the body of Christ's Church."

"But," I hear many good people exclaim, "there are many good clergymen
in the Church who do not believe in baptismal regeneration." To this my
answer is prompt. Why then do they belong to a Church which teaches
that doctrine in the plainest terms? I am told that many in the Church
of England preach against her own teaching. I know they do, and herein
I rejoice in their enlightenment, but I question, gravely question
their morality. To take oath that I sincerely assent and consent to a
doctrine which I do not believe, would to my conscience appear little
short of perjury, if not absolute downright perjury; but those who do
so must be judged by their own Lord. For me to take money for defending
what I do not believe–for me to take the money of a Church, and then
to preach against what are most evidently its doctrines–I say for me
to do this (I judge others as I would that they should judge me) for
me, or for any other simple, honest man to do so, were an atrocity so
great, that if I had perpetrated the deed, I should consider myself out
of the pale of truthfulness, honesty, and common morality. Sirs, when I
accepted the office of minister of this congregation, I looked to see
what were your articles of faith; if I had not believed them I should
not have accepted your call, and when I change my opinions, rest
assured that as an honest man I shall resign the office, for how could
I profess one thing in your declaration of faith, and quite another
thing in my own preaching? Would I accept your pay, and then stand up
every Sabbath-day and talk against the doctrines of your standards? For
clergymen to swear or say that they give their solemn assent and
consent to what they do not believe is one of the grossest pieces of
immorality perpetrated in England, and is most pestilential in its
influence, since it directly teaches men to lie whenever it seems
necessary to do so in order to get a living or increase their supposed
usefulness: it is in fact an open testimony from priestly lips that at
least in ecclesiastical matters falsehood may express truth, and truth
itself is a mere unimportant nonentity. I know of nothing more
calculated to debauch the public mind than a want of
straightforwardness in ministers; and when worldly men hear ministers
denouncing the very things which their own Prayer Book teaches, they
imagine that words have no meaning among ecclesiastics, and that vital
differences in religion are merely a matter of tweedle-dee and
tweedle-dum, and that it does not much matter what a man does believe
so long as he is charitable towards other people. If baptism does
regenerate people, let the fact be preached with a trumpet tongue, and
let no man be ashamed of his belief in it. If this be really their
creed, by all means let them have full liberty for its propagation. My
brethren, those are honest Churchmen in this matter who, subscribing to
the Prayer Book, believe in baptismal regeneration, and preach it
plainly. God forbid that we should censure those who believe that
baptism saves the soul, because they adhere to a Church which teaches
the same doctrine. So far they are honest men; and in England, where
else, let them never lack a full toleration. Let us oppose their
teaching by all Scriptural and intelligent means, but let us respect
their courage in plainly giving us their views. I hate their doctrine,
but I love their honesty; and as they speak but what they believe to be
true, let them speak it out, and the more clearly the better. Out with
it, sirs, be it what it may, but do let us know what you mean. For my
part, I love to stand foot to foot with an honest foeman. To open
warfare, bold and true hearts raise no objection but the ground of
quarrel; it is covert enmity which we have most cause to fear, and best
reason to loathe. That crafty kindness which inveigles me to sacrifice
principle is the serpent in the grass–deadly to the incautious
wayfarer. Where union and friendship are not cemented by truth, they
are an unhallowed confederacy. It is time that there should be an end
put to the flirtations of honest men with those who believe one way and
swear another. If men believe baptism works regeneration, let them say
so; but if they do not so believe it in their hearts , and yet
subscribe, and yet more, get their livings by subscribing to words
asserting it, let them find congenial associates among men who can
equivocate and shuffle, for honest men will neither ask nor accept
their friendship.

We ourselves are not dubious on this point, we protest that persons are
not saved by being baptized. In such an audience as this, I am almost
ashamed to go into the matter, because you surely know better than to
be misled. Nevertheless, for the good of others we will drive at it. We
hold that persons are not saved by baptism, for we think, first of all
that it seems out of character with the spiritual religion which Christ
came to teach, that he should make salvation depend upon mere ceremony.
Judaism might possibly absorb the ceremony by way of type into her
ordinances essential to eternal life; for it was religion of types and
shadows. The false religions of the heathen might inculcate salvation
by a physical process, but Jesus Christ claims for his faith that it is
purely spiritual, and how could he connect regeneration with a peculiar
application of aqueous fluid? I cannot see how it would be a spiritual
gospel, but I can see how it would be mechanical, if I were sent forth
to teach that the mere dropping of so many drops upon the brow, or even
the plunging a person in water could save the soul. This seems to me to
be the most mechanical religion now existing, and to be on a par with
the praying windmills of Thibet, or the climbing up and down of
Pilate's staircase to which Luther subjected himself in the days of his
darkness. The operation of water-baptism does not appear even to my
faith to touch the point involved in the regeneration of the soul. What
is the necessary connection between water and the overcoming of sin? I
cannot see any connection which can exist between sprinkling, or
immersion, and regeneration, so that the one shall necessarily be tied
to the other in the absence of faith. Used by faith, had God commanded
it, miracles might be wrought; but without faith or even consciousness,
as in the case of babes, how can spiritual benefits be connected
necessarily with the sprinkling of water? If this be your teaching,
that regeneration goes with baptism, I say it looks like the teaching
of a spurious Church, which has craftily invented a mechanical
salvation to deceive ignorant, sensual, and grovelling minds, rather
than the teaching of the most profoundly spiritual of all teachers, who
rebuked Scribes and Pharisees for regarding outward rites as more
important than inward grace.

But it strikes me that a more forcible argument is that the dogma is
not supported by facts. Are all persons who are baptized children of
God? Well, let us look at the divine family. Let us mark their
resemblance to their glorious Parent! Am I untruthful if I say that
thousands of those who were baptized in their infancy are now in our
goals? You can ascertain the fact if you please, by application to
prison authorities. Do you believe that these men, many of whom have
been living by plunder, felony, burglary, or forgery, are regenerate?
If so, the Lord deliver us from such regeneration. Are these villains
members of Christ? If so, Christ has sadly altered since the day when
he was holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners. Has he really
taken baptized drunkards and harlots to be members of his body? Do you
not revolt at the supposition? It is a well-known fact that baptized
persons have been hanged. Surely it can hardly be right to hang the
inheritors of the kingdom of heaven! Our sheriffs have much to answer
for when they officiate at the execution of the children of God, and
suspend the members of Christ on the gallows! What a detestable farce
is that which is transacted at the open grave, when "a dear brother"
who has died drunk is buried in a "sure and certain hope of the
resurrection of eternal life," and the prayer that "when we shall
depart this life we may rest in Christ, as our hope is that this our
brother doth." Here is a regenerate brother, who having defiled the
village by constant uncleanness and bestial drunkenness, died without a
sign of repentance, and yet the professed minister of God solemnly
accords him funeral rites which are denied to unbaptized innocents, and
puts the reprobate into the earth in "sure and certain hope of the
resurrection to eternal life." If old Rome in her worst days ever
perpetrated a grosser piece of imposture than this, I do no read things
aright; if it does not require a Luther to cry down this hypocrisy as
much as Popery ever did, then I do not even know that twice two make
four. Do we find–we who baptize on profession of faith, and baptize by
immersion in a way which is confessed to be correct, though not allowed
by some to be absolutely necessary to its validity–do we who baptize
in the name of the sacred Trinity as others do, do we find that baptism
regenerates? We do not. Neither in the righteous nor the wicked do we
find regeneration wrought by baptism. We have never met with one
believer, however instructed in divine things, who could trace his
regeneration to his baptism; and on the other hand, we confess it with
sorrow, but still with no surprise, that we have seen those whom we
have ourselves baptized, according to apostolic precedent, go back into
the world and wander into the foulest sin, and their baptism has
scarcely been so much as a restraint to them, because they have not
believed in the Lord Jesus Christ. Facts all show that whatever good
there may be in baptism, it certainly does not make a man "a member of
Christ, the child of God, and an inheritor of the kingdom of heaven,"
or else many thieves, whoremongers, drunkards, fornicators, and
murderers, are members of Christ, the children of God, and inheritors
of the kingdom of heaven. Facts, brethren, are against this Popish
doctrine; and facts are stubborn things.

Yet further, I am persuaded that the performance styled baptism by the
Prayer Book is not at all likely to regenerate and save. How is the
thing done? One is very curious to know when one hears of an operation
which makes men member s of Christ, children of God, and inheritors of
the kingdom of heaven, how the thing is done. It must in itself be a
holy thing truthful in all its details, and edifying in every portion.
Now, we will suppose we have a company gathered round the water, be it
more or less, and the process of regeneration is about to be performed.
We will suppose them all to be godly people. The clergyman officiating
is a profound believer in the Lord Jesus, and the father and mother are
exemplary Christians, and the godfathers and godmothers are all
gracious persons. We will suppose this–it is a supposition fraught
with charity, but it may be correct. What are these godly people
supposed to say? Let us look to the Prayer Book. The clergyman is
suppose to tell these people, "Ye have heard also that our Lord Jesus
Christ hath promised in his gospel to grant all these things that ye
have prayed for: which promise he, for his part, will most surely keep
and perform. Wherefore, after this promise made by Christ, this infant
must also faithfully, for his part, promise by you that are his
sureties (until he come of age to take it upon himself) that he will
renounce the devil and all his works, and constantly believe God's holy
Word, and obediently keep his commandments." This small child is to
promise to do this, or more truly others are to take upon themselves to
promise, and even vow that he shall do so. But we must not break the
quotation, and therefore let us return to the Book. "I demand
therefore, dost thou, in the name of this child, renounce the devil and
all his works, the vain pomp and glory of the world, with all covetous
desires of the same, and the carnal desires of the flesh, so that thou
wilt not follow, nor be led by them?" Answers "I renounce them all."
That is to say, on the name and behalf of this tender infant about to
be baptized, these godly people, these enlightened Christian people,
these who know better , who are not dupes, who know all the while that
they are promising impossibilities–renounce on behalf of this child
what they find it very hard to renounce for themselves–"all covetous
desires of the world and the carnal desires of the flesh, so that they
will not follow nor be led by them." How can they harden their faces to
utter such a false promise, such a mockery of renunciation before the
presence of the Father Almighty? Might not angels weep as they hear the
awful promise uttered? Then in the presence of high heaven they profess
on behalf of this child that he steadfastly believes the creed, when
they know, or might pretty shrewdly judge that the little creature is
not yet a steadfast believer in anything, much less in Christ's going
down into hell. Mark, they do not say merely that the babe shall
believe the creed, but they affirm that he does, for they answer in the
child's name, "All this I steadfastly believe. Not we steadfastly
believe," but I, the little baby there, unconscious of all their
professions and confessions of faith. In answer to the question, "Wilt
thou be baptized in this faith?" they reply for the infant, "That is my
desire." Surely the infant has no desire in the matter, or at the
least, no one has been authorized to declare any desires on his behalf.
But this is not all, for then these godly, intelligent people next
promise on the behalf of the infant, that "he shall obediently keep all
God's holy will and commandments, and walk in the same all the days of
his life." Now, I ask you, dear friends, you who know what true
religion means, can you walk in all God's holy commandments yourselves?
Dare you make this day a vow on your own part, that you would renounce
the devil and all his works, the pomps and vanities of this wicked
world, and all the sinful lusts of the flesh? Dare you, before God,
make such a promise as that? You desire such holiness, you earnestly
strive after it, but you look for it from God's promise, not from your
own. If you dare make such vows I doubt your knowledge of your own
hearts and of the spirituality of Gods's law. But even if you could do
this for yourself, would you venture to make such a promise for any
other person? For the best-born infant on earth? Come, brethren, what
say you? Is not your reply ready and plain? There is not room for two
opinions among men determined to observe truth in all their ways and
words . I can understand a simple, ignorant rustic, who has never
learned to read, doing all this at the command of a priest and under
the eye of a squire. I can even understand persons doing this when the
Reformation was in its dawn, and men had newly crept out of the
darkness of Popery; but I cannot understand gracious, godly people,
standing at the font to insult the all-gracious Father with vows and
promises framed upon a fiction, and involving practical falsehood. How
dare intelligent believer s in Christ to utter words which they know in
their conscience to be wickedly aside from truth? When I shall be able
to understand the process by which gracious men so accommodate their
consciences, even then I shall have a confirmed belief that the God of
truth never did and never will confirm a spiritual blessing of the
highest order in connection with the utterance of such false promises
and untruthful vows. My brethren, does it not strike you that
declarations so fictitious are not likely to be connected with a new
birth wrought by the Spirit of truth?

I have not done with this point, I must take another case, and suppose
the sponsors and others to be ungodly, and that is no hard supposition,
for in many cases we know that godfathers and parents have no more
thought of religion than that idolatrous hollowed stone around which
they gather. When these sinners have taken their places, what are they
about to say? Why, they are about to make the solemn vows I have
already recounted in your hearing! Totally irreligious they are, but
yet they promise for the baby what they never did, and never thought of
doing for themselves–they promise on behalf of this child, "that he
will renounce the devil and all his works, and constantly believe God's
holy Word, and obediently keep his commandments." My brethren, do not
think I speak severely here. Really I think there is something here to
make mockery for devils. Let every honest man lament, that ever God's
Church should tolerate such a thing as this, and that there should be
found gracious people who will feel grieved because I, in all kindness
of heart, rebuke the atrocity. Unregenerate sinners promising for a
poor babe that he shall keep all God's holy commandments which they
themselves wantonly break every day! How can anything but the
longsuffering of God endure this? What! not speak against it? The very
stones in the street might cry out against the infamy of wicked men and
women promising t hat another should renounce the devil and all his
works, while they themselves serve the devil and do his works with
greediness! As a climax to all this, I am asked to believe that God
accepts that wicked promise, and as the result of it, regenerates that
child. You cannot believe in regeneration by this operation, whether
saints or sinners are the performers. Take them to be godly, then they
are wrong for doing what their conscience must condemn; view them as
ungodly, and they are wrong for promising what they know they cannot
perform; and in neither case can God accept such worship, much less
infallibly append regeneration to such a baptism as this.

But you will say "Why do you cry out against it?" I cry out against it
because I believe that baptism does not save the soul, and that the
preaching of it has a wrong and evil influence upon men. We meet with
persons who, when we tell them that they must be born again, assure us
that they were born again when they were baptized. The number of these
persons is increasing, fearfully increasing, until all grades of
society are misled by this belief. How can any man stand up in his
pulpit and say Ye must be born again to his congregation, when he ha s
already assured them, by his own "unfeigned assent and consent" to it,
that they are themselves, every one of them, born again in baptism.
What is he to do with them? Why, my dear friends, the gospel then has
no voice; they have rammed this ceremony down its throat and it cannot
speak to rebuke sin. The man who has been baptized or sprinkled says,
"I am saved, I am a member of Christ, a child of God, and an inheritor
of the kingdom of heaven. Who are you, that you should rebuke me? Call
me to repentance? Call me to a new life? What better life can I have?
for I am a member of Christ–a part of Christ's body. What! rebuke me?
I am a child of God. Cannot you see it in my face? No matter what my
walk and conversation is, I am a child of God. Moreover, I am an
inheritor of the kingdom of heaven. It is true, I drink and swear, and
all that, but you know I am an inheritor of the kingdom of heaven, for
when I die , though I live in constant sin, you will put me in the
grave, and tell everybody that I died in sure and certain hope of the
resurrection to eternal life.'"

Now, what can be the influence of such preaching as this upon our
beloved England? Upon my dear and blessed country? What but the worst
of ills? If I loved her not, but loved myself most, I might be silent
here, but, loving England, I cannot and dare not; and having soon to
render an account before my God, whose servant I hope I am, I must free
myself from this evil as well as from every other, or else on my head
may be the doom of souls.

Here let me bring in another point. It is a most fearful fact, that in
no age since the Reformation has Popery made such fearful strides in
England as during the last few years. I had comfortably believed that
Popery was only feeding itself upon foreign subscriptions, upon a few
titled perverts, and imported monks and nuns. I dreamed that its
progress was not real. In fact, I have often smiled at the alarm of
many of my brethren at the progress of Popery. But, my dear friends, we
have been mistaken, grievously mistaken. If you will read a valuable
paper in the magazine called "Christian Work," those of you who are not
acquainted with it will be perfectly startled at its revelations. This
great city is now covered with a network of monks, and priests, and
sisters of mercy, and the conversions made are not by ones or twos, but
by scores, till England is being regarded as the most hopeful spot for
Romish missionary enterprise in the whole world; and at the present
moment there is not a mission which is succeeding to anything like the
extent which the English mission is. I covet not their money, I despise
their sophistries, but I marvel at the way in which they gain their
funds for the erection of their ecclesiastical buildings. It really is
an alarming matter to see so many of our countrymen going off to that
superstition which as a nation we once rejected, and which it was
supposed we should never again receive. Popery is making advances such
as you would never believe, though a spectator should tell it to you.
Close to your very doors, perhaps even in your own houses, you may have
evidence ere long of what a march Romanism is making. And to what is it
to be ascribed? I say, with every ground of probability, that there is
no marvel that Popery should increase when you have two things to make
it grow: first of all, the falsehood o f those who profess a faith
which they do not believe, which is quite contrary to the honesty of
the Romanist, who does through evil report and good report hold his
faith; and then you have, secondly, this form of error known as
baptismal regeneration, and commonly called Puseyism, which is not only
Puseyism, but Church-of-Englandism, because it is in the Prayer Book,
as plainly as words can express it–you have this baptismal
regeneration preparing stepping-stones to make it easy for men to go to
Rome. I have but to open my eyes a little to foresee Romanism rampant
everywhere in the future, since its germs are spreading everywhere in
the present. In one of our courts of legislature but last Tuesday, the
Lord Chief Justice showed his superstition, by speaking of "the risk of
the calamity of children dying unbaptized!" Among Dissenters you see a
veneration for structures, a modified belief in the sacredness of
places, which is idolatry; for to believe in the sacredness of anything
but of God and of his own Word, is to idolize, whether it is to believe
in the sacredness of the men, the priests, or in the sacredness of the
bricks and mortar, or of the fine linen, or what not, which you may use
in the worship of God. I see this coming up everywhere–a belief in
ceremony, a resting in ceremony, a veneration for altars, fonts, and
Churches–a veneration so profound that we must not venture upon a
remark, or straightway of sinners we are chief. Here is the essence and
soul of Popery, peeping up under the garb of a decent respect for
sacred things. It is impossible but that the Church of Rome must
spread, when we who are the watch-dogs of the fold are silent, and
others are gently and smoothly turfing the road, and making it as soft
and smooth as possible, that converts may travel down to the nethermost
hell of Popery. We want John Knox back again. Do not talk to me of mild
and gentle men, of soft manners and squeamish words, we want the fiery
Knox, and even though his vehemence should "ding our pulpits into
blads," it were well if he did but rouse our hearts to action. We want
Luther to tell men the truth unmistakably, in homely phrase. The velvet
has got into our ministers' mouths o f late, but we must unrobe
ourselves of soft raiment, and truth must be spoken, and nothing but
truth; for of all lies which have dragged millions down to hell, I look
upon this as being one of the most atrocious–that in a Protestant
Church there should be found those who swear that baptism saves the
soul. Call a man a Baptist, or a Presbyterian, or a Dissenter, or a
Churchman, that is nothing to me–if he says that baptism saves the
soul, out upon him, out upon him, he states what God n ever taught,
what the Bible never laid down, and what ought never to be maintained
by men who profess that the Bible, and the whole Bible, is the religion
of Protestants.

I have spoken thus much, and there will be some who will say–spoken
thus much bitterly. Very well, be it so. Physic is often bitter, but it
shall work well, and the physician is not bitter because his medicine
is so; or if he be accounted so, it will matter, so long as the patient
is cured; at all events, it is no business of the patient whether the
physician is bitter or not, his business is with his own soul's health.
There is the truth, and I have told it to you; and if there should be
one among you, or if there should be one among the readers of this
sermon when it is printed, who is resting on baptism, or resting upon
ceremonies of any sort, I do beseech you, shake off this venomous faith
into the fire as Paul did the viper which fastened on his hand. I pray
you do not rest on baptism.

"No outward forms can make you clean,

The leprosy lies deep within."

I do beseech you to remember that you must have a new heart and a right
spirit, and baptism cannot give you these. You must turn from your sins
and follow after Christ; you must have such a faith as shall make your
life holy and your speech devout, or else you have not the faith of
God's elect, and into God's kingdom you shall never come. I pray you
never rest upon this wretched and rotten foundation, this deceitful
invention of antichrist. O, may God save you from it, and bring you to
seek the true rock of refuge for weary souls.

I come with much brevity, and I hope with much earnestness, in the
second place, to say that FAITH IS THE INDISPENSABLE REQUISITE TO
SALVATION. "He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; he that
believeth not shall be damned." Faith is the one indispensable
requisite for salvation. This faith is the gift of God. It is the work
of the Holy Spirit. Some men believe not on Jesus; they believe not
because they are not of Christ's sheep, as he himself said unto them;
but his sheep hear his voice: he knows them and they follow him: he
gives to them eternal life, and they shall never perish, neither shall
any pluck them out of his hand. What is this believing? Believing
consists in two things; first there is an accrediting of the testimony
of God concerning his Son. God tells you that his Son came into the
world and was made flesh, that he lived upon earth for men's sake, that
after having spent his life in holiness he was offered up a
propitiation for sin, that upon the cross he there and then made
expiation–so made expiation for the sins of the world that Whosoever
believeth in him shall not perish, but have everlasting life. If you
would be saved, you must accredit this testimony which God gives
concerning his own Son. Having received this testimony, the next thing
is to confide in it–indeed here lies, I think, the essence of saving
faith, to rest yourself for eternal salvation upon the atonement and
the righteousness of Jesus Christ, to have done once for all with all
reliance upon feelings or upon doings, and to trust in Jesus Christ and
in what he did for your salvation.

This is faith, receiving of the truth of Christ: first knowing it to be
true, and then acting upon that belief. Such a faith as this–such real
faith as this makes the man henceforth hate sin. How can he love the
thing which made t he Saviour bleed? It makes him live in holiness. How
can he but seek to honour that God who has loved him so much as to give
his Son to die for him. This faith is spiritual in its nature and
effects; it operates upon the entire man; it changes his heart,
enlightens his judgment, and subdues his will; it subjects him to God's
supremacy, and makes him receive God's Word as a little child, willing
to receive the truth upon the ipse dixit of the divine One; it
sanctifies his intellect, and makes him willing to be taught God's
Word; it cleanses within; it makes clean the inside of the cup and
platter, and it beautifies without; it makes clean the exterior conduct
and the inner motive, so that the man, if his faith be true and real,
becomes henceforth another man to what he ever was before.

Now that such a faith as this should save the soul, is, I believe,
reasonable; yea, more, it is certain, for we have seen men saved by it
in this very house of prayer. We have seen the harlot lifted out of the
Stygian ditch of her sin, and made an honest woman; we have seen the
thief reclaimed; we have known the drunkard in hundreds of instances to
be sobered; we have observed faith to work such a change, that all the
neighbours who have seen it have gazed and admired, even though they
hated it; we have seen faith deliver men in the hour of temptation, and
help them to consecrate themselves and their substance to God; we have
seen, and hope still to see yet more widely, deeds of heroic
consecration to God and displays of witness-bearing against the common
current of the times, which have proved to us that faith does affect
the man, does save the soul. My hearers, if you would be saved, you
must believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. Let me urge you with all my
heart to look nowhere but to Christ crucified for your salvation. Oh!
if you rest upon any ceremony, though it be not baptism–if you rest
upon any other than Jesus Christ, you must perish, as surely as this
Book is true. I pray you believe not every spirit, but though I, or an
angel from heaven, preach any other doctrine than this, let him be
accursed, for this, and this alone, is the soul-saving truth which
shall regenerate the world–"He that believeth and is baptized shall be
saved." Away from all the tag-rags, wax candles, and millinery of
Puseyism! away from all the gorgeous pomp of Popery! away from the
fonts of Church-of-Englandism! we bid you turn your eyes to that naked
cross, where hangs as a bleeding man the Son of God.

"None but Jesus, none but Jesus

Can do helpless sinners good."

There is life in a look at the crucified; there is life at this moment
for you. Whoever among you can believe in the great love of God towards
man in Christ Jesus, you shall be saved. If you can believe that our
great Father desireth us to come to him–that he panteth for us–that
he calleth us every day with the loud voice of his Son's wounds; if you
can believe now that in Christ there is pardon for transgressions past,
and cleansing for years to come; if you can trust him to save you, you
have already the marks of regeneration. The work of salvation is
commenced in you, so far as the Spirit's work is concerned: it is
finished in you so far as Christ's work is concerned. O, I would plead
with you–lay hold on Jesus Christ. This is the foundation: build on
it. This is the rock of refuge: fly to it. I pray you fly to it now.
Life is short: time speeds with eagle's-wing. Swift as the dove pursued
by the hawk, fly, fly poor sinner, to God's dear Son; now touch the hem
of his garment; now look into that dear face, once marred with sorrows
for you; look into those eyes, once shedding tears for you. Trust him,
and if you find him false, then you must perish; but false you never
will find him while this word standeth true, "He that believeth and is
baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned."
God give us this vital, essential faith, without which there is no
salvation. Baptized, re-baptized, circumcised, confirmed, fed upon
sacraments, and buried in consecrated ground–ye shall all perish
except ye believe in him. The word is express and plain–he that
believeth not may plead his baptism, may plead anything he likes, "But
he that believeth not shall be damned;" for him there is nothing but
the wrath of God, the flames of hell, eternal perdition. So Christ
declares, and so must it be.

But now to close, there are some who say, "Ah! but baptism is in the
text; where do you put that?" That shall be another point, and then we
shall have done.

THE BAPTISM IN THE TEXT IS ONE EVIDENTLY CONNECTED WITH FAITH. "He that
believeth and is baptized shall be saved." It strikes me, there is no
supposition here, that anybody would be baptized who did not believe;
or, if there be such a supposition, it is very clearly laid down that
his baptism will be of no use to him, for he will be damned, baptized
or not, unless he believes. The baptism of the text seems to me–my
brethren, if you differ from me I am sorry for it, but I must hold my
opinion and out with it–it seems to me that baptism is connected with,
nay, directly follows belief. I would not insist too much upon the
order of the words, but for other reasons, I think that baptism should
follow believing. At any rate it effectually avoids the error we have
been combating. A man who knows that he is saved by believing in Christ
does not, when he is baptized, lift his baptism into a saving
ordinance. In fact, he is the very best protester against that mistake,
because he holds that he has no right to be baptized until he is saved.
He b ears a testimony against baptismal regeneration in his being
baptized as professedly an already regenerate person. Brethren, the
baptism here meant is a baptism connected with faith, and to this
baptism I will admit there is very much ascribed in Scripture. Into
that question I am not going; but I do find some very remarkable
passages in which baptism is spoken of very strongly. I find
this–"Arise, and be baptized, and wash away thy sins, calling on the
name of the Lord." I find as much as this elsewhere; I know that
believer's baptism itself does not wash away sin, yet it is so the
outward sign and emblem of it to the believer, that the thing visible
may be described as the thing signified. Just as our Saviour
said–"This is my body," when it was not his body, but bread; yet,
inasmuch as it represented his body, it was fair and right according to
the usage of language to say, "Take, eat, this is my body." And so,
inasmuch as baptism to the believer representeth the washing of sin–it
may be called the washing of sin–not that it is so, but that it is to
saved souls the outward symbol and representation of what is done by
the power of the Holy Spirit, in the man who believes in Christ.

What connection has this baptism with faith? I think it has just this,
baptism is the avowal of faith; the man was Christ's soldier, but now
in baptism he puts on his regimentals. The man believed in Christ, but
his faith remained between God an d his own soul. In baptism he says to
the baptizer, "I believe in Jesus Christ;" he says to the Church, "I
unite with you as a believer in the common truths of Christianity;" he
saith to the onlooker, "Whatever you may do, as for me, I will serve
the Lord." It is the avowal of his faith.

Next, we think baptism is also to the believer a testimony of his
faith; he does in baptism tell the world what he believes. "I am
about," saith he, "to be buried in water. I believe that the Son of God
was metaphorically baptized in suffering: I believe he was literally
dead and buried." To rise again out of the water sets forth to all men
that he believes in the resurrection of Christ. There is a showing
forth in the Lord's Supper of Christ's death, and there is a showing
forth in baptism of Christ's burial and resurrection. It is a type, a
sign, a symbol, a mirror to the world: a looking-glass in which
religion is as it were reflected. We say to the onlooker, when he asks
what is the meaning of this ordinance, "We mean to set forth our faith
that Christ was buried, and that he rose again from the dead, and we
avow this death and resurrection to be the ground of our trust."

Again, baptism is also Faith's taking her proper place. It is, or
should be one of her first acts of obedience. Reason looks at baptism,
and says, "Perhaps there is nothing in it; it cannot do me any good."
"True," says Faith, "and therefore will I observe it. If it did me some
good my selfishness would make me do it, but inasmuch as to my sense
there is no good in it, since I am bidden by my Lord thus to fulfil all
righteousness, it is my first public declaration that a thing which
looks to be unreasonable and seems to be unprofitable, being commanded
by God, is law, is law to me. If my Master had told me to pick up six
stones and lay them in a row I would do it, without demanding of him,
What good will it do?' Cui bono? is no fit question for soldiers of
Jesus. The very simplicity and apparent uselessness of the ordinance
should make the believer say, Therefore I do it because it becomes the
better test to me of my obedience to my Master.'" When you tell your
servant to do something, and he cannot comprehend it, if he turns round
and says, "Please, sir, what for?" you are quite clear that he hardly
understands the relation between master and servant. So when God tells
me to do a thing, if I say, "What for?" I cannot have taken the place
which Faith ought to occupy, which is that of simple obedience to
whatever the Lord hath said. Baptism is commanded, and Faith obeys
because it is commanded, and thus takes her proper place.

Once more, baptism is a refreshment to Faith. While we are made up of
body and soul as we are, we shall need some means by which the body
shall sometimes be stirred up to co-work with the soul. In the Lord's
Supper my faith is assisted by the outward and visible sign. In the
bread and in the wine I see no superstitious mystery, I see nothing but
bread and wine, but in that bread and wine I do see to my faith an
assistant. Through the sign my faith sees the thing signified. So in
baptism there is no mysterious efficacy in the baptistry or in the
water. We attach no reverence to the one or to the other, but we do see
in the water and in the baptism such an assistance as brings home to
our faith most manifestly our being buried with Christ, and our rising
again in newness of life with him. Explain baptism thus, dear friends,
and there is no fear of Popery rising out of it. Explain it thus, and
we cannot suppose any soul will be led to trust to it; but it takes it
s proper place among the ordinances of God's house. To lift it up in
the other way, and say men are saved by it–ah! my friends, how much of
mischief that one falsehood has done and may do, eternity alone will
disclose. Would to God another George Fox would spring up in all his
quaint simplicity and rude honesty to rebuke the idol-worship of this
age; to rail at their holy bricks and mortar, holy lecterns, holy
alters, holy surplices, right reverend fathers, and I know not what.
These things are not holy. God is holy; his truth is holy; holiness
belongs not to the carnal and the material, but to the spiritual. O
that a trumpet-tongue would cry out against the superstition of the
age. I cannot, as George Fox did, give up baptism and the Lord's
Supper, but I would infinitely sooner do it, counting it the smaller
mistake of the two than perpetrate and assist in perpetrating the
uplifting of baptism and the Lord's Supper out of their proper place. O
my beloved friends, the comrades of my struggles and witnessings, cling
to the salvation of faith, and abhor the salvation of priests. If I am
not mistaken, the day will come when we shall have to fight for a
simple spiritual religion far more than we do now. We have been
cultivating friendship with those who are either unscriptural in creed
or else dishonest, who either believe baptismal regeneration, or
profess that they do, and swear before God that they do when they do
not. The time is come when there shall be no more truce or parley
between God's servants and the time-servers. The time is come when
those who follow God must follow God, and those who try to trim and
dress themselves and find out a way which is pleasing to the flesh and
gentle to carnal desires, must go their way. A great winnowing time is
coming to God's saints, and we shall be clearer one of these days than
we now are from union with those who are upholding Popery, under the
pretence of teaching Protestantism. We shall be clear, I say, of those
who teach salvation by baptism, instead of salvation by the blood of
our blessed Master, Jesus Christ. O may the Lord gird up your loins.
Believe me, it is no trifle. It may be that on this ground Armageddon
shall be fought. Here shall come the great battle between Christ and
his saints on the one hand, and the world, and forms, and ceremonies,
on the other. If we are overcome here, there may be years of blood and
persecution, and tossing to and fro between darkness and light; but if
we are brave and bold, and flinch not here, but stand to God's truth,
the future of England may be bright and glorious. O for a truly
reformed Church in England, and a godly race to maintain it! The
world's future depends on it under God, for in proportion as truth is
marred at home, truth is maimed abroad. Out of any system which teaches
salvation by baptism must spring infidelity, an infidelity which the
false Church already seems willing to nourish and foster beneath her
wing. God save this favoured land from the brood of her own established
religion. Brethren, stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ has made
you free, and be not afraid of any sudden fear nor calamity when it
cometh, for he who trusteth to the Lord, mercy shall compass him about,
and he who is faithful to God and Christ shall hear it said at the
last, "Well done, good and faithful servant, enter thou into the joy of
the Lord." May the Lord bless this word for Christ's sake.

[Note.–Having been informed that the whole of the burial service is
not usually read at executions, I have, for the sake of fairness,
altered the passage upon page 318, although it strikes me that I might
justly have retained it, since the rubric of the Church and not the
practice of some of its ministers is that with which we must deal. The
rubric says, "The office ensuing is not to be used for any that die
unbaptized, or excommunicate, or have laid violent hands upon
themselves." The victim of our capital punishment is not by this rubric
shut out from the privileges (?) of the Anglican burial service, unless
his condemnation may be viewed as tantamount to excommunication, which
I can hardly think be the case, since many condemned persons receive
the sacrament. I have also altered an incorrect expression on page 316,
which has been pointed out to me by both friends and foes. May God
grant that the controversy which this sermon has commenced may lead to
the advancement of his truth, and the enlightenment of many.]