Bertha and Her Baptism
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Nehemiah Adams >> Bertha and Her Baptism
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"'What doth hinder me to be baptized?' you would properly say to me," I
continued. "'O,' my reply could be, 'the water is not in an available
shape. Had we time to scoop out a tank in the earth, or make a stone
baptistery in the rock, then you might be 'buried with him by baptism
into death.' But it is impossible. This living fountain of waters in the
mountain, full and overflowing though it be, does not allow of Christian
baptism. Besides, as to suitable apparel, and all the necessary
arrangements for comfort, not to say propriety,--you see that baptism,
here is out of the question.'"
"Do you think," said Mrs. Blair, "that the Head of the church has
appointed any such invariable mode of administering baptism,--one that
cannot be applied in numerous cases?"
I said to her, "I cannot believe it. The genius of Christianity seems
opposed to it. Let all who will, use immersion; we love them still, and
rejoice in their liberty, but I cannot agree that it was the New
Testament method. Even had it been, I should expect that the rule would
be flexible enough to meet cases of necessity."
"I was thinking," said Mr. Blair, "that, at least, four fifths of all
the people of God have gone to heaven unbaptized, if immersion is the
only valid mode of baptism. This is rather a serious thing, if the
solemn words, 'He that believeth, and is baptized, shall be saved,' look
only to baptism by immersion. It seems to me," he added, "that the
providence of God would have brought in some great reformation from so
calamitous an error in the church, if it were an error. Some Luther, or
Calvin, or Knox, or some John Baptist, would have been raised up, as in
other emergencies, to bring the church back to her duty."
"How clearly," said I, "does that seem to prove that all the people of
God have, as Paul says, 'One Lord, one faith, one baptism,' however
variant their modes of worship and administration may be."
"How many baptized children, from Christian families," said my wife,
"are gathered together in heaven! I cannot think of them as the
unfortunate subjects of a superstitious or corrupt observance, at the
hands of the ministers of Jesus, in all ages of the world. There must
seem to them, as they increase in knowledge, a beautiful fitness in
their having had those adorable names inscribed upon them, with God's
own initiatory seal of his covenant. What loving-kindness it must appear
to them, that God gave them the ordinance of baptism, and became their
God! How it will stand out before their minds as a principal
illustration of being saved by grace!"
"And then, again," said Mr. Blair, "think of the millions of children in
heaven who were not baptized,--saved, the most of them, from heathen and
pagan lands. How 'the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ,
hath abounded unto many.' Baptism is not an austere law. There is
nothing austere or rigid, in any sense, connected with it; but it makes
me think of the water itself, scattered in so many beautiful and pliable
forms all over the earth, in fountains, water-falls, dew, rain-drops;
and, when it cannot 'stand before His cold,' it comes down softly upon
us, in crystal asteroids and all the geometrical forms of snow. I love
to think that God has associated that beautiful element, the water, with
religion. And now it does not seem accordant with the works and ways of
Him, of whom we say, 'How great is his goodness, how great is his
beauty,' to make one obdurate mode of bringing the water in connection
with us essential to an ordinance, whose element seems everywhere to
shun preciseness."
"Water is certainly a beautiful emblem of open communion," said one of
the ladies. "It must be conscious, one would think, of violence done to
its ubiquitous nature, to be made the occasion of separating beloved
friends, at the Table whose symbolized Blood has made them one in
Christ."
But we had to part. I told them that my wife and I would certainly be
sponsors for little Philip, in the best sense; we would make a record of
its history, thus far, among our family memorials; tell our children
about him, and charge them in after life to inquire for him, and lose no
opportunity of doing him good. Though, as to that, I could not help
saying, no one knows in this world who will be benefactor or
beneficiary.
"Our children will always be interested in each other," said his wife,
"for their parents' sake."
"Can we not sing a hymn?" said the husband.
We found that our voices made a quartet. Susan was ready with her
beautiful contralto, Mrs. Blair sung the soprano, Mr. Blair the tenor,
and I the base.
THE BAPTISMAL HYMN.
"Lord, what our ears have heard,
Our eyes delighted trace--
Thy love, in long succession shown,
To Zion's chosen race.
"Our children thou dost claim,
And mark them out for thine;
Ten thousand blessings to thy name
For goodness so divine.
"Thee, let the fathers own,
And thee, the sons adore,
Joined to the Lord in solemn vows,
To be forgot no more.
"Thy covenant may they keep,
And bless the happy bands
Which closer still engage their hearts,
To honor thy commands.
"How great thy mercies, Lord!
How plenteous is thy grace!
Which, in the promise of thy love,
Includes our rising race.
"Our offspring, still thy care,
Shall own their fathers' God;
To latest times thy blessings share,
And sound thy praise abroad."
We saw them and their baggage on board the wagon that was to take them
over to the river; we waved our farewell, and sent our kisses; and, just
as they were turning a corner which hid them from our view, the father
stood up in the wagon, and held little Philip as high as he could (the
mother, of course, reaching up her arms to hold them both fast), as
though to catch the last benediction. The long, flowing white dress of
the child gave the picture a waving, vanishing effect, reminding us of
our first sight of the cascade, which, with the whole transaction to
which it gave occasion, has taken a permanent place in our sleeping and
waking dreams.
Chapter Ninth.
THE CHILDREN OF THE CHURCH.
Go, now, ye that are men, and serve the Lord.--PHARAOH.
We will go with our young, and with our old, with our sons, and with our
daughters.--MOSES.
Hosanna to the Son of David.--THE CHILDREN IN THE TEMPLE.
The children of thy servants shall continue, and their seed shall be
established before thee.--PSALM 102:28.
The reader will now be introduced, in imagination, to a seat in the
window of a country parsonage, with honeysuckle-vines trained over an
arched lattice-work that spans the window. There are several large
maples in the yard, which is a grass-plot, where six gentlemen are
enjoying pleasant conversation, and are seated at their ease, some in
chairs, and the rest on a sofa, which, at the suggestion of a kind lady,
they had lifted from its place in the parlor to the yard.
They are all of them pastors of churches, met, for social intercourse
and friendly counsel, at the house of one of their number, with their
wives, who are also together by themselves, in a pleasant room on the
north side of the house, and into whose sayings and doings these
husbands will, no doubt, be disposed to make, in due time, suitable
inquiry.
Those wonderful little elves, the humming-birds, are frequent visitors
to those honeysuckles, under which I have placed my reader to be a
listener. How many vibrations those little wings make in a minute, how
so long a bill can have subtractive force sufficient to get anything
from the flower, how, when obtained, that product is conveyed to the
throat, and where these creatures build their nests, and whither they
migrate, are questions which will, perhaps, divert attention from
everything else for a time, especially if the reader has escaped for a
season from a large city, and is one of those who there "dwell in
courts." Perhaps, therefore, he will choose to refresh himself, in
silent contemplation, in this arbor; and I will make true report of all
that transpires in the yard.
One of these pastors, Mr. A., has been reading to his brethren, for
their judgment as to the soundness of his views, a sermon, not yet
preached, on the relation of baptized children to the church. We will
call him, and two of the ministers who agreed with his views, by their
initials, respectively, which consisted of the first three letters of
the alphabet; while the three who dissented from them had, as initials
to their names, letters remote from these. Neither Messrs. A., B., and
C., nor Messrs. R., S., and T., had had any previous concert or
comparison of views on this interesting subject; but they found
themselves thus arrayed on different sides of the question.
Omitting the sermon that gave occasion to the discussion which follows,
a few lines only will put us in possession of the whole subject. I give
the opening paragraph:
"It is held by all who practise infant baptism, that the children of
believers have a peculiar relation to the church. That relation is very
generally expressed by the word membership. We have treatises, by the
most orthodox divines, on the church-membership of the children of
believers; which children they freely call members of the Christian
church; and, in catechisms and confessions of faith, the church of
Christ is declared to consist of such as are in covenant relations with
God, and their offspring."
The sermon being finished, Mr. R. was first called upon by the chairman,
Mr. C., for his remarks. The question, as stated by the chairman, was,
Are the children of believers, in any sense, members of the church? If
so, what is it? and, if not, what relation to the church do they
sustain?
_Mr. R._ I presume that brother A. does not wish us to take up time with
criticisms upon his style. He seeks to know our views with regard to the
subject of the sermon. I am compelled to say, at once, that I differ
from the views expressed by the reader, if he means by the terms,
_members_ and _membership_, which he employs, all which they would
convey to the majority of hearers. But I noticed that when he, and those
excellent men whom he quotes, come to define what they mean by members,
and membership, in this connection, they make explanations, and
qualifications, and also protestations, showing that no one can be, in
their view, a member of the spiritual, or, what is called the invisible,
church of Christ, without repentance and faith. Rightly understood,
therefore, they are free from any just imputation of making unscriptural
terms of membership in the kingdom of Christ. And, perhaps, when those
of us who dissent from some of their propositions, fully understand the
limitations which the writers themselves affix to their use of terms, no
great discrepancy will be found to exist.
It admits of a question, therefore, in my view, whether the terms
_members_ and _membership_, as applied to children, really mean that
which these writers themselves intend to convey by them; for certainly
they do not mean all which their readers at first suppose. The terms in
question require a great deal of explanation, which a term, if possible,
ought never to need. And, after all has been said, a wrong impression is
conveyed to the minds of many, while opponents gain undue advantage in
arguing against that which, for substance, all the friends of infant
baptism cordially maintain.
If Br. A. is asked, "In what sense are children members of the church,"
he resorts, for illustration, to citizenship, and to the sisterhood in
the church itself, to show how children and females may be members of
the community, and, in the case of females, may belong to the church,
while yet their privileges and functions are limited. So, he says, the
children of believers are a component part of God's church, not entitled
to the use of all its privileges till they are renewed by the Spirit of
God, yet so related by the sovereign appointment of God to those who are
members, as to be, in a subordinate sense, a part of the church.
Could the friends of infant baptism agree on some term, which would
express their common belief with regard to the relation of believers'
children to the church, better than _member_, I think it must have a
happy effect in promoting harmony of views and feelings, and take away
from others the grounds of several present objections.
It was here agreed that, instead of the question going round to each in
turn, the conversation should be free, subject to the rule of the
chairman.
Mr. A., the reader, then said that he should be glad to learn from his
Br. R. precisely what his views were of the relation of baptized
children to the church. "Let us see," he said, "how far we are agreed as
to the actual nature of this relation."
"Well, then," said Mr. R., "I will begin with this:
"_They are the children of God's friends_. We all know how God reminds
Israel of their relation to Abraham, his friend, tells them they are
beloved for the fathers' sakes, and he remembers his covenant with those
friends of his, their fathers, when provoked by the children's sins.
Toward the child of one who loves God (not merely a church-member, but a
friend of God), I suppose there are affections on the part of God, of
which our own feelings toward the child of a dear Christian friend are a
representation. This love to the child of his friend, I always thought,
is the great element in that arrangement of the Most High which we call
the Abrahamic covenant; for he who made us, knew how much a love for our
children, on the part of others, draws us together, and what bonds are
constituted and strengthened between men through their children; and
that one great means of promoting love to Him would be, his manifesting
special love and care for the offspring of those who love him. God has a
people, friends; and the children of such are the children of his
dearly-beloved friends. In this we are all agreed."
"Certainly," said Mr. A., "but you will go further than this, I
presume."
_Mr. R._ Yes, Mr. Chairman. One thing more is true of them:
_They are the principal source of the church's increase_. The selection
of Abraham, with a view to make of his lineage, the banks, within whose
defensive influences grace should find helps in making its way in this
ungodly world, had reference, I believe, to that power of hereditary
family influence, which has not ceased, and will not cease, to the end
of time. It is beautiful and affecting to see that recognition of our
free agency, and that unwillingness ever to interfere with it, which
leads the Most High to fall in with the principles of our nature
established by himself, in placing his chief reliance on the natural
love of parents for their offspring to contribute, by far, the larger
part of those who shall be converted. In this arrangement and
expectation do we not find the deep roots of infant baptism? which thus
appears to be neither Jewish nor Gentile, but grows out of our nature
itself, which also requires, which demands, some rite, a symbolic sign
and seal. God made the children of Adam partakers with him of his curse;
so that the parental and filial relation was, from the beginning made a
stream to bear along the consequences of the first transgression. No
new thing, therefore, was instituted when God, in calling Abraham,
appointed the parental and filial relation to bear, on its deep and
mighty stream, the most powerful means of godliness in all coming
generations. How little do we think of this, Mr. Chairman, and brethren;
how apt we are to neglect this great arrangement of divine providence
and grace,--the perpetuation of the church, chiefly by means of the
parental and filial relation. But, if such be the divine appointment,
and the children of believers are therefore the most hopeful sources of
the church's increase, of course they may be said to belong to the
church, in a peculiar sense, but without being "_members_."
_Mr. A._ I think you are coming on very well toward my ground. I
certainly agree with you thus far.
_Mr. R._ If I am not taking up too much time, Mr. Chairman, I should
like to proceed a little further, in order to do full justice to my
views. If I am found to agree with Br. A., it will be just as pleasant
as though he agreed with me.
_Chairman._ Please to proceed. Two things which are equal to the same
thing, are equal to each other.
_Mr. R._ I will, then, say, once more:
_The children of believers are the subjects of preeminent privileges and
blessings._ Special promises are made to them from love to their
parents; great advantages are theirs, directly and indirectly, from
their relation to those who are the true worshippers of God;
forbearance, long suffering, the remembrance of consecrations and vows,
prevail with God, oftentimes, in their behalf when they have broken
their father's commandment and forsaken the law of their mother. No
words of tenderness, in any relation of life,--said Mr. R., turning to
the Psalms,--surpass those, in which are described the feelings of God
toward the rebellious sons of Abraham: "But he, being full of
compassion, forgave their iniquity, and destroyed them not; yea, many a
time turned he his anger away, and did not stir up all his wrath." "For
he remembered his holy promise, and Abraham his servant." God still
remembers Abraham, his servant, in the person of every father and mother
who loves him, and is steadfast in his covenant; and "the generation of
the upright shall be blessed." Mistakes in family government, growing
out of wrong principles, too great reliance upon future conversion, and
the neglect of that moral training which is essential to the best
development of religious character, and, indeed, without which religious
character is often a melancholy distortion, or sadly defective, may be
followed by their natural consequences; and we cannot complain,--for God
works no miracle, nor turns aside any great law, in favor of our
misconduct; yet it remains true that all who love and serve him, and
command their children and households to fear the Lord, enforcing it in
all the proper ways of government, discipline, example, and the right
observance of religious ordinances, public and private, may expect
peculiar blessings upon their offspring.
One of the youngest of the company, the father of one young child, here
inquired, if the speaker would have us infer that the conversion of such
children is to be looked for as a matter of course.
_Mr. R._ Ordinarily, they will grow up in the nurture and admonition of
the Lord, to be followers of Christ; the proportion of persons baptized
on admission to the church, will become small; a healthful tone of
religious feeling will pervade our churches; less and less reliance will
be placed on startling measures, on splendid talents, on novelties, to
promote the cause of religion; but Christian families will extend like
the cultivated fields of different proprietors, whose green and
flowering hedges, instead of stone walls, mingle all into one landscape.
"And the work of righteousness shall be peace, and the effect of
righteousness, quietness and assurance forever." "And my people shall
dwell in a peaceable habitation, and in sure dwellings, and in quiet
resting-places." "And all thy children shall be taught of the Lord, and
great shall be the peace of thy children." Such, I believe, is sure to
be the manner of the church's prosperity, and therefore the children who
are to be the subjects of these inestimable blessings must be said, in
some sense, to _belong_ to the church, they being the objects of special
regard with the church and with God. Br. A. agrees with me in all this,
I presume.
_Mr. A._ Entirely; or, rather, you agree with me.
"Now, Br. A.," said an earnest man of the company,--who, however,
immediately checked himself, and bowed to Mr. R., and said, "I dare say,
Mr. Chairman, that Br. R. was going to put the very question which I
intended to ask."
_Mr. R._ Proceed, Br. S. I owe an apology for speaking so much.
_Mr. S._ Will Br. A., Mr. Chairman, please to tell us why he feels
obliged to call these children "_members_ of the church?"
For, we all know, that, notwithstanding all these glorious things, which
are spoken of them, to which Br. A. has also referred, not one baptized
child of a true believer can be, really, a member of the church, in
regular standing, till he, like the unbaptized heathen convert, has
repented of his sins and believed on the Lord Jesus. All the promises
and privileges appertaining to his relationship as a child of a
believer, promote, and make more certain, his repentance and faith; and
therefore, if asked, "What profit, then, hath circumcision, and its
substitute, infant baptism?" we can reply, "Much every way;" but it
never stood, and never can stand, in the place of justification by free
grace through the personal exercise of faith in the Redeemer.
_Mr. C._ But I wish to ask, in the name of Br. A., and for my own sake,
what objection there is to retaining the name, _member_, in this
connection?
_Mr S._ My answer is, it is the occasion of great stumbling to those who
reject infant baptism, and are confirmed in rejecting it, by
misapprehending the views and feelings of many who use the term in an
objectionable sense.
The discussion now became animated. Mr. S. said that he had a further
objection. It leads many, who use it erroneously, into perplexing and
fruitless positions. Assuming that the children are members of the
church, they discuss the question, as the sermon has stated, Of what
church are they members? Some reply, Of the church to which their
parents belong. Others say nay, but of the church universal. Then they
feel it incumbent upon them to provide some means of discipline for
these so-called members. In case they grow up, and neglect to come with
their parents to the Lord's Supper, must they not be disciplined? Some
insist that discipline, in some of its forms, must be administered, and,
in certain cases, excommunication must take place.
_Mr. T._ I know it, and I wonder at it. I should like to ask, who has
deputed to any church the power to say when the divine forbearance with
a child of the covenant has come to an end? Does it terminate at the age
of twenty-one in the case of male children, and at eighteen in the case
of females? David, when a full-grown man, plead the covenant of God with
his mother: "O Lord, truly I am thy servant; I am thy servant, and the
son of thine handmaid." Or, does it cease on the child's leaving the
parental roof for another place of residence? Or, on entering upon the
married state? Or, upon the commission of some great act of outward
transgression, shall we pronounce the covenant to be dissolved? Do we
not see that we are meddling with a divine prerogative, if we assume to
act in such cases? Expostulations, warnings, entreaties, from parents,
pastor, brethren of the church, may always be in place; but further than
these we cannot proceed.
"Perhaps, too," said Mr. R., "if discipline were to fall anywhere, it
might more justly descend on the parents of such a child."
_Mr. T._ The seeming mockery of a church punishing a youth for the
neglect of that which he himself never promised to do, would most
likely have the effect to drive him to a returnless distance from the
church, extinguishing the last ray of hope as to his conversion. A fit
parallel to such proposed church-discipline of children, is found in the
practice, which was not uncommon, twenty-five years ago, in a region of
our country where great religious excitements prevailed for some time,
when it was publicly recommended, in preaching and from the press, that
parents who had labored in vain for the conversion of children, should,
in certain cases, punish them, to make them submit to God.
_Mr. D._ Is it possible?
_Mr. T._ Yes, sir; and the records of those times furnish instances in
which this was done. Of such means of grace, I am happy to say, we have
no such custom, neither the churches of God.
_Mr. S._ Nor shall we probably ever see young people disciplined by the
churches, for not repenting and believing the Gospel. It is insisted on
as theoretically proper, but they have never ventured to carry it out in
practice.
Mr. C., the chairman, said, "Brethren, there is strong authority in
favor of the sermon. Since you have been talking, I have been looking
over Dr. Hopkins's works, to find this passage, which, if you please, I
will read. Dr. Hopkins says:
"Though under the milder dispensation of the Gospel, no one is to be put
to death for rejecting Christ and the Gospel, even though he were before
this a member of the visible church, yet he is to be cut off, and cast
out of the visible kingdom of Christ. And every child in the church, who
grows up in disobedience to Christ, and, in this most important concern,
will not obey his parents, is thus to be rejected and cut off, after all
proper means are used by his parents, and the church, to reclaim him,
and bring him to his duty. Such an event will be viewed by Christian
parents as worse than death, and is suited to be a constant, strong
motive to concern, prayer, and fidelity, respecting their children, and
their education; and it tends to have an equally desirable effect upon
children, and must greatly impress the hearts of those who are in any
degree considerate and serious."
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