THE POSITIVE COMMANDS OF CHRIST.
THIS is a day of latitudinarianism. Respect for law has been gradually undermined by the subtle forces of corruption and infidelity, until it required a civil war to establish the rights of property. The church has drifted somewhat with the current, and has felt the tendency to what is called liberalism, but what, in fact, is a neglect of the commands and ordinances of God. Religion has been made popular, at the cost of much of its power. "Woe unto you when all men shall speak well of you." Its emotional side has been largely developed, until we are in danger of substituting feeling for faith, and sentiment for conviction. The remedy is a return to the simple truth of the gospel, and a hearty acceptance of all the commands of the Master, a willing obedience to the divine law, instead of that arrogance that assumes to revise the ordinances of God, and alter and amend them at the pleasure of man, or the edict of a council. God's law is binding to the letter. His moral law is as imperative, as wide-reaching, as all-embracing, as his physical law, and the penalty for its violation is as sure to follow any breach. There are no small sins in the sight of God. The smallest will sink a soul into perdition as certainly as the greatest. We grade crimes into greater or less according as they affect others, and adjudge a varying penalty; but all sins are equal, as all receive the same penalty, under the law of God. He that hid the one talent could have received no severer doom had he hidden ten. Stealing is a less crime than murder, because the injury done to the wronged one is less. Property is less valuable than life, but the sin of theft will shut Heaven against a soul as surely as the sin of murder. James says, "Whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all. For he that said, Do not commit adultery, said also, Do not kill." The same who said, Do not kill, said also, Do not covet, and by the same reasoning the covetous man is guilty of the whole law. The young man who came to Christ lost Heaven because of his covetousness, although he had kept all the rest of the law from his youth up. It is quite natural to transfer our notion of the gradation of criminality before human law, to the degree of sinfulness before the divine law, and thus we separate the commands of God into those necessary to salvation, and those that may be obeyed or not according to our preference. We think this a dangerous error; for what authority is competent to sit in judgment upon the commands of God, and affirm some as binding and others as optional? One will set aside one, and another another, until the law loses all respect in losing all authority. It is safe to trust the wisdom of God; whatever he has commanded is essential; and nothing is non-essential but what he has not commanded. All that is left for us to do is to obey, not sit in judgment. Where God has issued no positive command, man has no right to issue one. We have no more right to add to than to take from; we have no right to exalt our inferences to an equality with the laws of God. The Scriptures are a sufficient rule of faith, but they are such only upon the condition that every command of God is equally binding, and that man has no latitude of choice in the matter, either by way of addition or subtraction. Under the old dispensation this was clearly stated: "Cursed be he that confirmeth not all the words of this law to do them." Deut. 27:26. The same principle must hold under the new dispensation, for God changes not. Indeed, it would be the height of absurdity to imagine that a law of God should not be binding always, but should derive its sanctions from the fluctuations of human choice. The passage is sometimes quoted: "The letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life" (2 Cor. 3:6), as though under the dispensation of grace there were no positive commands, but that human preference might be substituted for divine wisdom. The connection shows that the idea of the apostle was that the letter of the old law killeth because it required an absolute obedience, which, being beyond the power of sinful man, left him in a state of death; for by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified. The "spirit," on the other hand, refers not to human will, or human interpretation, but to Christ, the fulfillment of the law, by whose divine spirit working in the hearts of men this perfect justification in the sight of God was made possible. The whole tenor of Scripture shows that the positive commands of Christ are as binding upon men as are the commands given in the decalogue; that no more latitude is allowed to men in the one case than in the other; and that a neglect of any one vitiates any obedience, however perfect and continuous, to all the rest, because what Christ has commanded is essential to salvation; and obedience that is partial is not obedience. The command of Christ to his church was, "Go ye therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost." Here are three commands—first, to go; second, to teach; third, to baptize; and these three are equally binding. To baptize is as essential to perfect obedience to this command, as to preach. To baptize means something, and whatever it does mean is commanded, and anything it does not mean is not commanded. The command is positive, and leaves nothing to human choice. The form of baptism is the essence of the rite—it being purely a physical act, just as the doctrine taught is the essence of preaching—this being an intellectual procedure. Again: Christ says, "He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved." Here are two conditions of salvation, both given by the same divine author of salvation, and what right has any man to ignore one more than the other? The same Lord that said, "He that believeth," said in the same breath, "He that is baptized." Nor does this make baptism a saving ordinance; it leaves it where Christ placed it. Baptism does not save; it is Christ that saves. The same is true of faith or belief. Faith does not save; Christ saves. Faith is a condition of salvation. James asks, "Can faith save him?" and yet "without faith it is impossible to please" God. Faith is thus shown to be a condition, not a cause, of salvation. We speak of "saving faith," because it is a sign of salvation. The same is true of baptism; it is in no sense a saving ordinance, but Christ has placed it, like faith, as a condition of salvation. What right has a man to claim salvation who lives in open and continued disobedience to a known and positive command of Christ? It is the duty of the church, through its members and through its ministers, to declare the whole counsel of God. It has no right to blink any doctrine anywhere, or to form any combination under any such implied pledge. The commands of God are always binding; they are never held in abeyance that truth and error may work together in harmony. We are to preach the whole truth, whether men will hear or whether they will forbear. It can never be for the glory of God for his people to agree beforehand to ignore any one of his positive commands, especially under circumstances that demand its emphatic utterance. God is wiser than man. "Whosoever, therefore, shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of Heaven."—Prof. S. H. Carpenter, LL. D., in the Standard.