The Expositor's Bible: The Pastoral Epistles Part 13

There are Christians who love to look back to some period in the history of the Church, which they have come to regard as a sort of golden age; an age in which communities of saintly men and women were ministered to by a still more saintly clergy, and in which the Church went beautifully on its way, not altogether free from persecutions, which were perhaps necessary for its perfection, but untroubled by doubts, or dissensions, or heresies, and unstained by worldliness, apostasy, or sloth. So far as the experience of the present writer has carried him, no such golden age can be found in the actual history of the Church.

It is not to be found in the New Testament, either before or after Pentecost.

We do not find it, where we might have expected to find it, in the period when Christ was still present in the flesh as the Ruler and Instructor of His Church. That period is marked by the ignorance and unbelief of the Apostles, by their quarrels, their ambition for the first places in an earthly kingdom, their intolerant spirit, by the flight of all of them in the hour of Christ's danger, by the denials of St. Peter, by the treachery and suicide of Judas. Nor do we find it, where again we might have expected to find it, in the age immediately succeeding the completion of Christ's work, when the Apostles, newly anointed with the Spirit, were still alive to direct and foster the Church which He had founded. That period also is marred by many disfiguring marks. Apostles can still be timeserving, can still quarrel among themselves; and they also experience what it is to be forsaken and opposed by their own disciples. Their converts, as soon as the Apostle who established them in the faith is withdrawn, and sometimes even while he is still with them, become guilty of the gravest errors in conduct and belief. Witness the monstrous disorders in the Church of Corinth, the fickleness of the Galatian converts, the unchristian asceticism of the Colossian heretics, the studied immorality of those of Ephesus. The Church which was presided over by St. Timothy was the Church of Alexander, Hymenaeus, and Philetus, who removed the very corner-stone of the faith by denying the Resurrection; and the Churches which were presided over by St. John contained the Nicolaitans, condemned as hateful by Jesus Christ, and Diotrephes, who repudiated the Apostle and excommunicated those who received the Apostle's messengers.

And there is much more of the same sort, as the Pastoral Epistles show us, proving that what comes to us at first as a sad surprise is of still sadder frequency, and that the Apostolic age had defects and stains at at least as serious as those which deface our own.

The failure to find any golden age in either of these two divisions of the period covered by the New Testament ought to put us on our guard against expecting to find it in any subsequent period. And it would not be difficult to take each of the epochs in the history of the Church which have been selected as specially bright and perfect, and show that in every case, directly we pa.s.s through the hazy glow, which the imagination of later writers has thrown around such periods, and get down to solid facts, then, either the brightness and perfection are found to be illusory, or they are counter-balanced by many dark spots and disorders. The age of the martyrs is the age of the lapsed; the ages of faith are the ages of fraud; and the ages of great success are the ages of great corruption. In the first centuries increase of numbers was marked by increase of heresies and schisms; in the middle ages, increase of power by increase of pride. A fair comparison of the period in which our own lot has been cast with any previous period in the history of the Church will never lead to any just feeling of discouragement. Indeed it may reasonably be contended that at no era since Christianity was first founded have its prospects been so bright as at the present time.

Let us look at the contest between the Gospel and heathenism,--that great contest which has been going on since "the grace of G.o.d appeared bringing salvation to all men," and which is to continue until "the appearing of the glory of our great G.o.d and Saviour." Was there ever a time when missions were more numerous or better organized, and when missionaries were as a rule better instructed, better equipped, or more devoted? And although it is impossible to form a correct estimate on such a subject, because some of the most important data are beyond our reach, yet it may be doubted whether there ever was a time when missions achieved more solid success. The enormous growth of the colonial and missionary episcopate during the last hundred years is at any rate one great fact which represents and guarantees a great deal. Until 1787 there was not a single episcopal see of the Anglican communion in any of the colonies or settlements of the British Empire; still less was there a single missionary bishop. And now, as the Lambeth Conferences remind us, these colonial and missionary bishops are not far short of a hundred, and are always increasing.[80]

Or let us look at the relations between the great Churches into which Christendom is unhappily divided. Was there ever a period at which there was less bitterness, or more earnest and wide-spread desire for the restoration of unity? And the increased desire for reunion comes hand in hand with an increase of the conditions which would render reunion possible. Two things are absolutely indispensable for a successful attempt in this direction. First, a large measure of culture and learning, especially among the clergy of the divided Churches; and secondly, intelligent religious zeal. Ignorant controversialists cannot distinguish between important and unimportant differences, and thus aggravate rather than smooth difficulties. And without religious earnestness the attempt to heal differences ends in indifferentism. Both these indispensable elements are increasing, at any rate in the Anglican and in the Eastern Churches: and thus reunion, which "must be possible, because it is a duty," is becoming not only a desire but a hope.

Let us look again at our own Church; at its abundant machinery for every kind of beneficent object; at the beautiful work which is being done in a quiet and simple way by numbers of Christian men and women in thousands of parishes; at the increase in services, in confirmations, in communions; at the princely offerings of many of the wealthy laity; at the humble offerings--equally princely in G.o.d's sight--of many of the poor. Can we point to a time when party feeling (bad as it still is) was less rancorous, when parishes were better worked, when the clergy were better educated or more self-sacrificing, when the people were more responsive to what is being done for them?

The very possibility of seriously raising such questions as these is in itself a reason for taking courage, even if we cannot answer all of them in the way that would please us most. There are at any rate good grounds for hoping that much is being done for the advancement of Christ's dominion, and that the prayer "Thy kingdom come" is being answered day by day. If we could but convince ourselves more thoroughly of the truth of all this, we should work more hopefully and more earnestly. More hopefully, because we should be working with a consciousness of being successful and making progress, with a conviction that we are on the winning side. And more earnestly, not merely because hope makes work more earnest and thorough, but also because we should have an increased sense of responsibility: we should fear lest through any sloth or negligence on our part such bright prospects should be marred. The expectation of defeat makes some men strive all the more heroically; but most men it paralyses. In our Christian warfare we certainly need hope to carry us onward to victory.

"The appearing of the glory of our great G.o.d and Saviour Jesus Christ."

Among the foolish charges which have been brought against the Revisers is that of favouring Arian tendencies by blurring those texts which teach the Divinity of Jesus Christ. The present pa.s.sage would be a sufficient answer to such a charge. In the A.V. we have "the glorious appearing of the great G.o.d, and our Saviour Jesus Christ," where both the wording and the comma make it clear that "the great G.o.d" means the Father and not our Saviour. The Revisers, by omitting the comma, for which there is no authority in the original, and by placing the "our"

before both substantives, have given their authority to the view that St. Paul means both "great G.o.d" and "Saviour" to apply to Jesus Christ.

It is not any Epiphany of the Father which is in his mind, but the "Epiphany of the glory of our great G.o.d and Saviour Jesus Christ."

The wording of the Greek is such that absolute certainty is not attainable; but the context, the collocation of the words, the use of the word "Epiphany," and the omission of the article before "Saviour"

(?p?f??e?a? t?? d???? t?? e????? Te?? ?a? s?t???? ??? ?. ?.), all seem to favour the Revisers' rendering. And, if it be adopted, we have here one of the plainest and most direct statements of the Divinity of Christ to be found in Scripture. As such it was employed in the Arian controversy, although Ambrose seems to have understood the pa.s.sage as referring to the Father and Christ, and not to Christ alone. The force of what follows is enhanced, if the Revisers' rendering, which is the _strictly grammatical_ rendering, is maintained. It is as being "our great G.o.d" that He gave Himself for us, that He might "redeem us from all iniquity;" and it was because He was G.o.d as well as man, that what was uttered as a bitter taunt was really a glorious truth;--"He saved others; Himself He _cannot_ save." It was morally impossible that the Divine Son should turn back from making us "a people for His own possession." Let us strengthen ourselves in the hope that our efforts to fulfil this gracious purpose are never thrown away.

FOOTNOTES:

[80] Including the English and American bishops, invitations to two hundred and nine prelates were issued for the Lambeth Conference in 1888.

CHAPTER XXIV.

_THE DUTY OF OBEDIENCE TO AUTHORITY, WITH ITS LIMITS; THE DUTY OF COURTESY WITHOUT LIMITS._

"Put them in mind to be in subjection to rulers, to authorities, to be obedient, to be ready unto every good work, to speak evil of no man, not to be contentious, to be gentle, showing all meekness toward all men. For we also were aforetime foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving divers l.u.s.ts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful, hating one another"--t.i.tUS iii. 1-3.

St. Paul, having in the previous chapter sketched the special duties which t.i.tus is to inculcate upon different cla.s.ses of Christians,--aged men and aged women, young women, young men, and slaves,--now pa.s.ses on to point out what must be impressed upon all Christians alike, especially as regards their conduct towards those who are in authority and who are not Christians.

Here he is on delicate ground. The Cretans are said to have been a turbulent race, or rather a group of turbulent races; neither peaceable among themselves, nor very patient of foreign dominion: and the Roman rule had been established there for less than a century and a half.

Previous to their conquest by Metellus in B.C. 67, they had been accustomed to democratic forms of government, and therefore would be likely to feel the change to the Roman yoke all the more acutely. As our own experiences in a neighbouring island have taught us, people who have been allowed to misgovern themselves, and to fight among themselves, for many generations, do not readily give a welcome to a power which deprives them of these liberties, even when it offers in exchange for them the solid but prosaic advantages of peace and security. Besides this, there was in Crete a strong mixture of Jews, whose rebellious propensities seemed to be unquenchable. Nor was this all. Within the Church itself the spirit of anarchy had displayed itself: partly because, as in the Churches of Corinth and Galatia, the characteristic faults of the people still continued to show themselves after the acceptance of Christianity; partly because, as everywhere in the Churches of that age, the contests between Jewish and Gentile converts were always producing disorder. This appears in the first chapter of our Epistle, in which the Apostle states that "there are many unruly men, ... specially they of the circ.u.mcision," and in which he finds it necessary to make it a qualification for the office of bishop or overseer, that the persons appointed should be such as "are not accused of riot or are unruly." Besides which, as we learn from numerous sources in the New Testament, there was in various quarters a tendency to gross misconceptions respecting Christian liberty. Through Gnostic and other antinomian influences there was a disposition in many minds to translate liberty into license, and to suppose that the Christian was above the distinctions of the moral law, which for him had no meaning.

Lastly, there were probably some earnest Christians, who, without going to any of these disastrous extremes, or sympathizing with the factious and seditious spirit of their fellow-countrymen, nevertheless had serious doubts as to whether Christians were under any obligation to obey a pagan magistrate, and perhaps were inclined to believe that it was their duty to disobey him.

For all these reasons St. Paul must have known that he was charging t.i.tus to give instructions, which would be very unwelcome to a large number of Cretan converts, when he told him to "put them in mind to be in subjection to rulers and authorities, and to be obedient." But it was the very fact that the instructions would be unwelcome to many, that made it so necessary that they should be given. Both for the internal well-being of the Church, and for the maintenance of right relations with the State, it was imperative that the principle of obedience to authority, whether ecclesiastical or civil, should be upheld. There must be peace, and there must be liberty: but there could be neither the one nor the other without a respect for law and for those who have to administer it.

The Apostle does not here argue the case. He lays down certain positions as indisputable. The loyal Christian must submit himself to those who are placed over him; he must render obedience to existing authorities.

There is one obvious limit to this which he indicates by a single word to be noticed hereafter, but with that one qualification the duty of obedience is imperative and absolute. Jew and Gentile Christian alike must obey the laws, not only of the Church, as administered by its overseers, but also of the State, as administered by the magistrates, even though the State be a heathen power and the magistrate an idolater.

The reason why St. Paul does not argue the matter is obvious. He is not writing to those who are likely to dispute or disobey these injunctions, but to one who has to see that they are obeyed. His object is not to prove the excellence of the rules which he lays down, but to advise t.i.tus as to what rules are to be most insisted upon. t.i.tus was well aware of the principles upon which these rules were based and of the arguments by which the Apostle was accustomed to defend them. He does not need information on that point. What the Apostle thinks may be necessary for his guidance is a clear intimation of those practical lessons of which the Cretans needed most to be reminded. It was quite possible that t.i.tus might have taken the view that the question about obedience to existing authorities was a burning one, and that it would be better for the present to say as little about it as possible. To object, therefore, that these directions in the second and third chapters of this Epistle are unworthy of St. Paul, and consequently not written by him, because they contain nothing which might serve as a sufficient refutation of the adversaries, is to beat the air without effect. They contain nothing calculated to serve as a refutation of the adversaries, because the Apostle writes with no intention of refuting opponents, but in order to give practical instructions to his delegate.

But although the Apostle does not here argue the case, we are not left in ignorance as to the principles upon which he based the rules here laid down so emphatically. The thirteenth chapter of the Epistle to the Romans is quite clear on that point. "There is no power but of G.o.d; and the powers that be are ordained of G.o.d. Therefore he that resisteth the power, withstandeth the ordinance of G.o.d." That is the kernel of the whole matter. The fact that a few rule over the many is not to be traced to a world-wide usurpation of the rights of the simple and the weak by the selfishness of the crafty and the strong. That theory may explain the terrorism of a bully, or of a band of brigands, or of a secret society; it is no explanation of the universal relations between governors and the governed. Nor is it the result of a primeval "social compact," in which the weak voluntarily surrendered some of their rights in order to have the advantage of the protection of the strong: that theory is pure fiction, and finds no support either in the facts of man's nature, or in the relics of primitive society, or in the records of the past. The one explanation which is at once both adequate and true, is, that all authority is of Divine origin. This was the declaration of the Forerunner, when his disciples complained to him of the influence which Jesus exercised over those who came in contact with His teaching: "A man can receive nothing, except it have been given him from heaven" (John iii. 27). This was the declaration of the Christ, when the Roman Procurator pointed out to Him that he had power of life and death over Him: "Thou wouldest have no power against Me, except it were given thee from above" (John xix. 11). The power of the Redeemer over the minds of men and the power of a heathen governor over the bodies of men have one and the same source,--Almighty G.o.d. Christ declared His innocence and a.s.serted His claims; but He made no protest against being tried by a pagan official, who represented the power that had deprived the Jewish nation of its liberties, because he also represented the principle of law and order, and as such was the representative of G.o.d Himself.

St Paul, therefore, is doing no more than restating what the Lord had already taught both by word and example. Christians must show submission to rulers and const.i.tuted authorities, and must yield ready obedience to magistrates, even when they are heathen. As heathen they were no doubt rebels against G.o.d, however little they might be aware of the fact. But as magistrates they were His delegates, however little they were aware of the fact. The Christian is aware of both facts; and he must not suppose that the one cancels the other. The magistrate still remains G.o.d's delegate, however inconsistent his own life may be with such a position. Therefore it is not only allowable for Christians to obey him; they must make it a matter of conscience to do so: and the history of the Church throughout the eras of persecution shows how greatly such teaching was needed. Whatever may have been the case when St. Paul wrote the Epistle to the Romans, we may safely maintain that persecution had already taken place when he wrote these instructions to t.i.tus. Not that he seems to have a persecuting power in his mind, when he enjoins simple obedience to existing authority; but he writes with full knowledge of the extreme cases that might occur. A moralist who could insist upon the duty of submission to rulers, when a Nero had been on the throne for twelve or fourteen years, was certainly not one who could be ignorant of what his principles involved. Nor could it be said that the evils of Nero's insolent despotism were counteracted by the excellence of his subordinates. The infamous Tigellinus was Praetorian Prefect and the Emperor's chief adviser. Helius, who acted as governor of Italy during the Emperor's absence in Greece, was in character a second Nero. And Gessius Florus, one of Pilate's successors as Procurator of Judaea, was so shameless in his enormities, that the Jews regretted the departure of his predecessor Albinus, although he also had mercilessly oppressed them. But all these facts, together with many more of the same kind, and some also of an opposite character, were beside the question. Christians were not to concern themselves with discussing whether rulers governed well or ill, or whether their private lives were good or bad. The one fact which concerned them was that the rulers were there to administer the law, and as such must be respected and obeyed. The conscience of Christians and the experiences of politicians, whether rulers or ruled, throughout all the subsequent ages have ratified the wisdom of St.

Paul's injunctions; and not only their wisdom but their profound morality. Renan says with truth, but with a great deal less than the whole truth, that "Paul had too much tact to be a preacher of sedition: he wished that the name of Christian should stand well, and that a Christian should be a man of order, on good terms with the police, and of good repute in the eyes of the pagans" (_St. Paul_, p. 477). The criticism which resolves a profound moral principle into a mere question of tact is worthy of the critic who makes it. Certainly St. Paul was far-sighted enough to see that frequent collisions between Christians and the recognized administrators of the law would be no good thing for Christianity: but it was not because he believed obedience to be the best policy that he charged t.i.tus to insist upon it.

It is of the very essence of a ruler that he is "not a terror to the good work, but to the evil: ... for he is a minister of G.o.d to thee for good, ... an avenger for wrath to him that doeth evil." It is quite possible that the law which he administers is unjust, or that he administers it in such a way as to make it work injustice, so that good deeds are punished and evil deeds are rewarded. But nowhere is good punished _as_ good, or evil rewarded _as_ evil. When Naboth was judicially murdered to gratify Jezebel, it was on the a.s.sumption that he was a blasphemer and a rebel; and when Jesus of Nazareth was condemned to death by the Sanhedrin and by the Procurator, it was on the a.s.sumption that he was guilty of similar crimes. So also with all the monstrous and iniquitous laws which have been made against Christianity and Christians. The persecuting edict "cast out their name as _evil_."

It was because men believed, or professed to believe, that Christians were grievous offenders or dangerous citizens, that they brought them before the magistrates. And the same holds good of the religious persecutions of which Christians have been guilty against other Christians. Nowhere can we point to a case in which a person has been condemned for having been virtuous, or for having failed to commit a crime. Many have been condemned for what was really meritorious, or for refusing to do what was really wicked; but in all such cases the meritorious conduct and the wicked conduct were held to be of exactly the opposite character by the representatives of the law. Legally const.i.tuted authority, therefore, is always by profession, and generally in fact also, a terror to the evil and a supporter of the good. It is charged with the all-important duty of upholding right and punis.h.i.+ng wrong in human conduct, _a duty which it never disowns_. For even when through blindness or perversity it upholds what is wrong or punishes what is right, it professes to be doing the opposite. Therefore to rebel against it is to rebel against the principle of moral government; it is a revolt against that principle which reflects and represents, and that by His ordinance, the moral government of Almighty G.o.d.

St. Paul a.s.sumes that rulers aim at what is just and right. The Christian is "to be ready unto every good work": and, although the words are no doubt intended to have a general meaning as well, yet the context suggests that their primary meaning in this place is that Christians are always, not only to be obedient to rulers and magistrates, but to be ready to support and a.s.sist them in any good work: the presumption being that what the authorities direct is good. But, without perhaps having this object in view, the Apostle here indirectly intimates the limits to a Christian's obedience and support. They are to be given to further "every _good_ work": they cannot of course be given to further what is evil. What then must a Christian do when lawful authority requires him to do what he knows to be wrong? Is he to rebel? to stir up a revolt against those who make this demand? No, he is still "to be in subjection to rulers": that is, he must disobey and _quietly take the consequences_. He owes it to his conscience to refuse to do what it condemns: but he also owes it to the representative of Divine law and order to abstain from shaking its authority. It has the power to give commands and the right to punish disobedience, and he has no right to refuse both obedience and punishment. To disobey and submissively take the consequences of disobedience is his plain duty in so painful a case.

In this way, and in this way _only_, will loyalty to conscience and loyalty to authority both alike be preserved. In this way, and in this way _best_ (as history has again and again shown), is the reformation of unjust laws effected. The moral sense of society is far more impressed by the man who disobeys for conscience' sake and unresistingly goes to prison or mounts the scaffold for his disobedience, than by him who violently resists all attempts to punish him and stirs up rebellion against the authority which he cannot conscientiously obey. Rebellion may succeed in redressing injustice, but at a cost which is likely to be more grievous than the injustice which it redresses. Conscientious disobedience, accompanied by loyal submission to the penalty of disobedience, is sure to succeed in reforming unjust laws, and that without any cost to counterbalance the good thus gained.

Having thus trenchantly determined the duty of believers towards rulers and magistrates, St. Paul pa.s.ses on to sketch their proper att.i.tude towards other members of society. And just as in speaking of conduct towards authorities he evidently has in his mind the fact that most authorities are unbelievers, so in speaking of conduct in society he evidently is thinking of a state of society in which many of its members are unbelievers. What kind of conduct will t.i.tus have to insist upon as befitting a Christian? "To speak evil of no man, not to be contentious, to be gentle, showing all meekness towards all men."

It would be difficult to point to a precept which is more habitually violated by Christians at the present day, and therefore more worthy of being constantly brought to the front and urged upon their consideration. There are plenty of precepts both of the Old and of the New Testament, which are habitually violated by the G.o.dless and irreligious, by those who, while bearing the name of Christian, scarcely make even a pretence of endeavouring to live Christian lives. But here we have a group of precepts, which a large number, not only of those who profess to live soberly and righteously, but of those who do indeed in other respects live as Christians should, consent to forget or ignore. "To speak evil of no man; not to be contentious; to be gentle, showing all meekness towards all men." Let us consider calmly what such words as these really mean; and then let us consider what we constantly meet with in the controversial writing, and still more in the controversial speaking, of the present day. Consider the tone of our party newspapers, and especially of our religious newspapers, on the burning questions of the hour and on the men who take a leading part in them. Read what a High Church paper says of a Low Church Bishop, or what a Low Church paper says of a High Church Bishop, and measure it by the injunction "to speak evil of no man." Or again, read what some of the organs of Dissent allow themselves to say respecting the clergy of the Established Church, or what some Church Defence orators have allowed themselves to say respecting Liberationists, and measure it by the injunctions "not to be contentious, to be gentle, showing all meekness towards all men." It is sometimes necessary to speak out and call attention to real or suspected evils; although not nearly so frequently as we like to think. But it is never necessary to throw mud and deal in personal abuse.

Moreover, it is very unbecoming to do so. It is doubly unbecoming, as St. Paul reminds us. First, such conduct is utterly un-Christian.

Secondly, it is very much out of place in those who before now have been guilty of quite as grave faults as those for which we now abuse others.

We are just the persons who ought to remember, because we know from personal experience, how much the grace of G.o.d can effect. If we have by His mercy been brought out of the sins which we now condemn in other people, what may we not hope for in their case, provided we do not disgust them with virtue by our acrimonious and uncharitable fault-finding? Abuse is the wrong weapon to use against unrighteous conduct, just as rebellion is the wrong weapon to use against unrighteous laws.

CHAPTER XXV.

_THE CO-OPERATION OF THE DIVINE PERSONS IN EFFECTING THE NEW BIRTH.--THE LAVER OF REGENERATION._

"But when the kindness of G.o.d our Saviour, and His love toward man, appeared, not by works done in righteousness, which we did ourselves, but according to His mercy He saved us, through the was.h.i.+ng of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost, which He poured out upon us richly, through Jesus Christ our Saviour; that, being justified by His grace, we might be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life."--t.i.tUS iii. 4-7.

For the second time in this short letter we have one of those statements of doctrine which are not common among the practical instructions which form the main portion of the Pastoral Epistles. The other doctrinal statement was noticed in a previous discourse on chap. ii. 11-14. It is worth while to compare the two. Though similar, they are not identical in import, and they are introduced for quite different purposes. In the earlier pa.s.sage, in order to show why different cla.s.ses of Christians should be taught to exhibit the virtues which specially befit them, the Apostle states the purpose of Christ's work of redemption, a purpose which all Christians are bound to help in realizing, stimulated by what has been done for them in the past and by the hope which lies before them in the future. In the pa.s.sage which we have now to consider, St.

Paul contrasts with the manifold wickedness of unbelievers the undeserved mercies of G.o.d towards them, in order to show what grat.i.tude those who have been brought out of their unbelief ought to feel for this unearned blessing, a grat.i.tude which they ought to exhibit in gentle forbearance and goodwill towards those who are still in the darkness of unbelief as well as to others.

The pa.s.sage before us forms the main part of the Second Lesson for the evening of Christmas Day in both the old and the new lectionaries. Its appropriateness in setting forth so explicitly the Divine bounty in the work of regeneration is manifest. But it would have been equally appropriate as a lesson for Trinity Sunday, for the part which each Person of the Blessed Trinity takes in the work of regeneration is plainly indicated. The pa.s.sage is in this respect strikingly parallel to what St. Peter had written in the opening of his Epistle: "According to the foreknowledge of G.o.d the Father, in sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ" (1 Pet. i.

2). The goodness and love of G.o.d the Father towards mankind is the source of man's redemption. From all eternity He saw man's fall; and from all eternity He devised the means of man's recovery. He appointed His Son to be our representative; and He accepted Him on our behalf. In this way the Father is "our Saviour," by giving and accepting One Who could save us. The Father "saved us ... through Jesus Christ our Saviour." Thus the Father and the Son co-operate to effect man's salvation, and each in a very real and proper sense is called "our Saviour." But it is not in man's own power to accept the salvation thus wrought for him and offered to him. For power to do this he needs Divine a.s.sistance; which, however, is abundantly granted to him. By means of the outward laver of baptism the inward regeneration and renewal by the Spirit is granted to him through the merits of Christ; and then the work of his salvation on the Divine side is complete. Through the infinite mercy of the Blessed Trinity, and not through his own merits, the baptized Christian is in a state of salvation, and is become an heir of eternal life. It remains to be seen whether the Christian, thus richly endowed, will continue in this blessed state, and go on, by the daily renewal of the Holy Spirit, from grace to grace; or will through his own weakness and wilfulness, fall away. But, so far as G.o.d's share in the transaction is concerned, his salvation is secured; so that, as the Church of England affirms in the note added to the service for the Public Baptism of Infants: "It is certain by G.o.d's Word, that children which are baptized, dying before they commit actual sin, are undoubtedly saved." And the several parts which the Persons of the Blessed Trinity take in the work of salvation are clearly indicated in one of the prayers before the baptismal act, as in the present pa.s.sage by St. Paul.

Prayer is offered to the "heavenly Father," that He will "give His Holy Spirit to this Infant, that he may be born again, and be made an heir of everlasting salvation; through our Lord Jesus Christ." Thus, as at the baptism of the Christ, so also at that of every Christian, the presence and co-operation of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is indicated.

It is the Apostle's object in this condensed doctrinal statement to emphasize the fact that it was "not by works in righteousness which _we ourselves_ did," but by the work of the Blessed Trinity, that we were placed in a state of salvation. He does not stop to make the qualifications, which, however true and necessary, do not alter this fact. In the case of adults, who are converted to Christianity,--and it is of such that he is thinking,--it is necessary that they should be duly prepared for baptism by repentance and faith. And in the case of all (whether adults, or infants, who live to become responsible for their actions), it is necessary that they should appropriate and use the graces bestowed upon them; in other words, that they should grow in holiness. All this is true; but it does not affect the position. For although man's co-operation is indispensable--for G.o.d saves no man against his will--yet without G.o.d's a.s.sistance man cannot either repent or believe before baptism, nor can he continue in holiness after baptism. This pa.s.sage expressly denies that we effect our own salvation, or that G.o.d effected it in return for our merits. But it gives no encouragement to the belief that we have nothing to do with "working out our own salvation," but have merely to sit still and accept what has been done for us.

That "the was.h.i.+ng of regeneration," or (as the margin of the R.V. more exactly has it) "the _laver_ of regeneration,"[81] signifies the Christian rite of baptism, ought to be regarded as beyond dispute. This is certainly one of those cases to which Hooker's famous canon of interpretation most thoroughly applies, that "where a literal construction will stand, the farthest from the letter is commonly the worst" (_Eccl. Pol._, v. lix. 2). This Hooker holds to be "a most infallible rule in expositions of sacred Scripture"; and although some persons may think that a.s.sertion somewhat too strong, of the soundness of the rule no reasonable student of Scripture can doubt. And it is worth our while to notice that it is in connexion with this very subject of baptismal regeneration that Hooker lays down this rule. He is answering those who perversely interpreted our Lord's words to Nicodemus, "Except a man be born of water and the Spirit" (John iii. 5), as meaning no more than "Except a man be born of the Spirit," "water"

being (as they imagined) only a metaphor, of which "the Spirit" is the interpretation. On which Hooker remarks: "When the letter of the law hath two things plainly and expressly specified, Water, and the Spirit; Water as a duty required on our parts, the Spirit as a gift which G.o.d bestoweth; there is danger in presuming so to interpret it, as if the clause which concerneth ourselves were more than needeth. We may by such rare expositions attain perhaps in the end to be thought witty, but with ill advice." All which may be fitly applied to the pa.s.sage before us, in which it is quite arbitrary and against all probability to contend that "the bath of regeneration" is a mere metaphor for regeneration without any bath, or for the Holy Spirit, or for the unmeasured bounty with which the Holy Spirit is poured upon the believer.

This might be tenable, if there had been no such rite as baptism by water enjoined by Christ and practised by the Apostles as the necessary and universal method of admission to the Christian Church. In Eph. v. 26 (the only other pa.s.sage in the New Testament in which the word for "laver" or "bath" or "was.h.i.+ng" occurs) the reference to baptism by water is indisputable, for the water is expressly mentioned. "Christ also loved the Church, and gave Himself up for it; that He might sanctify it, having _cleansed it by the was.h.i.+ng of water_ with the word." And in the pa.s.sage in the First Epistle to the Corinthians which, like the one before us, contrasts the appalling wickedness of unbelievers with the spiritual condition of Christians, the reference to baptism is scarcely less clear. "And such were some of you: but _ye were washed_ (lit. 'ye washed away'[82] your sins), but ye were sanctified, but ye were justified in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ, and in the Spirit of our G.o.d" (1 Cor. vi. 11). In which pa.s.sage, as here, the three Persons of the Trinity are named in connexion with the baptismal act.

And in speaking to the Jews at Jerusalem of his own admission to the Church, St. Paul uses the same forms of the same word as he uses to the Corinthians of their admission. The exhortation of Ananias to him, as he lay at Damascus, was "And now why tarriest thou? Arise, and _be baptized_, and _wash away thy sins_" (?p????sa? t?? ?a?t?a? s??), "calling on His Name" (Acts xxii. 16): words which are very parallel to the exhortation of St. Peter on the day of Pentecost: "Repent ye, and _be baptized, every one of you_ in the Name of Jesus Christ _unto the remission of your sins_; and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost" (Acts ii. 38; comp. Heb. x. 23). In these pa.s.sages we have a sacred rite described in which the human and the Divine elements are clearly marked. On man's side there is the was.h.i.+ng with water; and on G.o.d's side there is the was.h.i.+ng away of sin and pouring out of the Spirit. The body is purified, the soul is purified, and the soul is hallowed. The man is washed, is justified, is sanctified. He is regenerated: he is "a new creature." "The old things," his old principles, motives, and aims, then and there "pa.s.sed away" (aorist tense, pa????e?): "behold, they are become new" (2 Cor. v. 17). Can any one, with these pa.s.sages before him, reasonably doubt, that, when the Apostle speaks of "the was.h.i.+ng of regeneration" he means the Christian rite of baptism, in which, and by means of which, the regeneration takes place?

We are fully justified by his language here in a.s.serting that it is _by means of_ the baptismal was.h.i.+ng that the regeneration takes place; for he a.s.serts that G.o.d "saved us _through_ the was.h.i.+ng of regeneration."

The laver or bath of regeneration is the instrument or means by which G.o.d saved us. Such is the natural, and almost the necessary meaning of the Greek construction (d?? with the genitive). Nor is this an audacious erection of a comprehensive and momentous doctrine upon the narrow basis of a single preposition. Even if this pa.s.sage stood alone, it would still be our duty to find a reasonable meaning for the Apostle's Greek: and it may be seriously doubted whether any more reasonable meaning than that which is here put forward can be found. But the pa.s.sage does not stand alone, as has just been shown. And there are numerous a.n.a.logies which throw light upon the question, proving to us that there is nothing exceptional in G.o.d (Who of course does not need any means or instruments) being willing to use them, doubtless because it is better for us that He should use them.