The Assembly's Shorter Catechism Explained

Question: What are the outward and ordinary means whereby Christ communicateth to us the benefits of redemption?

Answer: The outward and ordinary means whereby Christ communicateth to us the benefits of redemption, are his Ordinances, especially the word, sacraments, and prayer, all which are made effectual to the elect for salvation.

Question: What do you understand by the benefits of redemption?

Answer: All the blessings of Christ's purchase, which may be summed up in grace here, and glory hereafter, Psalm 84:11.

Question: Who communicateth these benefits or blessings to us?

Answer: Christ himself, who has them wholly at his disposal, Luke 22:29 - "I appoint unto you a kingdom."

Question: How comes Christ to have the disposal of them wholly in his hands?

Answer: By his Father's gift, John 3:35 - "The Father loveth the Son, and hath GIVEN all things into his hand;" and by his own purchase of them; hence called a "purchased possession," Eph. 1:14.

Question: What is it for Christ to communicate the benefits of redemption?

Answer: It is not to give away the property of them from himself, but to make us "sharers with him" in them all; that is, to make us "heirs of God, and joint heirs with Christ," Rom. 8:17.

Question: Does Christ communicate them in a mediate or immediate way?

Answer: In a mediate way, through the intervention of ordinances, Eph. 4:11-14.

Question: What are the ordinances by which Christ communicates to us the benefits of redemption?

Answer: They are "prayer and thanksgiving, in the name of Christ; the reading, preaching, and hearing of the word; the administering, and receiving the sacraments; church government and discipline; the ministry and maintenance thereof; religious fasting; swearing by the name of God, and vowing unto him."112

Question: Why are these called His ordinances?

Answer: Because they are all of them instituted and prescribed by him in his word, as the alone King and Head of his church, to be observed in it to the end of the world, Matt. 28:20.

Question: Have we any reason to expect, that the benefits of redemption will be communicated by ordinances of man's invention and appointment?

Answer: No; for all such ordinances, having no higher sanction than the commandments of men, are declared to be IN VAIN, Matt. 15:9; they are condemned as will-worship, Col. 2:23; and the observers of them severely threatened, Micah. 6:16.

Question: Why is it said, especially the word, sacraments, and prayer?

Answer: Because, though the other ordinances above mentioned are not to be excluded, as being all of them useful in their own place; yet the word, sacraments, and prayer, are the chief or principal outward means for communicating the benefits of redemption, Acts 2:42.

Question: What is the special usefulness of the word for communicating the benefits of redemption?

Answer: In the word these benefits are exhibited and offered to sinners of mankind, as the ground of their faith, that, believing they may be possessed of them all, John 20:31.

Question: What is the special usefulness of the sacraments for communicating these benefits?

Answer: The sacraments represent to our senses, 1 Cor. 10:16, what the word does to our faith, and are designed for the confirmation of it, Rom. 4:11.

Question: What is the special usefulness of prayer for the above purpose?

Answer: The prayer of faith fetches home to the soul all the good that is wrapped up both in the word and in the sacraments, Mark 11:24 - "What things soever ye desire when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them."

Question: Why are the word, sacraments, and prayer, called means, by which Christ communicates to us the benefits of redemption?

Answer: Because he is pleased to begin and carry on the work of grace in the soul, by and under these ordinances, Acts 2:41, 42.

Question: Why called the outward means?

Answer: To distinguish them from faith, repentance, and other inward means; and particularly to distinguish them from the inward and powerful influences of the Holy Spirit, which are necessary to accompany the outward means in order to salvation, Zech. 4:6.

Question: Why called ordinary means?

Answer: Because they are the stated and ordinary way and method, by which Christ communicates the benefits of redemption to sinners of mankind, Rom. 10:14-18; Ezek, 37:28.

Question: Are there any extraordinary means without the word, by which Christ communicates the benefits of redemption to adult persons?

Answer: No; for whatever providences God may make use of, when he is beginning or carrying on his work of grace in the soul, Acts 9:3-7; yet these dispensations are always to be considered in a subserviency to the word, chap. 16:25-33, or as occasions of the Spirit's working in concurrence with it, 2 Pet. 1:18, 19.

Question: Are the ordinances, of themselves, effectual for communicating the benefits of redemption?

Answer: No; they are made effectual, Rom. 1:16.

Question: To whom are they made effectual?

Answer: To the elect only, Acts 13:48.

Question: For what end are they made effectual to the elect?

Answer: For salvation, Heb. 10:39

Question: What is meant by salvation?

Answer: Not only a begun deliverance from all sin and misery, and a begun possession of all happiness and blessedness in this life, John 3:15; but likewise a total freedom from the one, and a full and uninterrupted enjoyment of the other, in the life to come, Rev. 21:4.

Question: If the ordinances are made effectual to the elect only for salvation, why have others, in the visible church, the benefit of them?

Answer: To show the infinite intrinsic sufficiency of the satisfaction of Christ, 1 John 4:14; and, at the same time, to render those who slight such valuable privileges the more inexcusable, John 15:22.

Question: What may we learn from Christ's instituting his Ordinances to be the outward and ordinary means of salvation?

Answer: We may from thence learn the difference between the church militant, which sees but through a glass darkly, and the church triumphant, which sees "face to face," 1 Cor. 13:12


The Assembly's Shorter Catechism Explained

Question: How is the word made effectual to salvation?

Answer: The Spirit of God maketh the reading, but especially the preaching of the word, an effectual means of convincing and converting sinners, and of building them up in holiness and comfort, through faith, unto salvation.

Question: What is meant by the word in this answer?

Answer: The whole of divine revelation, contained in the scriptures of the Old and New Testament.

Question: What has God appointed with reference to his word, that it may be effectual to salvation?

Answer: He has appointed the reading, John 5:39; "but especially the preaching thereof," 2 Tim. 4:2.

Question: "Is the word of God to be read by all?"

Answer: "Although all are not permitted to read the word publicly to the congregation, Deut. 31:9, 11, yet all sorts of people are bound to read it apart by themselves, chap. 17:19, and with their families, chap. 6:7."113

Question: What is the meaning of these words in our Larger Catechism, "all are not permitted to read the word publicly to the congregation?"

Answer: The meaning is: not, as if there were an order of men appointed by Christ, to be READERS in the church, distinct from ministers; but only, that none ought to read publicly to the congregation, except those whose office it is, not only to read the word of God, but to explain it to the edification of others, Neh. 8:8 - "So they read in the book of the law of God distinctly, and gave the SENSE, and caused them (namely, the people) to understand the reading."

Question: Why is the reading of the scriptures apart by ourselves necessary for every one?

Answer: Because the scriptures are a sword for defence, Eph. 6:17; a lamp for direction, Psalm 119:105; and food for nourishment, Jer. 15:16; in all which respects they are necessary for every Christian travelling Zion-ward, 2 Tim. 3:16, 17.

Question: May not the reading of the scriptures in our families, supersede the reading of them apart by ourselves?

Answer: No; the doing of the one ought by no means to jostle out the other.

Question: What is essentially requisite in order to capacitate the unlearned to read the scriptures?

Answer: That they be "translated out of the original into vulgar languages, 1 Cor. 14:11."114

Question: How is the word of God to be read?

Answer: "The holy scriptures are to be read with a high and reverend esteem of them, Neh. 8:5; with a firm persuasion that they are the very word of God, 2 Pet. 1:21; and that he only can enable us to understand them, Luke 24:45."116

Question: Why should we read the scriptures with a high and reverend esteem of 115them?

Answer: Because they are dictated by the Holy Ghost, and "are able to make us wise unto salvation," 2 Tim. 3:15.

Question: Why should we read them with a firm persuasion that they are the very word of God?

Answer: Because without this we can never build our hope on them, as containing the words of eternal life, 1 Thess. 2:13.

Question: Why should we read them with a persuasion that God only can enable us to understand them?

Answer: Because, without this, we cannot exercise a dependence upon him, for that spiritual and internal illumination, which is necessary to a saving and experimental knowledge of them, 1 Cor. 2:10.

Question: "By whom is the word of God to be preached?"

Answer: "Only by such as are sufficiently gifted, Mal. 2:7, and also duly approved and called to that office, Rom. 10:15; 1 Tim. 4:14."116

Question: Who are they that are sufficiently gifted?

Answer: They are such as are not only of a blameless moral walk, and "have a good report of them that are without," 1 Tim. 3:7; but likewise such as have a competent stock of human literature, Titus 1:9; and are, in the judgment of charity, reputed to be pious and religious men, 2 Tim. 1:5.

Question: What is it to be duly approved and called to that office?

Answer: It is not only to be approved by the presbytery, who have the sole power of trying the ministerial qualifications, and of ordination to that office, 1 Tim. 4:14; but likewise to have the call and consent of the people, who are to be under the pastoral inspection and charge, Acts 1:23, and 14:23.

Question: "How is the word of God to be preached by those that are called thereunto?"

Answer: They are to preach sound doctrine "diligently, plainly, faithfully, wisely, zealously, and sincerely."117

Question: What are we to understand by sound doctrine?

Answer: The whole system of divine truth, contained in the holy scriptures, or evidently deducible from it; particularly whatever has the greatest tendency to depreciate self, and to exalt Christ, who ought to be the main and leading subject of all gospelpreaching, 2 Cor. 4:5.

Question: What is it to preach sound doctrine diligently?

Answer: It is to be instant "in season, and out of season," 2 Tim. 4:2118 embracing every opportunity of doing good to souls; and watching for them, "as they that must give account," Heb. 13:17.

Question: What is it to preach plainly?

Answer: It is to essay it, "not in enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit, and of power," 1 Cor. 2:4.119

Question: What is it to preach the word faithfully?

Answer: It is a "making known the whole counsel of God," (or at least a not shunning to do so), Acts 20:27.120

Question: When may ministers be said to preach wisely?

Answer: When in studying, or preaching, they are wholly taken up in applying themselves to the necessities and capacities of the hearers,"121 Luke 12:42; 1 Cor. 3:2.

Question: When do they preach the word zealously?

Answer: When they do it "with fervent love to God, and the souls of his people,"122 2 Cor. 5:14, and 12:15.

Question: How is the word preached sincerely?

Answer: When there is an "aiming at God's glory," and his people's "conversion, edification, and salvation, 1 Thess. 2:4; 1 Cor. 9:22; 1 Tim. 4:16."123

Question: Who is it that makes the reading and preaching of the word effectual to salvation?

Answer: (THE SPIRIT OF GOD), 1 Cor. 2:11 - "The things of God knoweth no man, but the SPIRIT of God."

Question: How does he make them effectual?

Answer: By accompanying them with his divine power upon the soul, Rom. 1:16.

Question: Of what is it that the Spirit of God makes the reading and preaching of the word an effectual means?

Answer: He makes them an effectual means of convincing and converting sinners, and of building them up in holiness and comfort, through faith, unto Salvation.

Question: Does the Spirit make more frequent and ordinary use of the reading, or of the preaching of the word, for these valuable ends?

Answer: He makes more frequent and ordinary use of the preaching of the word; and therefore there is an ESPECIALLY prefixed to it in the answer.

Question: How do you prove, that the preaching of the word is honoured as the most ordinary means?

Answer: From express scripture testimony to this purpose, Acts 4:4 - "Many of them which heard the word believed;" chap. 11:20, 21 - "And some of them - spake unto the Grecians, preaching the Lord Jesus. And the hand of the Lord was with them: and a great number believed, and turned unto the Lord."124

Question: May not people be more edified in reading good sermons at home, than in hearing from the pulpit, such as are not perhaps, so well digested?

Answer: If they are in health, and not necessarily detained from the public ordinances, they have no ground to expect any real and saving benefit to their souls in the neglect of hearing the word preached: because it pleases "God, by the foolishness of preaching, to save them that believe," 1 Cor. 1:21; and "faith cometh by HEARING," Rom. 10:17.

Question: What use does the Spirit make of the reading, but especially of the preaching of the word, with reference to sinners in a natural state?

Answer: He makes use of them as an effectual means of convincing and converting them, 1 Cor. 14:24; Acts 26:18.

Question: What does the Spirit convince sinners of by the word?

Answer: Of their sin and misery.125

Question: Is it by the word of the law, or the word of the gospel, that the Spirit convinces of sin?

Answer: It is ordinarily by the word of the law, Rom. 3:20 - "By the LAW is the knowledge of sin."

Question: What of sin does the Spirit convince sinners by the law?

Answer: Both of the nature and desert of sin.

Question: In what consists the nature of sin?

Answer: In the want of conformity to, and transgression of, the law of God.126

Question: What is the desert of sin?

Answer: The wrath and curse of God, both in this life and that which is to come.127

Question: How does the Spirit convince men effectually, by the word, that they are sinners?

Answer: By convincing them, from it, that they are unbelievers, John 16:8, 9 - "He the Spirit will reprove or convince the world of sin, because they believe not on me," says our Lord.

Question: What influence has a conviction of unbelief, upon convincing a person that he is indeed a sinner?

Answer: Were a person once convinced, that unbelief is a rejection of the only method of salvation, devised in infinite wisdom, or treating of God's unspeakable gift offered in the word, with the utmost contempt, he could not but conclude himself, on this account, to be the greatest of sinners, and that he deserved the severest of punishments, Heb. 10:29.

Question: How does the Spirit make the word an effectual means of converting sinners?

Answer: By making use of it "to open their eyes, and to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God," Acts 26:18.

Question: Do all convictions of sin issue in conversion?

Answer: Far from it: many may be very deeply convinced of sin by the law, and yet never have a thorough change wrought upon their hearts; as in the instances of Cain, Judas, and others.

Question: What is conversion?

Answer: It is the spiritual motion of the whole man toward God in Christ, as the immediate effect of the real and supernatural change, that is wrought in regeneration, Jer. 3:22.

Question: Is there any difference between conversion and regeneration?

Answer: They are as inseparably conjoined, as the effect is to its cause. Regeneration, or the formation of the new creature (in which we are wholly passive), is the cause; and conversion, or the motion of the soul to God, is the effect, which infallibly follows, Hos. 6:2.

Question: Cannot man be the author of his own regeneration?

Answer: No; he can neither prepare himself for it, nor co-operate with God in it.

Question: Why can he not prepare himself for it?

Answer: Because the carnal mind is enmity against God, and remains so until regenerating grace take place in the soul, Rom. 8:7, 8.

Question: Why cannot man co-operate with God in this work?

Answer: Because there can be no acting, without a principle of action. Regeneration, being the infusing of spiritual life into the soul, it is impossible the creature can cooperate or concur with God in it, any more than Lazarus in the grave could concur in his own resurrection, till the powerful voice of Christ infused life and strength into him.

Question: What would be the consequence if man could co-operate with God in regeneration?

Answer: The consequence would be, that God would not be so much the author of grace, as he is of nature; nor have such a revenue of glory from the one, as from the other.

Question: How are regeneration and conversion denominated in scripture, to prove that God alone can be the author of them?

Answer: They are called a "creation," Eph. 2:10, and a "resurrection," chap. 5:14.

Question: Why called a creation?

Answer: Because there is nothing in the heart of man, out of which the new creature can be formed; "every imagination of the thoughts of his heart" being "only evil continually," Gen. 6:5.

Question: Why called a resurrection?

Answer: Because it is God only "who quickeneth the dead, and calleth things which be not, as though they were," Rom. 4:17.

Question: What influence has the word upon the conversion of sinners?

Answer: It has no physical or natural influence of itself, but only as it is an instituted means, in the hand of the Spirit of God to that end, John 6:63.

Question: What is the efficacy of the word, in the work of conversion, compared to in scripture?

Answer: It is compared to a fire, to a hammer, Jer. 23:29; to rain, Deut. 32:2; and to light, Psalm 119:105.

Question: Why compared to fire?

Answer: Because as fire purifies the metal, separating the dross; so the word, in the hand of the Spirit, purifies the heart, purging away the dross of sin and corruption that is there, Isaiah 4:4.

Question: Why compared to a hammer?

Answer: As a hammer "breaketh the rock in pieces," Jer. 23:29, and thus fits it for the building, so the Spirit of God, by the word, breaks the hard heart of man, and fits it for being built on the foundation God has laid in Zion, Proverbs 16:1.

Question: Why compared to rain?

Answer: Because as the rain falls irresistibly, so there is no withstanding the efficacy of the word in the hand of the Spirit, Isaiah 55:11.

Question: Why compared to light?

Answer: Because as light discovers things that were indiscernible in the dark; so the Spirit, by the word, discovers the latent wickedness of the heart, 1 Cor. 14:25, and the matchless glory and excellency of Christ, as IMMANUEL, "God with us," John 16:14.

Question: What use does the Spirit make of the reading, but especially the preaching of the word, with reference to SAINTS, who are brought into a state of grace?

Answer: He makes use of it as an effectual means of building them up in holiness and comfort, through faith unto salvation, Acts 20:32; Rom. 15:4.

Question: Is holiness necessary in order to our justification before God?

Answer: It is necessary in the justified, but not in order to their justification; because this would found their justification upon works, contrary to Rom. 3:20 - "By the deeds of the law shall no flesh be justified in his sight."128

Question: Is it necessary as the ground of our title to heaven?

Answer: It is necessary to clear our title; but our title itself can be founded only in our union with Christ, and the imputation of his righteousness, 1 Cor. 3:22, 23 - "All are yours, and ye are Christ's "compared with Rom. 8:30 - "Whom he justified, them he also glorified."

Question: Why are the saints said to be built up in holiness?

Answer: Because the work of sanctification, like a building, is gradually carried on towards perfection until death, Proverbs 4:18.

Question: How does the Spirit make the reading and preaching of the word, an effectual means of building up the saints in holiness?

Answer: By giving them, in the glass of the word, such clear and repeated discoveries of the glory of Christ, as to transform them more and more into the same image with him, 2 Cor. 3:18.

Question: How does he, by means of these ordinances, build them up in comfort?

Answer: By conveying with power to their souls, the great and precious promises, which contain all the grounds of real and lasting comfort, Gal. 3:29, and 4:28.

Question: Through what instrument is it, that the Spirit makes these means effectual, for building up the saints in holiness and comfort?

Answer: It is through faith, 1 Thess. 2:13.

Question: What instrumentality has faith, in the hand of the Spirit, for building up the saints, in holiness and comfort?

Answer: It rests upon God's faithful word for the promotion of both, Psalm 138:8 - "The Lord will perfect that which concerneth me."

Question: To what end does the Spirit, by means of the word, build them up in holiness, and comfort through faith?

Answer: It is unto their complete and eternal salvation, Rom. 1:16.

Question: What may we learn from the Spirit's making the means effectual to salvation?

Answer: That as no special blessing can be expected from God, in the wilful neglect of the ordinances, Proverbs 28:9; so we may sit all our days under a pure dispensation of the gospel, without reaping any spiritual profit, unless divine supernatural agency concur, 1 Cor. 3:6.


The Assembly's Shorter Catechism Explained

Question: How is the word to be read and heard, that it may become effectual to salvation?

Answer: That the word may become effectual to salvation, we must attend thereunto with diligence, preparation, and prayer; receive it with faith and love; lay it up in our hearts, and practise it in our lives.

Question: What has God enjoined upon us, in order to our reading and hearing his word in a right manner?

Answer: That we attend thereunto; that we receive it; and that we lay it up in our hearts, and practise it in our lives.

Question: What is it to attend to the reading and hearing of the word?

Answer: It is to make the reading and hearing of it the main business of our life; to have it mostly at heart, because the word contains "that good part which shall not be taken away," Luke 10:42.

Question: How ought we to attend to, or set about the reading and hearing of the word?

Answer: With diligence, preparation, and prayer.

Question: What do you understand by attending to the word with diligence?

Answer: A careful observing and embracing every seasonable opportunity, that may offer in providence, for reading and hearing the same, Proverbs 8:34.

Question: What preparation should we make for reading and hearing the word?

Answer: We should consider, that the word has the authority of God stamped upon it, 2 Tim. 3:16; that it is he himself who speaks to us in it, Heb. 12:25; that it is his ordinance for our salvation, John 5:39; and will be the savour either of life or death to us, 2 Cor. 2:16.

Question: Why is prayer requisite for reading and hearing the word in a right manner?

Answer: Because as it is God alone, and none else, who can dispose our hearts for the right performance of those religious exercises, so he ought always to be addressed and supplicated for that end, Psalm 119:18.

Question: What should we pray for, when setting about the reading and hearing of the word?

Answer: That it may be "the power of God unto our salvation," Rom. 1:16; or an effectual means in his hand for convincing, converting, and edifying our souls, John 6:63.

Question: What is our immediate duty, when we are actually engaged in reading or hearing of the word?

Answer: Our immediate duty, in that case, is to receive it.

Question: What is it to receive the word?

Answer: It is, with all readiness of mind, to take it in, as the dictates of the Holy Ghost to our souls, Acts 17:11.

Question: Why is the right improvement of the word, in time of reading and hearing of it, called a receiving it?

Answer: Because we can reap no real benefit to our souls, by the offer and exhibition of all the blessings that are brought nigh to us in it, unless we receive them as God's free gift to us, John 3:27.

Question: How are we to receive the word, and all the good that is in it?

Answer: With faith and love.

Question: When is the word received with faith, in time of reading and hearing of it?

Answer: When there is an application of it to the soul in particular, in a suitableness to the state and case of the person, and the nature of the word, whether in a way of promise, Lam. 3:24, or threatening, Psalm 119:120.

Question: How may a person know if he receives the word with faith?

Answer: By the quickening, Psalm 119:50, enlightening, ver. 130, sanctifying, ver. 9, and strengthening effect of it, Dan. 10:19.

Question: What is the native consequence of receiving the word with faith?

Answer: A receiving it also with love; for "faith worketh by love," Gal. 5:6.

Question: How may our receiving the word with love be discerned?

Answer: When our affections are drawn out to the blessed truths and objects revealed in it; so as to esteem them more than "thousands of gold and silver," Psalm 119:72, or even than our "necessary food," Job 23:12.

Question: What improvement ought we to make of the word after reading or hearing of it?

Answer: We should lay it up in our hearts, and practise it in our lives.

Question: What do you understand by the heart, where the word should be laid up?

Answer: The soul, with all its faculties, Proverbs 23:26; the understanding, to know the word; the will to comply with it; the affections to love it; and the memory to retain it.

Question: What is implied in laying up the word in our hearts?

Answer: That we account it the most valuable treasure, Psalm 119:127; that we keep it with the utmost care, ver. 11; and that we resolve to use it in all the future exigencies129 of our souls, ver. 24.

Question: How may we know if the word is really laid up in our hearts?

Answer: By our delighting to meditate upon it, Psalm 119:97; by the Spirit's bringing it to our remembrance, John 14:26; and by our habitual desire of farther conformity and subjection unto it, Psalm 119:5.

Question: For what end should we lay up the word in our hearts?

Answer: That we may practise it in our lives.

Question: What is it to practise the word in our lives?

Answer: It is to have a conversation becoming the gospel, Phil. 1:27; or to have both the outward and inward man regulated according to the unerring rule of the word, Psalm 119:105.

Question: What does the right manner of reading and hearing of the word teach us?

Answer: That the bare outward performance of duty will not be acceptable to God, unless the heart is engaged in it, Isaiah 29:13.


The Assembly's Shorter Catechism Explained

Question: How do the sacraments become effectual means of salvation?

Answer: The sacraments become effectual means of salvation, not from any virtue in them, or in him that doth administer them; but only by the blessing of Christ, and the working of his Spirit in them that by faith receive them.

Question: What is meant by effectual means of salvation?

Answer: Such means as, by the blessing of God, do fully attain the end for which they are appointed, 1 Thess. 2:13.

Question: What is the meaning of these words in the answer not from any virtue in them?

Answer: The meaning is, that the sacraments have not any virtue or efficacy in themselves to confer salvation; being only among the outward and ordinary means of grace, which can have no more efficacy of themselves to confer any saving benefit than the rainbow of itself has to prevent a deluge.

Question: Who are they who maintain that the sacraments have a virtue or power in themselves to confer grace?

Answer: The Papists, who affirm that the sacraments of the New Testament are the true, proper, and immediate causes of grace; and that the efficacy of them flows from the sacramental action of receiving the external elements.

Question: How do you prove that the sacraments have not any innate or intrinsic virtue in themselves to confer grace or salvation?

Answer: From this one argument, that if the sacraments had any such virtue, then grace, or salvation, would be infallibly connected with the external use of them: but it is obvious from scripture, that after Simon Magus was baptised, he remained still "in the gall of bitterness, and bond of iniquity," Acts 8:13, 23.

Question: Why is it said in the answer, that the sacraments become effectual means of salvation, not from any virtue in him that doth administer them?

Answer: It is so said in opposition to the Papists, who maintain, that the efficacy of the sacraments depends upon the intention of the priest; so that any benefit by them, is conferred, or withheld, according to them, just as the secret will of the administrator would have it.

Question: How is this error refuted?

Answer: If the efficacy of the sacraments depended upon the intention of the administrator, then there could be no certainty about the efficacy of them at all; because no mortal can be absolutely certain about the intention of another; the secrets of the heart being known to God only, Acts 1:24.

Question: From whence, then, have the sacraments their efficacy and virtue?

Answer: Only from the blessing of Christ, and the working of his Spirit.

Question: What do you understand by the blessing of Christ?

Answer: That divine power and life, with which he is pleased to accompany the sacraments and other ordinances; and without which they would be utterly ineffectual, Rom. 1:16.

Question: What is the working of his Spirit, which is necessary to make the sacraments effectual means of salvation?

Answer: Not only the planting of grace in the soul at first, but the drawing of it out into suitable exercise on all sacramental occasions, Zech. 4:6.

Question: Why is the working of the Spirit necessary to the efficacy of the sacraments?

Answer: Because we are utterly impotent of ourselves for any thing that is spiritually good, John 15:5.

Question: In whom are the sacraments (by the blessing of Christ, and the working of his Spirit,) effectual means of salvation?

Answer: In them that by faith receive them.

Question: What is it to receive the sacraments by faith?

Answer: It is to apply Christ, and the benefits of his purchase, as represented, and exhibited to us in them, Luke 22:19, 20.

Question: What may we learn from the necessity of Christ's blessing, and of the Spirit's working, in order to the efficacy of the sacraments?

Answer: It teaches us, that our whole dependence for the blessing, whether upon ourselves, when we partake of the sacrament of the supper, or upon our children, when we are sponsors for them in baptism, should be only on Christ alone, and the saving influences and operations of his Spirit, held forth in the promise, to accompany his own institutions; and therefore our partaking of these solemn ordinances, dispensed by some ministers, to the slighting of them as dispensed by others, equally sound and faithful, though perhaps in our esteem somewhat inferior in outward gifts, says upon the matter, that the efficacy of the sacraments depends, somehow, upon the administrator, and not upon the blessing of Christ alone: quite contrary to the mind of the Spirit of God, 1 Cor. 3:7 - "So, then, neither is he that planteth anything, neither he that watereth; but God that giveth the increase."


The Assembly's Shorter Catechism Explained

Question: What is a sacrament?

Answer: A sacrament is a holy ordinance instituted by Christ, wherein, by sensible signs, Christ, and the benefits of the new covenant, are represented, sealed, and applied to believers.

Question: From whence is the word sacrament derived?

Answer: It is of Latin origin, being anciently used, by the Romans, to signify their military oath; or that oath which their soldiers took to be true and faithful to their prince, and that they would not desert his standard.

Question: How is it used by the church?

Answer: Not only to signify something that is sacred, but likewise a solemn engagement to be the Lord's.

Question: What is the general nature of a sacrament?

Answer: It is a holy ordinance, instituted by Christ.

Question: Why is a sacrament called a holy ordinance?

Answer: Because it is appointed not only for holy ends and uses, but likewise for persons federally holy.

Question: Is it necessary that a sacrament be instituted by Christ?

Answer: Yes; it is essentially necessary that it have his express and immediate warrant and institution, otherwise it does not deserve the name, 1 Cor. 11:23 - "For I have RECEIVED of the Lord, that which also I delivered unto you," &C.

Question: Why must sacraments be expressly or immediately instituted by Christ?

Answer: Because he alone is the head of the church; and has the sole power and authority to institute sacraments and other ordinances in it, Eph. 1:22, 23.

Question: "What are the parts of a sacrament?"

Answer: "Two; the one, an outward and sensible sign, used according to Christ's own appointment; the other, an inward and spiritual grace, thereby signified, Matt. 3:11; 1 Pet. 3:21."130

Question: What are the outward signs in sacraments?

Answer: They are the sacramental elements, and the sacramental actions; but chiefly the elements, because it is about these that the sacramental actions are exercised.

Question: Why called sensible signs?

Answer: Because they are obvious to the outward senses of seeing, tasting, feeling, &c.

Question: What kind of signs are sensible signs in a sacrament?

Answer: They are not natural, nor merely speculative; but voluntary and practical signs.

Question: Why are they not natural signs?

Answer: Because natural signs always signify the self-same thing, as smoke is always a sign of fire, and the morning light a sign of the approaching sun; whereas the signs in a sacrament never signify what they represent in that holy ordinance, but when sacramentally used.

Question: Why are they practical, and not merely speculative signs?

Answer: Because they are designed not only to represent the spiritual grace signified by them; but likewise to seal and apply the same.

Question: Why are the signs in a sacrament called voluntary signs?

Answer: Because they depend entirely upon the divine institution to make them signs; yet so as there is some analogy or resemblance between the sign and the thing signified.

Question: When are sacramental signs used according to Christ's own appointment?

Answer: When they are dispensed with the words of institution annexed to them, Matt. 28:19; 1 Cor. 11:23-25.

Question: What do the words of institution imply or contain in them?

Answer: They contain, "together with a precept authorising the use" of them, "a promise of benefit to the worthy receivers, Matt. 28:20."131

Question: What is the inward and spiritual grace signified by the sensible signs in a sacrament?

Answer: Christ and the benefits of the new covenant.

Question: Why is the covenant of grace called the new covenant?

Answer: Because it is always to remain in its prime and vigour, without the least change or alteration; for "that which decayeth and waxeth old, is ready to vanish away," Heb. 8:13.

Question: What are the benefits of the new covenant?

Answer: They are all the blessings contained in the promises of it, which may be summed up in grace here, and glory hereafter, Psalm 84:11.

Question: Are Christ, and the benefits of the new covenant, separable from one another?

Answer: No; for, "he that hath the Son, hath life," 1 John 5:12; whoever has Christ, has all things along with him; "all are yours, and ye are Christ's," 1 Cor. 3:22, 23.

Question: What is the intention and design of sensible signs in a sacrament, with reference to Christ and the benefits of the new covenant?

Answer: The design of them is, that Christ and his benefits may be represented, sealed, and applied by them.

Question: Why are Christ and his benefits said to be represented by the signs in a sacrament?

Answer: Because as sacramental signs are of divine institution, so there is a resemblance or similitude between the signs and the things signified.

Question: Why are Christ and his benefits said to be sealed by these signs?

Answer: Because, by the sacramental signs, Christ and his benefits are confirmed to the believer, even as a seal is a confirmation of a bond or deed, Rom. 4:11.

Question: Why said to be applied?

Answer: Because, by the right and lawful use of the sacramental signs, Christ and his benefits are really communicated, conveyed, and made over to the worthy receiver, 1 Cor. 11:24 - "Take, eat; this is my body, which is broken for you."

Question: To whom do the sacramental signs represent, seal, and apply Christ and his benefits?

Answer: Not to all who use them, but to believers only.

Question: Why to believers only?

Answer: Because nothing but true faith can discern, and apply the spiritual grace, which is represented and exhibited by sensible signs in the sacrament, Gal. 3:26, 27.

Question: In what consists the FORM of a sacrament?

Answer: In "a spiritual relation, or sacramental union, between the sign and the thing signified."132

Question: What is the consequence of this sacramental union between the sign and the thing signified?

Answer: The consequence is, "that the names and effects of the one are attributed to the other."133 Thus Christ is called our passover, 1 Cor. 5:7; and the bread in the supper is called Christ's body - "This is my body," 1 Cor. 11:24.

Question: When are the signs and the things signified, united in those who partake of the sacraments?

Answer: When, together with the signs, (in virtue of Christ's institution) the blessings signified are received by faith, Gal. 3:27.

Question: How may this be illustrated by an example?

Answer: A little earth and stone put into a man's hand at random, signify nothing; but when this is done in a regular manner, according to the forms of law, to give a proprietor possession of his lands, from whence these symbols were taken, it is of great importance to corroborate his right: so bread and wine in the sacrament, are of little value in themselves abstractly considered; yet when received in faith, as the instituted memorials of the death of Christ, by which his testament was ratified and sealed, the believer's right to all the blessings of his purchase is by it most comfortably confirmed, 1 Cor. 11:24 - "This is my body, which is broken FOR YOU."

Question: Are the sacraments necessary for the confirmation of the word?

Answer: No; the word being of divine and infallible authority, needs no confirmation without itself: but they are necessary on OUR account, for helping our infirmity, and confirming and strengthening our faith, Rom. 4:11.

Question: What is the difference between the word and the sacraments?

Answer: The word may be profitable to the adult, without the sacraments; but the sacraments cannot profit them without the word, Gal. 5:6.

Question: What is the END of the sacraments?

Answer: It is "to represent Christ and his benefits; and to confirm our interest in him: as also to put a visible difference between those that belong unto the church, and the rest of the world; and solemnly to engage them to the service of God in Christ, according to his word."134

Question: Who are they that have a right to the sacraments?

Answer: They "that are within the covenant of grace, Rom 15:8."135

Question: Who are to be reckoned within the covenant of grace, in the sight of men?

Answer: They who "profess their faith in Christ, and obedience to him, Acts 2:38;" and "infants descending from parents, either both or but one of them professing faith in Christ, and obedience to him, are, in that respect, within the covenant, Rom. 11:16."136

Question: What may we learn from the nature of the sacraments in general?

Answer: The amazing love of the Lord Jesus, in giving us not only the word as the instrument in the hand of the Spirit, for besetting faith, and all other graces, Eph 1:13; but likewise the sacraments for strengthening and increasing the same, as well as for cherishing our love and communion with one another, 1 Cor. 12:13.


The Assembly's Shorter Catechism Explained

Question: What are the sacraments of the New Testament?

Answer: The sacraments of the New Testament are, baptism and the Lord's supper.

Question: What were the ordinary sacraments under the Old Testament?

Answer: They were two: CIRCUMCISION and the PASSOVER.

Question: When was circumcision first instituted?

Answer: In the ninety-ninth year of Abraham's age, Gen. 17:24; at which time, both he, "and all the men of his house, were circumcised," verse 26, 27.

Question: At what age were the male children afterwards to be circumcised?

Answer: Precisely on the eighth day after they were born, Gen. 17:12.

Question: What was the spiritual meaning of this sacramental ceremony?

Answer: It signified the impurity and corruption of nature, Jer. 4:4; the necessity of regeneration, or being cut off from the first Adam, as a federal head, Rom. 2:28, 29; and of being implanted in Christ, in order to partake of the benefits of his mediation, chap. 8:1; together with a solemn virtual engagement to be the Lord's, Gen. 17:11.

Question: What was the other sacrament of the Old Testament?

Answer: The passover.

Question: When was it instituted?

Answer: At the departure of the children of Israel out of Egypt, Ex. chapter 12.

Question: Why called the PASSOVER?

Answer: Because the destroying angel passed over the houses of the Israelites in the night when he smote the first-born with death, in every house or family of the Egyptians, Ex. 12:27.

Question: On what account did the angel pass over the houses of the Israelites?

Answer: Because, according to the express command of God, the blood of the passoverlamb was stricken upon the lintels and side posts of their doors, as a signal to the destroying angel to pass over them, Ex. 12:22, 23.

Question: What was meant by striking the blood upon their lintels and door posts?

Answer: It signified, that it is only in virtue of the blood or satisfaction of Christ, that the curse and sentence of the law (which is the Wrath of God) is not executed upon the sinner, Rom. 5:9.

Question: What were the significant ceremonies of divine institution that were to be observed in this sacrament?

Answer: The passover lamb was to be without blemish, Ex. 12:5; it was to be slain, verse 6; it was to be roasted with fire, verse 9; and it was to be eaten, and that wholly and entirely, verse 10.

Question: Why was it necessary that the passover-lamb should be without blemish?

Answer: To signify, that though our sins were imputed to Christ, yet he was in himself "holy, harmless, undefiled," Heb: 7:26; and therefore called "a Lamb without blemish and without spot," 1 Pet. 1:19.

Question: Why must the lamb be slain, or killed by blood shedding?

Answer: To denote, that the death of Christ was necessary, for satisfying justice, and reconciling us to God, Luke 24:26 - "Ought not Christ to have suffered these things?"

Question: Why was it to be roasted with fire?

Answer: To intimate, that Christ's sufferings, as our Surety, were exquisitely and inconceivably great, without the least abatement of any of that wrath which was due to our sins, Isaiah 53:10 - "It pleased the Lord to bruise him;" Rom. 8:32 - "God spared not his own Son."

Question: Why was it to be eaten wholly and entirely, and none of it to be left?

Answer: To signify, that Christ was to be wholly applied, in a way of believing, as being, "of God, made unto us wisdom and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption," 1 Cor. 1:30.

Question: Why were all the families of Israel to eat the passover, at one and the same time? Ex. 12:8.

Answer: To signify that there is enough in Christ to satisfy the need of all his people at once; "for in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily," Col. 2:9.

Question: Why was it to be eaten the very same evening in which it was slain? ver. 6, 8.

Answer: To signify, that Christ ought to be applied and appropriated by faith speedily, without delay: "Behold, NOW is the accepted time," 2 Cor. 6:2.

Question: "How many sacraments hath Christ instituted in his church under the New Testament?

Answer: "Under the New Testament, Christ hath instituted in his church only two sacraments; baptism and the Lord's supper."137

Question: How do these two sacraments come in the place of those under the Old Testament?

Answer: Baptism comes in the place of circumcision; and the Lord's supper in the place of the passover.

Question: Were the sacraments of the Old Testament no more than shadows of that grace, which is actually conferred by the sacraments under the New, as the Papists would have it?

Answer: By no means; for "the sacraments of the Old Testament, in regard of the spiritual things thereby signified and exhibited, were, for substance, the same with those of the New, 1 Cor. 10:1-5."138

Question: In what do they differ?

Answer: The sacraments of the Old Testament represented Christ as yet to come; whereas those of the New hold him forth as already come, and as having finished the work of our redemption, as to the purchase of it, Eph. 5:2.

Question: Is there any difference between them as to clearness and perspicuity?

Answer: The words annexed to the outward signs in the sacraments of the New Testament, make the things signified appear vastly more plain and perspicuous, than in the sacraments of the Old.

Question: What other sacraments do the Papists add to baptism and the Lord's supper?

Answer: They boldly venture to add other five; namely, confirmation, penance, orders, marriage, and extreme unction.

Question: How may it appear, in a word, that all these are false and spurious sacraments?

Answer: In regard that none of them have sacramental signs of divine institution, signifying any inward and spiritual grace; and, consequently, none of them can be appointed seals of God's covenant.

Question: Who may lawfully dispense the sacraments of the New Testament?

Answer: "Neither of them may be dispensed by any, but a minister of the word, lawfully ordained, 1 Cor. 4:1"139


The Assembly's Shorter Catechism Explained

Question: What is baptism?

Answer: Baptism is a sacrament, wherein the washing with water, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, doth signify and seal our ingrafting into Christ, and partaking of the benefits of the covenant of grace and our engagement to be the Lord's.

Question: What is the proper signification of the word baptism?

Answer: It is of Greek origin, and properly signifies a washing, sprinkling, or pouring out, in order to cleansing, Mark 1:8 - "I indeed baptise you with water, but he shall baptise you with the Holy Ghost;" that is, he shall pour his Spirit upon you, according to the promise, Isaiah 44:3 - "I will pour my Spirit upon thy seed, and my blessing upon thine offspring."

Question: Who is the author of baptism?

Answer: The Lord Jesus Christ, the Mediator and Head of the church.

Question: When did he institute and appoint it, as a sacrament of the New Testament?

Answer: A little before his ascension into heaven, when he gave his apostles that solemn charge, Matt. 28:19 - "Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost."

Question: Was not baptism used before that time?

Answer: It was used long before by the Jews, in receiving their proselytes, but not by divine institution.

Question: When came baptism to have a divine warrant and restitution?.

Answer: When God sent John the Baptist to baptise with water, John 1:33.

Question: Was there any difference between the baptism of John, and the baptism dispensed by the apostles after Christ's ascension?

Answer: There was no essential difference between them; for both of them had the same visible sign, and the same blessings signified by it. The difference was only circumstantial, in respect of time, and the objects of administration.

Question: How did they differ in respect of time?

Answer: The baptism of John was dispensed before Christ had finished the work which his Father gave him to do; but the baptism of the apostles was mostly after Christ had suffered, and had entered into his glory.

Question: How did they differ as to the objects of administration?

Answer: The baptism of John was confined to Judea only; but the baptism of the apostles extended to all nations, to whom the gospel was preached, Matt. 28:19.

Question: Did not Paul rebaptise some disciples at Ephesus who had been before baptised by John?

Answer: No; he only declares, that they who had heard John preach the doctrine of repentance and faith in Christ, were by John baptised in the name of the Lord Jesus, and so needed not to be rebaptised by any other.

Question: Why did Christ, who had no need of it, condescend to be baptised by John?

Answer: He gives the reason himself; "It becometh us," says he, "to fulfil all righteousness," Matt. 3:15.

Question: Did Christ himself baptise any?

Answer: No; "Jesus himself baptised not, but his disciples," John 4:2.

Question: Why did not Christ baptise any himself?

Answer: That he might commend the ministry of men of like passions with ourselves; and to show that the efficacy of the ordinance did not depend upon the administrator, but upon the divine blessing; even as the words spoken by him on earth, when they were efficacious, were so, not merely as spoken or uttered from his lips, but as accompanied with his own almighty power, Luke 5:17.

Question: What is the visible sign, or outward element in baptism?

Answer: Only water, pure and unmixed, Acts 10:47.

Question: How is water to be applied to the body in baptism?

Answer: "Dipping of the person into the water is not necessary, but baptism is rightly administered by pouring or sprinkling water upon the person."140

Question: How does it appear from scripture, that baptism is rightly administered by pouring or sprinkling water upon the person?

Answer: From repeated instances of the administration of baptism by the apostles in this manner; particularly when three thousand were baptised by them, Acts 2:41, water must have been sprinkled upon them, as the apostles could not have time, in a part only of one day, to take them one by one, and plunge them into it. Nor is it probable that the jailer, Acts 16:33, had such store of water in the night season, as was sufficient for himself and whole family to be dipped into; or that they went abroad in quest of some river for that purpose; it is much more reasonable to infer, that in both the above instances, they were baptised by sprinkling. The same may be said of Paul's baptism, Acts 9:18; and of the baptism of Cornelius and his friends, Acts 10:47, 48.

Question: Why is it most expedient to sprinkle water upon the face in baptism?

Answer: Because the face is the principal part of the body, and the whole person is represented by it, Ex. 10:29.

Question: What is signified by water in baptism?

Answer: The cleansing virtue of the blood of Christ, Rev. 1:5, and Spirit of Christ, Titus 3:5.

Question: What is the difference between cleansing by the blood, and cleansing by the Spirit of Christ?

Answer: The blood of Christ cleanseth meritoriously, 1 John 1:7; the Spirit of Christ efficaciously, Ezek. 36:27. By the former, the guilt of sin is, at once, taken away in justification; by the latter, the blot and stain of it is gradually carried off in sanctification.

Question: What is signified by sprinkling of water upon the body?

Answer: The application of the blood of Christ to the soul, by the Spirit of God, Titus 3:5, 6.

Question: What is the analogy, or resemblance, between the sign in baptism, and the thing signified?

Answer: Water makes clean, what before was foul; so the blood and Spirit of Christ purify from the guilt and pollution of sin, Zech. 13:1 water is open and free to all; so Christ and his benefits are freely offered to all the hearers of the gospel, Rev. 22:17.

Question: In whose name are we baptised?

Answer: In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, Matt. 28:19.

Question: What is it to be baptised in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost?

Answer: It is not only to be baptised by the will, command, and authority of the Threeone God; but likewise to be, by baptism, solemnly dedicated and devoted to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, as our God and portion for ever, Isaiah 44:5.

Question: What is it to be baptised by the command and authority of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost?

Answer: It intimates that the Trinity of persons do not only authorise and appoint baptism to be a sacrament of the New Testament; but that they become jointly engaged to make good all the blessings of the covenant, signified and sealed by that ordinance, Jer. 31:33 - "I will be their God, and they shall be my people."

Question: What is included in our being by baptism, solemnly dedicated and devoted to the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, as our God and portion for ever?

Answer: It includes a solemn profession, that these three adorable persons have the sole right to all our religious worship, Psalm 5:7; that all our hope of salvation is from them, Psalm 62:1, 5, and that we should be wholly and for ever the Lord's, Psalm 48:14.

Question: Is it necessary that baptism be dispensed in these express words, "In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost?"

Answer: Yes; because ministers are peremptorily commanded by Christ, to baptise in this very form, Matt. 28:19 - "Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations; baptising them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost."

Question: Did not the apostles baptise in another form, when they baptised in the name of the Lord Jesus? Acts 8:16.

Answer: It is not to be supposed, that the apostles would alter the form, so expressly delivered to them by their glorious Master; and therefore, when any are said to be baptised in the name of the Lord Jesus, it is not designed by this to notify to us in what form of words they were baptised; but only that they were baptised by the authority of Christ, who appointed this sacrament; and to faith in him, and communion with him.

Question: How ought the mentioning of the holy Trinity to be introduced in baptism?

Answer: It is proper that it be introduced by words in the first person, expressing the present act of administration; and likewise setting forth the authority that a minister, lawfully called, has to dispense this sacrament; such as, "I baptise thee, in the name," &c.141

Question: What are the ends and uses of baptism?

Answer: They are to signify and seal our ingrafting into Christ, and partaking of the benefits of the covenant of grace.

Question: What is it to signify and seal our ingrafting into Christ?

Answer: It is to signify and seal our union with him, and consequently the imputation of his righteousness to us, Gal. 3:27 - "As many of you as have been baptised into Christ, have put on Christ."

Question: What are the benefits of the covenant of grace, the partaking of which is signified and sealed in baptism?

Answer: They are "remission of sins by the blood of Christ; regeneration by his Spirit, adoption, and resurrection unto everlasting life."142

Question: What is the consequence of its being signified and sealed to us in baptism, that we partake of such great and glorious benefits?

Answer: The consequence is, that on this account, we enter into an open and professed engagement to be - the Lord's."143

Question: What is included in our engagement to be the Lord's?

Answer: That we shall be his "wholly and only."

Question: What is it to be his wholly?144

Answer: It is to be his, in all that we are, soul, spirit, and body, 1 Cor. 6:19, 20; and in all that we have, whether gifts, graces, or worldly comforts, 1 Chron. 29:14.

Question: What is it to be the Lord's only?

Answer: It is to be his in opposition to all his rivals and competitors, every one of whom we profess to renounce in baptism, Hos. 14:8.

Question: Who are these rivals and competitors with God, whom we profess to renounce in baptism?

Answer: They are sin, Rom. 6:6; Satan, Acts 26:18, and the world, John 17:14.

Question: Does baptism make or constitute persons church members?

Answer: No; they are supposed to be church-members before they are baptised, and if they are children of professing parents, they are born members of the visible church, 1 Cor. 7:14.

Question: Why must they be church-members before they are baptised?

Answer: Because the seals of the covenant can never be applied to any, but such as are supposed to be in the covenant; nor can the privileges of the church be confirmed to any that are without the church.

Question: Why then do our Confession,145 and Larger Catechism,146 say that "the parties baptised are solemnly admitted into the visible church?"

Answer: Because there is a vast difference between making a person a church-member, who was none before; and the solemnity of the admission of one, who is already a member. All that our Confession and Catechism affirm, is, that, by baptism, we are SOLEMNLY admitted into the visible church; that is, by baptism we are publicly declared to be church-members before, and thus have our membership solemnly sealed to us: "For by one Spirit we are all baptised into one body," 1 Cor. 12:13.

Question: Is it warrantable to call the baptising of any, the Christening of them?

Answer: No; because this is an encouraging of the superstitious Popish notion, that baptism makes even those who are born within the visible church, to become Christians; and that by the want of it, they remain infidels, and are left to uncovenanted mercy.

Question: What are the extremes about the necessity of baptism?

Answer: The Socinians and Quakers deny that it is necessary at all; on the other hand, the Papists, and some others, maintain that it is so absolutely necessary, that no salvation can be expected without it.

Question: What is the doctrine of our Confession of Faith, on this head?

Answer: That "although it be a great sin to contemn or neglect this ordinance, yet grace and salvation are not so inseparably annexed unto it, as that no person can be regenerated and saved without it; or that all who are baptised are undoubtedly regenerated."147

Question: In what consists the greatness of the sin of contemning and slighting this ordinance?

Answer: It consists in despising an express and positive institution of Christ, appointed to be administered in his church to the end of the world, Matt. 28:19, 20; and in slighting all the great and glorious benefits and privileges signified and sealed by it, Luke 7:30.

Question: How does it appear that grace and salvation are not inseparably annexed to baptism?

Answer: From the instance of Abraham, who had the righteousness of faith before he was circumcised, Rom. 4:11; of Cornelius, who feared God, and was accepted of him, before he was baptised, Acts 10:2, 4; and from the instance of the thief on the cross, who was saved without being baptised at all, Luke 23:43.

Question: How does the scripture evince, that all who are baptised are not regenerated and saved?

Answer: From the instance of Simon Magus, who was baptised, and yet, after baptism, remained "in the gall of bitterness, and in the bond of iniquity,"149 Acts 8:13, 23.

Question: Does baptism give a right to covenant-blessings; or, is it only a declarative sign and seal of them?

Answer: It is only a declarative sign and seal of them, as circumcision was, Rom. 4:11.

Question: What, then, gives a right?

Answer: The promise of the covenant, which is endorsed to the children, as well as to the parents, Acts 2:39 - "The promise is unto you, and to your CHILDREN."

Question: Is baptism designed to make the covenant more sure, or our faith stronger?

Answer: It is designed only to make our faith stronger; for the sureness of the covenant flows from the faithfulness of God, which is inviolable and unchangeable, Psalm 89:33, 34; Isaiah 54:10.

Question: In what consists the efficacy of baptism?

Answer: It consists in sealing and ratifying the right to covenant blessings, which persons have from the promise, so infallibly, that they shall certainly be put in possession of them, Eph. 5:25, 26. For, according to the doctrine of our Confession, "the grace promised is not only offered, but really exhibited and conferred, by the Holy Ghost, to such (whether of age, or infants,) as that grace belongeth unto, according to the counsel of God's own will, in his appointed time."148

Question: Is baptism efficacious at the time of its administration?

Answer: Not always: "the efficacy of baptism is not tied to that moment of time wherein it is administered,"149 but may take place afterwards, as God in his sovereignty has fixed it; "for the wind bloweth where it listeth," &c., John 3:8.

Question: What may we learn from the nature of baptism?

Answer: The infinite goodness of God, in appointing an initiating ordinance, irreversibly sealing all the blessings of the covenant to the elect seed, Gen. 17:7.


The Assembly's Shorter Catechism Explained

Question: To whom is baptism to be administered?

Answer: Baptism is not to be administered to any that are out of the visible church, till they profess their faith in Christ, and obedience to him: but the infants of such as are members of the visible church are to be baptised.

Question: Who may administer the sacrament of baptism?

Answer: Neither of the two sacraments "may be dispensed by any, but by a minister of the word, lawfully ordained.150

Question: How do you prove, that ordination by presbyters is lawful and valid, without a diocesan bishop?

Answer: From express scripture testimony, asserting the validity of ordination to the ministry, by "the laying on of the hands of the PRESBYTERY," 1 Tim. 4:14.

Question: Why should ministers lawfully ordained, and no other persons whatsoever, dispense the sacraments of the New Testament?

Answer: Because they only are the "stewards of the mysteries of God," 1 Cor. 4:1; and have the sole commission and authority from Christ to preach and baptise, Matt. 28:19 - "Go ye, therefore, and TEACH all nations, BAPTISING them," &c.

Question: Is public prayer requisite before the administration of baptism?

Answer: It is evident, that our Lord, at the first institution of the supper, and his apostles, afterwards, according to his example, prayed for the divine blessing to attend the dispensation of that solemn ordinance, 1 Cor. 11:24; and therefore, by parity of reasoning, ministers ought to pray, and the people to join in it, for the same blessing upon the administration of the sacrament of baptism.

Question: Ought not teaching, or preaching of the word, to go before baptism?

Answer: Yes; because our Lord has joined them together, Matt. 28:19 - "Go ye, therefore, and TEACH all nations, BAPTISING them," &c. And accordingly it was the uniform practice of the apostles to preach when they baptised, Acts 2:38-41; 8:35, 38, and 16:32, 33.

Question: Is naming of children necessary at baptism?

Answer: No; baptism dispensed by sprinkling of water, together with the words of institution, is every way valid and complete, though the person baptised is not named at all.

Question: But was not the naming of children, at circumcision, an ancient practice among the Jews? Luke 1:59.

Answer: It was so; and the names of children may be published at baptism still, provided it is not looked upon as essential to that solemn ordinance; for it is the parent, and not the minister, who gives the name.

Question: May baptism be administered in private?

Answer: It is more agreeable to the nature of this ordinance, when the Lord gives his people peace and opportunity for their public assemblies, that it be administered wherever the congregation is orderly called together, to wait on the dispensing of the word, Acts 2:41.151

Question: What if the child should be removed by death, before such a regular opportunity can be had?

Answer: Then the parents may comfort themselves in this, that they were neither guilty of an unnecessary delay, nor of contemning the ordinance; and that, in these circumstances, the want of it cannot harm the child, 2 Sam. 12:18, 23.

Question: With what frame and disposition of mind ought this sacrament to be dispensed and witnessed?

Answer: With a firm persuasion that it is an ordinance of God; with a filial and reverential fear of him on our spirits; and with gratitude and thankfulness for the inestimable benefits that are signified and sealed in it.

Question: How often is baptism to be administered to any person?

Answer: But once only, Acts 19:4, 5.

Question: Why but once only?

Answer: Because when our ingrafting into Christ (which is the comprehensive benefit signified and sealed in baptism) once takes place, it is never repeated, but remains firm and inviolable for ever, John 17:23.

Question: To whom is baptism not to be administered?

Answer: Baptism is not to be administered to any that are out of the visible church.

Question: Whom do you understand by those that are out of the visible church?

Answer: All infidels, or such as are Jews, or Heathens, and their children.

Question: Why may not these be baptised?

Answer: Because being strangers from the covenant of promise, they can have no right to the seals of it, Eph. 2:12.

Question: May infidels in no event be baptised?

Answer: Yes, they may, so soon as they profess their faith in Christ, and obedience to him.

Question: What is it to profess faith in Christ?

Answer: It is to profess a belief of the whole doctrines of the Christian religion, Acts 8:37.

Question: What is it to profess obedience to him?

Answer: It is to yield an external subjection to all the ordinances and institutions of Christ, Acts 2:46.

Question: Whom does such a profession respect?

Answer: It respects only the adult, or such as are grown up to ripeness of age.

Question: Have not INFANTS (who can make no such profession) a right to baptism?

Answer: Yes; the infants of such as are members of the visible church are to be baptised.

Question: Who are the members of the visible church?

Answer: They "are all such as profess the true religion, and their children."152

Question: What are we to understand by the true religion?

Answer: We are to understand by it the whole of those doctrines deduced from the holy scriptures, which are contained in our Confession of Faith, and Catechisms, as agreeing, in the main, with the Confessions of other reformed churches, 2 Tim. 1:13 - "Hold fast the form of sound words."

Question: What is it to profess the true religion?

Answer: It is openly to acknowledge, on all proper occasions, a steadfast adherence to the whole of divine truth; without espousing or countenancing any opposite error, Psalm 119:105. Rom. 10:10.

Question: Is a bare profession of the true religion sufficient?

Answer: No; for "faith without works is dead." James 2:26.

Question: Upon what ground have the infants of such as are members of the visible church a right to baptism?

Answer: Upon the ground of the grace and goodness of God in the promise, including them in the same covenant with their parents; as in the promise made to Abraham, Gen. 17:7 - "I will establish my covenant between me and thee, and thy seed after thee - to be a God unto thee, and to thy seed after thee."

Question: But what if this promise of including the seed in the same covenant with the parents have a respect only to the natural offspring of Abraham, and to none else?

Answer: The apostle Peter plainly affirms, that it is a promise of the covenant of grace, extending to the Gentiles, as well as to the Jews; and, at the same time, that it is the foundation of church-membership, and consequently, of baptism, when he says, Acts 2:38, 39, "Repent, and be baptised, every one of you; - for the promise is unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call."

Question: How does it appear from the text, that the promise of assuming the children into the same covenant with their parents, extends to the Gentile nations?

Answer: Because the apostle says, that the promise is unto "all that are AFAR OFF, even as many as the Lord our God shall call;" namely, by the external call or the word, which is appointed to be published "to every creature," Mark 16:15.

Question: How does it appear, that this promise is the foundation of churchmembership, and consequently of baptism?

Answer: It appears from this, that the apostle enforces his exhortation to repent, and be baptised, upon the adult persons to whom he is speaking, from this powerful and encouraging motive, that then their children should have a right and title to the privileges of the same covenant of promise, and the seal of which they themselves were to receive in their baptism; "Repent," says he, "and be baptised; for the promise is unto you and to your children."

Question: To what promise does the apostle here point?

Answer: He points at the promise made to Abraham, Gen. 17:7 - "I will be a God unto thee, and to thy seed after thee."

Question: What seal was annexed to this promise, or promulgation of the covenant of grace, made to Abraham?

Answer: The seal of circumcision, ver. 10 - "This is my covenant, which ye shall keep between me and you; - Every man-child among you shall be circumcised." And ver. 12 - "He that is eight days old shall be circumcised among you."

Question: What connexion is there between circumcising the seed of Abraham on the eighth day, under the Old Testament, and baptising the children of professing parents under the New?

Answer: The connexion is, that though circumcision and baptism be different signs, yet they are both of them seals of the same covenant of grace; and since the infant-seed of Abraham received the seal of circumcision under the Old Testament, by parity of reason, the infant children of professing parents should receive the seal of baptism under the New; especially as baptism is now come in the room of circumcision.

Question: How do you prove, from scripture, that baptism is come in the room of circumcision?

Answer: From Col. 2:10-12 - "Ye are complete in him - in whom, also, ye are circumcised with the circumcision made WITHOUT hands - buried with him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him."

Question: How does it appear, from this text, that baptism is now come in the room of circumcision?

Answer: From the plain and obvious scope of it, which is to show, that there is no need now of that circumcision which was outward in the flesh, as we have all the blessed fruits and effects of Christ's death and resurrection more clearly, and, at the same time, more extensively, represented and sealed in baptism; which is dispensed equally to both sexes.

Question: What would be the consequence, if the infants of professing parents, under the New Testament, were not admitted to the initiating seal of the covenant, as well as the infants of the Jews under the Old?

Answer: The consequence would be, that the privileges of the New Testament church would be more abridged and lessened, than those of the Old, whereas they are rather increased and enlarged, Isaiah 54:2, 3.

Question: How can infants be baptised, when they are incapable of making a profession of their faith, which seems to be required in order to baptism? Acts 8:37.

Answer: An explicit or formal profession of faith, is required only of them that are adult, or come to age, when they are to be baptised: but not of infants now, any more than when they were circumcised of old, on the eighth day after their birth.

Question: Are infants capable of the blessings signified and sealed in baptism?

Answer: Undoubtedly they are; for some of them have been filled with the Holy Ghost even from their mother's womb, Luke 1:15; and, consequently, by grace capable of regeneration, pardon, and eternal life; wherefore the sign and seal of these blessings ought not to be withheld.

Question: How are children of professing parents designated in scripture?

Answer: If any one of the parents be a visible believer, or regular church-member, the children, on that account, are called holy, 1 Cor. 7:14 - "The unbelieving husband is sanctified by the wife; and the unbelieving wife is sanctified by the husband; else were your children unclean, but now are they holy."

Question: What holiness is here meant?

Answer: Federal holiness, or being admitted to church membership, together with their believing or professing parent.

Question: May not this holiness be understood of legitimacy, or being lawfully begotten?

Answer: No; because marriage being an ordinance of the law of nature, the children of married parents, though both of them be infidels, are as lawfully begotten as those of professing Christians.

Question: How does federal holiness entitle an infant to baptism?

Answer: Federal holiness necessarily supposes a being within the covenant, in virtue of the credible profession of the parent; and, consequently, a right to the initiatory seal of it.

Question: Is there any express precept in the New Testament for baptising the infants of visible believers?

Answer: The privilege of the infant seed of visible church members, having been settled ever since Abraham's time, and never reversed, there was no need of any more than the general precept, "Go, teach and baptise," Matt. 28:19.

Question: Why is there need of no precept more express than this general one?

Answer: Because the infants' privilege of being assumed into the same covenant with their parents is declared to be continued in New Testament times, Acts 2:39 - "The promise is unto you, and to your children."

Question: Have we any scripture example for infant baptism?

Answer: Yes; the apostles baptised whole households or families at once; such as the household of Lydia, Acts 16:15; all the jailer's family, ver. 33; and the household of Stephanas, 1 Cor. 1:16.

Question: But there is no mention of their baptising infants in those families.

Answer: Neither is there mention of their baptising adult persons in them; only, since they baptised the whole, it may be inferred that there were some infants, or young ones, among them.

Question: "How is our baptism to be improved by us?"

Answer: "By serious and thankful consideration of the nature of it, and of the ends for which Christ instituted it; - by being humbled for our sinful defilement, our falling short of, and walking contrary to our engagements; - and by endeavouring to live by faith, to have our conversation in holiness and righteousness, as those that have therein given up their names to Christ, and to walk in brotherly love, as being baptised by the same Spirit into one body."153

Question: When should we thus improve our baptism?

Answer: "All our life long, especially in the time of temptation, and when we are present at the administration of it to others."154


The Assembly's Shorter Catechism Explained

Question: What is the Lord's Supper?

Answer: The Lord's supper is a sacrament, wherein, by giving and receiving bread and wine, according to Christ's appointments his death is showed forth; and the worthy receivers are, not after a corporal and carnal manner, but by faith, made partakers of his body and blood, with all his benefits, to their spiritual nourishment, and growth in grace.

Question: Why is this sacrament compared to a supper?

Answer: Because it was instituted immediately after eating the passover, (Matt. 26:26), which was always at night, Ex. 12:6, 8.

Question: Why is it called the Lord's supper?

Answer: Because the Lord Jesus was the sole author of it, 1 Cor. 11:23; and it is highly requisite it should be so.

Question: Why was it highly requisite that the Lord Jesus should be the sole author of this holy ordinance?

Answer: Because all the grace that is held forth in it, is treasured up wholly in him; and is conveyed and applied by him to the soul, John 1:16.

Question: When did Christ institute and appoint this sacrament?

Answer: "The same night in which he was betrayed," 1 Cor. 11:23.

Question: What night was that?

Answer: It was the very last night before his death, Matt. 26:47, 48, compared with chap. 27:1, 35, 46, 50.

Question: What is implied in his instituting this sacrament the same night in which he was betrayed?

Answer: It implies his infinite goodness, and inviolable attachment to mankind lost, whom he represented; that in the immediate prospect of his greatest sufferings and soul agonies in their stead, he should have their salvation and comfort so much at heart, as to leave this memorial and pledge of his dying love among them, till he come again, Matt. 26:29.

Question: Are Christians under any obligation to celebrate this ordinance at night, as our Lord and his disciples did at the first institution of it?

Answer: No; the substitution of this sacrament in the room of the passover, (which was eaten immediately before) was the occasion of its being first administered at night; and that particular occasion can never recur again.

Question: In what posture should the Lord's supper be received?

Answer: This sacrament being called the Lord's table, 1 Cor. 10:21, a table posture, which is sitting, seems to be most agreeable to the practice of our Lord, and his disciples, at the first supper, Matt. 26:20, 26.

Question: From whence did the practice of kneeling at the sacrament take its rise?

Answer: From the church of Rome, who maintain that the consecrated bread, or wafer, is changed into the real body of Christ, and therefore to be worshipped.

Question: What are the outward ELEMENTS, appointed by Christ, in this sacrament?

Answer: They are bread and wine, Mark 14:22, 23.

Question: What sort of bread and wine is proper to be used?

Answer: Just such as is ordinarily used in entertainments among men.

Question: Is the sacrament of the supper to be received, by every partaker, in both elements?

Answer: Certainly it ought; for our Lord gave both elements to his disciples; and the apostle appoints both the elements to be dispensed to communicants, 1 Cor. 11:28 - "Let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that BREAD, and drink of that CUP." And therefore the withholding of the cup from the people, as is done by the church of Rome, is both sacrilegious and impious.

Question: What is signified by the bread and the wine?

Answer: The body and blood of Christ, 1 Cor. 11:24, 25.

Question: What is to be understood by Christ's body and blood?

Answer: His incarnation and satisfaction, for the complete accomplishment of our redemption, John 6:51 - "The bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world."

Question: What is the analogy, or resemblance, between the bread and wine, and what is signified and represented by these elements?

Answer: As bread and wine make a sufficient entertainment for the nourishment of the body; so the righteousness and fulness of Christ, are a full and satisfying feast for the refreshment of the soul, John 6:55 - "My flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed."

Question: What are the sacramental actions with reference to these elements?

Answer: They are all of them comprehended in the answer, under giving and receiving bread and wine, according to Christ's appointment.

Question: Whom do these sacramental actions respect?

Answer: Some of them respect the administrator, and some the partakers in this holy ordinance.

Question: Who are the administrators of this sacrament?

Answer: Christ himself was the first administrator of it; and after him, ministers of the word, lawfully called and set apart to that office.

Question: What were the actions of Christ, the first administrator, which ministers are to imitate, in dispensing this sacrament?

Answer: After his example, they take the bread, and the cup; they bless these elements; they break the bread, and give both the bread and the wine to be distributed among the communicants.

Question: What is meant by taking the bread and the cup?

Answer: Christ's voluntarily assuming the human nature into union with his divine person, Heb. 2:16, that in it he might be a sacrifice of infinite value in our stead, Eph. 5:2.

Question: What is implied in blessing the elements?

Answer: That Christ has appointed the bread and the wine in this sacrament to be the visible signs or symbols of his body and blood; and likewise, by his example, has warranted ministers to set apart, by solemn prayer, so much of these elements, as shall be used in this sacrament, from a common, to a holy use.

Question: Why is Christ's blessing the elements called his giving thanks? 1 Cor. 11:24.

Answer: Because so inconceivably great was his love to lost sinners of mankind, that he was thankful he had all their debt to pay, Psalm 40:7, 8; and that he was able to do it to the uttermost, Heb. 7:25.

Question: What is to be understood by breaking the bread?

Answer: The most exquisite sufferings of the Son of God, Psalm 22:14, 15, and the necessity of them, as the channel, in which mercy was to be vented to the sinner, Rom. 5:21.

Question: What is intimated to us by giving the bread and giving the cup? Matt. 26:26, 27.

Answer: It intimates, that Christ is the free gift of God to sinners of mankind, for salvation and eternal life, John 3:16.

Question: What are the sacramental actions of the partakers in this sacrament, included in their receiving of bread and wine?

Answer: They take the bread and the cup: they eat the bread, and drink a part of the wine in the cup.

Question: What is imported in their taking the bread and the cup?

Answer: It imports, that our receiving of Christ, is founded on the gift and grant that is made of him in the word; for, "a man can receive nothing, except it be given him from heaven," John 3:27.

Question: What is included in their eating the bread, and drinking the wine?

Answer: It includes that there ought to be an application of Christ to the soul in particular, in virtue of the particular endorsement of the promise, to every one that hears the gospel: "For the promise," says the apostle Peter, "is unto you, (that is, unto every one of you,) and to your children," Acts 2:39.

Question: For what end did Christ institute these sacramental elements and actions?

Answer: That thereby his death, might be showed forth, 1 Cor. 11:26, and the remembrance of it kept up, Luke 22:19.

Question: What is it to show forth the death of Christ?

Answer: It is to profess, by partaking of the sacrament, that we believe his death, in our room, to have been most acceptable to God, Eph. 5:2; and that we acquiesce in it, together with his obedience, as the sole ground of our hope of salvation, Rom. 4:25.

Question: How does it appear, that his death, in our room, was most acceptable to God?

Answer: By his resurrection from the dead, 1 Thess. 1:10 and his entrance into glory, Luke 24:26.

Question: How may we know if we acquiesce in the obedience and death of Christ, as the sole ground of our hope of salvation?

Answer: If we are renouncing all other confidences, Hos. 14:3, and are convinced that the meritorious obedience unto death of the Son of God as our Surety, is the sole payment of the debt we owed to law and justice, Jer. 23:6 - "This is his name whereby he shall be called, THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS."

Question: Why has Christ appointed this sacrament to be observed in remembrance of him, Luke 22:19 - "This do in remembrance of me?"

Answer: Because though his incarnation and satisfaction are the greatest events that ever happened in the world, and the most interesting to us, yet we are apt to forget them; or at least not to have the solid and lively impression of them habitually upon our spirits, Psalm 106:13 - "They soon forgot his works."

Question: What is it about the death of Christ which we ought to remember in this sacrament?

Answer: The truth of it, the necessity of it, and the sufficiency of it.

Question: What is it to remember the truth of Christ's death?

Answer: It is by a true and saving faith, to believe that Christ really did and suffered all these things for us, that are recorded of him in scripture, 1 Cor. 15:3, 4.

Question: What is it to remember the necessity of his death, Luke 24:26 - "Ought not Christ to have suffered these things?"

Answer: It is to believe, that we had certainly gone down to the pit, unless God had found a ransom, or an atonement, Job 33:24.

Question: What is it to remember the sufficiency of it?

Answer: It is to believe that it is infinitely valuable; and, therefore, could have procured the salvation of thousands of worlds, had it been so ordained, it being the death and blood of him, who is the supreme God, Acts 20:28 - "Feed the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood."

Question: In what MANNER should we show forth and remember the death of Christ in this sacrament?

Answer: We ought to do it fiducially,155 humbly, mournfully, and thankfully.

Question: Why ought we to remember his death fiducially?

Answer: Because as he "was delivered for our offences," Rom. 4:25, so "God raised him up from the dead, and gave him glory, that our faith and hope might be in God," 1 Pet. 1:21.

Question: Why ought we to remember it humbly?

Answer: Because when we are unworthy of the least of all God's mercies, Gen. 32:10, we are much more so of the greatest that can be conferred, John 3:16 - "God so loved the world" &c.

Question: Why mournfully?

Answer: Because our sins were the procuring cause of his sufferings, Isaiah 53:5, 6 - "He was wounded for OUR transgressions, he was bruised for OUR iniquities - The Lord hath laid on him the iniquities of us all."156

Question: Why should the death of Christ be remembered thankfully?

Answer: Because his death was in our room, Titus 2:14; and was the finishing stroke of the work which his Father gave him to do, John 19:30.

Question: How often should the death of Christ be remembered, by partaking of this sacrament?

Answer: The scripture has not precisely determined how often; but it would appear that it ought frequently to be done.

Question: How does it appear that the death of Christ should be frequently remembered in the supper?

Answer: From the words of our Lord, 1 Cor. 11:25, 26 - "This do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance of me; for, AS OFTEN as ye eat this bread," &c., plainly implying, that it ought OFTEN to be done.

Question: When will the death of Christ be remembered perpetually, without interruption?

Answer: In heaven, though not in a sacramental way, Rev. 21:22 - "I saw no temple there."

Question: How may it be proved, that it will be perpetually remembered in heaven?

Answer: From the song of the redeemed there, recorded, Rev. 1:5, 6 - "Unto him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood - to him be glory." And chap. 5:9-14 - "And they sung a new song; saying - Thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood," &c.

Question: Who are called worthy receivers, in the answer?

Answer: None are worthy receivers of this sacrament, but true believers; and even they, in order to their partaking worthily and comfortably, ought to have grace in exercise, as well as in the habit; Song 1:12.

Question: Why are true believers called WORTHY receivers?

Answer: Not on account of any worthiness in themselves, for they have nothing of their own of which they can boast; but because they are united to Christ, and have all that grace from him, which enables them to partake in a suitable and becoming manner, 2 Cor. 3:5.

Question: What are the worthy receivers made partakers of in this sacrament?

Answer: They are made partakers of Christ's body and blood, with all his benefits.

Question: What is it to be partakers of Christ's body and blood?

Answer: It is to be entertained, in the sacrament upon all that was transacted upon the person of Christ, as God-man, Mediator: this being the only proper and suitable food of the soul, John 6:51, 53.

Question: In what respect is it, that the worthy receivers are NOT made partakers of his body and blood?

Answer: They are not made partakers after a corporal and carnal manner.

Question: Why are these words inserted in the answer, not after a corporal and carnal manner?

Answer: They are inserted in opposition to the Popish doctrine of transubstantiation, "which maintains a change of the substance of bread and wine, into the substance of Christ's body and blood, by consecration of a priest."157

Question: What is the absurdity of this doctrine?

Answer: It is "repugnant not to scripture alone, but even to common sense and reason; overthroweth the nature of the sacrament; and hath been and is the cause of manifold superstitions, yea, of gross idolatries."158

Question: How is it repugnant to scripture?

Answer: The scripture expressly affirms, that Christ gave the very same bread and cup to his disciples, after consecration, that he had taken into his hands before, Matt. 26:26, 27. Whereas the doctrine of transubstantiation maintains, that the elements, after consecration, are no more the same, having only the form, colour, taste, and smell of bread and wine, wanting the substance of either; being turned into the substance of Christ's body and blood; in opposition to which, the apostle calls the elements, after consecration, by the same names they had before it, to intimate, that there was no change of their substance, 1 Cor. 11:26-28 - "As often as ye eat this BREAD, and drink this CUP," &c.

Question: How is transubstantiation repugnant to common sense and reason?

Answer: Common sense and reason tell us, that a body occupies but one place, and cannot be in divers places at one and the same time; whereas they who defend transubstantiation must allow, that the body of Christ may be in a thousand places at once, even as many places as there are consecrated wafers.

Question: How does transubstantiation overthrow the nature of the sacrament?

Answer: By destroying the spiritual or sacramental relation, that is between the sign and the thing signified; for if the sign be turned into the thing signified, then all relation and similitude between them cease. Besides, the sacrament being a commemoration of what was done and suffered in the human nature of Christ, it supposes his body to be absent, whereas transubstantiation supposes it present.

Question: How is it the cause of manifold superstitions and gross idolatries?

Answer: In as much as strange and surprising effects are ascribed to the host, or consecrated wafer, even when not used sacramentally; and the alleged change of the bread and wine, into the substance of Christ's body and blood in the sacrament, is the very pretence, why they pay religious worship and adoration to the elements themselves; which is gross superstition and idolatry.

Question: What is the difference between the Papists and Lutherans on this head?

Answer: The Papists maintain, that the bread and wine lose their own natural substance, and are turned into the substance of Christ's body and blood; but the Lutherans affirm, that the bread and wine retain their own natural substance still, and, at the same time, that the substance of Christ's body and blood is in, with, or under, these elements.

Question: Are not both opinions equally absurd?

Answer: Yes; for transubstantiation supposes, that one body may be in many places at the same time; and consubstantiation takes it for granted, that two bodies may be together in the very same place, or that they may both occupy the same individual space at the same time.

Question: Is Christ offered up, in this sacrament, as a sacrifice for the remission of sins?

Answer: No; there is in it "only a commemoration of that one offering up of himself, by himself; upon the cross, once for all; and a spiritual oblation of all possible praise unto God for the same.159

Question: Why does our Confession say, that Christ's once offering up of himself was done BY HIMSELF?

Answer: In opposition to the unbloody sacrifice of the mass, which is offered up daily by the Popish priests, for remission of the sins both of the quick and the dead.

Question: What does our Confession of Faith affirm concerning this Popish "sacrifice of the mass," as they call it?

Answer: It affirms, that it is "most abominably injurious to Christ's one only sacrifice, the alone propitiation for all the sins of the elect, Heb. 7:27."160

Question: Is not Christ really present in the sacrament of the supper?

Answer: He is "as really, but spiritually, present to the faith of believers in that ordinance, as the elements themselves are to their outward senses, 1 Cor. 11:29."161

Question: If Christ be really present in the sacrament only in a spiritual sense, and not corporally, why does he say of the bread, "This is my body"?

Answer: The plain and obvious meaning is, "This bread is the sign or symbol of my body": so that the words are to be understood in the figurative, not in the literal sense.

Question: How do you prove, that these words, "This is my body," are to be understood in the figurative, and not in the literal and proper sense?

Answer: From this known rule in all language, that when the strict literal sense involves a manifest absurdity, or contradiction, we must of necessity have recourse to the figurative sense; as when the apostle says, 1 Cor. 10:4 - "That rock was Christ," it cannot be understood literally, as if that rock, materially considered, was really Christ; but, figuratively, that rock signified Christ; and so of a great many other scripture expressions.

Question: Since the worthy receivers are not made partakers of Christ's body and blood after a corporal and carnal manner, how do they partake of the same?

Answer: They partake of his body and blood, in this sacrament, only by faith.

Question: What is it for the worthy receivers to partake of his body and blood by faith?

Answer: It is to apply and appropriate himself and his righteousness, with all his benefits, to themselves, Psalm 16:5, 6.

Question: What are these benefits which faith, in this sacrament, applies together with Christ himself?

Answer: Among many others, there are these three comprehensive ones; namely, an ample indemnity of all sin, Micah 7:19; an unquestionable security for the progress of sanctification, Job 17:9; and an undoubted title to eternal life, John 10:28.

Question: Why are these, and the like, called his benefits?

Answer: Because he is the purchaser, Titus 2:14, proprietor, John 3:35, and dispenser of them, Eph. 4:8.

Question: Why are worthy receivers said to be made partakers of all his benefits?

Answer: Because where himself is received, all good things go along with him, 1 Cor. 3:22, 23 - "all are yours; and ye are Christ's."

Question: What is the fruit and effect of their being, by faith, made partakers of Christ, and all his benefits?

Answer: The fruit and effect of it is, their spiritual nourishment, and growth in grace.

Question: What does their spiritual nourishment imply in it?

Answer: That this sacrament is not a converting, but a nourishing ordinance.

Question: What does their growth in grace imply?

Answer: That the worthy receivers are already in a state of grace.

Question: How may spiritual nourishment and growth in grace be discerned?

Answer: If there is a more enlarged desire after the sincere milk of the word, 1 Pet. 2:2; if there is more living by faith, and not by sense, 2 Cor. 5:7; and if there is more inward opposition to sin, Psalm 66:18, and outward tenderness in the walk, Psalm 39:1.