chooses His own means. They may sometimes seem foolishness to man,
especially in the operations of His Grace.

Our Saviour, in working miracles, used some means that must have
struck those interested as very unsuitable. When He healed the man
blind from his birth, _He mixed spittle and clay_, and with this
strange ointment, anointed and opened his eyes. Well might the blind
man have said: "What good can a little earth mixed with spittle do?"
Yet it pleased our Lord to use it as a means, in working that
stupendous miracle. When Jesus asked for the _five barley loaves and
two small fishes_, to feed the five thousand, even an apostle said:
"_What are these among so many_?" Yes, what are they? In the
hands of a mere man, nothing--nay, worse than nothing; only enough to
taunt the hungry thousands and become a cause of strife and riot. But
in the hands of the Son of God, with His blessing on them, taken from
His hands, and distributed according to His Word, they became a feast
in the wilderness.

A poor woman, a sufferer for twelve years, craves healing from
our Lord. With a woman's faith, timid though strong, she presses
through the crowd close to Jesus, and with her trembling bony fingers
touches the hem of His garment. Jesus perceives that virtue is gone
out of Him. The woman perceives that virtue, healing and life are come
into her. There was a transfer from Christ's blessed life-giving body,
into the diseased suffering body of the woman. And what was the medium
of the transfer? The fringe of His garment--a piece of cloth. Yes, if
it so pleases the mighty God, the everlasting Saviour, He can use a
piece of cloth as a means to transfer healing and life from Himself to
a suffering one.

The same divine Saviour now works through means. He has founded a
Church, ordained a ministry, and instituted the preaching of the Word
and the administration of His own sacraments. Christ now works in and
through His Church. Through her ministry, preaching the Word, and
administering the sacraments, the Holy Spirit is given. (Augsburg
Confession, Article 5.) When Christ sent forth His apostles to make
disciples of all nations, He instructed them how they were to do it.
The commission correctly translated, as we have it in the Revised New
Testament reads thus: "_Go ye, therefore, and make disciples_ _of all
the nations, baptising them into the name of the Father, and of the
Son, and of the Holy Ghost; teaching them to observe all things
whatsoever I commanded you; and lo, I am with you alway, even unto the
end of the world._" Here then is the Saviour's explicit instruction.
The Apostles are to _make disciples_. This is the object of their
mission. How are they to do it? By _baptizing_ them into the name of
the triune God, _and teaching_ them to observe all Christ's commands.
This is Christ's own appointed way of applying His Grace to sinful
men, and bringing them out of a state of sin into a state of grace.

And this is the Way of Salvation in the Lutheran Church. We begin
with the child, who needs Grace. We begin by baptizing that child into
Christ. We, therefore, lay much stress on baptism. We teach our people
that it is sinful, if not perilous, to neglect the baptism of their
children. The Lutheran Church attaches more importance to this divine
ordinance than any other Protestant denomination. While all around us
there has been a weakening and yielding on this point; while the
spirit of our age and country scorns the idea of a child receiving
divine Grace through baptism; while it has become offensive to the
popular ear to speak of baptismal Grace, our Church, wherever she has
been and is true to herself, stands to-day where Martin Luther and his
co-workers stood, where the confessors of Augsburg stood, and where
the framers of the Book of Concord stood.

The world still asks: "What good can a little water do?" We
answer, first of all: "Baptism _is not simply water_, but it is
the water comprehended in God's command, and connected with God's
Word." (Luther's Small Catechism.) The Lutheran Church knows of no
baptism that is only "a little water." We cannot speak of such a
baptism. Let it be clearly understood that when we speak of baptism,
we speak of it as defined above, by Luther. We cannot separate the
water from the Word. We would not dare to baptize with water without
the Word. In the words of Luther, _that_ would be "simply water,
and no baptism." Let it be kept constantly in mind that whatever
benefits and effects we ascribe to baptism, in the further forcible
words of Luther's Catechism: "It is not the water, indeed, that
produces these effects, but the Word of God which accompanies and is
connected with the water, and our faith which relies on the Word of
God connected with the water." If now the question is further asked:
What good can baptism as thus defined do? we will try to answer, or,
rather, we will let God's Word answer. "What saith the Scripture?"




CHAPTER IV.

BAPTISM, A DIVINELY APPOINTED MEANS OF GRACE.

When we inquire into the benefits and blessings which the Word of
God connects with baptism, we must be careful to obtain the true sense
and necessary meaning of its declarations. It is not enough to pick
out an isolated passage or two, give them a sense of our own, and
forthwith build on them a theory or doctrine. In this way the Holy
Scriptures have been made to teach and support the gravest errors and
most dangerous heresies. In this way, many persons "_wrest the
Scriptures to their own destruction_." On this important point our
Church has laid down certain plain, practical, safe and sound
principles. By keeping in mind, and following these fundamental
directions, in the interpretation of the divine Word, the plainest
searcher of the Scriptures can save himself from great confusion,
perplexity and doubt.

One of the first and most important principle, insisted on by our
theologians and the framers of our Confessions, is that a passage of
Scripture is always to be taken in its natural, plain and literal
sense, unless there is something in the text itself, or in the
context, that clearly indicates that it is intended to convey a
figurative sense.

Again: A passage is never to be torn from its connection, but is
to be studied in connection with what goes before and follows after.

Again--and this is of the greatest importance--Scripture is to be
interpreted by Scripture. As Quenstedt says: "Passages which need
explanation can and should be explained by other passages that are
more clear, and thus the Scripture itself furnishes an interpretation
of obscure expressions, when a comparison of these is made with those
that are more clear. So that Scripture is explained by Scripture."

According to these principles, we ought never to be fully certain
that any doctrine is scriptural, until we have examined all that the
divine Word says on the subject. In this manner then we wish to answer
the question with which we started this chapter: What is written as to
the benefits and blessings conferred in baptism?

We have already referred to the commission given to the Apostles
in Matt, xxviii. 19. We have seen that in that commission our Lord
makes baptism one of the means through which the Holy Spirit operates
in making men His disciples. In Mark xvi. 16, he says: "_He that
believeth and is baptized shall be saved._" In John iii. 5, he says:
"_Except a man_"--_i.e._, any one--"_be born of water and of the
Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God_." In Acts ii. 38, the
Apostle says: "_Repent and be baptized every one of you for the
remission of your sins._" Acts xxii. 16: "_Arise and be baptized, and
wash away thy sins, calling on the name of the Lord._" Romans vi. 3:
"_Know ye not that so many of us as were baptized into Christ, were
baptized into His death._" Gal. iii. 27: "_For as many of you as have
been baptized into Christ, have put on Christ._" Eph. v. 25-26:
"_Christ also loved the Church, and gave himself for it, that He might
sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the Word._" Col.
ii. 12: "_Buried with Him in baptism, wherein ye are also risen with
Him through the faith of the operation of God._" Tit. iii. 5:
"_According to His mercy He saved us by the washing of regeneration,
and renewing of the Holy Ghost._" 1 Pet. iii. 21: "_The like figure
whereunto even baptism doth also now save us; not the putting away of
the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward
God, by the resurrection of Jesus Christ._"

These are the principal passages which treat of the subject of
baptism. There are a few other passages in which baptism is merely
mentioned, but not explained. There is not one passage that teaches
any thing different from those quoted.

All we now ask of the reader is to examine these passages
carefully, to compare them one with the other and to ask himself: What
do they teach? What is the meaning which a plain, unprejudiced reader,
who has implicit confidence in the Word and power of God, would derive
from them? Can he say, "There is nothing in baptism?" "It is of no
consequence." "It is only a Church ceremony, without any particular
blessing in it." Or do the words clearly teach it is nothing more than
a _sign_--an outward sign--of an invisible grace?

Look again at the expressions of these passages. We desire to be
clear here, because this is one of the points on which the Lutheran
Church to-day differs from so many others. Jesus mentions _water_ as
well as Spirit, when speaking of the new birth. "Make disciples, (by)
_baptizing_ them." "Be baptized _for the remission of your sins_." "_Be
baptized and _wash away thy sin._" "_Baptized _into Christ._" By
baptism "_put on Christ_." Christ designs to sanctify and cleanse the
Church with "the _washing of water_ by the Word." "_Washing of
regeneration_ and renewing of the Holy Ghost." "Baptism _doth also now
save us_." The language is certainly strong and plain. Any principle
of interpretation, by which baptismal Grace and regeneration can be
explained out of these passages, will overthrow every doctrine of our
holy Christian faith.

Our Catechism here also teaches nothing but the pure truth of the
Word, when it asserts that baptism "worketh forgiveness of sins,
delivers from death and the devil, and confers everlasting life and
salvation on all who believe, as the Word and promise of God declare."
Our solid and impregnable Augsburg Confession, also, when in Article
II. it confesses that the new birth by baptism and the Holy Spirit
delivers from the power and penalty of original sin. Also in Article
IX., "of baptism they teach that it is necessary to salvation, and
that by baptism the Grace of God is offered, and that children are to
be baptized, who by baptism being offered to God, are received into
God's favor." And so with all our other confessional writings.

The question might here be asked: Is baptism so absolutely
essential to salvation, that unbaptized children are lost? To this we
would briefly reply, that the very men who drew up our Confessions
deny emphatically that it is thus _absolutely_ necessary. Luther,
Melanchthon, Bugenhagen and others, repudiate the idea that an
unbaptized infant is lost. No single acknowledged theologian of the
Lutheran Church ever taught this repulsive doctrine. Why then does our
Confession say baptism is necessary to salvation? It is necessary in
the same sense in which it is necessary to use all Christ's
ordinances. The necessity is _ordinary_, not _absolute_. Ordinarily
Christ bestows His Grace on the child through baptism, as the means or
channel through which the Holy Spirit is conferred. But when, through
no fault of its own, this is not applied, He can reach it in some
other way.

As we have seen above, He is not so limited to certain means,
that His Grace cannot operate without them. The only thing on which
our Church insists in the case of a child as absolutely necessary, is
the new birth. Ordinarily this is effected, by the Holy Spirit,
through baptism, as the means of Grace. When the means, however,
cannot be applied, the Spirit of God can effect this new birth in some
other way. He is not bound to means. And from what we have learned
above of the will of God, toward these little ones, we have every
reason to believe that He does so reach and change every infant that
dies unbaptized. The position of our Church, as held by all her great
theologians, is tersely and clearly expressed in the words, "Not the
_absence_ but the _contempt_ of the sacrament condemns."

While the Lutheran Church, therefore, has confidence enough in
her dear heavenly Father and loving Saviour, to believe that her Lord
will never let a little one perish, but will always regenerate and fit
it for His blessed Kingdom ere he takes it hence, she still
strenuously insists on having the children of all her households
baptized into Christ.

Others may come and say: You have no authority in the Bible for
baptizing infants. Without entering fully on this point we will
briefly say: It is enough for a Lutheran to know that the divine
commission is to "_baptize the nations_"--there never was a
nation without infants. The children need Grace: baptism confers
Grace. It is specially adapted to impart spiritual blessings to these
little ones. We cannot take the preached Word, but we can take the
sacramental Word and apply it to them. God established infant
membership in his Church. He alone has a right to revoke it. He has
never done so. Therefore it stands. If the Old Testament covenant of
Grace embraced infants, the New is not narrower, but wider.

The pious Baptist mother's heart is much more scripturally
correct than her head. She presses her babe to her bosom, and prays
earnestly to Jesus to bless that babe. Her heart knows and believes
that that dear child _needs_ the blessing of Jesus, and that He
_can_ bestow the needed blessing. And yet she will deny that He
can bless it through His own sacrament.--"_the washing of water by
the Word_."

The devout Lutheran mother presses her baptized child to her
bosom, looks into its eyes, and thanks her Saviour from the depth of
her heart, that He has blessed her child; that He has breathed into it
His divine life, washed it, sealed it, and adopted it as His son or
daughter. How sweet the consolation to know that her precious little
one is a lamb of Christ's flock, "_bearing on its body the marks of
the Lord Jesus_."

But Christian parents have not fulfilled their whole duty in
having children baptized into Christ. The children are indeed in
covenant relationship with Jesus Christ. But it is their bounden duty
and blessed privilege to keep their little ones in that covenant of
Grace. Of this more in the next chapter.




CHAPTER V.

THE BAPTISMAL COVENANT CAN BE KEPT UNBROKEN.
AIM AND RESPONSIBILITY OF PARENTS.

We have gone "_to the Law and to the Testimony_" to find out
what the nature and benefits of Baptism are. We have gathered out of
the Word all the principal passages bearing on this subject. We have
grouped them together, and studied them side by side. We have noticed
that their sense is uniform, clear, and strong. Unless we are willing
to throw aside all sound principles of interpretation, we can extract
from the words of inspiration only one meaning, and that is that the
baptized child is, by virtue of that divine ordinance, a new creature
in Christ Jesus.

Here let us be careful, however, to bear in mind and keep before
us that we claim for the child only the _birth_ of a new life. It has
been _born_ of water and the Spirit. A birth we know is but a very
feeble beginning of life. So faint are the flickerings of the natural
life at birth, that it is often doubtful at first whether any life is
present. The result of a birth is not a full-grown man, but a very
weak and helpless babe. The little life needs the most tender,
watchful and intelligent fostering and care.

So it is also in the Kingdom of Grace. The divine life is there.
But it is life in its first beginnings. As yet only the seeds and
germs of the new life. And this young spiritual life also needs gentle
fostering and careful nourishing. Like the natural life of the child,
so its spiritual life is beset with perils. While the germs of the new
life are there, we must not forget that the roots of sin are also
still there. Our Church does not teach with Rome that "sin (original)
is destroyed in baptism, so that it no longer exists." Hollazius says:
"The guilt and dominion of sin is taken away by baptism, but not the
root or tinder of sin." Luther also writes that "Baptism takes away
the guilt of sin, although the material, called concupiscence,
remains."

Unfortunately for the child these roots of sin will grow of their
own accord, like the weeds in our gardens. They need no fostering
care. Not so with the germs of the new life. They, like the most
precious plants of the gardens, must be watched and guarded and tended
continually. Solomon says: Prov. xxix. 15, "_A child left to himself
bringeth his mother to shame_." And this may be true even of a
baptized child.

The Christian parent, therefore, has not fulfilled his whole duty
to the child by having it baptized. It is now the parents' duty; or
rather it should be considered the parents' most blessed privilege to
_keep_ that child in covenant relationship with the blessed
Redeemer. This also belongs to the teaching of the Church of the
Reformation. This point, however, many parents seem to forget. Many
who are sound on the question of baptismal Grace, are very unsound as
to a parent's duty to the baptized child.

Hunnius, a recognized standard theologian of our Church, in
speaking of the responsibility of those who present children for
baptism says it is expected of them _First_, to answer, in behalf
of the child, as to the faith in which it is baptized, and in which it
is to be brought up. _Second_, to instruct the child when it
comes to years of discretion, that it has been truly baptized, as
Christ has commanded. _Third_, to pray for the child, that God
may keep it in that Covenant of Grace, bless it in body and spirit,
and finally save it with all true believers, and _Fourth_, to use
all diligence that the child may grow up in that faith, which they
have confessed in the child's name, and thus be preserved from
dangerous error and false doctrine.

That most delightful Lutheran theologian, Luthardt, says: "Infant
baptism is a comfort beyond any other, but it is also a responsibility
beyond any other." Again: "As Christians we know that God has bestowed
upon our children not only natural, but spiritual gifts. For our
children have been baptized and received by baptism into the Covenant
of Grace. To preserve them in this baptismal Grace, to develop in them
the life of God's spirit, this is one side of Christian education. To
contend against sin in the child is the other." Dr. Schmid, in his
Christian Ethics, also teaches that it is possible to continue in the
uninterrupted enjoyment of baptismal Grace. Dr. Pontoppidan, in his
explanation of Luther's Small Catechism, asks the question: "Is it
possible to keep one's baptismal covenant?" He answers; "Yes, by the
Grace of God it is possible."

The teaching of our Church, therefore, is that the baptized child
can grow up, a child of Grace from infancy, and that under God, it
rests principally with the parents or guardians whether it shall be
so. And this Lutheran idea, like all others, is grounded in the Word
of God.

We note a few examples: Samuel was a child of prayer, given to
his pious mother in answer to prayer. She called him Samuel, _i.e._,
asked of God. Before his birth even, she dedicated him to God. As soon
as he was weaned she carried him to the Tabernacle and there publicly
consecrated him to the service of the Most High. From this time forth,
according to the sacred record, he dwelt in God's Tabernacle and
"_ministered unto the Lord before Eli_". As a mere child God used him
as a prophet. Of the prophet Jeremiah it is written: (Jer. i. 5)
"_Before thou earnest forth out of the womb, I sanctified thee._" Of
John the Baptist it is written: (Luke i. 15) "_He shall be filled with
the Holy Ghost, even from his mother's womb_". To Timothy, Paul says:
"_From a child thou hast known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to
make thee wise unto salvation_," and in speaking of Timothy's faith
Paul says, that faith "_dwelt first in thy grandmother Lois, and thy
mother Eunice_." Psalms lxxi. 5-6: "_Thou art my trust from my youth.
By thee have I been holden up from the womb._"

It is therefore possible for God, not only to give His Grace to a
child, but to keep that child in His Grace all its days. To dispute
this is, simply, to dispute the record that God gave.

Lest some one should still say, however, that the examples above
noted are isolated and exceptional, we note further, that the tenor of
the whole Word is in harmony with this idea. Nowhere in the whole
Bible is it even intimated that it is God's desire or plan that
children must remain outside of the covenant of Grace, and have no
part or lot in the benefits of Christ's redeeming work until they come
to years of discretion and can choose for themselves. This modern idea
is utterly foreign and contradictory to all we know of God, of His
scheme of redemption, and of His dealings with His people, either in
the old or new dispensation. He ordained that infants at eight days
old should be brought into His covenant. He recognized infant children
as partakers of the blessings of His covenant. "_Out of the mouth of
babes and sucklings thou hast perfected praise_;" "_Suffer them to come
unto Me_." Everywhere it is taken for granted that the children who
have received either the Old or New Testament sacrament of initiation
are His. Nowhere are parents exhorted to use their endeavors to have
such children converted, as though they had never been touched by
divine Grace. But everywhere they are exhorted to keep them in that
relation to their Lord, into which His own ordinance has brought them.
Gen. xviii. 19, "_I know that he will command his household after him,
and that they shall keep the way of the Lord_." Psalm lxxviii. 6, 7,
"_That the generation to come might know them, even the children which
should be born, which should arise and declare them to their children,
that they might set their hope in God, and not forget the works of
God, but keep His commandments_." Prov. xxii. 6, "_Train up a child in
the way he should go; when he is old he will not depart from it_."
Eph. vi. 4, "_Bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the
Lord_."

Let the baptized child then be looked upon as already belonging
to Christ. Let the parents not worry as though it could not be His
until it experiences a change of heart. That heart has been changed.
The germs of faith and love are there. If the parent appreciates this
fact and does his part, there will be developed, very early, the
truest confidence and trust in Christ, and the purest love to God.
From the germs will grow the beautiful plant of child-trust and
child-love. The graces of the new life may be thus early drawn out, so
that the child, in after years, will never know of a time when it did
not trust and love, and as a result of this love, hate sin. This is
the ideal of God's Word. It is the ideal which every Christian parent
should strive to realize in the children given by God, and given to
God in His own ordinance. How can it be done? Of this, more in the
next chapter.




CHAPTER VI.

HOME INFLUENCE AND TRAINING IN THEIR RELATION TO
THE KEEPING OF THE BAPTISMAL COVENANT.

According to the last chapter, it is indeed a high and holy ideal
that every Christian parent should set before him in regard to his
children. Every child that God gives to a Christian parent is to be so
treated that, from the hour of its baptism, it is to be a son or
daughter of God. It is to be so fostered and nurtured and trained
that, from its earliest self-consciousness, it is to grow day by day
in knowledge and in Grace. As it increases in stature, so it is to
increase in wisdom and in favor with God and man.

In order that this may be realized, it is first of all necessary
that there be the proper surroundings. We cannot expect that parent to
draw out these graces of the new life in the child, who is not himself
imbued with a spirit of living faith and fervent love to Christ. In
the beautiful words of Luthardt: "Religion must first approach the
child in the form of life, and afterward in the form of instruction.
Let religion be the atmosphere by which the child is surrounded, the
air which it breathes. The whole spirit of the home, its order, its
practice--that world in which the child finds himself so soon as he
knows himself--this it is which must make religion appear to him a
thing natural and self-evident."

And this is especially important for the mother. It is while
resting on the mother's bosom and playing at the mother's knee, that
the child is receiving impressions that are stones for character
building. The father, of course, is not released from responsibility.
He too is to set a holy example, to make impressions for good and to
use all his influence to direct the thoughts and inclinations of the
child upward. The man who does not help in the religious training of
his own children is not fit to be a father. But it is after all with
the mother that the little child spends most of its time and receives
most of its impressions. Oh, that every mother were a Hannah, an
Elizabeth, an Eunice. Then would there be more Samuels, Johns and
Timothys. Let us have more of the spirit of Christ in the heart of the
mother and father, and in the home. Let the child learn, with the
first dawnings of self-consciousness, that Jesus is known and loved
and honored in the home, and there will be no trouble about the
future.

But the child must be instructed. Begin early. Let it learn to
pray as soon as it can speak. Let it use its first lispings and
stammerings in speaking words of prayer. We quote again from Luthardt:
"Let it not be objected that the child cannot understand the prayer.
The way of education is by practice to understanding, not by
understanding to practice. And the child will have a feeling and a
presentiment of what it cannot understand. The world of heavenly
things is not an incomprehensible region to the child, but the home of
its spirit. The child will speak to his Father in Heaven without
needing much instruction as to who that Father is. It seems as though
God were a well-known friend of his heart. The child will love to
pray. If mother forgets it, the child will not."

Therefore, oh, ye parents! pray for your child. Pray with your
child. Teach that child to pray. The writer knows of a little girl who
came home from Sunday-school and said: "Mamma, why don't you ever
pray?" What a rebuke!

The child must be taught the truth of God's Word. It also must be
sanctified, _i.e._, made more and more holy "_through the truth_." As
a child it needs first the "_milk of the Word_." It is not desirable,
neither is it necessary, to try to teach the very young child
doctrines and abstract truths. Neither ought the child to be required
to learn by rote long passages from the Scriptures. In this way some
well-meaning, but mistaken parents make the Word a burden to their
children, and it becomes odious in their eyes. There are other and
better ways. Begin by showing the child Bible pictures, even if it
should soil the book a little. Better a thousand times have its
lessons of life and love graven on the heart of the child, than to
have its fine engravings as a parlor ornament for strangers. In our
day there is also an abundant supply of Bible pictures and story books
for children. Those parents who have never tried it will be surprised
to see the interest the little ones take. With the pictures connect
the stories of the Bible. And where are the stories better calculated
to interest a child than these same old stories, that have edified a
hundred generations? When will children ever weary of hearing of
Joseph, and Moses, and David, and Daniel, and especially of Him who is
the special Friend of children? It will be easy to so connect the
teachings of the Word with these pictures and stories that very young
children will be able to distinguish right from wrong, to know and
hate sin, and to be drawn ever nearer to the blessed Jesus.

As they become able to study, to think and to comprehend it, the
judicious parent will be glad to avail himself of the help of Luther's
Catechism. Here the more important teachings of the Word are
summarized and systemized.

Most parents indeed are glad to shirk this duty, and flatter
themselves that if they send their children to catechetical class,
when they grow old enough, they have performed their whole duty. Such
parents do not perhaps know, that Martin Luther wrote his Small
Catechism especially for family use. Let them take their Church books
and turn to the Catechism, and they will find that Luther heads the
Ten Commandments with the words: "In the plain form in which they are
to be taught by the head of the family."

So also with the Creed, the Lord's Prayer, and the Sacraments.
This is Luther's idea.

It is the true idea. It belongs to the Way of Salvation in the
Lutheran Church. It is the custom, still practiced in our older
Lutheran churches. The pastor, as we shall see hereafter, is only to
help the parents, and not to do it all for them. In teaching the
Catechism at home, it will give parents an opportunity to speak of and
explain what sin is, what faith is, what prayer is, and what the
sacraments are.

We would impress also the importance of instructing the child
concerning its own baptism. Let it understand not only the fact of its
baptism, but the nature, benefits and obligations of the same. It
certainly has a most salutary effect to impress the thought on the
child frequently that it was given to Christ and belongs to Him--that
He has received it as His own, and adopted it into the family of the
redeemed.

Here also there is a sad neglect on the part of parents. Many
never say a word to their children about their baptism. Many children
even grow up and know not whether they are baptized or not. This is
certainly un-Scriptural and un-Lutheran. "_Know ye not_," says
Paul, as if he said, have you forgotten it? "_that as many of us as
have been baptized into Christ have been baptized into His death_?"
Doubtless if we appreciated our own baptism as we should, it would be
a constant source of comfort, a never-failing fountain of Grace to us,
and to our children.

The Apostles frequently speak of the "_Church that is in the
house_." By this they mean such a household as we have tried to
portray--a home where the religion of our blessed Saviour permeates
the whole atmosphere; where the Word of God dwells richly; where there
are altars of prayer and closets for prayer--a home where Jesus is a
daily, a well-known Guest; where the children, baptized into Christ,
are nourished with the milk of the Word, so that they grow thereby,
increasing more and more, growing up unto Him who is the Head, even
Christ. In such a home the Church is in the house, and the household
in the Church. Blessed home! Blessed children, who have such parents!
Blessed parents, who have thus learned God's ways of Grace! No
anxious, restless parents there, hoping and praying that their
children may be converted. No confused, repelled children there,
crying because Jesus will not love them till they "get religion." On
the contrary, parents and children, kneeling at one altar, children of
one Father, with the same trust, the same hope, the same Lord--hand in
hand they go from the church in the house to the house of God's
Church.

Says Dr. Cuyler, an eminent Presbyterian, "The children of
Christian parents ought never to need conversion."




CHAPTER VII.

THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL IN ITS RELATION TO
THE BAPTIZED CHILDREN OF CHRISTIAN PARENTS.

We have tried to set forth the Lutheran idea of a Christian home.
In such a home, called, "_a Church in the House_," all ought to
be Christians. The children having been given and consecrated to
Christ in holy baptism, and having had His renewing and life-giving
Grace imparted to them through that Sacrament, are to be kept in that
relationship with Him.

The popular idea that they must of necessity, during the most
impressible and important period of their existence, belong to the
world, the flesh and the devil, is utterly foreign to the Lutheran, or
Scriptural view. That the child is fated, for a number of years, to be
under the influence of evil, and to be permitted to "sow wild oats"
before divine Grace can reach it, is certainly a principle that is
contradictory to the whole scheme of salvation. Yet this seems to be
the idea of those parents who will not believe that God can reach and
change the nature of a child, and bring it out of the state of nature
into the state of Grace, and keep it in that Grace. These people treat
their children much as a farmer does his colts, letting them run wild
for a while, and then violently breaking them in.

This pernicious idea has also obtained sway to an alarming extent
in the Sunday-school system of our land. The children in the
Sunday-school, whether baptized or not, whether from Christian or
Christless homes, are looked upon as outsiders, impenitent sinners,
utter strangers to Christ and His Grace, until they experience such a
marked change that they can tell exactly where and when and how they
were converted. Hence the popular idea that it is the object of the
Sunday-school to _convert_ the children. This seems to be the
underlying principle of both the American Sunday-school Union and
American Tract Society; institutions otherwise so excellent that we
are loth to say aught against either. This idea pervades also the
undenominational helps and comments of the International Lesson
System. This is the undertone of the great mass of undenominational
Sunday-school hymnology. It is the key-note of the County, State,
National and International Sunday-school Conventions and Institutes.
So popular and wide-spread is this idea that many Lutheran pastors,
Sunday-school teachers and workers have unconsciously imbibed it. Even
our Church papers, professing to be strictly confessional, often
publish articles setting forth the idea that it is the object of the
Sunday-school to _Christianize_ the children. As though the baptized
children of the Church, the children of devout Christian parents, had
been heathen, until Christianized by the Sunday-school! Many of our
Sunday-school constitutions also set it down as the object of the
school to "lead the children to Christ," or to "labor for their
conversion."

Now we believe that this idea is un-Scriptural and therefore
un-Lutheran. If what we have written in the preceding chapters on
baptismal Grace, the baptismal covenant, and the possibility of
keeping that covenant, is true, then this popular idea, set forth
above, is false. And _vice versa_, if this popular view is
correct, then the whole Lutheran system of baptism, baptismal Grace,
and the baptismal covenant, falls to the ground.

But notwithstanding the immense array of opposition, we still
believe that the Lutheran doctrine is nothing else than the pure
teaching of God's word. Where we have the "_Church in the House_,"
there we have lambs of Christ's flock. Ah, how many more we could
have, how many more we would have, if the fathers and mothers in the
Church understood this precious article of our faith, and prayerfully
built their home life thereon! Then would there be a more regular and
healthful growth of the Church, and the necessity for fitful,
spasmodic revival efforts would cease. But we digress.

From our Christian homes the baptized children of the Church come
to the Sunday-school. How is the school to treat them?--We speak now
of the baptized children from Christian homes; we will speak of the
unbaptized and untrained further on.

These children, with all their childish waywardness and
restlessness, do generally love Jesus. They do trust in Him, and are
unhappy when they know they have committed a sin against Him. They do,
when taught, pray to Him, believe that He hears their prayers and
loves them. Shall the teacher now begin to impress upon the minds and
hearts of these little ones the idea that they are not yet Christ's,
and that Christ has nothing to do with them, except to seek and call
them, until they are converted? And shall they go home from
Sunday-school with the impression that all their prayers have been
empty and useless, because their hearts have not been changed? Dare
the Sunday-school thus confuse the child, raise doubts as to Christ's
forgiveness and love, and "_quench the Spirit_?" Oh how sad, that
thus thousands of children have their first love, their first trust,
quenched by those who have more zeal than knowledge!

No, no, these are Christ's lambs. They come with His marks upon
them. Let the Sunday-school teacher work in harmony with the mother
who gave these children to Christ. Let the whole atmosphere of the
school impress on that child the precious truth that it is Jesus'
little lamb. _Feed_ that lamb, feed it with _the sincere milk
of the Word_. Lead that lamb gently; teach it to understand its
relation to the Great Shepherd, to know Him, to rejoice in His love,
to love His voice, to follow His leadings more and more closely.

Instead of singing doubtfully and dolefully:

"I am young, but I must die,
In my grave I soon shall lie.
Am I ready now to go,
If the will of God be so?"

or,

"Child of sin and sorrow
Filled with dismay,
Wait not for to-morrow;
Yield thee to-day:" etc.

or,

"Depth of mercy, can there be
Mercy still reserved for me?" etc.

or,

"Hasten, sinner, to be wise,
Stay not for to-morrow's sun," etc

or,

"I can but perish if I go,
I am resolved to try,
For, if I stay away, I know
I shall forever die."

or,

"When saints gather round Thee, dear Saviour above,
And hasten to crown Thee with jewels of love,
Amid those bright mansions of glory so fair--
Oh, tell me, dear Saviour, if I shall be there!"

Some of these sentiments are unscriptural. Some may do for
penitent prodigals. But all are out of place on the lips of baptized
children of the Church. Let such rather joyfully sing:

"I am Jesus' little lamb,
Therefore glad and gay I am;