Eric Bechler's sermon discusses the 1689 London Baptist Confession's view on baptism and the Lord's Supper as ordinances of positive and sovereign institution appointed by Jesus Christ. These ordinances differ from natural laws as they are not inherent but instituted by Christ for the new covenant. The sermon examines why 'ordinance' is used instead of 'sacrament', suggesting a desire to distance from Catholic sacramentalism. It contrasts the broader Catholic interpretation of sacraments with the Reformers' view, which acknowledges only baptism and the Lord's Supper based on scripture. The sermon emphasizes that these ordinances are not essential for salvation but obligatory as a divine precept, with baptism symbolizing entrance into the faith and the Lord's Supper commemorating Christ's death until his return. The sermon concludes that the church should continue these practices until the end of the age.

For the Second London Baptist Confession of 1689 comes from chapter 28 of Baptism and the Lord's Supper, paragraph 1. Baptism and the Lord's Supper are ordinances of positive and sovereign institution appointed by the Lord Jesus, the only lawgiver to be continued in his church to the end of the world. We start a new chapter today with a focus on ordinances and we'll start it By taking a look at the terms that are used here, our confession describes baptism in the Lord's Supper as ordinances, a positive and sovereign institution. An ordinance is defined as a rule or law or a command established by authority, which is a pretty broad definition. In fact, too broad for our discussion here since we have many commands from Scripture from God.

Our confession narrows the scope with the use of the phrases of positive and sovereign institution. Let's try to understand what that means. When we look at the term positive, It's used in contrast to a natural command. It's not used in terms of positive and negative or happy or sad. A natural command would be like a law of nature, something that has always existed, like the law is written on our hearts.

Such a law has always existed and cannot change. Positive law would be in addition to the law of nature. Baptism and Lord's Supper are not part of the law of nature, although there were some forms of baptism in existence before Christ came, Christian baptism was uniquely tied to the new covenant and instituted by Christ. The Lord's Supper, of course, didn't exist until Christ introduced it with his disciples in the upper room. Because they have not always existed, they are considered positive commands or laws.

The other phrase used here is sovereign, which stresses that these commands or laws must be instituted by Christ, our Sovereign Lord. Baptism and the Lord's Supper are not in themselves moral, but are moral because they have been commanded by the power and authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, who is the head of the church, our king, and ultimate lawgiver. Robert Shaw emphasizes this, that the express institution of God is essentially requisite to constitute a sacrament. No ordinances ought to be observed in the Christian church, but such as have been appointed by Christ alone as king and head. He only can have authority to institute sacraments, who has power to confer the blessings which are thereby represented and applied.

No right therefore can deserve the name of a sacrament unless it bear the stamp of divine institution. And I'd like to expand our discussion today a little bit. We see in the London Baptist Confession the use of the word ordinance and this is a change from the other confessions that the London Baptist Confession was based on. This chapter in the Westminster Confession in the Savoy Declaration is titled Of the Sacraments. But why the difference?

Why the change in the word used? Why reduce the context or the content within this chapter? It's been reduced from five paragraphs to two, and those being very brief, more so than anywhere else in our confession. Honestly, I don't know. Historically, we don't have much information available to us that describes the authors thinking at the time that they wrote the confession.

So we only can speculate. It could be a desire to separate themselves from the sacramentalism of the Catholic Church, who believe that grace is imparted or conferred by the sacraments in and of themselves and are necessary for salvation. It could be a desire to minimize the connection to the covenant of grace as signs and seals. Could be something completely different or a combination. I don't know and probably We'll never know.

But I'd like to try to understand for comparison purposes what is a sacrament. We'll first start by stating that this word is not found anywhere in Scripture, which is okay because there are a number of words that we use in theology that aren't found in the Bible. However, the word sacrament has been in use since the beginnings of the early church, and it can be useful for summarizing what the special ordinance of scripture have in common. In the early church, Very broad definitions were used. Augustine said, signs when they pertain to sacred things are called sacraments.

In the 17th century, Francis Turriton defined sacraments as sacred, visible signs and seals divinely instituted to signify and seal to our consciences the promises of saving grace in Christ and in turn testify our faith and piety and obedience towards God. A. A. Hodges states, the word sacrament was used very indefinitely in the early church to include any religion's rite which had a latent spiritual meaning. A preeminence was and has always been awarded to baptism in the Lord's Supper as forming a class by themselves.

But the number of ordinances to which the term sacrament was applied varied at different times and in different places, from 2 to 12. And I've even seen up to 30. For more than a thousand years, baptism in the Lord's Supper were seen as the sacraments or ordinances of positive and sovereign institution of the church. When more broad definition was to be used, of course, more ordinances were found. It wasn't until the 12th century that the list of seven held by the Catholic Church was compiled.

Dr. Joel Beeke states that Lombard, from the 12th century, was the first to establish the seven sacraments of the church, baptism, confirmation, the Eucharist, penance, extreme unction, orders, and marriage. The system of seven sacraments was reaffirmed at the Council of Trent in the 16th century and is still taught and preached in the modern Roman Catholic Church. So let us take a moment to go over these seven sacraments. Some you may be familiar with, some of them you may not.

And this summary comes from sacraments from the Catholic archdiocese of Adelaide. The sacrament of baptism. It removes the guilt and effects of original sin and incorporates the baptized into the church, the mystical body of Christ on earth. The sacrament of confirmation, which was administered after the sacrament of baptism. Confirmation perfects our baptism and brings us to the graces of the Holy Spirit that were granted to the apostles on the Pentecost Sunday.

Again, these I'm reading are from the Catholic Church. So, where does this come from? They appeal to Acts 8, 14 through 7, Acts 19, 6, and Hebrews 6, 2 for their support. The sacrament of Holy Communion, the sacrament is the source of great graces that sanctify us and help us grow in the likeness of Christ. The sacrament of confession, also called penance, in reconciling us to God, It is a great source of grace.

They appeal to the power Christ has given his apostles to forgive sins. Matthew 16, 19, Matthew 18, 18, and John 20, 22 through 23 as biblical bases. In the sacrament of marriage, it reflects the union of Christ and his church, instituted by God at creation, Genesis 2 18. The sacrament of holy orders, it is the continuation of Christ's priesthood, which he bestowed upon his apostles. There are three levels to the sacrament, the episcopate, the priesthood, and the diaconate.

First Timothy 3, 1-13, and Acts 6, 1-6. And finally, the sacrament of anointing of the sick, also called extreme unction or last rites. The sacrament is administered both to the dying and to those who are gravely ill or about to undergo a serious operation for the recovery of their health and for spiritual strength. The Catholic Church appeals to James 5, 13-16 and Mark 6, 13, which actually only addresses anointing with oil for healing. A hajjist states, penance, confirmation, and extreme unction are not divine institutions in any sense, and that marriage was instituted not by Christ but by God, and orders were instituted by Christ, but neither of these ordinances consist of an outward visible sign signifying an inward spiritual grace, nor does either of them represent, seal, or confer Christ in the benefits of the New Covenant.

Dr. Beeke comments further that the fundamental criticism by the Reformers was that aside from baptism and the Lord's Supper, the so-called sacraments had no solid basis in the Holy Scriptures, but were instituted by men and sustained merely by human tradition. We have and we confess to only two sacraments or ordinances in the church. They are baptism and the Lord's Supper. Only those two.

They are the only visible signs that God has given us to show the truth of the Gospel. Herman Vivink comments on these signs. In the Roman Catholic Church, the words of institution change or incorporate the sign into things signified. Consequently, the words are directed more to the element than to the listener. They view the visible signs as absorbing the invisible grace so that the sacrament works by the act performed ex opera operato.

It only requires negatively that the recipient does not pose an obstacle to its operation. We in our church don't believe this. We don't believe that the sacraments are efficacious in themselves. In fact, the sacraments are not even essential for salvation. It is presupposed that you have faith in Christ before you would be baptized.

It's not the waters of baptism that saves you. But does that mean we ignore or neglect the sacraments? Absolutely not. Louis Berkhoff states, the sacraments are not absolutely necessary under salvation, but are obligatory in view of the divine precept. And John Murray wrote, disregard of the sacraments is disobedience to Christ.

Offers dishonor to His grace and brings to us and to the church spiritual impoverishment. There's a lot in that statement to think about from John Murray. If we disregard the sacraments it's a disobedience to Christ, dishonors his grace and brings us into the church spiritual impoverishment. Whether you use the term sacrament or ordinances is not as important as having a proper understanding of what is meant and how they are defined. I personally prefer to use the word sacrament so that's typically what you'll hear from me when talking about baptism or the Lord's Supper.

I also think in this particular paragraph and chapter they remove too much content from this chapter from the Westminster to the point where in some ways it can be difficult to defend that there's only two ordinances out of all of Christ's commands. Having said that, I want to emphasize that there are still only two sacraments, baptism and the Lord's Supper. In our final part of today's paragraph, we touch on how long these sacraments should be continued by the church. Is there a time when we should stop baptizing? And we find the answer from Jesus himself in a very familiar passage recorded in the Gospel of Matthew, 28, verses 18 through 20.

And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, all authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth go therefore and make disciples of all the nations baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you and lo I am with you always even to the end of the age amen even to the end of the age what does that mean end of the age end of the world end of John Gill clarifies this for us not merely to the end of their personal lives, which would be the end of the world for them, nor to the end of the Jewish state, which was not a great way off, but to the end of the world to come, the gospel church state, which now takes place or to the end of the present world. But what about the Lord's Supper? Is there a time we shouldn't take communion? Some take communion once a year, once a month, Odd Sundays, we do it every week, but that's not what they're asking here. It's how long should we keep partaking in the Lord's Supper?

And again, we find the answer in Scripture in Paul's letter to the Corinthians. For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death till he comes. We are to take the Lord's Supper until Christ comes again. Amen.