EVER since the Oxford Movement began, the growth of sacerdotalism in the Church of England has been specially marked. Some time ago Lord Halifax wanted the Pope to recognize the validity of Anglican orders, with a view to giving the priests power to transubstantiate the elements at the Eucharist into the real body and blood of Christ.
The setting up of a sacerdotal caste is a necessary part of the sacramental system; because, where so much efficacy is attributed to Church ordinances and ceremonies, the due administration of them is held to be only possible in the hands of a priestly class: thus they constitute themselves the channels of blessing from God to man. Now, to one who bows to the authority of Scripture, it is evident that the whole theory of a sacerdotal class of persons, as set apart from ordinary Christians, is a denial of the essentially distinctive truths of Christianity.
Under the Jewish system there was an order of priests ordained and established by God Himself, because the way of approach into the presence of God was not yet made manifest, as the Epistle to the Hebrews tells us. The work was not yet accomplished, in consequence of which the veil (which barred the way into the holiest of all, where God dwelt) was rent. But when Christ died the veil was rent, the way into the presence of God was opened up, and every believer has boldness to enter in at all times by the blood of Jesus; in fact, he is invited to draw near where his Great High Priest has entered, Jesus, the Son of God (Heb. 10). Christianity, the basis of which is the work of atonement and its results, supersedes the Jewish system. Christ, having entered in once into the holy place, presenting His own blood before God as the efficacious ground of that atonement, has obtained eternal redemption for us; and as a consequence every true Christian has free access to God’s presence now. Under Christianity, therefore, priesthood is not confined to a class of persons, it is the common privilege of all, inasmuch as all have access directly into God’s presence―within the holiest, where only the high priest could enter under the Jewish system. This is confirmed by various scriptures. For example, the apostle Peter says, “Ye are... a royal priesthood” and a “holy priesthood,” and the apostle John, in Revelation 1, gives thanks to Him who has made us “kings and priests unto God and His Father.” All Christians are recognized as priests. But the corrupt Christianity to which so many are now going back is a mixture of Judaism and Christianity, which spoils both, and is destructive of the truth in its most vital points.
It is quite true that Scripture plainly teaches the value and importance of true ministry, and God has given gifts as He pleases―teachers, pastors, evangelists, &c. There were in the early Church, too, overseers and deacons who were appointed to take an oversight of things in the places where they lived; but this is very different from setting up a class of persons between the soul and God. It has been well said that true ministry makes nothing of itself, hides itself, in order that it may bring those to whom it ministers to feel that they have not to deal with man at all, but with God. False ministry, on the other hand, makes much of itself; it interposes itself between the soul and God in order that it may support a falsely assumed position.
The apostolic warnings as to this false assumption of authority show how God foresaw all from the beginning, and He did not fail to provide for the evil day.
Paul says to the Ephesian elders that even from among themselves men would arise speaking perverse things to draw away disciples after them; grievous wolves would enter in, not sparing the flock; and to Timothy he speaks of the “perilous times” of the last clays, when men would have a form of godliness, but deny the power; evil men and impostors would wax worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived. If the evil is faithfully foretold, the resource for the faithful is equally plain; so the apostle commends them, not to a line of successors, but to God and the Word of His grace, and he enjoins them to continue in the things which they had learned and been assured of―these things we have in the Scripture.
Peter, in like manner, warns against false teachers who would come in among them, and draws a dark picture of their ways. But, instead of pointing the faithful to those who assumed to be his successors, he tells them to remember the words spoken by the prophets and the commandments of the Lord and Saviour—these are left to us in the Scriptures.
Jude begins his epistle by saying he intended to write about the salvation common to all Christians, but certain men had crept in unawares corrupting the truth, and therefore he has to turn aside to exhort them to contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints. No mention is made of a body of Church dignitaries as those to whom they were to look in these evil times: they are told to build themselves up on their most holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost. This faith is preserved to us in the Scriptures pure as it was given.
Lastly, the apostle John says, “It is the last time.” Already there were many antichrists: and then, so far from making the Christian dependent on a succession of priests as the expositors of Scripture and the channels of Christian blessings, he says to the youngest in the faith that they had an unction from the Holy One and knew all things. Yes, they needed not that any one should teach them. It is not that one would undervalue true ministry, but the Holy Spirit teaches through the Word of God, and in this way the Christian is safeguarded against what is not true. Then he exhorts them to let that abide in them which they had heard from the beginning; there can be no new developments in Christianity, for it was complete when it was given at the beginning. Truth, just because it is truth, does not admit of change or succession; it cannot be other than what it is: nor does it need to be secured to us by a successional order, for we have it in the Word of God.
Confession to a priest naturally flows out of the principle which puts a man between the soul and God. The sin-burdened soul is supposed to go to his confessor to unburden his conscience and to look for ghostly counsel and relief. All this secures for the priest an immense accession of power and authority, and human nature loves power. The degrading side of the evil, as practiced in the Church of England, is sufficiently shown in Mr. Walsh’s “History of the Oxford Movement,” in the chapter dealing with that evil book, “The Priest in Absolution.” It is an evidence of the fact that, when blinded by devotion to a false system, men who take a high religious stand will pursue a course of conduct which any right-minded man of the world would not be guilty of in the ordinary affairs of life.
The passage in the Epistle of James, “Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed,” is a very plain proof that confession to a priest was unknown in those days. It was a mutual exercise of love and confidence one towards another amongst Christians, so that the chastisement for the sin might be removed, when the heart was restored and right with God. If we are to listen to what God says in His Word, the place confession has is plain enough; the Christian is told what to do when he sins: “If we confess our sins, He (God, our Father) is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:99If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. (1 John 1:9)). Not a word about going to a man as confessor, for we are brought to God to know Him as Father. The Christian is to go directly to God his Father, against whom he has sinned, and acknowledge his fault and get restored to the happy enjoyment of communion with Him. Again, “If any man sin, we have (it does not say, a father confessor to go to; no, indeed, but) an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.” Christ is always there as the believer’s righteousness before God; He is his Advocate, to carry on his cause in the presence of God, and his relationship as a child of God is not broken by his failure, but his communion is interrupted until he confesses his sins and gets restored again to the happy enjoyment of the Father’s presence.
For a poor fellow-mortal to take the place of confessor, and to pretend to have authority from God to pronounce absolution from sin, is certainly daring presumption, wholly unwarranted by the teaching of Scripture. F. G. B.