Being A Review Of “Church Doctrine, Bible Truth,” By The Revelation M. S. Sadler
There are many things I accept in this book, truths that the evangelical world have, from circumstances, lost, or which have been thrown by them into the background. I shall refer to some of the chief ones here.
First, I believe the person of the Lord has lost the place—at least in revival preaching—it ought to have, and it makes that preaching, though I doubt not often blessed, seriously defective. Salvation by the love of God to sinners—surely a blessed truth—is preached rather than Christ. This I have long felt and remarked. Still, Mr. Sadler is all wrong about it, as I shall show. He leaves out the salvation—rather a serious defect, and certainly unscriptural.
Secondly, I have no doubt that worship, with the Lord's supper as the great and characterizing center of it, and not preaching, is the great object of Christians assembling themselves together. Preaching and teaching is the work of individuals, and goes on pari passu. But it is not the assembly's (and church simply means assembly) part to teach or set forth the gospel, but the apostles', evangelists', or whoever is able. The assembly is taught, and confesses the truth.
Thirdly, going to heaven—an unscriptural expression—has displaced in the evangelical mind the coming of the Lord and resurrection. But, for all that, Mr. Sadler has wholly missed the mark here too. He has read the scriptures enough to see the defects of the evangelical school, but has not the faith of God's elect so as to know the truth either as to the gospel or the church. Moreover, as to church history, his representation of it—I do not mean intentionally—is far away from the truth. He must have read it with a very prejudiced eye.
I must first take notice of his statements as to the Gospels in a few words. Here, as to what is evidently vital, his statements are quite unfounded. Gospel is not applied, as he states, exclusively to the announcement of certain events occurring at a particular time in the history of the world. Gospel means simply glad tidings, whatsoever they are. The verb is applied to the good news Timothy brought of the Thessalonians to Paul. (1 Thess. 3:66But now when Timotheus came from you unto us, and brought us good tidings of your faith and charity, and that ye have good remembrance of us always, desiring greatly to see us, as we also to see you: (1 Thessalonians 3:6).) As to Mark, the incarnation and birth of Christ form no part of what he calls the gospels. Further, the gospel of the kingdom being at hand, which above all is called the gospel in the four Gospels, is not included in Mr. Sadler's list, and could not subsist, as chiefly there spoken of, till all the events which are were past. All that is peculiarly Paul's gospel (though surely recognizing all) is outside all the events contained in Mr. Sadler's list. It did not begin, in fact and in doctrine, till Jesus was glorified.
Paul calls it the gospel of the glory, and this is vital to his mission, and that which connected it with the assembly or church, which he alone speaks of in his teaching as formed on earth, and speaks of as a distinct and separate ministry; and he is specially the apostle of the Gentiles. Nor even does what is said by Mr. Sadler as to the beginning of Romans give any true idea of Paul's statement as a whole there, nor even of that part of it which Mr. Sadler does refer to. I think it of great moment to note, as I have often done, in public and in private, how the apostle puts Christ personally forward here as the great subject of the gospel, but Mr. Sadler's use of this fact is partial and false. As “made of the seed of David according to the flesh,” we have nothing to do with Christ. He was “a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God, to confirm the promises made to the fathers;” the Gentiles stand on other ground. They “glorify God for his mercy,” having no promises, though prophecies spoke of them. As Son of David Christ was not sent but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel, and could not take the children's bread and cast it to dogs. He declares, “I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me.” “Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone."
As God manifest in the flesh, He is the object of infinite delight to the believing soul—its food, as the bread come down from heaven; and when we have found peace through the divine commentaries of the apostle on the value of His work, the soul returns to the Gospels to feed on the bread come down from heaven. But even as to this, though souls may be drawn by the adorable grace manifested in His life, yet, till they eat His flesh and drink His blood, they have no life in them to feed on Him as bread come down from heaven. But, to show how little foundation there is for this statement of Mr. Sadler, the meaning he ascribes to 'gospel' is not the meaning of it in Mark. In the same chapter as that to which Mr. Sadler refers, the evangelist says, “Jesus came into Galilee preaching the gospel [the glad tidings] of the kingdom, and saying, The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand.” The preaching is the same, Matt. 4:12, 2312Now when Jesus had heard that John was cast into prison, he departed into Galilee; (Matthew 4:12)
23And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing all manner of sickness and all manner of disease among the people. (Matthew 4:23). Such was the constant tenor of Christ's preaching.
The twelve, consequently, were sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. So, in Luke 4:18-2118The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, 19To preach the acceptable year of the Lord. 20And he closed the book, and he gave it again to the minister, and sat down. And the eyes of all them that were in the synagogue were fastened on him. 21And he began to say unto them, This day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears. (Luke 4:18‑21), He preached the fulfillment of promise, not His death for our sins, or resurrection; and so, verse 43, He preaches the kingdom of God. In chap. 9:2 He sends them to preach the kingdom of God. As regards His death and resurrection, we read that, from the time immediately preceding the transfiguration, He forbade them strongly to say any more that He was the Christ; and so far from preaching His death, or that being the gospel then set forth, we find that, when He told them of it prophetically, they could not bear to hear of it. Yet His death and resurrection, now they are accomplished, are become the great subject of testimony (1 Cor. 15:8, 48And last of all he was seen of me also, as of one born out of due time. (1 Corinthians 15:8)
4And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures: (1 Corinthians 15:4)), and that for our sins. Christ according to the flesh (that is, as presented to the Jews as their Messiah, come according to promise) Paul knew no more. (2 Cor. 5:11For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. (2 Corinthians 5:1)G.) See Matt. 16:20, 2120Then charged he his disciples that they should tell no man that he was Jesus the Christ. 21From that time forth began Jesus to show unto his disciples, how that he must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised again the third day. (Matthew 16:20‑21); Mark 9:3131For he taught his disciples, and said unto them, The Son of man is delivered into the hands of men, and they shall kill him; and after that he is killed, he shall rise the third day. (Mark 9:31); Luke 9:21, 2221And he straitly charged them, and commanded them to tell no man that thing; 22Saying, The Son of man must suffer many things, and be rejected of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be slain, and be raised the third day. (Luke 9:21‑22).
I turn to what is said of it in Romans. We have seen that Paul begins with the double character of Christ, known as Son of David according to the flesh, and Son of God by resurrection. But Mr. Sadler leaves out that Paul was not ashamed of the gospel, or that it was the power of God to salvation, because the righteousness of God was revealed in it (Rom. 1:16, 1716For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. 17For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith. (Romans 1:16‑17)); and that he largely sets forth (chap. 3:19-20) how Christ was set forth a propitiation through faith in His blood—how, further (chap. 4:25), He was delivered for our offenses, and raised again for our justification. I believe the gospel will have power in the measure in which it is stated as facts, and I bless God that it comes in the shape of facts, because the poorest can understand it. But what it is for us is spoken of. God commends His love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. The Shepherd seeks the sheep, the woman the piece of money, the father has his joy in recovering the prodigal.
It is not merely objective facts concerning Christ, but God's disposition towards us as displayed in them, not merely that Christ was raised but raised for our justification; not merely that God's Son came, but that God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish but have eternal life. It is not exclusively applied to the announcement of certain events; it is God's dealing with us revealed in them, and our conscience and heart directly dealt with by it. God was in Christ. Yet that is not the way the ministry of the gospel is put, but, “God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them.” This was Paul's estimate of the gospel history, and then of his own gospel when Christ had died, that, as though God did beseech by us, we beseech in Christ's stead, be reconciled to God. In the passage quoted by Mr. Sadler from 1 Cor. 15, it is not that Christ died, “a certain event occurring,” but Christ died for our sins; the purpose and grace of God to us as sinners is stated.
Mr. Sadler's account, then, of the gospel in the New Testament is a totally false one as to every part of the New Testament, and falsifies the whole bearing of it, and the way God deals with man in it. And this is connected with his whole system. His gospel is a system of facts, contemplated by persons ecclesiastically born of God in baptism. The gospel in scripture is the expression in facts, and the public declaration by the Holy Ghost (sent down when the facts were accomplished, and Christ, having by Himself made the purgation of our sins, had sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in the heavens), of what God is in His love to sinners, and of how they might be righteous before Him through faith in the work accomplished by the Savior. The gospel is addressed to sinners in the attractive power of grace. “I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me.” Mr. Sadler's gospel, whether during the lifetime of Christ or after His death, is not what scripture makes it. With him it is a history for saints: the scriptures make it glad tidings for sinners. The facts may be the same, and these facts we have to announce; but he announces them to those whom he deceives as to their state (calling them saints when they know they are not) as objects of contemplation, while the scripture gospel presents them to sinners as what they need, and the expression of God's love to them.
“The gospel,” says Mr. Sadler, “does not appear in scripture under the aspect of certain dealings of God with the individual soul apart from its fellow souls. It does appear as certain events, or outward facts,” &c. We have seen how the gospel is stated in scripture. Glad tidings are hardly actual operations in individual souls, but such dealings are as much presented in scripture as pertaining to the gospel, as the blessed facts concerning the Lord. “Except a man be born again” is not exactly glad tidings, but it is with this truth the Lord meets Nicodemus. “In the day,” says Paul, “when God shall judge the secrets of men by Christ Jesus, according to my gospel.” The whole Epistle to the Ephesians is occupied with what Mr. Sadler says is not the gospel, but in a large part is dealing with individual souls; and he is wholly mistaken in saying, as he does, that it is only of the church. The church relationship with Christ only comes in at the end of the first chapter; the previous part of the chapter is occupied with individuals and their relationship with the Father, and if it be not gospel, I know not what it is. The whole of the doctrinal part of the Romans—and I suppose there is some gospel there—is occupied exclusively with individual souls, and the church does not come in at all. The church is not found in the Romans, save in the hortatory part (chap. 12), and for the plain reason that responsibility is individual, conscience individual, justification individual, judgment individual; 1 Cor. 1, where Paul says he was sent to preach the gospel, is individual.
To whom did Paul preach the gospel? to sinners standing on individual responsibility, or to the church? The answer to this will at once show, not only the falseness, but the absurdity, of Mr. Sadler's statement. See 2 Cor. 2:12-1612Furthermore, when I came to Troas to preach Christ's gospel, and a door was opened unto me of the Lord, 13I had no rest in my spirit, because I found not Titus my brother: but taking my leave of them, I went from thence into Macedonia. 14Now thanks be unto God, which always causeth us to triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest the savor of his knowledge by us in every place. 15For we are unto God a sweet savor of Christ, in them that are saved, and in them that perish: 16To the one we are the savor of death unto death; and to the other the savor of life unto life. And who is sufficient for these things? (2 Corinthians 2:12‑16), this was preaching the gospel, and nothing could be more peremptorily individual, and dealing with individual souls. We have only to go to scripture times to learn the absurdity of the whole system. The gospel is for responsible sinners, not for the church, however needed for what Mr. Sadler calls the church now, as it surely is, because they are largely unconverted sinners, though far more responsible sinners than the heathen, but of the church anon. Read 2 Cor. 4:1414Knowing that he which raised up the Lord Jesus shall raise up us also by Jesus, and shall present us with you. (2 Corinthians 4:14): we have there “the glorious gospel,” or rather the gospel of the glory. Paul fancied he was by manifestation of the truth commending himself to every man's conscience in the sight of God. He had not had churchmen to instruct him, it is true. Quite true, he spoke of the death, resurrection, and glory of the Lord Jesus in his gospel. This assuredly is not what I am opposing; but that he spoke of them only as events and outward facts, apart from dealing with the individual soul: that is, what Mr. Sadler says about it is wholly and entirely false; and I repeat, this is connected with and involves the whole system. Scripture tells us God of His own will begat us by the word of truth; churchmen tell us it is baptism. Which am I to believe? This is the question.
I might multiply proofs of what the gospel is as presented in scripture; what I have given must suffice. Mr. Sadler seeks to prove his statements by the Gospels, forgetting that these are records of Christ's life and death, and most precious ones for those who believed already (though surely the Holy Ghost may use them to give faith), not the preaching the gospel at all. They are memoirs, as called in old times, richly setting forth the Lord Jesus in the different characters in which He came among men, according to the wisdom of the Holy Ghost. He is Son of David, Emmanuel, in Matthew; the Prophet Servant in Mark; the Son of man, in grace, amongst men in Luke; and His whole person, with the mission of the Holy Ghost, in John.
What little we have of the preaching of the gospel in Acts is altogether the contrary of what Mr. Sadler states. Peter, who never preaches that He is the Son of God, after explaining what Pentecost was, at once charges their individual sin home upon their conscience: You have crucified and slain, God has raised up, Jesus. What was their condition? And they were pricked to the heart, and he tells them, on their urgent demand, what they were to do, It is not a mere outward event, but their act of sin, and God's having owned Him whom they had slain, so as to act by grace upon their consciences. It was for as many as the Lord their God should call. It was individual, and those that received the word profited by it. It is the same story in Acts 3:18-15, though with a different object.
In Paul's discourse at Antioch (Acts 13), it is the same thing; verses 38-41 dealing with individual souls. The same principle governs them, verses 46-48. We have no preaching to Gentiles, only we learn that its effect was individual faith. God opened the heart of Lydia, they so spake that they believed, and Paul at Athens preached Jesus and the resurrection. When the jailor asked what he should do to be saved, Paul in his answer knows nothing of Mr. Sadler's system, but says, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved. No thought of Mr. Sadler's system here, though there can be no doubt he was added to the assembly. As he that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life, salvation is always individual, never what Mr. Sadler makes it to be. The discourse in Acts 17 is Paul's apology, not his preaching. Of course the apostles preached Christ, not His incarnation (perhaps, as Acts 10:37, 3837That word, I say, ye know, which was published throughout all Judea, and began from Galilee, after the baptism which John preached; 38How God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power: who went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil; for God was with him. (Acts 10:37‑38), His service as “anointed"), but man's rejection of Him, and God's testimony to Him in resurrection, and then whosoever believes shall receive remission of sins; that is, they did not only give many, doubtless all-important, facts, but they did always deal individually with souls. That in reasoning they sought to prove with the Jews that Jesus was the Christ is of course true, but it proves nothing. The commission given in Luke is the one that runs all through the Acts; and this was, that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name, which is strictly dealing with the individual soul.
One other point remains to be noticed under this head. The church, we are told, after speaking of these “outward events,” makes provision that this gospel of the kingdom should be set before her children; “she provides for the setting forth of the gospel, under this one scripture aspect, by the arrangement of her yearly round of fast and festival.” We have seen how little true this statement as to the one aspect of the gospel is; but here, assuming the facts of the gospel, a second point arises, the means of communicating it. The church gives a yearly round of fasts and festivals, so that mere outward events may be before the mind without any dealing of God with the individual soul. Such is Mr. Sadler's approved method, adding a small complement of saints and saints' days—whether to complete the gospel, or for what other purpose, he does not tell us. He seems to bring it in charily (p. 12). Scripture says, “it pleased God, by the foolishness of preaching, to save them that believe;” but this foolishness of God dealing with the individual soul does not please the wisdom of the church. It has its own way of doing it. It keeps days, and months, and years. They turn again to the weak and beggarly elements, to which they desire again to be in bondage.
"I am afraid of you,” says the apostle. It was, he tells us, going back to heathenism. And Mr. Sadler, with his knowledge of ecclesiastical history, must know that, except Easter, which was the Jewish Passover, and Pentecost, and perhaps some more recently added saints' days, the church festivals were deliberately and formally adopted from heathenism. Christians, so-called, would have festivals, and they tacked on Christian names to heathen ones, The great Augustine informs us that “the church” did it, that if they would get drunk (which they did even in the churches), they should do so in honor of saints, not of demons. One of the Gregorys was famous for this, and left only seventeen heathen in his diocese by means of it. And another Gregory, sending another Augustine to England, directed him not to destroy the idol temples, but turn them into churches, and as the heathens were accustomed to have an anniversary festival to their god, to replace it by one to a saint. It was thus Europe, Africa, and Asia Minor at least were Christianized. Sicily, which in spite of all efforts had remained heathen, as soon as it was decided that Mary was the mother of God at what I must call the disgraceful and infamous general council of Ephesus, gave up all her temples to be churches.
It was as easy to worship the mother of God as the mother of the gods. But everywhere drunkenness in honour of the saints, and even in the churches, took the place of drunkenness in honor of demigods, the great Augustine and other fathers being witnesses. Such were festal anniversaries; Christmas having been (and it is still celebrated in heathen countries) the worst of heathen festivals, to celebrate the return of the sun from the winter solstice, without a pretense that Christ was born that day, but, as they could not stop the revelry, they put Christ's birth there. Such, in real fact, is the church's celebration of anniversaries and saints' days. This is certain, that the apostle declares that it was a return to heathenism, so that he was afraid his labor was in vain—avowedly turning the great and mighty parts of Christianity, by which God acted on souls, to bring them into blessed and divinely wrought relationship with Himself, individually and collectively, into certain outward events, or outward facts, and exclusively to their announcement as occurring at particular times. “I am afraid of you."