CHAPTER XIII.

RELATION OF BAPTIZED CHILDREN TO THE CHURCH. Difference in the constitution and grounds of membership, in the Jewish and Christian church. Illustration of the use of Baptism, and its intention. Objection to Infant Baptism, that unbaptized children are frequently converted. INFLUENCE OF A RIGHT OBSERVANCE OF THIS PRACTICE IN THE CONVERSION OF THE WORLD. Pious parental influence the great means of strengthening and increasing the church. THE FAMILY, considered as a means of spiritual good. Appeal to parents. Conclusion. FUTURE SCENES IN PARENTAL

AND FILIAL RELATIONS.

It is a frequent question, What relation do baptized children hold to the church?

This question arises from the fact that when the ancient Jewish nation was the church of God, children were members of the church. But the constitution of the Christian church is different from that of the Jewish; we are not members of the visible Christian church by birth or lineage; but in every nation, he that serveth God is entitled to membership. Hence, while we believe that the children of believers now have a peculiar relation

to God, like the children of his ancient covenant people, their relation to the church is different from that held by the latter, because of the difference in the constitution of the two churches. The only respect-but it is the important one-in which children of believers now resemble the children of the ancient covenant people, is in the feelings with which God regards them for the parents' sake. But as church membership is not now a national right, children are in no respect members of the Christian church. At the same time, the reason why God formerly admitted them into the church, and into the covenant made with their parents, extends, we think, to the children of believers throughout the world; and this reason is, His regard for his people. 'Because He loved the fathers, therefore He chose their seed.'

Another view of this point is of importance. No one can doubt that an object of Jehovah, in his directions and arrangements concerning the children of his ancient people, was, to secure the succession of a pious race. For this purpose, the children of his own people, rather than of the world in general, were calculated upon to perpetuate religion in the earth. This was a natural and obvious arrangement. Is it not equally natural and proper now to expect that religion will be perpetuated in the same way, and are we not to look to the offspring of Christians for the transmission of a religious influence in the

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world? Is the family a nursery for all the departments of active life, of civil and patriotic service, and shall it not secure the perpetuity of the true faith?

For this purpose, we believe, children were anciently included with their parents in the covenant of God, and as the children of Christians now stand in the same relation to the continuance of religion in the earth with the children of the ancient church, they have a peculiar relation to the Christian church.

Now, though these children sustain no relation to the church in the way of accountability or subjection to discipline, they do sustain a most interesting relation to it, as those in whom, from their early consecration, and intelligent and faithful instruction as children devoted to Christ, is the hope of Christ and of his kingdom.

Another view of the propriety of baptizing them, is as follows:

Suppose that a great reformer, commissioned from Heaven, should arise in this land, and should visit all our towns to establish a certain form of doctrine and practice, appointing the stamp of a cross to be made upon the hand of every one who received the system to denote that he was a disciple, and to remind him of the obligations implied in the new faith.

That mark would be considered as a sign of the

devotion or separation of him who received it to the Christian faith.

While the reformer would wish that every one who should receive the sign, would believe with all his heart, and would refuse to give it, if he suspected hypocrisy, he would nevertheless regard it more as a sign or seal of discipleship, than as a discriminating index of the state of the heart.

So, while the apostles required of every believing adult, a profession of his faith in Christianity, and of course sought for evidences of his sincerity, they felt, without doubt, in placing the sign of Christianity upon him, that they were signifying his separation to the Christian religion as a system, rather than the certainty of his spiritual regeneration. We know not how else to understand Paul's feelings, when he says, 'I thank God, I baptized none of you but Crispus and Gaius. For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the Gospel.'

Such being the great object of Baptism, how perfectly natural for the apostles to secure an influence for Christianity in the earth, by taking, as it were, a vow of every believing parent for the consecration of his children to the Christian faith. How natural for the parent to say, Let the sacred sign, whose impression marks upon my heart my own consecration to the Christian religion, be laid upon my child, I engaging thereby to bring him up for Christ, and to instruct him hereafter that I

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have separated him, by the use of the Christian seal, to the belief and practice of Christianity. What a powerful means would this be of securing for Christianity a hold upon the rising generation! The rite of Baptism administered to the child, would make the parents feel that their child was consecrated by an act of religious devotion; and we all know the power of an appropriate solemnity upon the mind. Such a means of propagating the Christian faith we do not believe the apostles overlooked. We believe that their commission included it. We have seen from the first of testimony, that 'the early church received an order from the apostles to give Baptism unto children.'

With the same understanding of the original intention of Baptism, we give the ordinance to children. It will be seen that the object is not to mark children as members, in any sense, of the the church of Christ, but to impress upon the parents and, through them, afterwards, upon their children, the feeling that there is a special relation between those children of the covenant and God, and a special obligation upon them to believe, practise, and maintain the Christian religion.

Were there nothing in Infant Baptism but the pleasure of presenting a child in public, or if it were only a distinctive ordinance of a denomination of Christians, this book would not have been