Alexander Campbell The Christian System: CS - 51-Remission of Sins ő Proposition 08

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Alexander Campbell The Christian System: CS - 51-Remission of Sins ő Proposition 08

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PROP. VIII.--The gospel has in it a command, and as such

must be obeyed.

And here I need only ask, Who are they who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord? Paul replies, 'They who know not God, and obey not the gospel of his Son.'²⁹ To 'obey the gospel,' and to 'become obedient to the faith,' were common phrases in the apostolic discourses and writings. 'By whom we have received apostleship, in order to the obedience of faith in all nations, on account of his name.'³⁰ 'By the commandment of the everlasting God, the gospel is made known to all nations for the obedience of faith.'³¹ 'A great company of the priests became obedient to the faith' ³² 'But they have not all obeyed the gospel;'³³ and, 'What shall be the end of them who obey not the gospel'?³⁴ From these sayings it is unquestionably plain, that either the gospel itself, taken as a whole, is a command, or that in it there is a command through the obedience of which salvation is enjoyed.

The obedience of the gospel is called the obedience of faith compared with the obedience of law. Faith in God's promise through Jesus Christ being the principle from which obedience flows. To present the gospel in the form of a command is an act of favor, because it engages the will and the affections of men, and puts it in their power to have an assurance of their salvation from which they would be necessarily excluded if no such act of obedience were enjoyed.

Whatever the act of faith may be, it necessarily becomes the line of discrimination between the two states before described. On this side, and on that, mankind are in quite different states. On the one side they are pardoned, justified, sanctified, reconciled, adopted and saved: on the other, they are in a state of condemnation. This act is sometimes called immersion, regeneration, conversion; and, that this act may appear obvious to all, we shall be at some pains to confirm and illustrate it.

That a relation or a state can be changed by an act, I need scarcely at this time attempt to prove; especially to those who know that the act of marriage, of naturalization, adoption, and their being born, changes the state of the subject of such acts. But, rather than attempt to prove that a state is or may be changed by an act, I should rather ask if any person has heard, knows, or can conceive of a state being changed without some act? This point, being conceded to us by all the rational, we presume not to prove. But a question may arise whether faith itself, or an act of obedience to some command or institution, is that act by which our state is changed.