# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_October 1860_S296
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

296                                                    Old Testimonies against New Errors concerning the Working etc.

...at Wittenberg, died 1688) writes: "Our thesis (that the sacraments are effectual means of grace) is proved from the conformity of the Gospel and the sacraments. Whatever belongs to the Word of the Gospel in general must not be denied to the sacraments. Now it belongs to the Word of the Gospel that it is an effectual means by which the grace of God, the forgiveness of sins, and eternal salvation are offered to men and appropriated to believers. Therefore this must not be denied to the sacraments. The first proposition is plain from the fact that the sacraments are the visible Word, an appendage of the Gospel, indeed as it were a brief epitome of the Gospel. The second proposition is proved from John 50:10, Romans 1:16, where it is said of the Gospel that it is a power of God able to save all who believe on it, compare Galatians 3:2, 1 Timothy 4:16, Hebrews 4:12. So the conclusion stands unshakably firm, that this efficacy may not be denied to the sacraments." (Theol. didactico-polem. fol. 1043). From this testimony it is clear that our fathers held the doctrine that the Word gives the same grace, forgiveness, and salvation as the sacrament, so that it was precisely from the unquestionable effects of the Word that they proved the efficacy of the sacraments. Far from it, then, that those who now wish to exalt the power of the sacraments at the expense of the Word thereby defend the sacraments; rather, they undermine the very faith in the power of the sacraments themselves. For if the Word is so powerless that it can give no one faith and work regeneration in him, then the sacrament of baptism, whose water without God's Word is plain water and no baptism, will work still less! The new doctrine of the power of baptism is therefore the old Reformed error, only stood on its head.

The same writes elsewhere: "It is true that baptism does not first impart the gift of regeneration to adults, but it increases the same and seals it in them powerfully. Through the preaching of the Word faith is imparted to adults, Romans 10:17, which is then confirmed by baptism as by a seal." (Fol. 1137, 1189.)

Caspar Erasmus Brochmand (professor at Copenhagen, died 1652) writes: "Just as the hearing of the Word of God is the ordinary means which God uses for the regeneration of adults, Romans 10:17, 1 Peter 1:23; so baptism is applied for the cleansing of children, Ephesians 5:27, Titus 3:5." (Systema universae th. Tom. II. fol. 226.)

The same: "Another question is whether baptism is the first entrance into the covenant of grace and into the Church. But this claim is to be understood not of adults, but of children. For adults are first grafted into Christ and the Church through the faith which they receive from hearing the Word, and are then baptized, Romans 10:16, Matthew 28:19, Acts 8:36-37. But for children, baptism is the first entrance into the covenant of God and into the Church." (Ib. fol. 448.)