Since therefore we have seen that the doctrine of baptismal regeneration was taught not only by the symbolical books, but also by Luther and Melancthon in their other writings, as well as by the leading divines of the first two centuries after the Reformation, who all received the symbolical books, and understood their import, we may regard the charge of the Platform as established beyond contradiction, that this tenet was a part of Symbolic Lutheranism.
Influence of this Doctrine on the Pulpit.
Now the influence of this doctrine on the ministrations of the pulpit, is of the most deleterious nature. The word of God represents all mankind as by nature dead in trespasses and sins. Paul tells us that "there is none righteous, no not one, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God:" and affirms that the carnal mind is enmity against God. The faithful ambassador of Christ must therefore announce the command of God, "that all men every where should repent: and that unless they do repent, they shall all likewise perish. He must divide his congregation into two classes, the friends and the enemies of God, those who are for the Saviour and those who are against him: and he must insist upon judging not by their profession, "Lord, Lord, but by the question, whether they do the will of our Father in heaven." Thus when the faithful servant of Christ represents all as unconverted, and exposed to the curse of the divine law, who do not give evidence of regeneration in their walk and conversation; careless sinners become alarmed and feel the necessity of fleeing from the wrath to come, by repenting and turning to God, by seeking pardon and a new heart, and consecrating all their powers of mind and body to the service of God.
But all this the believer in baptismal regeneration cannot consistenly [sic] do. Because 1. If we believe all our hearers regenerated, (for they are generally all baptised) even those whose life presents not the least evidence of piety, and many proofs to the contrary; we still must believe them in some sense the children of God, as they are born again! We cannot tell them that they are in the gall of bitterness and bonds of iniquity; because we profess to believe them regenerated— therefore children of God in some sense.
2. We cannot exhort the impenitent baptised, though apparently dead in trespasses and sins, to pray for a new heart and a new spirit; for these, as regenerated persons, they have obtained.
3. The minister who believes in baptismal regeneration, cannot with Paul proclaim, "If any man be in Christ Jesus and is a new creature, old limits are passed away, behold all things have become new;" for his ungodly baptised hearers are all new creatures by baptism, and yet their old sinful habits have not passed away, and all things have not become new to them.
4. He cannot consistently preach, that those who have put on the new man (Ephes. iv. 24,) are created in righteousness and true holiness; for the majority of those said to be regenerated, or to have put on the new man by baptism, continue in sin and are destitute of righteousness and trim holiness.
5. He cannot, with the blessed Master, preach, "by their fruits ye shall know them; for here, on his theory, are regenerate souls bringing forth the fruits of death, good (regenerate) trees bringing forth rotten fruits," which is as incredible as thorns producing grapes, and thistles yielding figs.
6. The believer in baptismal regeneration cannot consistently preach, that "not every one who saith, "Lord, Lord," shall enter into the kingdom of heaven, but only those who also do the will of our heavenly Father; for here are regenerate men who have the germ of eternal life in them (by baptism) who do not the will of God. Now as these on his theory are regenerate men, the bible promises them salvation. But according to the Saviour they shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven.
The apostle James Inquires, [sic] "What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith and have not works? Will his (dead) faith save, him?" Or we may add, can his dead baptismal regeneration do it? As the apostle of the Gentiles declares, that circumcision is nothing and uncircumcision is nothing, but the keeping of the commandments of God: so as baptism occupies the place of circumcision, baptism is nothing and the want of it nothing, unless accompanied with a sincere, universal and irrevocable purpose to keep the commandments of God.