The Plan of Salvation.

Thames Star, Volume XII, Issue 3810, 15 March 1881, Page 2

The Plan of Salvation.

[We continue the Rev S. J. Neill's second lecture on the above : —] * * * • # *

When we speak of the plan of salvation, it is to be understood by that, the plan adopted by that part of the Christian Church to which we profess to belong; it cannot be supposed to include all those who, like the Methodists, discard our theory of election —a most vital part of our plan of salvation—nor to include Roman Catholics, nor the Christadelphians, whose views about conditional immortality we turn from; nor to include those of the New Church, nor Pelagions, nor Snpralapsarians, and a number of others which we need not particularise. I do nob know if any of you who are here to night are Supralapsarians. If any of you are, then you are, as a matter of course, well acquainted with the different nice points touching on this subject, and need not that any man should explain them unto you ; but you will bear with me while I briefly explaia to those who are not so learned as you are on this point. What is meant by Supralapsarianism and Infralapsarianism ? This bears upon the plan of salvation at its very fountain head, and if you go astray here, how caniyou expect to be right afterwards. According to the Supralapsariau scheme, "God, in order to manifest his grace and justice, selected) 'from creatable men (i.e., from men to be created) a certain number to be vessels of mercy, and certain others to be vessels of wralh. In the order of thought, election and reprobation precede the purpose to create and permit the fall. Creation is in order to Redemption." This scheme is called Supralapsarian because it supposes that men, as unfallen, or before the fall (i.e., before the creation of Adam, when men were as yet only in the idea of God), are the objects of election to eternal life—foreordination to eternal death. Dr Hodge, speaking of this view, says that it was held among a certain class of Augustinians even before the Reformation, but that Augustine himself and many others were Infralapsarians, by which is meant that they held; that it was from the mass of fallen men that some were elected to eternal life, and some foreordained to endless punishment. The position of Calvin himself as to this point has been disputed. The Prolocutor of the Westminster Assembly of Divines was a strong Supralapsarian, but he vvas in the minority. Howeyer, that augilst body, in the framing of the Confession of Faith, was careful to wnrdi; ifc so, as not to give offence to either party^a very happy solution, of the difficulty if you can manage it. In the shorter Catechism Infralapsarianism comes out more; strongly and distinctly, than it does in the Confession of Faith, * • #•"■■.*■ #. , ,

You will now perceive when we speak of the plan of salvation, what special plan is signified, and when objections are raised you will see that we are not bound to answer any: except those raised against our own plan. You will, to speak figuratively, see what the citadel is against which the opposing forces march, and be enabled to distinguish voices amid the clash of arms.

The first part of the citadel attacked is our notion of the Trinity, which it is said, is chiefly formed from repeating frequently a creed which nobody knows the author thereof, and nobody can understand the meaning thereof; but which, as far as it can be understood, is very childish nonsense under a garb of great erudition—the Athenasian creed. How, it is saidi can. you have the Father infinite, the Spa infinite, and the Holy Spirit infinite^rtlie. Father God, the Son God, and the Holy Spirit God, and only one God,, only one infinite. To speak of three as being dach distinctly God, each infinite, and then say that there is only one Infinite and only one God is, it is said, a misuse of language, seeing that the meaning of infinite is " without limit, the whole," and how can you have three wholes, or anything but one whole. Again^it is said that Sonship implies the order of Father and Son, and that Eternal Sonship, or eternally begotten,. are, just as mucb a misuse of language as to talk of three infinites, and then say that there was only one infinite. Besides, it is Objected that in the Psalms this view is not supported by such a passage as "Thouart My Son, this day have I begotten. Tfiee." Those objecting to eternal generation say that it should be eternal procession, just as it is said of the Holy Spirit that He eternally proceeds from God. We shall not reply to these objections singly, as they are given, but give a number, and then" bring forward the answers that are given. The next objection is brought against the acceptation put on the first part of Genesis, and especially tlae account given of the origin of sin. It is said that the ordinary interpretation, and the ordinary chronology, must go together, and that if there be evidence to show that man has been more than 6000 years on this planet, or that the different races of men, though formed of kindred elements, did not proceed from a single pair, then the validity of that part of the Bible story is seriously weakened, or is shown to be untenable. This, however, is touching somewhat upon! the scientific wing of the opposing army, or as the scientists themselves Would regard it, the centre. But many tians regard the whole of the first part of Genesis as no real literal history at ajjjl any more than the Pilgrims' Progress, df similar Oriental accounts of men among the Chaldeans and other nations of the East. They would still regard it as containing, under the form of an actual history, a symbolical philosophy of the origin and nature of man. We t shall now proceed to the details against which objections have been raised. The chief points are the Trinity and the account of the Fall, for it is upon these that the others are built. The Eev. John Hyde, of England, has grouped together a few of the objections raised against our plan of salvation by those who still believe in an atonement, and who believj in Christ: as God, but who do not believe in the common notion of the Trinity. The first objection he brings forward is the «»'.: reasonableness o? the doctrine of substitution commonly preached. He says, "No condition of society exists in which the punishment of the innocent for the guilty would' not meet with execration.. lfo': legislature could venture to. enact such a law, and no judge could be found to administer it. JSo father ever did, or could adopt such a method in the government of his family, and that even those who believe in the doctrine of ■« substitu- ; tion' in relation to the atonement, would not tolerate the practice of substitution in our criminal jurisprudence. What The says) would we think of a father who, if he had many rebellious children, and 000

son who never trans'gresspd. refused lo receive the many guilty ones back to his favor unless the innocent son consented to bear all the punishment due to his rebellious children? Again, that it is easy to tnlk of the inexorable justice of God, but how can it as justice be satisfied by punishing one who never deserved punishment, instead of those deserving it— regarding as unjust one who was altogether just? Punishing one as a sinner wbo never sinned ? Does it not paint God as acting altogether unlike God, in order that he might be enabled to act lite God ? That it is impossible to bring words together that shall express a stronger violation of all justice:—lnfinite justice demand infinite satisfaction, and inflicts an infinite penalty on a being who is infinitely holy. 2. He says it involves a double subterfuge. It makes infinite justice regard Christ as- a sinner, which He was not, and then it makes infinite mercy regard the unjust as holy and just. That God should hold the innocent as guilty, which would be (firstly) untrue and (secondly) unjust, therrthat God upon this substitute 'should pour out his j infinite wrath, which,'if it could have taken place, would have been a crime; further, that be should impute the merits of Christ's righteous obedience to unrighteous and disobedient men—another un-ruth, and therefore injustice. 3. He t asserts that there is another subterfuge in v that God is said to forgive sins, when he has already exacted a more than sufficient penalty in the infliction of the punishment due to men's sins in Christ in men's stead. Either the punishment borne by Christ was sufficient, or not sufficient. If it was sufficient, then forgiveness wasonly an act of justice, aot of mercy. If it was not sufficient, Christ did not bear the punishment in man's stead. Mercy . .pardons freely, but aubstitutionists assert that God would not let men off till the whole penalty was paid down. Further, - it is asserted that this doctrine makes it impossible to love God. We may love Christ for His mercy, but that it is impossible to love Him who would have damned us eternally for eating a fruit unless Christ had freely borne all for us. The love of Christ "is love-inspiring, but God the Father becomes altogether terrible. Therefore, the moral tendency of the doctrine of substitution shows that it •is not Christ like—noi; Christian. (To ie continued,-)