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 Since
April (Vol. 12, No. 2) we have been quoting from “The
Commission Given by Jesus Christ to His Apostles,” by
Archibald McLean, 1786. We believe the material is worthy of
study: for its inherent value, and because of McLean’s
indirect relation to Alexander Campbell and the “restoration.”
We give no unlimited endorsement to his arguments or exegesis
— he leans a bit toward cleansing from Adamic sin — but he
shows a high degree of scriptural learning and non-sectarian
thinking. I deeply regret that limited space has forced me to
“cut” much. Last installment in next issue.
“Lastly,
baptism ultimately signifies the death of this mortal body, and
our resurrection from the dead to inherit eternal life; which is
our complete conformity to Christ, who was “put to death in
the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit” (1 Pet. 3:18).
As
to the death of the body; it has been already observed that
immersion represents a death and burial, which imports an entire
extinction of life, and so signifies, not a partial but total
destruction of the body of sin; and that not merely as to its
reigning power over us, but as to its very being and existence
in us. It represents our putting it off, as we put off this
earthly tabernacle by death. Now this will never be fully
accomplished until we actually put off the body itself, in which
it remains as a law in the members warring against the law of
the mind; for while believers are in this life, “the flesh
lusteth against the Spirit and the Spirit against the flesh; and
these are contrary the one to the other; so that they cannot do
the
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things that they would” (Rom. 7:2l;
Gal. 5:l7).
Paul,
during the whole course of his Christian race and warfare, had
to keep under his body, and bring it into subjection, and did
not expect. a complete freedom from the law in his members until
he should be delivered from the body itself; and, therefore,
exclaims: “0 wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from
this body of death?” i.e. from this mortal body (1 Cor. 9:27;
Rom. 7:24). He considered sin so inveterately rooted in his
flesh that, like the fretting leprosy under the law, it could
never be entirely eradicated until the earthly house of this
tabernacle was pulled down; and for this, as for other reasons,
he groans, being burdened, to be absent from the body. As,
therefore, immersion signifies the entire destruction of
indwelling sin, it must refer ultimately to the death of the
mortal body, when the following words shall be verified, not
only in their spiritual, but full and literal sense: “He that
is dead is freed from sin” (Rom. 6:7), “he that hath
suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin” (1 Pet. 4:1).
The
redemption by Christ does not prevent the execution of this
original sentence upon the body (physical death through Adam —-
rft), but converts it into a benefit (Rev. 14:13; 1 Cor.
3:21-22); for hereby they are entirely freed from all their
remaining connection with, and conformity to the first man in
order to their being completely conformed to the second, (1 Cor.
15:47).
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