Complete dependence upon the
Lord for all needed help this evening. I wish to direct your
very prayerful attention to the chapter that we read together
in the Acts of the Apostles, chapter 2. And our text is found in verses 41
and 42. the Acts of the Apostles chapter
2 verses 41 and 42. Then they that gladly received
his word were baptized. And the same day they were added
unto them about 3,000 souls. and they continued steadfastly
in the Apostles doctrine and fellowship and in breaking of
bread and in prayers. Then they that gladly received
his word were baptised and the same day they were added unto
them about three thousand souls and they continued steadfastly
in the Apostles doctrine and fellowship and in breaking of
bread, and in prayers. Some time ago, an officer in
one of our chapels that will remain nameless, was challenged
as to the scriptural practice of restricted communion. And the poor man couldn't give
an answer. Friends, these things ought not to be. We are to contend
earnestly for our position. I maintain this to you that there
has never been a better day to have Strict Baptist Chapel written
outside the door. Any casual visitor can see the
title in the day of modern technology can look on his phone and have
a full explanation for what we believe and why we believe it. What we have in our text tonight
is a vindication of the position of restricted communion. You know I love the doctrines that we hope. I
could be nowhere else. And you know the ecclesiology
that we have is the very richest I believe in the kingdom. No
denomination is perfect. But you know I'm a believer in
having a network of churches up and down the land, nationally
and internationally. that hold and believe to the
same body of doctrine. And was not this the very principle
for what the apostles contended? Mr. Popham was right. We've said
it here before, but we must stress it for emphasis. When he said,
there was one denomination in the Bible that was strict Baptists. He was absolutely right. You
see here we have at Pentecost the very commencement of the
Gospel Church as we have it today. Now we must be clear, we must
be clear. We're not of those that say there
was no such thing as the Church in the New Testament. That error
is one that Darby propagated in about 1830 and was found and
believed nowhere prior to that. We have the very example of the
Church in the Gallery of Faith in Hebrews 11. But they were
called Christians first at Antioch. And here we can see the very
principles upon which the Gospel Church is built. And here we have an example,
verse 37 commences with that paragraph, that new body of text,
deriving from the original, making it clear that a new argument,
if you like, is being made. That those that heard the truth
were pricked in their hearts. You see, the truth is preached.
Here we have the order of salvation and the
order of coming into a gospel church. They that heard this
were pricked in their hearts and said unto Peter and to the
rest of them, what shall we do? You see, That's the response
of man, isn't it? What shall we do? But here we
have Peter in his preaching. Repent and be baptized every
one of you in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now a word to a duty-faith man
here. We read that they were pricked
in their hearts. Here we have the warrant for coming to Christ. Here we have the very reason
that one may come, that one is pricked in the heart. And our
principle is, of course, if one feels to need the healing of
the Gospel, if one feels their need of Christ,
then of course we may approach Him just as we are. You see here, we read of these souls being
pricked and these people being called by Sovereign Grace. Notice here, it was the preaching
of the Gospel that was the means used. And that is the principle
that we would set for the New Testament Church. Some of the
ministry of the Apostles was unique. But here this preaching
ministry is one that is set forth as we read through the New Testament
and through the epistles we can see Paul making this clear. The very infancy of the church
here in Acts 2 is set forth in terms of what right and scriptural
church order is. we read at the commencement of
our text then they that gladly received his word were baptized
now just a word of polemics really the Presbyterian will get themselves all excited
about verse 39 and will say, well the promise says it's unto
you and to your children and to they that were afar off. Now
the response to that is found in our text. They that gladly
received his word were baptized. It was those that were pricked
in their hearts that were baptized. Not just anyone. This isn't A
physical seed. This is a spiritual seed. If
you be Christ's, then you are Abraham's seed. And an heir according
to the promise. And that word, is that word,
that word baptised, is that word baptizal. Which appears well
over 70 times. in the New Testament. It means
to dip, to plunge, to immerse in water. That's the origin of
the word. So there's no sprinkling, there's
no pouring, there's no elaborate ritual.
We read that they were baptised. So we have an order here, don't
we? Saved, baptised and added unto the church. They that gladly received his
word. You see here something must happen,
mustn't it? We have to state clearly that
baptism by immersion is not magic one of the errors of the early
church was that of a form of baptismal regeneration and what
tended to happen was those thought that the water would do something
for you and still people who believe that even Constantine
toward the end of his life, only desired to be baptized when he
was dying, the idea that it could wash away sin. And thus this
was used as an excuse by many to change the form of baptism
and actually to eradicate the practice of total immersion. So they that gladly received
His Word were baptised. And we have to ask this question
tonight. Do we gladly receive His Word? Do we gladly receive His Word?
You see, if His Word has had an effect upon us, we must declare
what the Lord has done for our soul. Now here we must state clearly
that this is a scriptural doctrine and should be preached. Strict
communion is a true doctrine but you know baptism by immersion
is an absolute prerequisite to the Lord's table. Thus it's necessary that we have
to bring out this doctrine of believers baptism. Now we have
to ask ourselves how stands the case with us. Now I'm not one
of these people who is obsessed with the subject. I remember
as a boy at Leeds Chapel there were some men who came to preach
who could hardly get through a sermon without mentioning it.
All they wanted to do is baptise people. We don't want to fall
into that mistake. It only brings grief in the end.
But you know friends we must not neglect the truth and the
doctrine of believers baptism. We don't want to be negligent
in bringing these things forth. It is a truth. We must not be
ashamed of it. You know, baptism by immersion
is the beginning of a profession, not the end. Do we gladly receive his word? Some of you may be aware of Mr. John Green. He was the pastor
Shaftesbury Avenue or Gower Street Chapel and he said this at the end of
his life, he says, I have had many regrets in my life but I
never regret being baptised I can only speak for myself,
I have many regrets, I've never regretted being baptised but we read this Something must
follow baptism, mustn't it? Some people think they've got
this strange idea that they can be baptised and they do what
they like. Friends, church membership is
in the Scripture and it is a principle which must be followed for many
practical reasons as well. If we were not to have a church
membership, if we were not to have a membership here, it would
be chaos. Anybody could do what they liked. It's no way to run
a church, friends. You have to have some form of
discipline. And we see here that the friends came together in
a unified manner. They were baptized and the same
day they were added unto them about 3,000 souls. We have the
word added unto them. They were joined together. in
a formal mechanism, in a formal way. They recognized one another. So here we have a principle of
church membership, of coming together as a local group, as
some call the local assembly, a local group of believers. We
have to remember travel was not what it was now in those days. And one would be quite restricted
as to where you could go. There would be little bodies
of believers in a number of places. But they recognized one another.
They recognized, they came together for mutual encouragement. mutual edification and they came
together for the preached Word. We'll come to that in a moment. But we can see this principle
of membership is found a number of places within the Scripture. My mind always is struck by Acts
and chapter 13 when we have in verse 2 the sending out, we might
say, of the preaching of Barnabas and Saul. We're reading here of the church
at Antioch and we read, As they ministered to the Lord and fasted,
the Holy Ghost said, Separate me Barnabas and Saul for the
work whereunto I have called them. And when they had fasted
and prayed and laid their hands on them, They sent them away.
What could that be other than the gathered church at Antioch? It wasn't chaos. It wasn't everybody
just doing what they felt like. This was church order. And we
must follow today church order. And when we're added unto a church
we have to say that there are only certain scriptural ways
of leaving a church. The first is, obviously, is termination
of membership by death. That is obvious. The second is
by dismission, an honourable discharge, where one church of
the same faith and order requests the release of a member or members
to another. This must be a church holding
the same doctrine and the same practice. The third is a rather
solemn result, and that is by expulsion. We read in the scripture,
if anyone of you walketh disorderly, withdraw from such an one. And
there is the scriptural precedent for the way that we deal with
that. So here we have the gathered
church as we find it within the New Testament. These souls were
added the same day. Well notice it was the practice
very much of Mr Gadsby when he baptized in the open air not
so far from where I was born. He would baptize the brethren
and then immediately after there would be a preaching service
where at the conclusion, as we have this evening, the ordinance
of the Lord's Supper would be administered. You see the New
Testament practice very clearly there within our churches, which
followed directly the line of the Apostles. Just a word on the number here.
They were added unto them about 3,000 souls. now we live in a day of small
things we live in a day of small things and it's a sad state of affairs
where if we see a cause of truth have a number of baptisings within
the same year it's sometimes considered suspect now I know that many professions
in many places are spurious and don't last the course but friends
when this chapel was built it was not unusual to have a dozen
or more people go through the water, it wasn't unusual the
Lord hasn't changed do we not pray that the Lord
would revive us once again in the midst of the years Oh, that the Lord would raise
us up again, those who would stand on Zion's walls, who would
declare these things firmly and faithfully, that we would be
men and women of vision. The Scripture says without a
vision, the people perish. Where there's no vision, we will
surely perish it were added unto them about
three thousand souls the spirit moved but you see here we have this
principle the word is preached the Lord deals with souls saves
them they are baptised and added unto the church this is a formal recognition. We also have here, don't we,
the function of the Church. The function of the Church. We read that they continued steadfastly
in the Apostles doctrine and fellowship and in breaking of
bread and in prayers. They continued steadfastly in
the Apostle's doctrine and fellowship. Now, this is the primary reason why
we gather, is it not? It's God's ordained means. It
pleased Him by the foolishness of preaching to save them. That's believed. The foolishness
of preaching. The sermon, the preached word,
is central. That's why the pulpit is central. And not the altar. Because it's
the Lord's word that we set forth. And you'll notice it's a modern
phenomenon to remove the pulpit. More is suspicious of people
who remove the pulpit. we have to contend in our day
for faithful preaching. They continued steadfastly. You
know that means that they contended for something. We live in a day
where very few people contend for anything. They contended
for something. They were earnest in what they
believed and why they believed it. The Apostles Doctrine, the very
truths of Scripture. The foundation, the foundations of the faith,
the preached Word. But notice here, it's the Apostles
doctrine and fellowship. Now we read a little further
on that they that gathered together those that believed had all things
in common there was a community spirit, a community feel if you like to the New Testament
Church people looked out as it were for the benefit of one another
That is the spirit of the New Testament. And that's different
to the spirit of activism, where you simply put on, as we mentioned
this morning, you put on loads of extracurricular activities.
Actually, that's condemned here. Notice here. This is the order. Preaching, prayer meetings, the breaking
of bread, the communion. These are the three things that
we find are the function of the Church, of the New Testament
Church. We don't read anywhere here of a Sunday school. We don't
read anywhere here of a children's meeting. We don't read anywhere
here of any kind of gimmick or extracurricular activity. It
is preaching Prayer meetings and the ordinance of the Lord's
Supper. That is a function of the New
Testament Church. It's no such thing as a gospel
campaign or anything like that. Anything of those nature. You
shouldn't encourage those things either. It's the preached word
that we look for. You know the means by which we
get people in is the means by which you keep them. If the people
come in on doctrinal and experiential preaching, that's what they'll
expect. If you get them in on froth, that's what you'll have
to feed them. These are the stark differences between the Church
of the New Testament and the contemporary Church today. Continued steadfastly in the
Apostles' doctrine and fellowship. You see there is a unity here,
isn't there? There's a unity. You know sometimes
you might meet somebody for the first time and you immediately
have a spiritual unity. You see things one in the same. You believe, you hold, you endeavour
to set forth these things in the breaking of bread the preaching and then there
is the breaking of bread the ordinance of the Lord's Supper that we have before us tonight And it's not the ordinance of
the Lord's Supper in and of itself a representation of the New Testament
Church. If we sit down to the ordinance
are we not testifying as to the Lord's goodness to us? And you know strict communion It's no bar to anyone. People
say, oh, you people who believe in strict communion, it's bigoted
and it's narrow, you're cutting people off and so on. Absolutely
not. Absolutely not. Absolutely not. If you believe
the doctrines of this church, then one may apply for membership.
It's as simple as that. Strict communion doesn't bar
anyone. One may apply for membership in the right way, saved, baptized
and added formally and coming under the discipline of the local
church. And if we don't hold to strict
communion, if we let anyone sit down, then we are going outside
the New Testament. Every example that we have within
the New Testament of those that sit at the table are those who
were baptised there's not a single person in the New Testament here
who sat down at the Lord's table un-baptised not one! if you can
find one please tell me afterwards I'll be interested to know it's
found nowhere within the scripture they were all baptised and they
came together they came in unity and friends if there's no formal
recognition if we have a haphazard communion how can there be any
oneness in doctrine? how can there be any oneness
in fellowship? how can there? you see these are the principles
aren't they? of the New Testament Church You see, instances of
mixed communion only ends in disaster. Such churches adopt not only an unscriptural
practice but one that causes practical difficulties. In a
mixed communion or an open membership church, one man may get up and
pray. men and women would come in and
be baptised. He offends the other member who's
not baptised and so on. There are many instances we can
give which prove that it is an unsustainable system. Strict
communion is right, it's scriptural. We're not putting a bar to anyone.
But friends, when we go elsewhere But we venture only to sit down
at those churches which hold the same body of doctrine. That's
why we hold the principle of same faith and order. There must
be that same body of doctrine. And that is why we can only unite
with others that hold, in the Lord's table, that hold the same
views, that hold the same restricted table same faith and order you
see, same articles of faith same scriptural standard for joining
the church and so on and so forth same faith and order, it's absolutely
right the breaking of bread, we come
to it shortly it's an outward sign a visible
witness of Christ's Church upon Earth, His redeemed people. So we have the Apostles' Doctrine
and Fellowship, the breaking of bread, and in prayers, in
prayers, we read of those meeting where
prayer and praises want to be made. in prayers. When we come to the
ordinance of the Lord's Supper, this is a very unique service in respect
to the prayers that are offered up. It's not to be a prayer meeting.
But those prayers that are offered up are to be in worship unto
the Lord and for whom He is and for what He has done in and for
his people you see this is a New Testament church here set forth
and if we follow these we won't ever have a perfect church of
course not of course not but you know if we follow the New
Testament pattern as We have light. As the Lord has shown
us, as He's opened these things up to us, then the Lord will honour us.
He will honour us. If we hold to the principles
of baptism by total immersion and strict communion, the Lord
will honour it. The Lord will honour it. You see, these are
not mine. principles, personally, that
I have derived of myself. These are the Lord's principles.
We have to follow what the Lord has set down and what He has
made known. And here, this church, there
were 3,000 souls added. You know some of those souls
may have learnt that may have known at that time very little. But they knew the reality of
their own salvation. They knew the reality of a risen
Christ in the soul. They knew what it was to join
in fellowship with the Lord's people. So they came together and they
were built up in their most holy faith. You see, this is the pattern
that the Lord uses for building up his saints, is it not? This
is the very beginning. This is the very beginning. The
Lord uses his church to build up his people. But we must see the very origins, the original
principles of how New Testament ecclesiology is saved, baptised
and added unto the church. And here we see the functions
of the church, just in these two verses of preaching, of breaking
of bread and of prayer meetings. As we leave tonight, I hope these
are our principles. As we venture again into another
year, do we not desire to hold fast to the rich ecclesiology
that we have? Then they that gladly received
his word were baptized. In the same day they were added
unto them about 3,000 souls. And they continued steadfastly
in the Apostles doctrine and fellowship. and in breaking of
bread and in prayers. I'll leave it there for this
evening. May the Lord add His blessing. Amen.