God's Covenant Signs & Seals: Why We Need Them & How God Uses Them
Notes
Transcript
Handout
In past decade south of the border - huge controversy over the flying of a Symbol and of statues of those who led under the symbol. Speak ing of a Confederate Flag - to some this means oppression, slavery… interesting that for those in the South most acknowledge real problem with slavery and sinful saw it had to end - but Confederate Flag not about slavery but idea of a republic where a big central government not in control of everything, but values of sphere.. Passions run so deep. But if you can put yourself on both sides for a minute; you understand that a symbol is more than a piece of cloth, It represents something profound . But a stop sign is representational like that too… but no emotion tied to octagonal red sign. Because a flag is more than representational, as a symbol, it is part of what it symbolizes! Like a flag our symbols kind of capture us in a particular life. And God says, when I make covenant with My people, I am going to give them those symbols, sign and seals that picture my work and gospel and person - and they are going live in the world presented in them! And God does this not because those symbols actually do the work of God saving us, but because he knows as weak and crude creatures - slow-learners, and we are embodied creatures - taste touch and feel. And its not that we understand God’s work in history, we receive the word and try to explain it to others, and then we say how can we represent it, as if sacraments are our human invention, our teaching aid. No , no, no. nobody, no individual no body, a church council or denomination decided to have sacraments. We didn’t decide they’d be important or crucial to our lives. No sacraments come to us, as an action of God. - they are God manifesting His gracious turning to us in mercy!
weakness and infirmities - indwelling sin remains, not completely… So if Art. 20-26 of the Confession are true: that God’s wrath toward us has been satisfied in Christ, that we are justified before him freely by grace alone, that his Spirit is continually sanctifying us, and that Christ himself is interceding for us at the right hand of. Then you see the importance of how the church must minister to apply that salvation and to keep us walking in it extending it to this world. And the sacraments are a part of God’s action through the church with the gospel.
Intro: Sacrament chart - what part… important… As those seeking to live in covenant with God, everything offered to us in the Word - but because of our weakness, infirmity - confirmed with visible, tangible, earthly signs and seals!! God tacking these on to the Word - He is addressing the human heart through these God-ordained and God-commended activities!
A. WHY: The Sacraments are Signs & Seals that God attaches to His Word to Strengthen Faith
A. WHY: The Sacraments are Signs & Seals that God attaches to His Word to Strengthen Faith
Clearly see we don’t believe the purpose of the sacraments is to be physical channel to give us the substance of Grace. And their purpose is also not so much to see if by experiencing them - is God angry or happy with me, is God dissatisfied or satisfied with me, discover by taking them I am saved, nor statement of how strong my faith is in my self … Anabaptist - kind of mystical sign from God and statement of my faith!…
But God chosen to be gracious, this is God’s action, accommodating, coming down another level to sign and seal his gospel truths and promises… for our weakness, and indwelling sinfulness..
Sign and seal - earthly visible… “Calvin Inst, “condescends to lead us to himself even by these earthly elements, and set before us in the flesh a mirror of spiritual blessings!
So when we think of why God gave His people covenant signs - for use before and after they were converted in terms of the individuals, but signs and seal that individuals carry through life - that the assembly of His People would have speaking to them continually… got to ask why did God give them?
Confession says the purpose of the sacraments - not how we use them who we use them with, not what is the essence they represent and communicate - but why does God give them to us - that is all about faith. Vital to see and not get lost in the other questions get this first
God saves sovereignly in history,and applies sovereignly and mysteriously - that doesn’t need the sacraments in an way, but God gives them as appendages why? Look at the supper wise answer our Confession gives:
“Nourish and strengthen our faith” as they “better . . . present to our senses both that which He declares to us by His Word and that which He works in our hearts.” Belgic Confession Art. 33
Though we may know up here that justified by faith alone, by grace in Christ alone. Though we may experience as 1 John 5:4 says faith is the victory that overcomes the world. We also know so experientially, what the man with the sick sick boy, at wit end, Jesus says do you have faith - its possible then - Remember the father so raw and honest answer: I believe help my unbelief! Mark 9:24
For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith.
Immediately the father of the child cried out and said, “I believe; help my unbelief!”
So too you and I, believe God exists, regards those who seek Him, as we believe yes supernatural world, Son of God God sent for me, Holy Spirit with Word - work a real reconciliation - between God of the universe and me, but not only that - adopts me to be His son or daughter, to walk with him in this earth like A&E used, even more Holy Spirit makes Christ dwell with in my heart - See historic events, trust in the word that explains them, experience in your soul working of God like this - but God says I know the weakness of your faith - and all these realities of my grace, my relationships to You, all I have done as great Covenant Keeping God - I want to give you a sacramental picture - one that gets you believing into and participating with these supernatural inner realities of grace, by your very simple physical use of them!
And listen carefully its not the grace itself, not the inner reality itself - but a tool to get our faith participating more fully in them. SO neither to be trusted for salvation, nor discounted as empty. Now who here says my faith is strong, or these sacraments so empty and dispensable I don’t need baptism I don’t need to come to the Lord’s Supper? You don’t need to for salvation, but listen for the nourishment of your faith for its strengthening - God graciously gifts these to you.
From the strongest to the weakest - all who would draw near to God offered these. No power in themselves to work salvation by physical operation, but also not empty of God’s use. Look in Scripture see how all God’s people, always never without physical sign - Adam and Eve, covenant of life - tree of K of g & e, and tree of Life. Noah receives great covenantal promise: Gen 9:11 and you can imagine after he saw preview of judgment day - do I want to get close to this God, can I trust him, know still struggle with sin - that holy - look what God gives Noah… accommodating sacramental sign and seal of HIS PROMISE… Bow with Arrow up…
Or think of Abraham. In Genesis 12 leave Ur, place later known as Babylon of this world, idol worship of created things, instead of one true living God. Gracious promise go and I will make you a great nation, bless you, name great, make you a blessing, all the families of the earth blessed through you, your seed. Still wondering wavering yet faith:
But look what God does: Gen 17:10
This is my covenant, which you shall keep, between me and you and your offspring after you: Every male among you shall be circumcised.
Think of the covenant signs and seals of the nation of Israel in the OT, set free to come up out bondage to truly worship, to be a kingdom of priests and prophets, holy people live by law of two great loves … How by Passover and commanded again circumcision, but so clear not of flesh but of our hearts, not only grace of forgiveness by blood, but of heart separated from sin, heart alive to God for His ways and His loves!
And Romans 4:11 in the NT speaking of why God gave covenant sign of circumcision, describes its purpose and the purpose of all sacraments God used of his covenant of grace: Not to save Abraham that is by faith alone . But why this sign of the promises for Abraham and his offspring:
He received the sign of circumcision as a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised. The purpose was to make him the father of all who believe without being circumcised, so that righteousness would be counted to them as well,
It’s that sign and sealing of the promises of God, that the sacraments are given for. DO you not think we and our children, do you not think that those being converted out of Babylon - new converts that they don’t need these signs, not to save them but in their weakness and sin, just our weakness of faith and sin, to have God come to us at our label in these signs and seals - to more fully declare and seal to us the promise of the Gospel.” As HC 66 puts it.
So the function, the purpose of God in these sacraments - will only work by faith, they are not converting tools, but tools by which God Declares His gospel personally to us - declares His word in picture form for us to taste and touch - declares to us that which He promises to work in our hearts! Why they don’t give grace as some sort of magical action or object, but they are a means, a tool of grace, the sacramental action - that feed faith! They when used by us properly actually can nourish and strengthen faith. Have to see how with baptism and the Lord’s Supper.
Sacraments are not independent actions we do, but hey as I mentioned are appended to the one great means of grace of the WORD of the gospel. Don’t give the grace in any physical one to one way, but they do communicate the grace of God. They seal His promises, they pledge the good will and grace of God. So do you see it these signs are joined to the Word of the Gospel. Like window opens up from heaven - God’s promises in Christ, come down and stand right before they church before each individual - gospel is that Christ is imparted and the sacraments are that this salvation of Christ is declared and proclaimed and when faith nourished and strengthened!
God uses various physical symbols,like the tree, the rainbow, the manna, the bitter herbs w Passover Lamb and the unleavened bread, the waters of the Red Sea, and even the Rock in the wilderness. Remember how Paul explains it in 1 Corinthians 10:4
and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ.
Do get that, a visible sign isn’t an end itself, what it points to, by faith we got to go beyond the visible symbol, so that by faith and trust in Christ, what the physical sign is signifying actually benefits us and we actually more fully put our trust in that promise of - acceptance, foreignness, new life. In the Lord’s Supper that is why that phrase in our preparatory form should ECHO in your heat - I take to myself Christ and All His Benefits! Mouth of faith, not physical mouth. In baptism - - that adoption, that welcome into the Church, that promise of forgiveness, and gift of Holy Spirit, - God gave me picture of water cleansing, refreshing ,sustaining falling as gentle rain from heaven like Holy Spirit, - I am living into and believing and assured and strengthened in those realities!
So that is the why and really must answer that question first before look at what do each of them do! That is what a sacrament is, IN words most of the Christian church acknowledges with Augustine: They are visible signs and seals of an inward and invisible grace.” now we can move to what a sacrament does!
B. HOW: Sacraments do God’s Work of Pledging
B. HOW: Sacraments do God’s Work of Pledging
And here we should feel a holy awe at God adding them to the gospel. I tell you in my first years of ministry I felt not a holy awe, but a holy dread - of what was going on every Lord's Supper and every Baptism - do people really get what they are doing, am I leading this the right way, is it just a RC superstition, do they see real action, of faith, and then transaction , covenantal action ongoing on. I didn’t understand how Lord’s Supper and Baptism are first of all action on God’s part pledging Himself to act graciously to His people!
Listen to how it worked with Abraham being given that sacrament of circumcision, sign and seal of righteousness that is by faith,. Gen 17:11
You shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you.
A sign of the covenant. What is a covenant - an agreement based on promises. What Jesus called the new covenant - the cup of the Lord Supper, What Paul says Christian circumcision its sign and sealed in baptism Col 2:11
In him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ,
Do you get it - in the signs and seals of a sacrament a promise relationship - a pledge is being made. And I was so scared in first years of ministry because I focused on the pledge being made by the people to God. Their is that - there is a badge to the world - this is what we’re about. But the idea of these signs & seals as a pledge is not first of all about our pledge to God, but His to us.
The original word sacrament is an oath that a Roman soldier took in loyalty to his commander, and their is our oath of allegiance when you say yes baptize me, or yes I will come to the table, but as our confession makes clear, this is the Shepherd’s oath to sheep, its the Commanders oath to his soldiers. Right this is God saying, I pledge my good will and grace to you in my gospel. In baptism “Feel my grace pouring over your filthy head, n the Supper, Taste my grace pouring down your parched throat. This is what I pledge and promise to all who respond in faith to me. God has said I will make an everlasting covenant of grace with us, and will wash us in the blood of Jesus, and nourish us with the body and blood of Christ - and in the sacraments he is actually showing us that pledge!
Picture it this way the Word of the gospel is a scroll, and like good old fashion scroll, their is big seal at the bottom that authenticates these pledges these promises are from the super-authorized all-important, all powerful all knowing God of the universe! The seals better represent to our external senses what the pledge and promises in Christ are!
So do you see what is happening when a sacrament is participated in? bread, wine, water - pictures from life - portray clearest simple great promises, and we don’t halt with the sign, but by faith raised to see the hidden inner spiritual mysteries of the gospel that lie hidden in the sacrament!
That’s the biblical verbiage of sacrament - mystery -now revealed by faith in the gospel!,
And that’s why we don’t believe in infant baptism or adult baptism, we don’t believe in mere memorial view of the Supper or a magical view - no we have a covenantal view of the sacraments. There is real action between God and us going on here - he when faith seals on our consciences the promises - and guess what we the recipients of the covenant “attest our piety our faith to him.”
IN the simplest way, what’s happening is mutual covenant relationship. Just like two kids realizing special friendship I will be your best friend forever… and what do they give each other . BFF bracelet.
Well God says, When you come into my Covenant Family - I want in a physical way to declare something to you - do that with baptism - new converts , covenant children - and they are to live into these realities.. And that is a one time and on our part we are completely passive - God saying - I welcome you as a member of the covenant - nothing you do, I take first step, respond with faith live into this reality signed and sealed with. And this I want those of you been baptized but haven’t responded publically professing the faith of those promises …after being discipled - You saying, God I pledge my allegiance to you. Lord’s Supper not passive, you with active faith, only after have been converted step forward and you take and you eat , you remember and believe . Do you see it? God is saying in the sacraments: I will be your God, and we are in turn saying hear is my pledge of allegiance afresh to you, as God says You will be my people! Yes Lord I am with them and you are with us!
That is the mother of all promises in the Bible - I will be your God and you will be my people - and baptism and the Lord’s Supper proclaim that in picture form! We have the promises of the Word confirmed to us, and we as participants and recipients of His covenant - show our loyalty and piety toward Him.
And do you see what a wonderful thing it is to have these promises confirmed in this way. We are people who always face an unknown scary future. Like a couple at the wedding altar - who knows what circumstances and problems may come our way. Who knows how hard fulfilling these vows actually is in nitty-gritty reality. And God comes with His first word of grace - I will be with You… sacramental authenticating seal - personally to you when received with faith. The promises kind of floating in the word, crystallize into a physical sign in very present earthly reality - and we perceive the promises of God the work of God through them. And the truth of the bread and wine and water - connects us to the ultimate reality in Jesus Christ! God has turned toward me in Jesus!
Danny Hyde, says: I cannot see the blood of Jesus wash away my sin. But I can see the water of baptism every time it is applied to someone on the basis of God’s covenant promise–“I will be your God and you will be my people.” I cannot see Christ’s broken body and shed blood as recounted in the gospel. But I can take in my hands and hold the bread and then drink the wine which point me to Christ’s broken body and shed blood for me. In fact, these things are both signs (pointers) and seals (covenant renewal) of God’s promise to save me from my sins
This is what it is to HAPPEN in the sacraments, that is what the sacraments are to do! Not because a priest does something, nor because something magical happens with the bread and wine. But because with faith and the word, something goes on externally, but the big deal is what must go internally! Do you get that by the Spirit and the Word, baptism and the Lord’ Supper connect us to God’s action in us! DO you get that? They are not religious rituals we dream up and try hard to sense God’s presence in, no they are signs and seals God uses for internal invisible reality of His grace!
This is why sacraments are never to be celebrated outside of worship, or separated from the preached Word. Its why we read the institution and meaning of baptism, so our faith is directed not to the sacrament but the living Christ who says I will be present for those with faith in these acts, you are participating in me! The very same thing we have in the Gospel, Jesus and His work, is what the sacraments strengthen and confirm in us - Jesus and His work.
And this is why we are to look at our baptisms and every Lords’s Supper we participate in with faith - like a mirror in which we see and contemplate and take hold of Jesus Christ and him crucified to take all my sin and raise me up again - from the bondage of sin and even from death - to live in communion and everlasting life with Him! Do you get this? The essence of baptism isn’t immersion into water, but the essence of baptism is a sign and seal given to us of our deliverance from sin and sign and seal of the promise of the Holy Spirit! The essence of the Supper is not bread and wine, but to point us to the reality behind them, again the blood of Jesus, his sacrifice to cleanse and forgive and welcome us into new life and kingdom!
This is why Calvin said the sacraments bring the clearest promises, over and above the Word they represent those promises of the gospel as painted in picture from life! Our hearts and minds and our eyes are drawn to Christ and the drama of His covenant and love for us.
That’s how sacraments work, kind of like during quarantine life - we look through a glass to connect with others - think of what Facetime or Zoom - family members in hospital - vital communication - primarily through word, but see that face - we are to see Christ’s promises in visual form bread wine water - and like a mirror like iPad screen behold spiritual and heavenly blessings - they are aids to faith so teach our children and us - we participate by faith in Christ in that water - that water crushes everything that is an enemy to God and goodness, our sin and all evil destroyed consumed on the Cross , the world, the flesh the devil, the friends of God come through come up from the water to resurrection life. In the Lord’s Supper - the body of our Lord upon the cross bear sins and sorrow guilt and shame in the flesh, and see his shed blood poured out to forgive. We get a foretaste of a meal, a feast, the Marriage Supper of the Lamb. And with faith we participate in those realities! Like Abram’s dream in Gen 15:17
When the sun had gone down and it was dark, behold, a smoking fire pot and a flaming torch passed between these pieces.
look at bread & wine, like Abraham did the broken animal that the torch and firepot went through - this is my body given for you. Jesus took our part of the broken covenant and took our punishment,,, but as perfect sacrifice - we look at the cost to save us from guilt and power of sin, and we rejoice - as hold emblems’ of his loving sacrifice - broken for you! The sign and seal ratifies the promise given to me in the Gospel!
And here is a wonder as the Pictures hold forth the Gospel Promises, it’s not the bread, wine, or water themselves that do this work, the grace pictured isn’t so tied to the elements that just by physically partaking everyone gets the grace regardless of faith (Luther). Nor is it that they only are effective by making us really remember. Zwingli. No Look at Art 33 says, “By means [of the sacraments] . . . God works in us by the power of the Holy Spirit.”
Do you get that, the power in these sacraments is like the power of the Holy Spirit with the Word, read the word without Faith without the Holy Spirit - results in nothing, so too the sacraments. But Combined with faith and the work of the Holy Spirit - these appendixes to the gospel they really do nourish and strengthen our weak faith! Which is why we really pray that the Holy Spirit would be sent in these moments upon and even the elements to do God’s work with us!
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Huge issues… why so long… But like Gospel Coalition - focus first on what given for what they mean, how they are to be used by a believer… before who gets them and how to be administered…
sacraments a witness not only to what God did in Christ, but to God’s ongoing active involvement in history - God Himself reconciling the world to Himself in Christ. and in sacraments God is really present and acting in this world in a present and future way!
CONCLUSION - sense Calvin celebrating with refugees, with nobles and … all at the table something recovered … sense Guido DeBres, - why was he put o death, yes this confession, but actually arrested for serving communion in simple house church, serving the Lord’s Supper to congregants of Reformed Exiles.. Convinced that Bible does teach baptism and Lord’s Supper, had to rediscover and defend it. We live in age where two sacraments of evangelical church for which no command, infant dedication and the altar call…