On the necessity of means and exhortations to the lost

“The twelve went out and also preached, that men should repent. It is to be greatly regretted that any of our preachers should have supposed that their commission did not extend to sinners, and that it was not consonant with sound doctrine to exhort them to repent and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. How could this error ever have been entertained for a moment, with the strong bible precept, the plain example of Christ and his disciples before them? The very commission itself assures us that some would not believe, and yet includes them in the gospel address. It is in this and similar ways that the spirit of exhortation has been grieved and lost in our pulpits. This shows the great propriety of rightly dividing the word of God, and not shunning to declare all of it — to feed the lambs, to feed the sheep, to exhort all, every creature to repent and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. There are 'other sheep' yet unbrought, and we as ministers can reach them only by a general address, believing that the Lord knoweth them that are his, and that the excellency of power has not been delegated to us, but is still with God. If our Old Baptist system be right, it will be found in agreement with every text, and if we have to alter or abridge the commission to preach the gospel, it is plain evidence of an error among us.

“The Lord has plainly revealed the great truth, that all Christians are saved by grace, but in our Calvinistic ultraisms we are too little inclined to study the Lord's way of saving his people; his plan as connected with earthly things, signs, means, methods, or what you please to term them. The Antinomian affects to despise them because the Arminian perverts them. Both are wrong. If it be the Lord's method to have us say to sinners dead in trespasses and sins, repent and believe, we should practice it. Our exhorting sinners to repent and believe is according to the Lord's plan, and how can we reject it, or neglect it, without the very consequences which have followed. Our commission, alas! brethren, has been narrowed down to the words ‘feed my sheep.’ There are but few if any lambs to feed, and still fewer of the ‘other sheep’ being brought in by our ministry. To exhort sinners to repent does not conflict with the doctrine that God alone can give life and repentance; or to believe does not conflict with the truth that faith is the gift of God; nor do the exhortations, warnings and threatenings oppose the doctrine that the believer is kept by the power of God; no more indeed than if it were now said that the leper's cure was not of God, because he bathed in Jordan; that the bringing forth of fruits meet for repentance was not of God, because John exhorted them to repent. Our ultraists would then have said why bathe in Jordan, as God only can cure leprosy? Why encompass the walls as God has purposed to throw them down? Why remain in the ship as it is the purpose of God to save all the crew? Just as they now say, why exhort sinners to repent, as the Lord only can give life and repentance? Why exhort men to believe as faith is the gift of God? Why exhort believers to persevere, as God only can enable them to do so?

“The very considerations which in their estimation amount to objections should on the contrary be regarded as inducements to preach in that way. No one should preach the gospel, without the faith of the gospel; he should believe that the Lord gives the blessings of the gospel, even to those who oppose it—God may peradventure give them repentance to the acknowledging of its truths. We preach according to a peradventure—many are called in that way, but few are chosen – many hear outwardly, but few inwardly.  We call on sinners to awake from the sleep of death by faith, believing that God will give them life; to repent because he has promised to give repentance; to believe because, he gives faith, to persevere because he is the Finisher of our faith. Shall we give up this part of the work of the ministry because it has been Arminianized, and call all Arminians who carry it out? Faith divests all these things of Arminianism; faith which has regard to what the Lord will do, and not a false trust in what we may do ourselves.  Have modern preachers become wiser than the ‘sower’ of old? One fourth only of his seed fell on ‘good ground.’ The modern servant affects not to cast any seed on stony or thorny ground or by the way side. Our system should not only embrace the doctrine of salvation by grace, but also the method or way of grace. The way of grace is to call on sinners to live as well as to give life, to exhort them to repent, as well as to give repentance, to exhort unbelievers to believe as well as to give faith. It both leads by the spirit, and exhorts by the word.

“But alas! Where are our exhorters? They are characters almost unknown among us. Where is the preacher who stops in his ultra doctrinal course to exhort either saint or sinner? Some particular dogma must be proved by a perversion of revealed truth; the sincere milk of the word is withheld, strong meats are poisoned, and the great spiritual interest of the congregation is disregarded—all this and even more, the peace and well being of the household of faith is broken up, if necessary, to establish some ultra tenet.

“But to return: after all that has been preached and written on the subject of means, the whole doctrine resolves itself into this truth, that means are nothing more or less than the ways or methods of the Lord in doing the things which he has purposed. He could do the same things by any other methods or ways were he disposed so to act, or without any means at all; at least without such as involve human acts. Although we are thus free to believe, yet we are not thus free to act. We are bound as the Lord's servants to regard with much concern his revealed will in all things. We believe the Lord can save sinners without our preaching to them, but that does not excuse us from saying to them, repent ye and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ; that he can save them without water baptism or the Lord's supper, but that he does not authorize us to dispense with them. But verily we have deviated so far from the bible in our views and feelings, if one were to call on sinners to repent, in the earnest, warm and emphatic way, which Christ and his disciples did, he would be regarded as an Arminian.

“Until the spirit of exhortation shall revive among us—if we are the people of God, that spirit is among us in some state, vexed, grieved or quenched—we shall lightly regard the wholesome exhortations of the bible. Who of us is so meek and lowly as to be taught by another? Who has determined to preach according to the model preachers of the New Testament? Who like Paul has determined not to know any thing in the pulpit but Jesus Christ and him crucified? Who of us have resolved to quiet the minds of our brethren about things hard to be understood, the things which engender strife, contention, and confusion? There is certainly too great a fondness for the like, which must first be corrected in our pulpits. But until the spirit of exhortation shall revive, and cease to be vexed, grieved and quenched, as it has been for a long time, we need not expect much reformation in our mode of preaching. There are, however, a few who have eyes to see, and hearts to deplore the things now under consideration. The errors of preachers are not private ones, but are disseminated from the pulpit among the brethren, and produce among them contentions, divisions, coldness and barrenness;—-they act on their minds as doth a canker on the body. How very needful that they should study to show themselves approved unto God; and not pursue those hurtful things of which I now speak.” 

Dr. John M. Watson, The Old Baptist Test (Nashville: Republican Banner Press, 1855), p. 188-191.