William Kelly

Next comes Acts 2:38-41. The doctrine of the tract here is: "Peter did not tell them to believe, and then be baptized, but to repent — to judge themselves, and then be baptized for the remission of sins. Now, if they had truly believed, they would have had the forgiveness of sins; but they had not the forgiveness of sins, and therefore, they were not true believers; they were to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ that they might believe on Him, and through Him receive the forgiveness of their sins, and the gift of the Holy Ghost" (p. 7). Now I distinctly affirm that this is thoroughly bad doctrine, a falsification of God's word, a delusion and a snare for souls. Is the author so infatuated with a theory as to set aside the fundamental truth of God's operation in souls? Does he not see that the repentance on which Peter insisted before baptism implies faith? His doctrine here is the baldest Pelagianism or worse, a mere action on the natural conscience, a self-judgment without true faith, and baptism for the remission of sins distinctly said to be before faith also: "if they had truly believed" (argues he), "they would have had the forgiveness of sins." The reasoning is wholly fallacious, for faith is supposed throughout as it is indeed inseparable from repentance. So repentance, though distinct from faith, is inseparable from believing. Hence if the Philippian jailer was only called on to believe, it would be as false to infer that he did not truly repent, as it is here to infer that there was no true faith because Peter only called on them to repent. There is not the smallest reason to doubt that the persons thus addressed were converted (always leaving room for the creeping in of false brethren) before they were baptized. Only we must remember that the proclamation of repentance and remission of sins in Christ's name was a new thing; faith was not, nor new birth, but the administration of the blessings now first bestowed in Christianity. To suppose therefore, because these souls had not yet remission of sins, that they did not truly believe, is to reason to their state from the Christian's state, fully made known afterwards, and hence a very serious blunder. Is it forgotten that no Old Testament saint enjoyed the Pentecostal state of things? Yet were the saints of old born of God and true believers. The ground taken is false, and the result disastrous. The author has sacrificed God's truth to the imminent danger of souls, because he has merely taken up another's thought, ill-understood, which he himself, not having learnt it from God, does not know how to conciliate with the rest of the truth. I believe there is truth behind, not seen in general, as to the Christian estate introduced at Pentecost. But this tract, far from clearing the ground, destroys as far as it can God's immutable principles in dealing with souls.