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HOW THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE GOSPEL IS ETEKNAL LIFE.

A SERMON

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IN RECOMMENDATION OV THE

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ON THE MOBNING- OB THE

ANNUAL MEETING, JANUARY 12th, 1868:
BY SAMUEL BACHE,

Minister ov the Congeegation.

BIEMINGHAM:
PEINTED BY EICHAED L. GREW, 27, TEMPLE EOW.

HOW THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE GOSPEL IS ETERNAL LIFE.

A SERMON

PREACHED IN THE

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in recommendation or the

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ON THE MORNING OP THE

ANNUAL MEETING, JANUARY 12th, 1868
BY SAMUEL BACHE,

Minister oe the Congregation.

BIEMINGHAM:
PEINTED BY EICHAED L. GEEW, 27, TEMPLE EOW.

PREFACE

Having expressed a desire to place in the hands of each
member of my Congregation a record of my distinctive opinions,
and thuse of my illustrious predecessor Dr. Priestley, with reference
to doctrines which I hold most dear, and which are set forth in
the following Discourse, a few friends have requested me to publish
it. I very willingly accede to their request, and gladly avail
myself of the opportunity of giving a brief notice of the practical
application of our Fellowship Fund in the maintenance of those
doctrines. This Fellowship Fund, established in our Congregation full
fifty years ago, is intended for the aid of poor Unitarian Con
gregations in the repair of their places of worship and school
buildings and in the maintenance of their worship. It is raised.
by small subscriptions of one shilling per quarter and upwards,
and is disbursed by a Committee elected by the Subscribers, who
receive applications and investigate cases.
Very valuable assistance is rendered by this benevolent
Association. Each year brings many new applications ; and
many are the instances in which seasonable relief has encouraged
the energy and raised the drooping spirits of needy Congregations.
Our Fellowship Fund thus becomes a very valuable agency
for enabling us, after the example of our Divine Master, to
" bear witness to the truth ; " and it is therefore hoped that the
list of Subscribers, which falls far short of the number of
worshippers in the Church of the Messiah, may be largely
increased, and wider powers of usefulness thus accorded to the
Committee. Subscriptions are received by the Treasurer of the Church
with the Seat Bents, and he will gladly include new names in
the list of Subscribers.
The references to Dr. Priestley's Works in the following
Discourse are to the edition of them in 25 volumes, by J. T.
Eutt, published in 1831.

John xvn., 3.—" This is life eternal, that they might know thee the only
true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent."

As we shall hold immediately after this present
service the Annual Meeting of a Society established
half a century ago for the express purpose of the
maintenance and diffusion of Unitarian Christianity, I
request your attention now to this most solemn and
explicit declaration by our divinely appointed Teacher
and Lord of the fundamental principle on which it
distinctively rests. That declaration occurs in the
prayer of Jesus Christ himself to his Father on behalf
of his followers immediately before his crucifixion.
The prayer is prompted and sustained throughout by
an immediate and earnest regard to the most impor
tant fact connected with the destiny of man ; that by
the knowledge of which he can alone obtain correct
views of his present relations and duties, can alone
acquaint himself with the highest and purest motives
to virtue, the fact which it is the peculiar purpose of
Christianity to attest of man's immortality. The gospel
of Jesus is adapted to the requirements of the spirit
within us in no respect more admirably than in this,
that it maintains throughout an explicit reference to this
momentous truth, shows us its constant bearing on
the life that now is, and enables us to improve our
present season of discipline by continually reminding
us of the glorious purpose which it is intended to
effect, and of the manner in which that purpose may
be successfully accomplished. In this declaration of

Jesus he distinctly sets before us the basis on which
his constant and reverential and urgent recognition of
that eternal life which awaits us actually rests. Let us
endeavour clearly and completely to learn the real
nature of this basis of all rational and firm and un
wavering faith in our immortal destiny. It presents
to us three distinct but intimately and indissolubly
connected topics, to each of which I will briefly ask
your attention. It teaches us — first, that the Father
is the only true God; secondly, that Jesus, His
messenger, is the Christ ; and, thirdly, that in the
knowledge of these momentous truths standeth our
eternal life.
First : The Father is the only true God. The gospel
throughout assumes the fundamental Jewish doctrine
of the absolute unity of God ; monotheism in opposition
to and in contrast with polytheism. In ancient times
polytheism was naturally and unavoidably the common
sense of mankind if they entertained any belief in
superhuman existences and powers at all. The dis
courses of Socrates had relation to the providence of
the Gods, not of God, and the philosophical enquiries
of Cicero were into the nature of the Gods, not of
God : because in those times men were unavoidably
impressed with diversities and even seeming con
trarieties of superhuman agency which the discoveries
of modern science enable us to recognise as what they
really are : —
"All are but parts of one stupendous whole,
" Whose body nature is, and God the soul."
Pope's Essay on Man, I., 267
The monotheism, therefore, of the ancient Jews was
clearly the result, not of scientific or philosophical
enquiries, but of an express revelation : and its firm

establishment among them as a nation in the time of
David, (whose illustrious contemporary Homer has
immortalised in his Hiad the polytheism which then
prevailed throughout all the rest of the world,) is to
my mind all but a mathematical demonstration of the
substantial verity of the Pentateuch originating in the
time of Moses, and based upon the realities of his
history as the deliverer of the Israelites from Egypt.
The distinction, however, between monotheism and
polytheism is not the distinction between Unitarianism
and Trinitarianism. Our Trinitarian brethren justly
claim to be worshippers of only one God equally with
ourselves : they are not consciously worshippers of
more Gods than one. The distinctive difference on this
point between them and ourselves arises from the
application in very early times of the subtle metaphysics
of the Platonic philosophy to the interpretation of the
Christian records, with the view of conciliating the
favour of the then predominant heathenism. Not until
the year A.D. 325 was the doctrine of the Trinity
established in its present form by the celebrated Council
of Nicoea in Bithynia; established, that is, by
ecclesiastical authority, by which alone it has since
been predominantly maintained. From the very
moment of its establishment, as well as prior to that
event, it has been repudiated by many sincere
Christians. Take the evidence of this fact afforded by
Tertullian, the celebrated presbyter of Carthage, who
flourished about A.D. 200. In his days the words
Unitarian and Trinitarian derived from the Latin were
represented by the correspondent Greek terms
Monarchy (single and sole ruler) and Economy (family
or household) . Employing these Greek terms, Tertullian
writes, "The simple, the ignorant and unlearned, who

"are always the greater part of the body of Christians,
"since the rule of faith" — meaning, probably, the
Apostles' Creed — "transfers the worship of many gods
"to the one true God, not understanding that the
"unity of God is to be maintained but with the
"ceconomy, dread this oeconomy, imagining that this
"number and disposition of a Trinity is a division of
"the Unity. They, therefore, will have it that we are
"worshippers of two and even of three Gods, but that
"they are worshippers of one God only. We, they
"say, hold the' monarchy. Even the Latins have
"learned to bawl out for the monarchy, and the
"Greeks themselves will not understand the oeconomy."
(Priestley's Works, vol. vi., p. 486-7.) Neither do we
Unitarians understand it or recognise it for the very
reason for which it was rejected by the majority of
these early Christians ; viz., that it was not recognised
by Jesus Christ himself : for being himself, as the Son
of God, one of the persons in that supposed oeconomy,
he nevertheless prays as a man to his Father, and de
clares that his Father is the only true God. He
therefore does not claim to be himself God, but most
effectually repudiates such an assumption.
My illustrious predecessor, Dr. Priestley, from
whose works I have copied the early Christian
quotation which you have just heard, became fully
impressed with a conviction of the truth and import
ance of Unitarian Christianity by his study of the early
Christian Fathers for his defence of the verity of our
New Testament Scriptures against the deists and
atheists of his age, and then by his reverent and
conscientious study of that New Testament itself.
Referring to his "Appeal to the serious and candid
Professors of Christianity," first published in 1770,

8

(nearly a century ago), he writes as follows, what we
his lineal successors in this Church of the Messiah
shall do well attentively to consider. (Priestley* s
Works, vol. ii., p. 413-416.) — "I shall conclude this
'address with a word of advice and exhortation to all
'Unitarians, whether they be members of the Estab-
'lished Church, or of any society of Dissenters in this
'country. Of such great importance is the doctrine
'of the Divine Unity, that nothing will more fully
'justify a separation from any Christian Church that
'does not openly profess it, and much more from those
'that avow the contrary doctrine, directing prayers
'and paying supreme worship to any other than 'the
"God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.' It was
'for the preservation of this great and fundamental
'doctrine, that Abraham, and his family by Isaac and
'Jacob, were separated from the rest of the world,
'and made a distinct people, as it were, to be the
'depositaries of the true religion, which consists
'principally in the sole worship of the one true and
'living God, the Maker and Preserver of all things.
'The same important doctrine was uniformly taught by
'Christ and the apostles; though Christians in after
'times, like the Israelites after the time of Joshua,
'relapsed into that idolatry which has generally pre-
' vailed to this day. If it was a sufficient justification
'of the first Reformers, that they considered the church
'from which they separated as worshipping saints and
'angels, will it not justify your separation from their
'partial reformations, that you consider them as pray-
'ing to and worshipping one whom you consider as a
'man like yourselves, though honoured and dis-
'tinguished by God above all other men ? To join
'habitually in public worship with Trinitarians, is

9

"countenancing that worship which you must consider
"as idolatrous ; and which, however innocent in them,
"is highly criminal in you. If they think it a point of
"conscience not to go to mass in Popish countries,
"because, in their opinion, it is idolizing a piece of
"bread, you ought to make a point of conscience of
"not worshipping with them, because, in your opinion,
"it is idolizing a man, who is as much a creature of
"God as a piece of bread, and just as improper an object
"of worship. Besides, the great offence to Jews,
"Mahometans, and the world at large, being the
"doctrine of the Trinity, it is highly necessary that
"societies of Christians should be formed expressly on
"this principle of the Divine Unity, that it may be
"evident to all the world, that there are Christians,
"and societies of Christians, who hold the doctrine of
"the Trinity in as much abhorrence as they themselves
"can do. For the conversion of Jews or Mahometans
"to Christianity while it is supposed to contain the
"doctrine of the Trinity, no person who knows, or has
"heard of Jews or Mahometans, can ever expect.
"Assemble together, therefore, in the name and in the
"fear of God, and according to the order of the gospel,
"every Lord's-day ; if there be no more than two or
"three, or even a single family of you in a place, read
"the Scriptures and pray together. Be careful, how-
"ever, to do this in the spirit of Christian charity,
"which should be extended to all men, but especially
"to all that bear the Christian name. Consider them
"as men who are in an error which is always involun-
"tary. Endeavour to remove the prejudices they
"unhappily lie under, but forbear all angry reproaches,
"all insult, and even ridicule ; for religion is a serious
"thing, and brotherly love is the very essence of it.

10

f ' And if this love is to be extended even to enemies,
"much more should it be indulged towards our merely
"mistaken friends."
How earnestly, and perseveringly, and efficiently
the excellent Dr. Priestley carried out his avowal and
maintenance of what he believed to be the tfuth of the
gospel, and how nobly he endured the persecution
which he had to encounter in consequence of it, should
be well known to you all. It was not until the year
1813 that the professors of Unitarian Christianity were
liberated by Act of Parliament from the severe
penalties to which they had previously been liable ; and
immediately they passed a Resolution, "That as
"Unitarian Christians feared not to profess and in-
"culcate what they esteem the doctrines of the Gospel,
"though liable to the infliction of severe penalties, it is
"their incumbent duty, now that they are placed
"within the protection of the law, not to relax their
"efforts, but rather to extend those exertions which well
"consist with the peace and order of civil society and
"the purest principles of Christian charity." (Monthly
Repository, 1813, p. 746.) Immediately afterwards,
therefore, originated the Fellowship Fund in connexion
with our Congregation, whose Annual Meeting you are
earnestly requested at the close of this service to attend.
I trust that I have succeeded in showing you how faith
ful and earnest and religious were the principles and
sentiments on which it was at first established.
To return now to the declaration of Jesus Christ
in his prayer to his Father. We have clearly seen that
he does not claim to be himself God. But does he
make no claim for himself ? Yes : one very clear and
important claim to the maintenance of which he
sacrificed his life. Let us note —

n

Secondly : That in this his solemn prayer, 'he dis
tinctly claims to have been immediately sent by God,
and to be not merely one of God's special messengers,
as were the other ancient prophets, but His Messiah
too. This idea is clearly expressed in the several
translations of the clause which different interpreters
have given. Thus Campbell translates it, "Jesus the
"Messiah, Thy apostle :" Archbishop Newcome, "him
"whom Thou hast sent, even Jesus Christ :" Granville
Penn in his New Covenant, "that Jesus whom Thou
"hast sent is Christ :" Gilbert Wakefield's translation
is, "that they might know Thee to be the only true
"God, and Jesus, Thy messenger, to be the Christ."
Accordingly the word Christian, both etymologically
and historically, and in all but universal usage, denotes
one who acknowledges Jesus to be the Christ. By
those who did not acknowledge Jesus to be the Christ
his disciples were therefore called not Christians but
Nazarenes, and it was not until the faith of the
Messiahship of Jesus prevailed in Antioch, or the Jew
ish opposition to his claim was not there put forward,
that the name Christian was first employed at all as
the name of the disciples of Jesus of Nazareth. (Acts
xi. 26.) Its essential and inseparable signification is
the recognition of Jesus as the Christ : whoever dis
avows this recognition may be to some extent a
Nazarene, but is certainly no Christian. On behalf not
only of Christ and his holy gospel, but of common
sense, and natural reason, and true philosophy, I am
constrained to resist and repudiate the tendency to
deprive this term of its appropriate meaning as' con
trary to all sound judgment and understanding, not
less than to the actual claim and character of Christ
and to his sacred divine authority.

12

Here then we have distinctly laid down the two grand
and comprehensive truths, which it is the immediate and
Sole purpose of our Unitarian Fellowship Fund, both
theoretically and practically to maintain and extend.
Let us see in conclusion —
Thirdly : How the knowledge of these truths con
stitutes our eternal life, how our eternal life stands
in them. Eternal life may be considered in two dis
tinct but connected senses : First, as the opposite of
that temporal mortal life which is terminated by death,
whereas eternal life is life without end : Secondly,
as opposed to those worldly views and principles,
to those sensual and selfish habits, to that worldly
spirit, which the present life regarded, mainly by and
for itself is apt to generate. The real and practical
knowledge of God and of His Christ cherishes in
every one who sincerely embraces it this eternal life
by the following distinct and powerful agencies :
First : Jesus Christ hath abolished death and
brought life and immortality to light by his gospel
and resurrection. " If Christ have not been raised
from the dead," writes St. Paul to the Corinthians,
(i. xv.) " then is our preaching vain and your faith
" also is vain. Yea, and we are found false witnesses
" of God, because we have testified of God that
" he raised up Christ ; whom he raised not up, if
" so be that the dead rise not at all. But in
"truth Christ hath been raised from the dead, and
" become the first fruits of them that slept." Paul,
who was himself converted to Christianity, to which
he had previously been a most violent opponent, by
clear and indubitable evidence afforded to him as an
upright and conscientious man, thus distinctly attests
the fact of the resurrection of Jesus Christ as render-

13

ing eternal Ufe after death a definite and substantial
object of faith and hope. Such it was not to the most
enlightened and virtuous of the ancient heathen
philosophers, nor such could it be without such testi
mony to us now. One of the last things which Socrates
said to his friends who attended upon him at the time
of his death was, " I am going to die and you con-
"tinue in life, but which of us shall be in a better state
"is known to none but God." (Priestley's Works, vol. ii.
p. 99.) Cicero writes to one of his friends, " If in
"this I err, believing that the souls of men are immortal,
"gladly I err, nor do I desire that this error in which I
"rejoice should be wrested from me so long as I live."
Well, therefore, writes Middleton in his Life of Cicero,
" From this general view of Cicero's religion, one
" cannot help observing that the most exalted state of
" human reason is so far from superseding the use, that it
" demonstrates the benefit of a more explicit revelation :
"for though the natural law, in the perfection to
" which it was carried by Cicero, might serve for a
" sufficient guide to the few, such as himself, of enlarged
" minds and happy dispositions, yet it had been so long
"depraved and adulterated by the prevailing errors
" and vices of mankind, that it was not discoverable, even
"to those few, without great pains and study, and
" could not produce in them, at last, anything more
" than a hope, never a full persuasion ; whilst the
" greatest part of mankind, even of the virtuous and
"inquisitive, lived without the knowledge of a God, or
" the expectation of a futurity ; and the multitude in
" every country was left to the gross idolatry of the
" popular worship. When we reflect on all this, we
" must needs see abundant reason to be thankful to God
"for the divme light of his Gospel; which has revealed

14

" at last, to babes, what was hidden from the wise;
" and without the pains of searching or danger of mis-
" taking, has given us not only the hope, but the
" assurance, of happiness, and made us not only the
"believers, but the heirs of immortality." (Priestley's
Works, vol. ii., p. 100.) Thus does the knowledge of
God as indeed our Father and of Jesus as the Christ
constitute our eternal life by that confident assurance
which it gives us, and which without it we could never
have attained. Nor is even this all. Let us observe —
Secondly : That Jesus as the Christ was sent to make
known to us the will of God and our duty as supreme.
The life that is to be ours after death is the divinely
appointed prolongation, so far as our moral and spiritual
consciousness are concerned, of the life which wenowlive
in this world. We are here and now in the infancy of our
being, be our earthly pilgrimage long or short ; and pre
cisely as' in the earlier seasons of our mortal life on
earth, we are instructed and educated for the improve
ment and enjoyment of such as may follow here, so
throughout the whole of our earthly sojourn we are in
fact the pupils of Divine culture and education, for the
improvement of which it is indispensable that we make
the knowledge and performance of the Divine will our
first and chief concern. " Ye cannot serve God and
" mammon," said our Divinely appointed Teacher.
We are bound to discover and to make a clear and
practical distinction between them, and to serve God
alone. Consequently our Redeemer and our Lord does
not simply set before us this abstract proposition. But —
Thirdly : Both by his precepts and his life, he takes
us away from all sensual and selfish and mere worldly
views, and teaches us that it is not the will of our
Heavenly Father that we should live only for ourselves,

15

i.e., for the gratification of our own selfish desires.
" If any man will come after me, let him deny himself
" and take up his cross and follow me." (Matthew xvi.
24.) Accordingly this great practical lesson, as illustrated
in the Ufe and in the voluntary sacrifice of Jesus
Christ himself, was earnestly taught by his apostles
generaUy, and especiaUy by St. Paul ; who, drawing
out in detail the distinction which his Master had so
emphaticaUy announced, writes to his Galatian Converts
(v. 16.) " Walk in the Spirit and ye shaU not fulfil the
the lust of the flesh." Thus Christian moraUty is an
indispensable part of the Christian Ufe ; without it, we
are the servants of mammon, i.e., of the flesh and
of the world ; with it we become the servants of God,
and practicaUy the disciples of His Son, Jesus Christ
our Lord.
FinaUy : Christ in his gospel and Ufe shows us the
spirit of filial gratitude and reverence and love in
which we should obey God. Though claiming for
himself, as the Son of God, the honour with which men
should honour his and our Father, (John v. 23),
because he had been specially sent into the world as
the revealer and representative of God to men, he no
where claims, he no where accepts the worship which is
due and which he him self paid to God the Father alone.
When on a certain occasion some one addressed him in
the words, " Good Master, what shaU I do that I may
inherit eternal Ufe?" Jesus, apprehending no doubt
that the expression " Good Master" was employed in
somewhat of the spirit of flattery, repUed, " Why
" caUest thou me good ? There is none good but one,
"that is God." (Mark x. 17, 18.) And when, on
another occasion, the Jews vindicated their having
taken up stones to stone him by saying that they did

16
it " because thou, being a man, makest thyself God,"
Jesus asserted his right in conformity with the phraseo
logy of their law to have adopted the name, but affirmed
that what he had actually said was, " I am the Son of
"God." (John x. 31—36.) Thus did he always
himself maintain a devout reverence for his Heavenly
Father as "the only true God," and thus did he most
efficiently recommend it to others. May we, my
brethren, thankfully accept and faithfully and diligently
improve his gracious recommendation. May we
recognise as distinctly and faithfully and perseveringly
as he did the principles of God's moral government
here as being precisely the same as those to which we
shaU be subject hereafter. The practical recognition
of these great and fundamental truths of the gospel of
Christ, wul then give us an abiding and animating
assurance of our eternal life, and all needful direction
and aid towards the happy reaUsation of it. Without
such recognition, we are really in the condition of the
ancient heathen : " having no hope and without God in
"the world." (Ephesians U., 12.)
Such are distinctively the blessings which we
derive from our Unitarian Christianity, and which it is
our duty and privilege, by means of such agencies as
that to which your attention and co-operation are now
earnestly invited — (our Fellowship Fund) — both to
maintain and to diffuse. May we thus approve our
selves faithful as weU as enlightened advocates of the
truth as it is in Jesus, extend the triumphs of his
Kingdom on earth, and finaUy obtain his welcome to
those mansions in his Father's House whither he is
gone before to prepare a place for us ! Amen.
Printed by Richard L. Grew, 27, Temple Row, Birmingham.