Here we have gathered this morning by divine appointment in order to worship by giving glory, honor, and praise to the Triune God. We ascribe to Him all worthiness and dominion. However, in Worship, God also comes close to us in Christ and by Christ, as applied by the Holy Spirit we receive the blessings of salvation out of the eternal fountain of God’s grace.
Something very supernatural that looks very common is happening as we gather here. God is conveying His grace – His favor – week by week as we hear the Word proclaimed and the Sacraments dispensed. In brief, God is communicating His grace to us – His favor to us – by certain means.
Those means are called the “means of grace.”
Like the words “Trinity” or “Incarnation” the phrase “Means of grace,” is not found in Scripture but its usage is warranted as we look at Scripture to learn that God saves us and keeps us in His salvation by certain means.
Just as God uses means to grow our children physically via food and drink and exercise so God uses means to grow His children spiritually. Throughout history, the Church has referred to these means God uses to save us and to preserve us in salvation as the “means of grace.”
So … already we have briefly defined the idea of the “means of grace.” To expand a wee bit the “means of grace,” are those common realities that God has ordained to be the normative channels by which He saves us and preserves us in His salvation.
To say it another way;
The means of grace are God’s appointed instruments by which the Holy Spirit enables believers to receive Christ and the benefits of redemption.
So, we have briefly defined the idea of the “means of Grace,” now we consider just exactly what means God uses in order to bring us into His salvation and then to keep us in His salvation.
The Heidelberg Catechism answers this question in LD 25 – Q. 65
Question 65: Since then we are made partakers of Christ and all His benefits by faith only, whence doth this faith proceed?
Answer: From the Holy Ghost, who works faith1 in our hearts by the preaching of the gospel, and confirms it by the use of the sacraments.2
The Westminster Confession puts it this way,
Q. 154. What are the outward means whereby Christ communicates to us the benefits of his mediation?
A. The outward and ordinary means whereby Christ communicates to his church the benefits of his mediation, are all his ordinances; especially the Word, sacraments, and prayer; all which are made effectual to the elect for their salvation
So God normatively uses means in order to save and keep His people in His salvation.
This is not so strange to us when we pause to think about this. We don’t normatively talk about the means of this or that in our lives but the reality of means is everywhere in our lives.
In order to have gardens, the means required is the planting of seeds and the maintenance work of gardening
In order to preach the means required is commonly some kind of ordination process
In order to have children, a man and his wife have need of the means of intimacy
And in order to be saved, grow in that salvation, and be kept in God’s salvation we are learning that God uses means … these are called the means of grace.
And just as gardens won’t grow without means, and men won’t preach without means, and families won’t be had without means so God’s favor in salvation won’t be normatively had apart from the means of grace.
Well, let’s not get too far ahead of ourselves but lodge that last statement in your memory banks because we will be returning to it.
Let us appeal to the Scriptural support that the Catechism’s appeal to for this idea of means of Grace relating to God’s salvation.
The Reformers spoke of the Word as being the primary means of Grace and we see that taught throughout Scripture. The reason the Reformers offered the Word as the primary means of Grace is that Baptism and the Eucharist find their meaning as dependent upon the Word informing
God’s grace as we get that in our other senses.
Dutch theologian Gerharrdus Vos put it this way speaking of the primacy of the Word over the sacraments,
“If necessary, we can think of Word as a means of grace without sacrament, but it is impossible to think of sacrament as a means of grace without Word. The sacraments depend on Scripture, and the truth of Scripture speaks in and through them. “
So, we see the Word proclaimed as the primary means of grace
Matthew 28:19-20. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world. Amen.
Here we see the appointment by Christ as to the responsibility to collect the elect into the Church and the means He appoints to do so are the Word (hence the reference to teaching) and Baptism. Here it is the Word and Baptism as means of grace.
In Acts we see that church now as it has begun to be collected;
Acts 2:42, 46-47. And they continued stedfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and in prayers..
We note here the church continued steadfastly in the apostle’s doctrine (Word) and in the breaking of bread which we understand to be a reference to the Eucharist.
That the Word is the primary means among God’s means of grace is seen clearly in Romans 10.
14 How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher? 15 And how shall they preach unless they are sent? As it is written:
“How beautiful are the feet of those who [b]preach the gospel of peace, Who bring glad tidings of good things!” 16 But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, “Lord, who has believed our report?” 17 So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.
Note here the emphasis on the Word as a means of grace as it comes forth as Preached. The Reformers took this idea very seriously. It was not just the Word as a means of grace but the Word as preached.
Westminster Shorter Catechism
Q. 89. How is the Word made effectual to salvation?
A. The Spirit of God maketh the reading, but especially the preaching, of the Word, an effectual means of convincing and converting sinners, and of building them up in holiness and comfort, through faith, unto salvation.185
But that Baptism and the Lord’s Table are also instruments by which God’s conveys His grace is seen in Scripture,
First, we remember how often Baptism is placed cheek by jowl with salvation. Peter, answering the question, “What must we do to be saved,” replies,
Acts 2:38 Then Peter said to them, “Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins;
Note the tightest of connections between the remission of sins and Baptism. However this is not the only time that tight connection is made, Hear the language Paul uses to recount his salvation as he quotes Ananias speaking to him,
Acts 22:16 And now why are you waiting? Arise and be baptized, and wash away your sins, calling on the name of the Lord.’
Baptism is clearly a means of grace. Baptism is an instrument that God has ordained to the end of gifting us with salvation just as the Eucharist is an instrument that God has ordained for our being preserved in His salvation.
One more text relating to Baptism as a means of grace,
Titus 3:4 But when the kindness and the love of God our Savior toward man appeared, 5 not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit, 6 whom He poured out on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior, 7 that having been justified by His grace we should become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.
Here we notice that Baptism is not man’s work but it is God’s work. If Baptism was our work then Paul couldn’t write here “not by works of righteousness which we have done.” No, Paul is communicating that Baptism is God’s Work. Baptism is God’s means of Grace … it is God’s “washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit.”
And the table is God’s means of grace in order to nourish and nurture us in His salvation… in order to preserve us and keep us. This is why we speak of eating the bread of forgiveness and drinking the wine of eternal life. The bread and wine are to us as we eat and drink in faith what spinach was to Popeye. They are the food and elixir of grace.
Luke 22:17-20
17 Then He took the cup, and gave thanks, and said, “Take this and divide it among yourselves; 18 for I say to you, I will not drink of the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of God comes.” 19 And He took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to them, saying, “This is My body which is given for you; do this in remembrance of Me.” 20 Likewise He also took the cup after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in My blood, which is shed for you.
As we said though earlier though the sacraments are dependent upon the Word. The sacraments are God’s drama but a drama is only as good as the Word that informs it. We should also say about the sacraments that they are God’s means of grace to us in our other senses. With the Word, we receive the means of grace via our hearing organ. However, with the sacraments, we receive God’s means of grace in our organ of tactile, our organ of smell, our organ of taste. With Word & Sacrament, the believer is saturated in their senses with the means of God’s grace. God considers our weakness and so plummets our whole being with His favor leading to our growth in His grace.
Oh, the wonders of God’s condescension to us in Jesus Christ by the Holy Spirit. How tender He is towards us. How carefully He nurtures and nourishes His people. How generously He provides all things needed for our salvation.
Amazing grace indeed!
So, we see that the power of the Church is in the administration of Word & Sacrament.
Now, if we pause and gather ourselves we can make a derivative observation from these truths.
1.) God’s Word on the means of grace teaches us the necessity of your and my Church attendance.
How do I get at that? By the simple observation that there is nowhere else that you can get Word & Sacrament except in the Church. The Church is to Word & Sacrament what a specialty shop is to whatever good that specialty shop is carrying. If you want shoes you go to a cobbler. If you want your car fixed you go to a mechanic. If you want bread you go to a bakery. If you want health you go to a Dr. office… and if you want eternal life as found in the means of grace of Word & Sacrament there is nowhere else you can go except to the Church. The Church is God’s ordained agent to teach, drench, and feed His people unto eternal life.
Here in this seemingly very ordinary place, God is meeting with His people to convey to them the supernatural means of grace. What looks to be very common is suffused with the supernatural by God’s appointment. The gathering of the saints is not an option any more than water is an option to a man dying of thirst…. and that twice on the Lord’s Day.
If this is true, and it is, then all of us should value the Church and church attendance much much higher than we typically do. Why would any Christian want to excuse themselves from the one and only place where they can find the means of Grace? Why would we want to excuse ourselves from the one place God has promised to meet us in order to feed and nurture us? To excuse ourselves then from attending the word preached and the sacrament dispensed is to contradict our insistence that there is no higher priority in our lives than the Christian faith.
I know many who are hearing my voice don’t have true churches to attend because of the continued apostasy of the modern Reformed Church. Believe me, I weep with you over the current Babylonian captivity of the Church. My soul is raked and bruised over what passes for the Church today.
Having said that if you are one of those people allow me to encourage you, if at all possible, given all other necessary considerations, to move your family to be in a place where you can attend a true Church and so receive God’s means of Grace. I know of a Church in Charlotte that would love for you to find a home here.
2.) All of this we have said explains why you want a trained and holy man (not a woman) in your pulpit for it is he who the burden of the Lord is laid upon to faithfully and accurately deliver the Word and dispense the Sacraments. In God’s economy, the visible church in any era will only rise as high as the men in the pulpit.
What a fearful thing to be a minister and to bear this awful responsibility and because it is a fearful thing you, in the years that lie before many of you, long after I am gone, have need to look for ministers who are so overwhelmed by the fear of God that they labor assiduously to bring you the Word faithfully, passionately, and with Spirit-driven unction and conviction.
Parents and Grandparents, you ought to be praying already for your children and grandchildren to be blessed to be able to attend Churches and hear ministers that take deeply seriously their place in relation to God’s means of grace of Word & Sacrament.
In conclusion, we are reminded again that the means of grace proclaim Christ in His saving role as our mediatorial King & Priest. Word & Sacrament scream Christ’s finished work and His ongoing Kingdom reign over the cosmos.
Oh for the grace for all of us realize how much we need grace and then to pursue it where it is in open display and so can be found.
