What a sacrament is

This week's questions

How do the sacraments become effectual means of salvation? The sacraments become effectual means of salvation, not from any virtue in them, or in him that doth administer them; but only by the blessing of Christ, and the working of his Spirit in them that by faith receive them.

Question 91

What is a sacrament? A sacrament is an holy ordinance instituted by Christ; wherein, by sensible signs, Christ, and the benefits of the new covenant, are represented, sealed, and applied to believers.

Question 92

After the Word (last week), Questions 91 to 97 teach the sacraments. Question 91 asks how they work, Question 92 what they are, and Question 93 next week names the New Testament's two.

Where a sacrament's power comes from

Question 91 says no twice, and then yes.

Not in the water or the bread. In the first proof text Peter says that the baptism that saves is "not the removal of dirt from the body, but the pledge of a clear conscience toward God" (1 Peter 3:21). John the Baptist baptised with water, but said of the one coming after him, "He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire" (Matthew 3:11). Human hands give the sign; Christ gives the grace it signifies.

Not in the minister's holiness. In the fourth century the Donatists of North Africa held that sacraments given by clergy who had lapsed in persecution had no effect; the church, with Augustine, bishop of Hippo, judged that the sacraments are Christ's and not the minister's (Donatism). Paul writes in the third proof text:

I planted the seed and Apollos watered it, but God made it grow. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow.

1 Corinthians 3:6-7

The English minister Matthew Henry draws the lesson: "We should not put ministers into the place of God" Matthew Henry. The Westminster Confession teaches that a sacrament's efficacy does not "depend upon the piety or intention of him that doth administer it, but upon the work of the Spirit, and the word of institution" WCF 27.3, and the Anglican Thirty-nine Articles agree: "Neither is the effect of Christ's ordinance taken away by their wickedness" art. 26. No one need doubt their baptism because of the person who gave it.

But by the Spirit, in those who receive by faith. "For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body," Paul writes (1 Corinthians 12:13). Augustine taught that when the word is added to the element it becomes a sacrament, a kind of visible word, and that the water cleanses not because the word is spoken but because it is believed Augustine, Tractates on John 80.3.

Represented, sealed and applied

Question 92 calls a sacrament ‘instituted by Christ’, not devised by the church. Paul says he received the Supper from the Lord (1 Corinthians 11:23). Its signs are ‘sensible’: seen, touched and tasted. The Larger Catechism puts it plainly:

The parts of a sacrament are two; the one an outward and sensible sign, used according to Christ's own appointment; the other an inward and spiritual grace thereby signified.

Larger Catechism, Q. 163

The three verbs say what a sacrament does. It represents Christ and his benefits like a picture before our eyes; it seals them, as a king's seal on a letter confirms his promise; and it applies them, truly giving them to faith. Paul says Abraham "received the sign of circumcision as a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith" (Romans 4:11). Such signs were given before Christ came: in Question 92's proof texts God makes his covenant with Abraham and gives circumcision as its sign (Genesis 17:10):

I will establish My covenant as an everlasting covenant between Me and you and your descendants after you, to be your God and the God of your descendants after you.

Genesis 17:7

The blood of the Passover was a sign too (Exodus 12:13), and the Supper shows forth Christ's death: "you proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes" (1 Corinthians 11:26). The Belgic Confession (1561), confessed by the Dutch Reformed churches, says that "Jesus Christ is the true object presented by them, without whom they would be of no moment" Belgic Confession, art. 33.

Other churches explain a sacrament's power differently. The Catholic Church teaches that, since Christ acts in it, a sacrament rightly celebrated works by the act itself (ex opere operato), not by the minister's righteousness, and that its fruit also depends on how the one receiving it comes Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1127–1128. The Reformed agree about the minister, but place the power in Christ's blessing and the Spirit. Luther's Small Catechism teaches that the water does not do such great things, "but the word of God which is in and with the water, and faith, which trusts such word of God in the water" Small Catechism, Baptism, third. Many Baptists and free churches call them the Lord's ordinances, stressing obedience and remembrance. The Second London Confession (1689) of the Reformed Baptists also calls them ordinances 28.1, yet confesses that in the Supper believers spiritually receive and feed upon Christ crucified 30.7. The traditions are set side by side in Baptism and the Lord’s Supper and What are baptism and the Lord's Supper?

To ponder this week

When you next see a baptism or come to the table, what promise of God are you being shown and sealed? The water speaks of sins washed away; the bread and cup, of a body given and blood shed for us. Look past the one who administers it to the Christ who promised, and ask to receive it by faith.

Practice