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 A Statement Concerning 
 
 Faith and Order 
 of the 
 
 Seve nth Day Baptist 
 ' Churches ' 
 
 AMERICAN SABBATH TRACT SOCIETY 
 (Seventh Day Baptist) 
 Plainfield New Jersey 
 
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A Statement Concerning 
 
 FAITH AND ORDER 
 
 of the Seventh Day Baptist Churches 
 
 The following statements were prepared 
 by the Seventh Day Baptist General Con¬ 
 ference Committee on Faith and Order 
 Movement at the request of the North 
 American Preparation Committee of the 
 World Conference on Faith and Order. The 
 Committee says, “We believe it is an es¬ 
 sentially correct account of the views of 
 Seventh Day Baptists concerning Christian 
 Faith and Order.” 
 
 I. 
 
 The following statements are, we trust, 
 in substantial harmony with the faith of 
 modern Protestantism: 
 
 1. God is the eternal and perfect 
 Spirit, the creator, sustainer, and ruler 
 
 of all things. 
 
 2. Man, in his higher nature, is the 
 image of his Maker, and is capable of 
 everlasting blessedness. 
 
 3. Sin is alienation from God, opposi¬ 
 tion to his holy will, transgression of his 
 laws. 
 
 4. Salvation and the life eternal come 
 by the grace of God, through repentance 
 and faith, and in loyalty to Jesus Christ, 
 who was God manifest in the flesh, the 
 
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Son of‘ God, who lived, suffered, died, 
 was raised from the dead, and ever liveth, 
 our Savior and Lord. 
 
 5. The Holy Spirit is God alwavs at 
 work in the minds and hearts of men 
 seeking to lead us toward perfection in 
 individual righteousness and social jus¬ 
 tice. 
 
 6. The Bible is an inspired record of 
 men^s progressive understanding of God, 
 who is revealed in nature, history, and 
 experience,—the supreme revelation of 
 his character and will being through 
 Jesus Christ his Son, the center of the 
 holy Book. 
 
 7. Wherever the will of God is done 
 there is his kingdom, and the new spirit¬ 
 ual life. This kingdom is heavenly in 
 origin and nature, and is destined to 
 triumph and last forever. 
 
 8. The work of the Church, which is 
 an organized revelation to the world of 
 the kingdom of God, is evangelism, the 
 administration of the ordinances of bap¬ 
 tism and the Lord’s Supper, Christian 
 culture and training, social service, and 
 missions. 
 
 9. All who accept Jesus Christ as 
 Savior and Lord, in all lands, constitute 
 the holy catholic or universal Church. 
 
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 The following statements suggest some 
 denominational differences in matters of 
 religion: 
 
 1. An organized body of believers in 
 Christ is a church. As an organization 
 it is quite independent, save as it shall 
 elect, for purposes of fraternity and ef¬ 
 ficiency, to become a unit of a larger 
 whole. 
 
 2. All true believers constitute a uni¬ 
 versal and holy priesthood; but for the 
 sake of promoting evangelism, spiritual 
 edification, and Christian service, the 
 church ordains chosen persons to the 
 Christian ministry and the diaconate. 
 
 3. Christian baptism is the immersion 
 in water of believers; and is a symbol and 
 pledge of our new and risen life in 
 Christ. 
 
 4. The holy Supper, instituted by our 
 Lord, is a spiritual communion and 
 covenant of the church, his Body, with 
 him who gave himself for us, and who 
 now gives himself to us in the power of 
 an endless life. 
 
 5. We believe in ‘'the coming of 
 Christ,’^ “the resurrection,” “the judg¬ 
 ment,” and “the end of the world”; but 
 some among us interpret these events 
 
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literally; while others find in them only 
 an ethical and spiritual meaning. 
 
 III. 
 
 The one truth that has seemed to us to 
 justify our separate denominational ex¬ 
 istence is the Sabbath doctrine. 
 
 The great ancient religions had sacred 
 times; but it was the Hebrew lawgivers 
 and prophets alone who held to holy days 
 in connection with ethical monotheism. 
 
 Whatever the historical origin of the 
 Sabbath in the course of the gradual de¬ 
 velopment of religious ideas, it is a con¬ 
 stituent part of the beautiful story of 
 creation; it is given a central and signi¬ 
 ficant place in the Decalogue; and the 
 prophets set great store by its spiritual 
 and social value. 
 
 The New Testament does not seem to 
 
 us to abrogate the Sabbath principle, or 
 substitute a different day. And we be¬ 
 lieve that the Bible, history, and holy 
 fitness and sentiment, vindicate the right 
 of the seventh or last day of the week 
 to be the supreme time-symbol of our 
 holy religion, and the one sacred means 
 of preserving the Sabbath idea; a weekly 
 witness for Him who created the heavens 
 and the earth; and a visible sign of the 
 believer’s rest in the living God. 
 
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We go to our Lord, the Church’s su¬ 
 preme lawgiver, who said, ‘The sabbath 
 was made for man, not man for the sab¬ 
 bath,” and not to Mosaism or Levitical- 
 ism, for the final sanction of the Sabbath 
 Day itself, and to learn how to keep it 
 spiritually, ethically, and socially. 
 
 And we believe that the Church and 
 the world greatly need the Sabbath of 
 Christ as a vehicle of divine truth and 
 blessing. 
 
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