Now, Baptists have their own vain tradition in this regard, where they have morphed the
two sacraments into two ordinances.
Who's heard this thing of two ordinances in the church?
You've heard that doctrine before?
I mean, it's in most statement of faiths of independent Baptist churches.
I'm not saying that there are bad churches that have this in their statement of faith,
but I'm saying it's a false doctrine to say, oh, there's two church ordinances, baptism
and the Lord's Supper.
That is found nowhere in scripture.
Let me tell you exactly where that comes from.
This is how the progression was.
Catholics have seven sacraments.
They reduce it with the Protestants to two sacraments because they only think that two
things are tied in with salvation.
And then the Baptists come along and say, none of that stuff's tied in with salvation.
We don't have any sacraments.
So they're like, well, it's not two sacraments, it's two ordinances.
Why do we need two of anything?
Why did we need seven of anything?
Why do we need to try to match up with the Catholics or the Protestant?
Well, if the Catholics have their seven sacraments and the Lutherans have their two sacraments,
well, we're going to have the same two things as the Lutherans, but we're just going to
call them ordinances.
That way we kind of look like Luther.
I'm not trying to look like a Lutheran.
I don't have my collar turned around backwards up here.
I'm not wearing a long dress like a Catholic priest or like a Lutheran rector or whatever.
I'm not trying to be Protestant.
I'm not trying to be a Catholic.
I'm trying to be a Bible-believing Baptist, a Christian, sola scriptura, amen?
I don't need to try to match up.
Now let me ask this.
Does two ordinances come from the Bible?
I mean, if we're going to have a statement of faith, it should reflect the clear teachings
of the Bible, especially because many churches hold their statement of faith up as like
something that can never change or never be altered.
It's like the law of the Medes and Persians.
Well, if you're going to make this document that's the definitive document of what you
believe, shouldn't it all be based on scripture?
Okay, so where in the world do you get two ordinances?
The only way you get it is from the Lutherans, and then you're just like, well, it's not
going to save you, so let's call it an ordinance.
Let's see if there are two ordinances.
Look down at your Bible at 1 Corinthians 11, verse 1.
Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ.
Now I praise you, brethren, that you remember me in all things and keep the ordinances as
I deliver them to you.
Now what is he praising them for?
Put away all preconceived ideas.
Don't get all upset because you know that there's two ordinances because you learned
that Baptist spells, you know, B is for, you know, believers baptism, A is for autonomy
of the local church, P is for priests of the believer, and T is for two ordinances.
Don't get all nervous.
Just look what the Bible says.
What is he praising them for?
He's praising them for doing what?
For keeping the ordinances, and not only for keeping the ordinances, but for doing it the
way that he told them to do it.
Isn't that what it says?
I mean, does anybody's Bible say anything different?
I mean, it says, I praise you, brethren, that you remember me in all things and keep the
ordinances as I deliver them to you.
So he's about to really rip into these people, but he starts out by complimenting them, sort
of like I kind of complimented the Protestants, and now I'm going to spend the rest of the
sermon ripping into them.
So that's kind of what Paul did here.
He says, you know, I'm going to praise you because you did keep the ordinances as I delivered
them to you.
There are some things you're doing right.
But, and then the whole rest of the chapter is a big but of everything that they're doing
wrong.
Okay.
But I would have you to know that the head of every man is Christ, the head of the woman
is the man, the head of Christ is God.
We're not going to read the whole chapter for sake of time, but jump down to verse 20.
When you come together therefore into one place, this is not to eat the Lord's supper.
For in eating, everyone taketh before other his own supper, and one is hungry and another
is drunken.
What?
Have you not houses to eat and to drink in?
Or despise ye the church of God and shame them that have not?
What shall I say to you?
Shall I praise you in this?
I praise you not.
So what is he not praising them for?
He's not praising them for the way that they're observing the Lord's supper.
I mean, does everybody see that?
He's saying, look, you are messing up the Lord's supper.
Should I praise you for it?
I praise you not.
So 18 verses ago he said, hey, I just want to praise you that you keep the ordinances.
I mean, look at verse 2.
I praise you.
Does everybody see that?
For doing what?
Praising the ordinances.
What's he saying, I'm not praising you about the Lord's supper?
So let me just help you with math.
If there are two ordinances, right, baptism and the Lord's supper, and they're screwing
up the Lord's supper royally, and he's saying I'm not praising you, then is it humanly possible
for him to be praising them for keeping the ordinances?
I praise you for keeping the ordinance, one, just baptism.
No, because you know what, there aren't two ordinances, that's why.
And in fact, when Paul said the ordinances, he's not even including the Lord's supper.
That's not even a church ordinance.
He's not even including that because he says you're doing the ordinances right, but you're
screwing up the Lord's supper.
How can they be the same thing?
Somebody help me out here.
I mean, it just doesn't work.
Now one person said to me, well, what he's saying is he's glad that they're keeping the
ordinances, you know, at least they're keeping it.
He's praising them for keeping it, but he's not praising them because they're doing it
wrong.
But at least he's praising them that at least they do it.
But that's not what the Bible says, because in verse 2 he says, I praise you, brethren,
that you remember me in all things and keep the ordinances as I delivered them to you.
So whatever the ordinances are that he's referring to, they're doing it as he delivered it to
them.
They're doing it correctly, whereas they're doing the Lord's supper incorrectly.
Does everybody see that?
So they can't be the same thing, folks, it's just simple logic.
Now there are lots of things that are ordinances in the Bible, because the word ordinance,
and by the way, look at verse 17 in case you think, oh, he's just glad they're doing it
even though they're not doing it right.
Look at verse 17.
Now on this I declare unto you, I praise you not that you come together, not for the better
but for the worse.
And this is in the context of them observing the Lord's supper.
He's saying it'd be better if you didn't even come together at all.
The way you're coming together, not for the better but for the worse.
It's worse the way you're doing it, as not doing it.
Does everybody see that?
So what are the ordinances?
Go back to 1 Corinthians 7.
The true story is, friend, that ordinance just simply means anything that's ordained.
Ordinance is just the noun to go with the verb ordain.
So anything that's appointed to be done in church is an ordinance.
I mean, reading the Bible out loud in church is an ordinance.
And certainly marriage is an ordinance.
Look what the Bible says in 1 Corinthians 7, verse 17.
And this is in the context of teachings on marriage.
1 Corinthians 7 is a teaching on marriage.
And it says in verse 17, but as God had distributed to every man, as the Lord had called everyone,
so let him walk, and so ordain I in all the churches.
So he's ordained marriage in the churches.
So isn't that an ordinance since it was ordained?
Now look, that was on the original Catholic seven sacrament list.
Why didn't Martin Luther keep that one?
Oh yeah, because his two sacraments had to do with salvation, which is how he came up
with the two, baptism and Lord's Supper.
So why would we as Baptists take that list of two, which is meaningless as an ordinance,
it doesn't even mean anything.
Because you know what else is, how about this, ordaining preachers, isn't that an ordinance?
How about marriage?
How about everything else he ordained?
How about where the Bible says, at the front of our King James, appointed to be read in
churches?
That's an ordination there, that it be read in church, ordinance.
So anyway, that was kind of for free tonight, because that doesn't really have anything
to do with the Protestants.
But the point is that look, I'm not just up here saying, hey, Baptists good, Protestant
bad.
The Bible's good.
And here's the thing, we even as Baptists could be wrong about this or that, and so
we need to tighten up our doctrine and believe sola scriptura, not sola, you know, doctrina
statementa, you know, and sola what the Bible college taught me.
You know, we need to be sola scriptura and not be a hypocrite and say, oh yeah, everything
we believe is based on the Bible, but there's two ordinances.
Really?
You got chapter and verse on that?
I didn't think so.