The Influence of Family-Worship in Perpetuating Sound Doctrine

Those for wdiom these pages are chiefly intended are in nothing more fully agreed than in this, that every portion of divine truth is precious, and that every deviation, however small, from the faith once delivered to the saints, is most earnestly to be deprecated. Hence unusual care was taken by our pious forefathers, in so framing compendious forms of doctrine, and so inculcating them upon the infant mind, and so exacting adherence to them from church-officers, as might best preclude departures from the original, covenanted, testimony. This has not been unobserved by our adversaries, and we are familiar, as a church, with the charge of being stiff, opposed to innovations, and tenacious of the traditions of the elders.

Though no human guards can maintain sound doctrine, we must, nevertheless, avail ourselves of every lawful means. There is a constant tendency to deflect from the line of true direction. It arises from the depraved nature, and has manifested itself in every successive age, from that of the Apostles downwards. Hence the necessity for God’s frequent and gracious interposition, in the way of reformation and revival. Thus the great work which was wrought by the instrumentality of Luther, was a clearing away of wood, hay, and stubble, errors and abuses which had been built on the primitive foundation. The early Lutheran church was, comparatively, pure. But even before the death of that mighty man of God, tares began to be visible among the wheat, and those who succeeded him allowed serious errors to creep in, especially in regard to the decrees of God. In the eighteenth century this dereliction of the old faith became more and more striking, until, in the present day, not only Arminianism and Pelagianism, but Arianism, Sabellianism, Socinianism, and that form of Atheism which is called Pantheism, are knowm to prevail among preachers and professors. And though we rejoice in manifest tokens that God is arising to have mercy on that land, we have still to lament the wide departures of multitudes from the truth. In Geneva, the very place of Calvin’s teaching, and of his death, the growth of heresy has been so rapid, that until the late gracious awakenings which have raised up witnesses for the doctrines of the gospel, the whole body of the ministry had gone astray. The case of Boston and of Harvard College is well known to all our readers. In England, a large number of the churches called Presbyterian have become Unitarian. The piety of ancestors conveys no hereditary blessing to their children. Nor do we believe it to be the purpose of God to connect perpetuity of faith with any form of external service, however excellent. Yet we are deeply persuaded, that among the means which he is pleased to use for this end, one of the most prominent is Family- Worship. If any thing has been attained by our investigations thus far, it has been shown, that Family- Worship is promotive of piety. It is in this very way that it is promotive of soundness in the faith. Truth and holiness act and react on one another. The first instrumentality is doubtless that of the truth, by which, in the hand of the Spirit, the work of sanctification is effected. But not less undeniable is that further influence, by which the graces of the soul foster the doctrines of the word. All defection from the faith begins in decay of piety. Sound doctrine is a plant that will not flourish in a soil which has lost the warmth of gracious afiection. There may be scriptural creeds, in the very words of the venerable reformers; such are the Confessions of Germany, Holland, and the Swiss churches; but the body of the people, and especially the clergy, will go off into the most destructive errors. There was a period of ‘’ dead orthodoxy,” as it was called in GLermany, which preceded the grand apostasy. For a time there was fiery contention for the symbols, resulting in the unrelenting persecution of such men as Spener, Francke, and Canstein; but shortly the door was opened for the irruption of a rationalistic deism. Decay of vital godliness leads rapidly to heterodox teaching. Times of outward prosperity are seized by the adversary for carrying on this disastrous work. Wealth flows into the church, and Christian professors, forgetting their vocation as a “peculiar people,” emulate the world, in their expenditure, their equipage, and their entertainments. The question which is common among us, as to the lawfulness of certain frivolous amusements, is a question which could not be

so much as agitated in a flourishing and spiritual church. No man can think of it as mooted among the Apostles or early martyrs, among the reformers or covenanters. But at a certain stage in the declension, we find members of the church opening their houses for the midnight dance; then going freely to the theatre, and to games of hazard; and finally, making shipwreck of the faith. As piety decays, there are great tenderness for error, and great latitude in the exposition of doctrine. A spurious charity forbids every word of harshness towards even gross error. Indifferentism is the mother of heresy; as we may read in the annals of Wittenberg, Geneva, and Cambridge; and both have their descent from worldliness in the church. Whatever, therefore, promotes piety, in the same degree promotes the belief of truth.

Family-Worship is one of those observances which it is difficult to maintain for any length of time, without at least some sentiment of reverence for evangelical truth More public and ceremonious ordinances may continue to be rendered necessary and decorous by the customs of society; but the prayer of the household is apt to fall into desuetude, when the spirit in which it originated has altogether fled.

It is worthy of observation, that there is something in the very temper engendered by Family -Worship, which favours persistency in the faith. It is a temper of mingled love and veneration. We entertain no respect for that youthful independence which exhibits itself in the division of Christian households, and in the going off of sons and daughters to this or that religious community, while, perhaps, the aged pair are left to totter on, unsupported, to the ancient church. Our estimate of a young man does not rise, when he takes a pride in showing that he does not care what may have been the opinion of his father. Such is not the disposition wliicli is nurtured by the daily worship of a godly house. The body of associations, which is formed by repeatedly engaging, for long years, in acts of common devotion, with honoured parents, is very strong and lasting, and manifestly leads, unless there are powerful and conscientious reasons on the other part, to the maintenance of the tenets which those parents loved. The recollection of a departed father or mother, as employed in the patriarchal conduct of domestic worship, has often, we doubt not, been an operative bond to restrain the wayward youth from false teachings. And though some may be disposed, without ceremony, to tear asunder, and cast away, such cords, as hostile to independence of thought, we have always observed them to be strongest in the most ingenuous and noble natures. Family religion is therefore eminently conservative, and stands among the barriers on which we most rely against an inundation of errors.

But there is something more than an appeal to blind affection, in the power of domestic piety to perpetuate sound doctrine. Family- Worship, from its very nature, keeps the mind attentive to truth, and familiar with 142 IfAMILY-WORSHIP.

its smallest ramifications. The way in which great truths fall into discredit, be it observed, is not by being refuted, but by being kept out of view. Hence you may hear even a whole series of Socinian discourses, from a smooth, wily teacher, without a single word against the Trinity, or the way of salvation. All is negative; but the result, as in the churches of Boston, is positive and ruinous heresy. Who can fail to perceive the advantage of a daily exercise, which holds before the minds of youth, in a natural and unobtrusive, yet satisfactory manner, the leading doctrines of religion?

Where the Scriptures are fully and statedly read in a household day by day, there is the greatest possible safeguard against error. We desire no other orthodoxy than that which is contained in this Rule of Faith. We leave it to Rome, to be afraid of the volume. Our venerated formulas of faith were drawn up by men, who, though for the most part educated under other influences, derived their tenets from the naked word. By this we are ready to abide; and we maintain with earnestness, that the best of all methods for preventing latitudinarian declension, is a perpetual inculcation of the Scriptures, such as is continually taking place in Family-Worship. Though there may be some marked exceptions in times of controversy, and among disputants, it is a general truth, that errorists are seldom great textuaries. Heterodoxy becomes weary of a record which must be garbled and tortured before it can speak the new language; while, on the other hand, we venture the assertion, that no race of men ever existed, to whom the very words of Scripture have been so familiar as those who, among our ancestors, have professed the strictest doctrines of the Reformation. A Christian family is brought daily to the fountain of all truth. Prayer itself inculcates truth. All acceptable prayer is founded on distinct views of doctrine. The posture of the soul in prayer, moreover, is favourable to the reception of those very doctrines which are commonly the first to be impugned. Hence it is a trite and true saying, that errorists are more sound in their prayers than in their preaching. This is natural. One of the most common deviations into error regards human ability to keep God’s law But he who is upon his knees will falter before he can address the Almighty with any boast of such ability. Many, we are sure, have bewailed their original depravity, and confessed their natural corruption, in prayer, who have denied it in books and sermons; and many, we would fain believe, have pleaded the righteousness of Christ, imputed to the believing soul, as their only meritorious ground of justification, who have stoutly denied the possibility of such an imputation. These remarks are made for the purpose of showing that prayer itself is a vehicle for the conveyance of sound doctrine, and that he who, in a Christian house, listens from year to year, to the voice of humble, ardent supplication, especially from parental lips, and. who, by the very nature of the exercise, is called to make the sentiments his own, is already in a school of theology, whose instructions tend to maintain his adherence to the faith of his church. In old Presbyterian families, it has been a usaore to connect the catechetical instruction of children and servants with the domestic worship of the Lord’s-day evening. It is a beautiful and blessed remnant of Reformation-customs, and we have gained nothing by allowing it, in any degree, to pass away. There is a propriety in having at least one hour of the week in which the Christian parent may take the place of a solemn instructer in divine things, and there is seemliness in connecting these lessons with the season of devotion. There have never been better theologians, nor have there been any more disposed to abide by what they had learned, than those catechumens of the Scottish Sabbath evening. Professors, and even ministers, bearing the Presbyterian name, have been known, not merely to disuse our venerable catechism, but to sneer at it. Such are the families, the sons of which we shall see, without surprise, flying to other communions, and looking down with contempt on the faith of their fathers.

In our first chapter, we found occasion to lament the decay of Family- Worship in the original seats of the Reformation, and we have now observed the decay of sound doctrine in the same countries. The former neglect may be fairly considered as one of the causes which have wrought the present evils in the Protestant churches of the continent. It is remarkable, that where Family-Worship, and the due observance of the Sabbath, have fallen into disuse, error and worldliness prevail: and it is equally remarkable, that one of the prominent symptoms of recovery, wherever the gospel resumes its power, is a return to these ordinances. For we would not be understood as charging upon the whole body of believers on the European continent, a disregard of household devotion. In cases where men have been brought to the true light, from rationalism and neology, they have exhibited the family-likeness which prevails in all ‘’the household of faith.” We have been struck with this in the biography of Sybel, a lovely German preacher, who was signally blessed in the training of youth, and whose domestic life is worthy of universal imitation.

“Sybel’s domestic life,” says a friend, ‘’was very orderly and methodical. He arose very early, between three and four o’clock, awakened his scholars, and, in the same room with them, worked hard till about seven. Then he called the whole family together, and they sung, with the accompaniment of a piano-forte, a few verses from the hymn-book. Sybel read a short portion of

Scripture, making a brief application to our necessities, always in a very devout and hearty manner, yet very simple, so that even children and servants could understand. He then prayed, making a similar reference to what was read, and to domestic circumstances, and closed with a short singing. Then followed breakfast, which we took in common, after which he went with the boys to school, where he remained till twelve. At noon he offered a short extemporaneous prayer. In the afternoon, the time was in like manner devoted to his calling. On holidays, there was a longer walk than usual. He was fond of taking some of the boys with him on these occasions, and had a faculty of instructing them by means of plays, songs, and conversation. The day was closed with divine service, like that of the morning.”*

Now that which affects us in the history of this blessed young man, is the fact, that his attachment to these pious observances of the household, advanced at equal pace with his progress in evangelical truth.

* “Arnold August Sybel: nach seinem Leben und Wirken. Von Dr. F. Liebetrut. Berlin, 1841.”