We would express our continued conviction that our Lord appointed no outward rite or ceremony for observance in His church. We accept every command of our Lord, in what we believe to be its genuine import, as absolutely conclusive. The question of the use of outward ordinances is with us a question, not as to the authority of Christ, but as to His real meaning.

We reverently believe that, as there is one Lord and one faith, so there is one baptism whereby all believers are baptized in the one Spirit into the one Body. This is not an outward baptism with water, but a spiritual experience; that work which transforms the heart and settles the soul upon Christ. No baptism in outward water can satisfy the description of the apostle, of being buried with Christ by baptism unto death. It is with the Spirit, alone, that any can thus be baptized. In this view, we accept the commission of our Lord as given in Matthew 28:18-20. This commission was not designed to set up a new ritual under the new covenant, or to connect the initiation into a membership in its nature essentially spiritual, with a mere ceremony of a typical character. Otherwise, it was not possible for the Apostle Paul to have disclaimed that which would, in that case, have been of the essence of his commission when he wrote, "Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the gospel." Whenever an external ceremony is commanded, the particulars, the mode, and incidents of that ceremony become of its essence. There is an utter absence of these particulars in the text. Our persuasion is that the essential baptism is with the Spirit of God.