Counsel to a Son About Baptism

From the pen of David Kinghorn to his son, Joseph Kinghorn, who had openly professed faith in Christ and was desirous of baptism. The letter was written on October 14, 1782:

Every ordinance of divine appointment ought to be attended to with seriousness and caution, and, as you observe, with prayer for the divine presence and blessing. Two things are necessary antecedents to it: First, a sense of our lost condition by the fall, and our inability to recommend ourselves to the favour of God by and duties or acts of obedience we are able to perform. Second, a hearty reception of, and dependence on Jesus Christ for salvation. Without the first, the second cannot be; nor can the first be of any advantage without the second—therefore both must go together, and obedience to the precepts of Christ will flow from love, not from slavish fear, if he is viewed and depended on, as an able, all-sufficient Saviour, and loved as such…

The Life and Works of Joseph Kinghorn, by Martin Hood Wilkin, reprinted by Particular Baptist Press, 1995, pp. 44-45.