by Joel V Webb | Dec 8, 2025 | Uncategorized
This article was originally written for and posted on HolyJoys.org
s as having deep spiritual symbolism. What we see in historic sanctuaries, such as those in older Anglican, Methodist, and Presbyterian churches, represents a blend of practical development and profound spiritual significance. This blend contributes to the richness of Christian worship and continually points us toward the central work of Christ through the gospel.
The Two-Fold Testimony of Scripture
Step into most churches shaped by the church’s historic liturgy and you are likely to see two candles, one placed on each side of or on top of the altar or communion table. Over time, the two candles came to be associated with the proclamation of Scripture. When facing the altar, the candle on the right became known as the Epistle Candle, and the one on the left became the Gospel Candle. This grew out of the historic practice of reading the Epistle from one side of the chancel (the front portion of the church) and the Gospel from the other, an arrangement still visible in some older churches and described in medieval ceremonial guides (e.g., Ordo Romanus I).
This practice also reflects the shape of older lectionaries such as the one found in the 1662 Book of Common Prayer which assigned only two readings for the Eucharistic liturgy: an Epistle and a Gospel. The modern four-reading pattern (OT, Psalm, Epistle, Gospel), familiar in most churches today, only became standard after the liturgical reforms of the 20th century, especially following The Second Vatican Council. So here we see the close weaving together of tradition and practicality: candles originally needed for light eventually became markers of the very structure of the liturgy.
The Two Natures of Christ
Beyond their connection to Scripture readings, the two altar candles also came to symbolize the two natures of Christ, His full divinity and His full humanity, as defined by the Council of Chalcedon in A.D. 451. The church has long sought to confess visually what she proclaims verbally: Jesus Christ is one Lord, “acknowledged in two natures, without confusion, without change, without division, without separation” (Chalcedonian Definition). Thus, the dual candles become a small but meaningful reminder that the One whose presence we invoke at the altar is both God and Man, fully divine Light and fully human flesh, united for our salvation.
The church has long sought to confess visually what she proclaims verbally.
The Light that Gathers and Sends Us
Even the way the candles are lit and extinguished carries meaning. Many traditional services begin with a processional, as clergy, deacons, and acolytes (those assisting in the service) enter the sanctuary in reverence. Often, an acolyte will carry the light itself—sometimes taken from a sanctuary lamp or another ever-burning flame within the church—and use it to ignite the altar candles. This represents Christ, the Light of the World (John 8:12), entering into the midst of His people as worship begins.
Likewise, when the service concludes with the recessional, the light is carried out again. This action reminds us that Christ does not remain “on the altar” when worship ends; rather, He goes out with His people, sending them into the world as bearers of His light. In this way, the extinguishing or carrying out of the candles becomes a liturgical sign of the Great Commission—Christ’s light shining in the world through His Church.
Beauty in Worship
Finally, candles add beauty to Christian worship. While beauty is a profoundly underasked question in our age, there is a reason why the United States has a four billion dollar candle industry! We love candles not just because of the aroma, but because they are beautiful. We certainly don’t need their light, but we are captivated by the mood that’s created by a flickering light. Using candles in the church is a way to beautify the place where we worship our supremely beautiful God.
Using candles in the church is a way to beautify the place where we worship our supremely beautiful God.
Living Catechesis
For some, the use of candles and related practices may appear quaint or overly ceremonial. But far from being empty rituals, they serve as a living catechesis. They teach us—silently, consistently, and beautifully—truths about Christ, the Scriptures, and the mission of the Church. They connect us to the unfathomably long story of Christian worship, where objects once needed for simple visibility have become symbols that illuminate the gospel. Technology may change, and with it many of our daily habits. But within the worship of the Church, candles remain steady witnesses: to the enduring unity of practicality and spirituality; to the two-fold testimony of Scripture; to the two natures of Christ; to the Light that both gathers us and sends us out; and to the beauty of our God. They help us to reconnect not only with our past, but with the One who is the same yesterday, today, and forever.
Candle Options and Where to Buy Them
If your church doesn’t currently use altar candles but you’d like to begin, the internet offers a wide range of options. You can choose traditional wax candles or oil-based ones. Wax candles often come in paraffin (cheaper) or beeswax (more expensive but longer-burning, cleaner, and more “traditional”). Oil-based candles—either refillable or with disposable cartridges—are convenient if you want low-maintenance, reusable lighting. Which type you choose will depend on your church’s budget, how often you use candles, and the aesthetic or symbolic tone that you want for worship.
Once you pick a fuel source, you’ll need candlesticks or candle holders appropriate to your altar space. Even a simple brass or wooden pair can be a good starting point, with the option to upgrade later. The goal isn’t luxury, but to add reverence, symbolic meaning, and beauty to worship.
While there are numerous church suppliers you could utilize (and of course you could always go to Amazon!), there are several well-established online vendors where you can order altar candles (wax or oil) and related church supplies. For the best quality, customer service, and a history of supplying the Church, these are wonderful companies to support:
by Joel V Webb | Oct 31, 2025 | Uncategorized
Today is Reformation Day. October 31st is the day that Martin Luther posted his 95 theses, an open request to debate points of theology and abuse going on in the Medieval Roman Catholic Church. Here’s the thing…posts about today from both Protestants and Roman Catholics often talk about Martin Luther separating from the Church. Yet…that’s not the actual story.
The Early Church was seen as a part of the ongoing Jewish faith and practice. Jewish believers in Jesus still met in Synagogues, went to the Temple, and continued in their cultural and religious adherence to the faith, not also fulfilled through the Resurrected Christ. It was not the Christians who ‘split off’ from the rest. They understood they were the fulfillment of the law, now with Gentiles grafted in, and would continue to do so. But just a few years following the close of the New Testament Canon, we see in history the complete separation of the Christian and the Jewish faith. This separation was primarily instigated by the now templeless Jewish worshipers. The desire was not to be separate, but to let God’s people know that all they had been hoping and praying for was now here, and has been fulfilled.
Later on in history after the Reformation we see in the life of John Wesley, who, while remaining an Anglican priest his whole life, faced severe distrust from the State Church because of His Gospel centered and transformational preaching, and the Methodist movement was officially separated almost directly following his death. While this likely would have happened eventually, his desire was not to start a new church movement, but instead to reform and recenter the Anglican Church around the transforming nature and work of the Gospel.
And just a few generations later we see this again with B.T. Roberts in western New York in the late 1800’s. The preaching of the Gospel, and of holiness led the at the time lukewarm Methodist Episcopal church to defrock Roberts and other clergy, leading to the Free Methodist Church being formed in 1860. Again, not a desired separation, but a forced one by those not thrilled about the convictional lives and preaching of Roberts and his compatriots.
This now brings us back to Martin Luther in 1615. Luther did not desire separation, he did not desire to form a new movement, or be anything other than a part of the Church. And yet, he didn’t have any choice. He was forced out by a Papal Bull that excommunicated him. But when Luther nailed the theses to the Church door on October 31, 1615, it was not to start a new church, but to address the abuses and accretions in the Church of that day. And that is the true spirit of the Reformation. Not a desire for schism or control, but the desire, but to see the Church return to the Gospel, and to see abuses remedied.
This was the continued desire of the Magisterial Reformers, which has sadly been overshadowed in large part by the ideas of the radical reformation that almost wholly rejects the premises of reform established by Luther himself.
So the call to the Church today is to continue reforming. But not to just make changes or “get rid of tradition”, but to remain rooted in the Gospel, and the traditions that God has given and established through His Church, and continue spreading the Kingdom until He returns.
by Joel V Webb | Oct 20, 2025 | Uncategorized
Less than a month ago the first woman was appointed to become the next Archbishop of Canterbury. This decision has thrown the Anglican world into a fury of activity and debate as to what to do next. As an outsider of the Anglican Communion it has been fascinating to watch those inside the Anglican movement discuss, debate and make plans for the future from here. The questions and debates brought up because of this appointment are challenging and important.
For many Anglicans, the appointment of Sarah Mullalley represents a foundational theological problem purely on the issue of the ordination of women. Myself, as someone in the Methodist movement overall which originated in Anglicanism, and the Free Methodist Church specifically has a long history of stalwart orthodoxy while also allowing for and advocating for the ordination of women. That being said, it is a point of deep contention within the Anglican world, with some Provinces (national or semi-national) and Dioceses (similar to a conference or district) have differing positions on the issue. With the Anglican Church in North America (ANCA) varying from within on the issue. All of that being said, the new appointment has thrust the debate to the forefront of the conversation, with even more intense vigor.
My contribution to this discussion (as much as it is worth not being formally Anglican) is not to take issue with the appointment of a woman, but with the particular individual who has been appointed. I, like those in my tradition and denomination, uphold women’s ordination to the ministry. Seeing it as the fulfillment of God calling all humanity to be proclaimers and ministers of His Gospel. This is rooted in an Edenic and Kingdom ideal and principle that the divisions and contentions between the sexes are ultimately healed and restored in the coming of Christ’s Kingdom on earth through His Church. I won’t be making the full case for women’s ordination here. It is something I have done in other places, and there are those who do it more regularly than me, such as Marg Mowczko.
My primary issue with the new Archbishop is her overall theological and moral framework and outlook. Sadly, over the decades in the Church of England (CoE), as it has been in Canada and the USA (which led to the creation of the ACNA) has been a quick march away from Biblically foundational truths, particularly surrounding gender, marriage and abortion. These issues in particular are where the new Archbishop to be sadly is deficient in all. Sarah Mullally regardless of her being a man or a woman is not fit to lead the CoE, or act as head of the Anglican Communion purely on the basis of her theological positions that are contrary to the Biblical foundations of not just the Anglican expression as laid out in the 39 Articles of Religion, but that are also found in Scripture.
She has expressly made her position on marriage and abortion clear in the past, demonstrating that it continues to line up with the progressive voices in the Church of England that continue to chip away at the solid truths that it was established on during the Reformation into nothing more than a secularized state church that rather than proclaiming the Gospel, seeks to equivocate on the issues of the day by collapsing at the feet of pandering words and wholly un-Biblical expressions of love that affirm rather than speak truth.
For myself, I am thankful that as a Free Methodist I have Bishops that I can trust. Are they perfect, no. But they have continued to demonstrate their submission to the Word of God, and holding fast to the faith once delivered to the saints.
In response to all of this, GAFCON, which was established itself in 2008 as a clear and Biblical voice to the insanity of liberalizing Anglicanism in the West has now just put themselves forward not as a conservative alternative to the Anglican Communion headed up by Canterbury, but as THE Worldwide Anglican Communion that represents the voice and interest of that tradition worldwide. With it, a majority of Anglicans worldwide, most represented in the global south in Africa, South America and South-east Asia will effectively reduce the historic Anglican Communion to a shell of its former self.
This move, while certainly sad to see in one sense, also seems to be the only option. The pretences and precepts that before allowed differences among the variety of perspectives in the Communion are being totally shorn away, making it clear that there is only one path forward. “Progress at all costs.”
May this be a warning to all followers of Christ in any tradition. Yes, we are to contextualize the sharing of the Gospel to our age and culture. What we are not to do is pervert and fold to the voice of the age, exchanging the truth of God for the shallow pool that is the temporal approval from culture. The Gospel calls for transformation of us into His image, not the other way around.
by Joel V Webb | Oct 17, 2025 | Uncategorized
When one studies Church history as a Protestant there are one of two avenues to approach it. The first is that of the magisterial reformers such as Luther, Calvin, Cranmer and others who saw the ongoing move of the Church as good, with the need to reform and adapt to the issues being presented to maintain the fidelity and effectiveness of Christ’s Kingdom on earth. The second approach likewise stems from the reformation from characters like Zwingli, and others of the radical reformation that saw the medieval church as wholly apostate and unfaithful, having been that way some few generations after the close of the book of Acts, and it is their job to bring the Church back to the true apostolic practice of the Christian faith.
I used to be a part of that latter group. I was unequivocally taught that while there is always a faithful remnant, the Church really got back on track with Martin Luther in the 16th Century, and while things have not always been done correctly, we have the true and best version of the faith. These tendencies are particularly found in low-church Reformed circles, anabaptist, baptist and non-denomination evangelicalism. Anything traditional is viewed with suspicion as being “too Catholic” (Roman Catholic), and generally there is a HUGE knowledge gap between the book of Acts and Martin Luther, because frankly there’s not much worth knowing until the church was saved by Luther. The problem with this mentality is that in its desire to be faithful, it ends up throwing out the baby with the bathwater, and ultimately rejects what the reformers sought to do.
To actually be Protestant—and not restorationist—means recovering what the Reformers themselves knew in their bones: that the faith of the apostles was never lost, but preserved, guarded, and handed down through the centuries by the Church under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. The Protestant Reformation was never meant to erase history, but to redeem it—to scrape off the corrosion of error and neglect so that the gold of the Gospel could shine once again.
Modern Protestants often forget this. We imagine that the Reformation was about starting over, about “getting back to the Bible” as though no one in fifteen hundred years had ever read it rightly. But that’s not how Luther, Calvin, Cranmer, or any of the magisterial Reformers saw their work. They saw themselves as continuing the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church—reforming her where she had strayed, but never abandoning her. They were heirs of the Fathers, not orphans. Their vision of reformation was renewal within the story of God’s people, not rebellion against it.
When you actually read the Reformers, you see how deeply they drew from the well of patristic theology. Luther was steeped in Augustine; Calvin filled his Institutes with quotations from Chrysostom, Basil, and the early councils. Cranmer built the Book of Common Prayer on the bones of ancient liturgies, purified and translated for the English people. These men saw no contradiction between Scripture and the Church’s historical witness; they believed that the same Spirit who inspired the Word also preserved its faithful interpretation through the ages.
That conviction stands in sharp contrast to the restorationist impulse that dominates much of modern evangelicalism. Restorationism assumes that the Church fell off the rails almost immediately after the apostles died—that by the second or third century, Christianity was already hopelessly compromised. It views history not as a story of God’s faithfulness, but as a long night of corruption and error until “we” finally rediscovered the truth. Its posture toward the past is suspicion, not gratitude.
But such thinking is historically false and spiritually dangerous. It cuts the believer off from the communion of saints, leaving each generation to reconstruct Christianity on its own terms. It treats the Holy Spirit as though He took a sabbatical for 1,400 years, only to return in the 16th century or, worse, in a 19th-century revival meeting. That’s not faithfulness to Scripture—it’s arrogance cloaked in piety.
Thomas Oden, one of the most important theologians of the 20th century, saw this clearly. After decades as a progressive theologian chasing modern trends, he underwent what he called a “paleo-orthodox” conversion—a return to the consensual tradition of the early Church. Oden realized that genuine renewal comes not from innovation but from remembrance. He argued that the Church’s future depends on recovering her ancient consensus, what he called “the great cloud of witnesses” of the first five centuries.
Oden’s rediscovery of the Fathers was not mere academic nostalgia; it was a spiritual awakening. He came to see that the early Church’s theology was not speculative philosophy but lived wisdom—the fruit of prayer, persecution, and pastoral care. These were men and women who wrestled with heresy, hammered out the creeds, and preserved the integrity of the Gospel under immense pressure. They gave us the vocabulary of Christian faith: Trinity, Incarnation, grace, and salvation. To ignore them is to amputate ourselves from our own theological bloodstream.
The Reformers understood this instinctively. Calvin wrote, “If we wish to provide in the best way for the consciences of men, we must go back to the ancient Church.” Luther affirmed that he taught nothing new but “the same faith that Augustine and the Fathers held.” Cranmer’s Anglican liturgy drew directly from patristic sources such as the Didache, Chrysostom, and the Gelasian Sacramentary. They didn’t imagine a sharp divide between the apostolic and the catholic; they saw themselves as faithful heirs of both.
By contrast, restorationism tries to make every believer an apostle and every church a new Jerusalem. It erases history, treating the Church as a failed experiment that must be rebooted from scratch. The result is a dizzying array of “New Testament” churches, each claiming to have recaptured the primitive faith, yet all differing on baptism, the Lord’s Supper, authority, and even the Gospel itself. What was once meant to restore unity ends up multiplying division.
True Protestantism offers a different way. It stands with Scripture as the final authority, but never apart from the Church’s living memory. It reforms what has been corrupted but keeps what is good, refusing both blind traditionalism and reckless innovation. It honors the Fathers as witnesses to how the early Church lived, prayed, and understood the Word of God. It confesses that the Spirit who inspired Scripture is the same Spirit who preserved its meaning through the generations.
Thomas Oden put it simply: “The next reformation will be a recovery of memory.” That is the call of genuine Protestantism—to remember who we are, to recover the faith that formed us, to recognize that the Church is not a modern invention but an ancient household. If the Reformers could say with confidence that they stood in continuity with the Fathers, can we?
To be Protestant, rightly understood, is to be reformed and rooted—to be biblical and historical—to be evangelical and catholic. It means confessing the faith of the Nicene Creed without embarrassment, praying words shaped by centuries of saints, and reading Scripture through the same lenses worn by those who first received it. It means recognizing that tradition, when purified by the Word, is not our enemy but our inheritance.
Our age does not need another “new” version of Christianity. It needs a remembering Church—a Protestantism that knows its Fathers, honors its Reformers, and lives its faith as part of the one Body that stretches across time and space. That kind of Protestantism is not a protest of rebellion, but a protest of witness: a bearing forth of the ancient Gospel in every generation, until the Lord returns.
by Joel V Webb | Oct 13, 2025 | Uncategorized
Evangelical Christianity has rightly emphasized that forgiveness is grounded in the once-for-all atoning work of Jesus Christ (Hebrews 10:10–14), received by grace through faith alone (Ephesians 2:8–9). Yet Scripture and the historic Christian tradition alike reveal that the means by which this grace transforms believers are not purely internal or private. Confession—verbal, relational, and restorative—stands as one of the chief practices through which the gospel is embodied in the life of the Church.
For many Protestants, the very idea of confession evokes imagery of Roman Catholic practice: a believer entering a confessional booth, disclosing sins to a priest, and receiving absolution. This often triggers skepticism: “We only have one mediator—Christ—and only God can forgive sin!” Such a reaction is understandable, especially in light of historical abuses. Yet beneath this instinct lies an incomplete picture of what confession truly is and how it functions in Scripture and the Church’s life.
One of the key differences between Protestant and Roman Catholic understandings of confession lies in the theology of the sacraments. Roman Catholicism recognizes seven sacraments, including penance, whereas most Protestant traditions affirm only two—Baptism and the Eucharist—as dominical sacraments, instituted directly by Christ. However, this need not exclude other practices from being understood as sacramental—that is, as outward signs that convey inward grace—even if they are not sacraments in the strictest sense.
A sacrament may be defined as an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace, instituted by Christ himself, whereby God works effectively to convey and confirm that grace to the believer. Rooted in Augustine’s classic definition (De Catechizandis Rudibus 26.50) and received through the Anglican formularies (Article XXV of the Thirty-Nine Articles), this understanding was embraced and expanded by John Wesley. Wesley described the sacraments as “means of grace”—channels through which the Holy Spirit works to awaken, justify, and sanctify believers (cf. Sermon 16, The Means of Grace).
Scripturally, these means are grounded in Christ’s own commands: “Do this in remembrance of me” (Luke 22:19) and “Repent and be baptized… for the forgiveness of your sins” (Acts 2:38). The sacraments are therefore both divine acts and human responses—signs of covenantal grace that unite the Church to Christ and to one another.
At its most basic, a sacrament is an avenue of divine grace for the believer who approaches in faith. In the Anglican tradition, two sacraments—Baptism and the Eucharist—are recognized as instituted by Christ, while five additional “sacraments of the Church” (confirmation, ordination, marriage, penance, and unction) are regarded as sacramental practices that, while not dominical, still convey grace as means of grace. Through this framework, confession (or penance) can rightly be seen as a vital part of Christian life—biblically grounded and pastorally fruitful—without elevating it beyond the authority of Scripture.
Why, then, emphasize confession in particular? Because of all the “sacraments of the Church,” it is the only one largely absent from Evangelical practice. Marriage is universally observed; ordination and the laying on of hands continue in various forms; prayer for the sick remains common; and church membership often functions analogously to confirmation. Yet confession—or Penance and Reconciliation—is virtually without an equivalent in most Evangelical contexts. While believers are encouraged to confess sins privately to God or occasionally to one another in accountability settings, these practices often lack the theological depth, consistency, and pastoral intentionality that historic confession embodies. Recovering a form of confession rooted in Scripture and Wesleyan spirituality could therefore restore an essential dimension of the Church’s ministry of healing and holiness.
In Scripture, confession and repentance are rarely private matters. Sin has both a vertical dimension (against God) and a horizontal one (against others and the covenant community). For this reason, biblical confession almost always involves both acknowledgment before God and accountability or restitution before others.
In the Old Testament, confession was typically public and tied to tangible acts of repentance. Leviticus 5:5–6 commands that “when anyone becomes aware that they are guilty… they must confess in what way they have sinned,” followed by a guilt offering to make atonement. Numbers 5:6–7 likewise directs that when one wrongs another, “they must confess the sin they have committed” and “make full restitution for the wrong, adding a fifth of the value to it.” Confession here is both verbal and restorative—it seeks to repair relationships and restore justice.
Public confession also marked Israel’s communal life. In Ezra 10:1, Ezra prays, “We have been unfaithful,” prompting the people to gather and confess together. Similarly, Nehemiah 9:2–3 depicts the people standing and confessing “their sins and the sins of their ancestors.” Repentance in these contexts is not merely individual but corporate—acknowledging that sin damages the whole covenant community.
This pattern continues into the New Testament. John the Baptist’s ministry of repentance included open confession: “They were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins” (Matthew 3:6). James instructs believers, “Confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed” (James 5:16), emphasizing both mutual accountability and the healing power of truth-telling.
Restitution also remains integral to repentance. When Zacchaeus encounters Jesus, his faith expresses itself through reparation: “If I have defrauded anyone of anything, I restore it fourfold” (Luke 19:8). Jesus affirms this as genuine repentance, declaring, “Today salvation has come to this house.” Repentance, then, is never merely inward—it manifests in transformed behavior and restored relationships.
Even the Lord’s Prayer ties divine forgiveness to human reconciliation: “Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us” (Matthew 6:12). Our reconciliation with God is inseparable from our reconciliation with one another.
Thus, biblically, confession is not a private transaction between the sinner and God alone. It is a relational act—rooted in community, expressed through words and deeds, and often requiring public acknowledgment and restitution. The grace of forgiveness is never cheap or isolated; it calls us into restored fellowship with both God and neighbor, embodying the gospel’s ministry of reconciliation (2 Corinthians 5:18–19).
Confession to another believer is a powerful act of humility and healing (James 5:16). Yet confession to an ordained pastor carries a distinct biblical and ecclesial significance, recognizing the Church as the appointed instrument through which Christ ministers reconciliation. Throughout Scripture, God’s forgiveness is declared through authorized representatives—prophets, priests, and ultimately the apostles—to whom Christ entrusted the authority of forgiveness: “If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven” (John 20:23; cf. 2 Corinthians 5:18–20).
The pastor, as a steward of Word and Sacrament, stands not as a private confidant but as a public servant of Christ and his Church—entrusted to declare absolution, offer pastoral counsel, and guide the work of restitution in the name of the gospel. Confession before a pastor thus anchors repentance in the visible life of the Church, guards against self-deception, and assures the penitent that forgiveness is not merely a feeling but a divine reality—announced through Christ’s ordained minister.
Attached here is the PDF of this entire article, along with confessional rubrics and guidelines for privacy and legal requirements.
https://www.theprimitivemethodist.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/Evangelical-Confession.docx.pdf
by Joel V Webb | Oct 11, 2025 | Uncategorized
Within the spiritual framework and practice of many evangelical Christians in the United States, there exists a significant gap in our understanding and application of the historical theology and praxis of the sacraments—or, more broadly, of sacramental actions. These are actions that, while not instituted sacraments of Christ (such as Baptism and the Eucharist), still bear a sacramental quality in that they serve as means of grace: tangible conduits through which God communicates His grace to His people. In classical Methodist and Wesleyan theology, these are understood as divinely appointed channels by which the life of God is imparted to the believer (cf. John Wesley, Sermon 16: The Means of Grace).
The Modern Divide Between the Physical and the Spiritual
One of the primary roots of this deficiency lies in the modern dichotomy between the spiritual and the physical. Western thought since the Enlightenment has often driven a rigid bifurcation between the two realms, sometimes even veering toward a subtle Gnosticism—a disdain for the physical in favor of the “purely spiritual.” This worldview is foreign to the biblical imagination.
In Scripture, and in the world that birthed it, the physical and spiritual are deeply intertwined. Creation itself is sacramental in that it reveals God’s invisible nature through visible means (Romans 1:20). Humanity, made in the image of God (Genesis 1:27), embodies this intersection of spirit and matter. God’s interactions with His people consistently employ physical means—anointing oil, water, bread, wine, touch, and even dust—to communicate spiritual realities.
The Incarnation as the Foundation of Sacramentality
At the heart of a sacramental worldview lies the Incarnation: “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:14). In Christ, God sanctified matter itself, showing that the physical world can be a vessel of divine grace. To affirm this is not to drift toward superstition, but to stand squarely within the center of Christian orthodoxy.
The Incarnation declares that God does not despise material creation; He works through it. From the water of baptism (Acts 2:38; Titus 3:5), to the bread and wine of the Eucharist (1 Corinthians 10:16–17), to the laying on of hands (2 Timothy 1:6), the pattern is consistent: God uses the physical to effect the spiritual.
The Laying on of Hands: A Sacramental Action
Paul reminds Timothy, “Do not neglect the gift you have, which was given you by prophecy when the council of elders laid their hands on you” (1 Timothy 4:14). Here, something more than symbolic recognition occurs—grace is conferred. The act of laying on hands is a physical sign through which God imparts spiritual empowerment and affirmation of calling. This understanding echoes throughout Church history, from the apostolic era to the present day.
John Calvin, while cautious about overextending the term “sacrament,” still recognized that God uses external signs as “instruments of His grace” (Institutes, IV.xiv.1). Likewise, Wesley emphasized that means of grace are “outward signs, words, or actions, ordained of God, and appointed for this end—to be the ordinary channels whereby He might convey His grace to men.”
The Eucharist and the Sacramental Imagination
The same principle applies to the Eucharist. While we eat bread and drink wine, we do so in faith that through these elements we participate in the Body and Blood of Christ (1 Corinthians 10:16). The physical act points beyond itself; it is both remembrance and participation (anamnesis and koinonia). As Jesus said, “This is my body… this is my blood” (Matthew 26:26–28).
Such an understanding guards against a reductionist view of the Lord’s Table as mere memorial. The mystery of Christ’s presence is not explained by philosophical categories but experienced by faith within the Church’s worship.
The Loss of the Sacramental Imagination
Unfortunately, in the last two centuries, the rise of scientific rationalism and modernistic philosophy has profoundly shaped Protestant imagination. Evangelicals often seek the movement of the Spirit, but only in “spiritual” ways—detached from the physical and the ordinary. We have come to expect God in the spectacular, forgetting that He often chooses the simple, tangible, and embodied.
Recovering Evangelical Sacramentalism
To recover a robust sacramental worldview is not to abandon evangelical conviction—it is to deepen it. Evangelical sacramentalism affirms that grace is not confined to the invisible realm but permeates all creation. It insists that God meets us in Word and matter, Spirit and flesh.
When we anoint with oil (James 5:14), lay hands in prayer (Acts 8:17), break bread in communion (Luke 24:30–31), or even gather in corporate worship (Hebrews 10:24–25), we participate in the mystery of a God who mediates His presence through His creation.
The Church’s task, then, is to reclaim this incarnational imagination—to see the world once again as charged with the grandeur of God (Psalm 19:1). By doing so, we do not drift into ritualism, but rediscover the very heart of our faith: that the God who became flesh continues to meet us in the ordinary, to make us holy, and to confer grace through the tangible signs of His love.
