The reader should always turn to the Bible and read the passages referred to.

QUES. 5.-Does Col. 2:12, teach that a person must first put off "the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ" before he can be baptized? If so, would that do away with infant baptism?

ANS.-Baptism itself is, in figure, the putting off the body (the sum total) of sin. When a person is dead, we bury him; and the law has nothing more to say to him. "We are buried with Christ (our representative) by baptism unto (His) death" (Rom. 6:3, 4). Baptism is a picture of this-and no more. Faith in Christ is what connects us with Him who is the life eternal. A better rendering of Col. 2:12 is as follows:"Buried with Him in baptism; in whom also (in Christ) ye have been raised through faith in the operation of God who raised Him from the dead."

As to Christian parents baptizing their children, they present them to God in that which figures the death of His beloved Son; trusting in Him to connect them with Christ by faith. Everywhere in Scripture, approach to God is by that which figures the death of His Son. As God-given guardians for their children, parents present them thus to God; then "bring them up in the discipline and admonition of the Lord" (Eph. 6:4).

QUES. 6.-In 1 John 2:28 it says:"Now, little children, abide in Him, that when He shall appear, we may have confidence, and not be ashamed before Him at his coming." Can this happen to a saved person, or does it speak of the mere professor?

ANS.-The apostle was writing to Christians about deceivers (ver. 26) who had been among them (ver. 19), but had gone out teaching error (ver. 23); and the children of God are warned not to be led astray by them, but to abide in the truth. God's true children are manifested by continuing in the truth (ver.24), and to this they are exhorted and encouraged by the apostle; for spiritual diligence and prayerful watchfulness are enjoined as our responsibility in connection with God's gracious call-see 2 Pet. 1:6-10.

"That we may not be ashamed before Him at his coming," is applied by John to himself, I believe, as in 2 John 8. If those he calls "my children" should prove untrue, his labor for them would also fail, and he be ashamed as a bad workman when all is manifested at the Lord's coming. See 1 Cor. 3:14,15.

QUES. 7.-I have a difficulty as to Heb.4:15:Speaking of our. Saviour it says, He "was tempted in all points like as we are, yet without sin." Was He liable to sin?

ANS.-The little word yet, in italics (which should not be there), tends to give a wrong impression. A truer rendering is as follows:"We have not a high priest who cannot sympathize with our infirmities, but one in all points tempted like as we are, apart from sin"-or "sin excepted."

In all circumstances of trial in which we may be, our Lord passed through it before us, and sympathizes with us in any trial. In sin, He does not, cannot sympathize. Scripture says:"He was manifested to take away our sins, and in Him is no sin" (1 John 3:5). His humanity was as holy as His divinity. It was not of the seed of man, but from the Holy Spirit:so it was said to His virgin mother, "That Holy Thing which shall be born of thee, shall be called the Son of God" (Luke 1:35)-no taint, no nature of sin was in Him. The sacrifice to be accepted for us must be, "Holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners" (Heb. 7:26).