I don’t say that I don’t need the church.
The church exists and I am part of it. I need other believers. There is need for accountability to other believers and those whom God has called into leadership position.
What I’m saying is that attending church, Sunday worship services, should not be the mainstay of the Christians spiritual growth.
The OT is a different covenant than the new. It was a covenant of Law. Under the OT, the covenant was *If you do this, I’ll do that*. God actions were determined by the actions of man to a degree. The Law was bondage to man.
Under the new covenant, the covenant of grace, God’s actions are not determined in any way by ours. He is free to be faithful to us even when we are faithless. We are free from having to obey the requirements of the Law to receive God’s grace.
The whole purpose of the Law was to lead us to Christ. It never was intended as a means of salvation. It was to show us that we COULDN’T keep it and show us our need of the Redeemer. Everything in the Law pointed to Christ.
The problem many people encounter in life is trying to apply the OT principles to NT living. We still have this mindset that what we do influences God’s treatment of us. That’s why when things go south, people wonder if God is punishing them for something they did. Or if things are going bad, they get into the mindset of thinking *Well, if I just do this thing that I think will please God, then He will do ________*.
It doesn’t work that way any more. God gives us grace because of the new covenant, not because we performed actions that triggered the desired response from God. The Law of grace supersedes the Law of works.
Baptism and communion, under grace, are physical declarations of the spiritual reality the believer has already experienced. Because it is not under the old covenant, they do not CAUSE the spiritual reality.
I don't see that anywhere in the NT -- although it wouldn't surprise me if you see things I don't see, and I see things you don't see. Like when my husband calls me into the kitchen and says, "Look in the fridge and see if you can see the mayonnaise." And I say, "OK, but first could you look next to the bed and find my glasses?" :o)
Perhaps you could provide me with the texts where it says baptism and communion are "declarations"?
The Christian faith is centered around the Incarnation, in and through which Christ our God is constantly working in and through physical, material, and sensory things. It is Christianity's rival, Gnosticism, which taught the false, hyperspiritual view that God disdained material things and that humans should defocus and disregard the body and physical things generally, in favor of disembodied spirituality.
Why did Christ use physical things? Why did He use spittle, or mud? Why did He breathe on people? Why did He permit healing to be transmitted by touching the hem of His garment? Why did He permit people to be healed by Peter's shadow, or by cloths and napkins that had been touched by Paul? Here we have objects which become instruments of God's power. The God who used the bones of Elisha to cause a dead man to come to life (2 Kings 13:21), used, and still uses, material things. It's not just "the Sacraments" that are sacramental. All of created realty is sacramental.
"Because it is not under the old covenant, they [physical things] do not CAUSE the spiritual reality."
I may have expressed myself inadequately ("No!" "Yes!") but I'm pretty sure I didn't say that physical things "cause" spiritual reality. That would be some kind of superstition. God uses physical things because of His gracious condescension to us, His accommodation to our natures. It is His will and pleasure to involve His creatures very, very often as secondary causes of things of which He is the primary cause.
In some cases, it might be like a dad who lets his little son help move the piano. The dad doesn't "need" the little boy to help; but he knows the little boy needs to help. And that pleases Him.