Sufficient for All, Efficacious for the Elect

Your weekly dose of Spurgeon
posted by Phil Johnson

The PyroManiacs devote some space each weekend to highlights from The Spurgeon Archive. The following excerpt is from "Rivers of Water in a Dry Place," a sermon preached on Sunday morning 11 July 1875 at the Met Tab in London.

NOTE: Arminians and high Calvinists alike often misunderstand or misconstrue the point Spurgeon is making in this weekend's excerpt (black text below). Spurgeon was an unabashed Calvinist—a full five-pointer. He emphatically rejected the notion that Christ died for all persons alike. From the start of his ministry to the end he believed in the Calvinistic doctrine of particular redemption. Here is his critique of the Arminian view:

The Arminian holds that Christ, when He died, did not die with an intent to save any particular person; and they teach that Christ's death does not in itself secure, beyond doubt, the salvation of any one man living. They believe that Christ died to make the salvation of all men possible, or that by the doing of something else, any man who pleases may attain unto eternal life; consequently, they are obliged to hold that if man's will would not give way and voluntarily surrender to grace, then Christ's atonement would be unavailing. They hold that there was no particularity and speciality in the death of Christ.

Christ died, according to them, as much for Judas in Hell as for Peter who mounted to Heaven. They believe that for those who are consigned to eternal fire, there was a true and real a redemption made as for those who now stand before the throne of the Most High.

Now, we believe no such thing. We hold that Christ, when He died, had an object in view, and that object will most assuredly, and beyond a doubt, be accomplished.

We measure the design of Christ's death by the effect of it. If any one asks us, "What did Christ design to do by His death?" we answer that question by asking him another—"What has Christ done, or what will Christ do by His death?" For we declare that the measure of the effect of Christ's love, is the measure of the design of it.

We cannot so belie our reason as to think that the intention of Almighty God could be frustrated, or that the design of so great a thing as the atonement, can by any way whatever, be missed of. We hold—we are not afraid to say that we believe—that Christ came into this world with the intention of saving "a multitude which no man can number;" and we believe that as the result of this, every person for whom He died must, beyond the shadow of a doubt, be cleansed from sin, and stand, washed in blood, before the Father's throne.

We do not believe that Christ made any effectual atonement for those who are for ever damned; we dare not think that the blood of Christ was ever shed with the intention of saving those whom God foreknew never could be saved, and some of whom were even in Hell when Christ, according to some men's account, died to save them.

Nevertheless, Spurgeon also despised the view of those high Calvinists who insist that the sufficiency of the atonement can be no greater than its efficacy. He held to the classic Dordtian formula that "The death of the Son of God is the only and most perfect sacrifice and satisfaction for sin, and is of infinite worth and value, abundantly sufficient to expiate the sins of the whole world."

Spurgeon was annoyed with pedantic high Calvinists who believed the particularity of the atonement could be properly defended only by denying its infinite sufficiency. Here is his response to that brand of Calvinism:

esus is as rivers of water, because he is full of grace and truth. It would be a very difficult thing to calculate the body of water to be found in the Thames, but in rivers such as our American friends are favored with it must be almost beyond the power of mind to conceive the mass of water that must come rolling down into the sea. Gallons and hogsheads seem quite ridiculous by the side of the Mississippi and the St. Lawrence.

I always feel very fidgety when theologians begin making calculations about the Lord Jesus. There used to be a very strong contention about particular redemption and general redemption, and though I confess myself to be to the very backbone a believer in Calvinistic doctrine, I never felt at home in such discussions. It is one thing to believe in the doctrines of grace, but quite another thing to accept all the encrustations which have formed upon those doctrines, and also a very different matter to agree with the spirit which is apparent in some who profess to propagate the pure truth.

I can have nothing to do with calculating the value of the atonement of Christ. I see clearly the speciality of the purpose and intent of Christ in presenting his expiatory sacrifice, but I cannot see a limit to its preciousness, and I dare not enter into computations as to its value or possible efficacy. Appraisers and valuers are out of place here. Sirs, I would like to see you with your slates and pencils calculating the cubical contents of the Amazon: I would be pleased to see you sitting down and estimating the quantity of fluid in the Ganges, the Indus, and the Orinoco; but when you have done so, and summed up all the rivers of this earth, I will tell you that your task was only fit for school-boys, and that you are not at the beginning of that arithmetic which can sum up the fullness of Christ, for in him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. His merit, his power, his love, his grace surpass all knowledge, and consequently all estimate. Limits are not to be found, neither shore nor bottom are discoverable.

Instead of coldly calculating with a view to systematize our doctrines, let us joyfully sing with the poet of the sanctuary—

"Rivers of love and mercy here
In a rich ocean join;
Salvation in abundance flows,
Like floods of milk and wine."

All idea of stint or insufficiency is out of place in reference to the Lord Jesus. When any man enquires, "Is there enough merit in the Savior's death to make atonement for my sin?" The answer is, "The blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin." When any say, "Perhaps I may not taste his love and believe on his name," the reply is, "Whosoever will, let him take of the water of life freely."

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Something You Need to Read

by Phil Johnson




ere's an excellent paper on a vital topic many Christians are either blithely unaware of or callously unconcerned about:


From Mysticism to the Gospel, by Paul Dan
(pdf file)

It's a sane and measured critique of contemplative mysticism, together with an insightful account of how the Reformation impacted Eastern Orthodoxy (and how the "Orthodox" mainstream rejected the Reformation). It also is an effective critical analysis of the Emerging/Emergent/Evangelical-Charismatic/YoungRestlessReformed love affair with dangerous forms of contemplative mysticism.

Read it, and feel free to respond.

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How to forgive yourself; or instead....

by Dan Phillips

Tuesday, we springboarded off a WikiHow article on "How to Forgive Yourself." I concluded with this:

So where does this whole idea come from? I think a lot of it comes from psychologized, man-centered nonsense.

But I also think some of it doesn't, at least not as directly. I think some of it comes from Christians who have sinned, who know they've sinned, and who nonetheless continue in guilt and misery. What shall we tell them, then?

So, what of those situations? Since I'm not writing a book on the subject, let's just dart into some of the possible causes of a lingering, unassuaged sense of guilt:

FIRST: Given that "lingering" is a relative term, one possibility is that this is a normal part of the conviction process, part of the Holy Spirit bringing one to a full grasp of the enormity of what he's done. After David's sin with Bathsheba, the brief narrative alludes to no inner conflict within David; merely that he marries Bathsheba (2 Samuel 11:27). Yet he himself gives us a window into his internal life in that period, in Psalm 32:3-4 --

For when I kept silent, my bones wasted away
through my groaning all day long.
4 For day and night your hand was heavy upon me;
my strength was dried up as by the heat of summer. Selah

I take it, then, that David was feeling the pressing weight of conviction for his unrepented sin during this period. The closeness he'd enjoyed with the Lord was gone, and he was haunted with nagging guilt and restlessness (cf. Proverbs 28:1, 17).

In this case, the confrontation by Nathan was the lance that pierced the boil and released the infection of truth-based guilt (2 Samuel 12:1ff.). The spear went straight into David's heart, he accepted the reproof, humbled himself, and repented. David found sweet relief when he confessed and acknowledged his sin, and knew the purifying and forgiving grace of God (Psalm 32:1-2, 5, 11; 51). The genuineness of his repentance was shown in part by how he accepted the consequences of his sin.

SECOND: injured pride. In this case, the stinging, lingering pain is not a heart aching over the affront done to God, and God's name and glory -- but the embarrassment of letting myself down. Here I'd thought of myself as such a fine Christian, and I did that. My friends so look up to me; what will they think? What will happen to my reputation? How could such a great guy/gal do such a thing?

All the worse if we've resisted rebuke for awhile, insisting that our sewage doesn't stink, that the sin we sinned wasn't sin when we sinned it. Then we feel we'd have to eat humble pie... which is exactly what we need to do. But our defense and attempted prettification of our sin didn't un-sin the sin, and if'we're Christians, we know that at some level.

In this case, Satan has successfully misdirected us. We've lost the whole focus of the situation. Sin is sin because it is an affront against God. What makes it awful is what it does to His glory, and what it cost Him to redeem us from it. There is no excuse and no buffer for it. Getting our eyes on ourselves and our own wounded dignity and majesty indicates that:

1. We think far too highly of ourselves; and
2. We think far too lowly of God

Only with such an orientation can we let loose with nonsense about needing / being unable to forgive ourselves.

In such cases, we must humble ourselves before God, ask Him to open our eyes to see our sin as He sees it, start analyzing it Biblically, and take it to the Cross.

THIRD: works-righteousness. This is related to the previous, though it feels more like humility. I cling to the feelings of misery and guilt and shame, because I have an unspoken (and perhaps unconscious) belief that I am myself atoning for my sin thereby. I am not bringing bulls or lambs or chickens to any altar; but I am bringing my frowns and moans and sighs and moroseness. Maybe enough of that will satisfy... will satisfy....

Well, whom? See, here's where we so often get mired in the bottomless swamp of our own subjectivity. Do we really think we'll appease God by these sacrifices? Odds are we don't really think it out that far, as we're being ruled by our emotions. The truth is, however, that it is ourselves we are trying to appease, and we cherish murky hopes of reaching some point of satisfaction that we have "suffered enough."

In this case, we must repent of our "repentance" that is not repentance. If we feel that our feelings (of misery) can atone for our feelings (of guilt), we haven't yet grasped the weight of sin as objective wrong against the holy God.

What is more, we have not seen that there is only one suffering that atones for sin, and it is not our suffering. It is the suffering of Christ that atones for our sin (Hebrews 9:26; 1 Peter 3:18). How can the Father declare that He is satisfied with Christ's suffering (Romans 4:25), yet we insist that we are not?

FOURTH is pretty obvious: we simply have not repented. Instead, we have rationalized our sin, redefined it in some way that it is not sin, made excuses and distractions and dodges and scenarios. God does not forgive rationalizations, He does not forgive excuses, He does not forgive dodges and blame-shifting. Those, we keep, until they neutralize our prayers and destroy us (Proverbs 28:9, 13a; 29:1). God forgives sins, when we repent of them as sins (Proverbs 28:13b; 1 John 1:9).

Nuts, isn't it? By our refusal to deal with sin as sin, we cling to it and all the miseries and harm that it brings in its train.

So we must repent, which is Bible-oriented and God-centered and involves specificity and mortification, and possibly a commitment to restitution (an essential element of mortification).

FIFTH, a simple lack of faith. Twenty-five years ago, I would have felt this was far too simplistic. But I've come to see that it's dead on the money.

Jesus announces that He is about to pour out His blood to establish the new covenant, with its element of the forgiveness of sins (Matthew 26:28). He does pour out His blood, forsaken by God for our sins (Matthew 27:46), and announces that "It is finished" (John 19:30). He is buried. When He rises from the tomb, He signals the Father's acceptance of His sacrifice as sufficient to bring us a righteous legal standing before Him (Romans 4:25). In His blood, through faith, we have forgiveness and a fully-righteous standing (Romans 3:25; Ephesians 1:7).

It is for this reason that John says that, when we confess our sins, He is faithful and just/righteous to forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness (1 John 1:9). Though we need not sin and should not sin, if we do sin we have an attorney to plead our case before the Father -- Jesus Christ, the righteous.

I want to close with that though, as developed to my own great comfort and encouragement by Charles Spurgeon. It comes from his meditation for the evening of October 4, and it's worth quoting at length:

“If any man sin, we have an advocate.” Yes, though we sin, we have him still. John does not say, “If any man sin he has forfeited his advocate,” but “we have an advocate,” sinners though we are. All the sin that a believer ever did, or can be allowed to commit, cannot destroy his interest in the Lord Jesus Christ, as his advocate. The name here given to our Lord is suggestive. “Jesus.” Ah! then he is an advocate such as we need, for Jesus is the name of one whose business and delight it is to save. “They shall call his name Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins.” His sweetest name implies his success. Next, it is “Jesus Christ”—Christos, the anointed. This shows his authority to plead. The Christ has a right to plead, for he is the Father’s own appointed advocate and elected priest. If he were of our choosing he might fail, but if God hath laid help upon one that is mighty, we may safely lay our trouble where God has laid his help. He is Christ, and therefore authorized; he is Christ, and therefore qualified, for the anointing has fully fitted him for his work. He can plead so as to move the heart of God and prevail. What words of tenderness, what sentences of persuasion will the anointed use when he stands up to plead for me! One more letter of his name remains, “Jesus Christ the righteous.” This is not only his character BUT his plea. It is his character, and if the Righteous One be my advocate, then my cause is good, or he would not have espoused it. It is his plea, for he meets the charge of unrighteousness against me by the plea that he is righteous. He declares himself my substitute and puts his obedience to my account. My soul, thou hast a friend well fitted to be thine advocate, he cannot but succeed; leave thyself entirely in his hands.

Amen.

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Election Results

by Frank Turk

This is not a reprint of my very fine essay from April of this year. This is a brief note to you all about what just happened in the United States. Sorry to bore our international friends.

There were no surprises last night, least of all to God. This seems like a really hackneyed point of God's sovereignty, but I think that those thinking that are not really thinking very hard.

See: when Barack Obama was elected president, God wasn't surprised. His plan wasn't sent into a tailspin -- not for the U.S., and not for the grand scheme to glorify himself and save people. But many of our dear friends were very undone by the election of President Obama -- and today I think we will see many of them overdone about the giant changes in store now that President Obama's election may be moot at best.

That doesn't mean it doesn't matter how you voted or how you should vote. What it does mean is that we cannot trust in salvation through politics. We also cannot trust in salvation through our nation.

We have to trust in a salvation which actually addresses our danger, a salvation which saves us from what we are actually dying from. This is what God is working on.

And those are the election results we should be focused on.

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How to forgive yourself: a Biblely appraisal

by Dan Phillips

Here's a site called WikiHow, which publishes a wild array of "how-to" articles. Some of the topics include:

How to appreciate death metal, mosh in a mosh pit, care for a library book, start a jazz collection, survive a freestyle rap battle, convert bicycle tires into studded snow tires, save money on gas, get out of a cellular service contract, open rigid plastic clamshells safely

Now comes "How to Forgive Yourself."

So, before reading it all though, here's the article I would write, were that the title I was assigned. Ahem.

There are two steps to forgiving yourself.

1. Make yourself God, so that your moral offenses are committed primarily against yourself rather than against God
2. Since you can't do #1, bail out on the whole project and come up with a more Biblely analysis of the situation.

The end.

I can hear what "Statler and Waldorf" (as Marley and Marley) from the Muppet Christmas Carol might say:

- That was the [article]?
- It was dumb!
- It was obvious!
- It was pointless!
- It was... short.
{pause}
- I loved it!
- I loved it!

However, the actual WikiHow article shows no concern with being Biblical, so it's a lot longer. It traverses the usual therapeutic route, viewing guilt as a negative feeling, a psychological rather than a moral/spiritual issue, and assuming that the sooner we're rid of it, the better. Period. Then a little video from some mind-science guru serves to poison-cherry the pie. The worldview assumed is relativistic and Godless (— did I just say the same thing, twice?), with me and my feelings at the center (— thrice?).

Puzzlingly, one of the contributors to this article bears the screenname 1sweetchristian, whose self-introduction says "Hi my name is Sarah. I am a follower of Jesus Christ. I am learning how to trust Him with all my heart and be obedient to His will." That is a wonderful goal, and may God bless her; however, I don't see any impact from that perspective on the article.

Sin is a word for which we should keep as strictly-defined a definition as possible, straying only under duress. The apostolic definition is lawlessness (1 John 3:4; cf. Romans 5:13). The definition from Piper's Baptist catechism also works: "Sin is transgression of the revealed will of God which teaches that we are to act in perfect holiness from a heart of faith to the glory of God."

The Bible is really serious about this. How serious?  Well, think of someone who really, really sinned badly against people — sexually used one, had another killed, betrayed the trust of scores and hundreds. Of course, you know I am thinking of King David. And you know right where I'm going, to his head-scratching confession in Psalm 51:4 — "Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight." On the face of it, this is simply an absurd statement. "You only"? What of Bathsheba? What of his own wife/wives? What of Uriah?

Yet David knew the truth that most deeply offends atheist, humanists, everyone who's bought the big lie: sin is only sin because God defines it as sin. Sin is sin because God says it is sin. Spouse betraying spouse, children failing to honor parents, neighbor slandering or robbing neighbor — all these are sins because God says they are sins.

Apart from God, there would be no sin. All sin is, in the final analysis, against God; for without God there would be no sin. And so, as I have heard D. A. Carson say well more than once, in all sin, God is the primary offended party.

Back to the notion of forgiving yourself. It simply is faddish, man-exalting nonsense to speak of forgiving yourself. In your sin, you aren't the wronged party. If you (or I) really think that it is meaningful to speak of forgiving ourselves for our sins, then I don't think we've got that whole repentance thing straight. It isn't our own forgiveness which we need. It is, of course, God's forgiveness, a forgiveness that cost the Son of God His lifeblood (Ephesians 1:7; Hebrews 9:13-14, 22; 10:4).

It is only meaningful to speak of forgiveness of ourselves, then (A) by God, (B) of sin (C) against God, extended to us only (D) because of the shed blood of Christ, through whom alone we can find forgiveness. Secondarily, it is meaningful to speak of horizontal forgiveness of people upon repentance (that is not the focus of this post; but I can recommend a great book on the subject). But we know that God does command us to repent of our wrongs against others, to pursue restitution for those wrongs. We do those things because God calls us to do them. He defines my sin against my brother, He calls me to repent and pursue restitution and reconciliation (and commands me to forgive those who repent of sins against me). It's still all about God, and it's a subject of direct Biblical teaching.

Forgiving myself, however? Never. Biblically meaningless at best.

"Ah," a deeper scholar might say, "but what of 1 Corinthians 6:18?"

Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body.

Yes, what of it? Would anyone argue that immorality is not a sin against God? That it is not a sin against the person used? Would anyone say that he should ask his own body to forgive him? Is it not fairly plain that the meaning is that the sin harms, wrongs, defiles the body — not that the body becomes the offended party, of which forgiveness must be sought and from which it must be received? How would such an apology proceed? Never mind, I don't want to go there.

Worse, the usual application is made to sins that really are clearly sins against God, and/or sins against others. The man who has committed adultery says, "God has forgiven me, but I just can't forgive myself." The woman who has failed her husband or her children in some way says "God has forgiven me, but I just can't forgive myself." And on it goes.

So where does this whole idea come from? I think a lot of it comes from psychologized, man-centered nonsense.

But I also think some of it doesn't, at least not as directly. I think some of it comes from Christians who have sinned, who know they've sinned, and who nonetheless continue in guilt and misery. What shall we tell them, then?

My, such a long post already.

Better finish up Thursday, Lord willing.

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The Problem for Arminians

by Phil Johnson



f God knows every detail of the future with infallible certainty, then (by definition) the outcome of all things is already determined. And if things are predetermined but God did not ordain whatsoever comes to pass, then you have two choices:

1. A higher sovereignty belongs to some being (or beings) other than God. That is idolatry.
   
2. Some impersonal force did the determining. That is fatalism.

Therefore if the thinking Arminian wants to avoid both fatalism and idolatry, he or she must deny God's foreknowledge, thereby nullifying God's omnscience—in other words, they essentially undeify God. That is of course blasphemy. But that is precisely the road Open Theism takes.

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Don't Bow to Worldly Wisdom

Your weekly dose of Spurgeon
posted by Phil Johnson

The PyroManiacs devote some space each weekend to highlights from The Spurgeon Archive. The Following excerpt is from "The Key-Note of a Choice Sonnet," a sermon preached at the Metropolitan Tabernacle sometime after 1861, first published in early 1880.

f all the philosophers in the world should contradict the Scriptures, so much the worse for the philosophers; their contradiction makes no difference to our faith. Half a grain of God’s word weighs more with us than a thousand tons of words or thoughts of all the modern theologians, philosophers, and scientists that exist on the face of the earth; for God knows more about his own works than they do. They do but think, but the Lord knows.

With regard to truths which philosophers ought not to meddle with, because they have not specially turned their thoughts that way, they are not more qualified to judge than the poorest man in the church of God, nay, nor one-half so much. Inasmuch as the most learned unregenerate men are dead in sin, what do they know about the living things of the children of God? Instead of setting them to judge we will sooner trust our boys and girls that are just converted, for they do know something of divine things, but carnal philosophers know nothing of them.

Do not be staggered, brothers and sisters, but honor God, glorify God, and magnify him by believing great things and unsearchable—past your finding out—which you know to be true because he declares them to be so. Let the ipse dixit of God stand to you in the place of all reason, being indeed the highest and purest reason, for God, the Infallible, speaks what must be true.

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Logos: two neat things — one new (new Greek NT!), one not

by Dan Phillips

While we're all waiting and hoping to hear from Phil... you get to hear from me, about Logos.

First: you all know how much I love me some BibleWorks 8. Mine is a love that cannot be denied.

However, I've been looking  for an opportunity to share one feature Logos has over BW8:
Layout of the Biblical texts.

That is, in BW8, the font is simply there. It's beautiful, it's clear, it's all the wonderful things that BW is — but it's all block-set. No paragraphs, and no broken margins for poetry. So recently when I wanted to do a read-through of the ESV of Amos, I simply used my Logos.

That would be a nice BW upgrade for BW9.

Second: Logos has just released a new critical edition of the Greek New Testament, for free. The edition was done by Michael W. Holmes and sponsored by the Society of Biblical Literature.

I just read about it at the BibleWorks forums, and added it to my Logos yesterday, with no time for more than a hasty glance. You can read more about it here and here.

Logos is providing it to users free here. (You can also get a hard-copy next month.)

Holmes has taught in evangelical institutions, as you'll see in his bio. This may jar your impression of the SBL, as it does mine. However, lately, the SBL has apparently been letting (gasp!) evangelicals move up the bus a bit — a fact which has caused some panic and hysteria.

Good times.

UPDATE: now the multitalented Mike Hanel has made the SBLGNT available for BibleWorks 8 as well.
UPDATE II: and, thanks to Jim Darlack, the apparatus as well.

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This is important

by Frank Turk

OK, we don't usually do this, but this is important. A real scholarship is on the line here.

Look at this:

The blogger is yellow is our friend Mark Lamprecht, the blogger also known as "HereIBlog", at http://www.hereiblog.com/. He was in second place until a secular blog plugged the current first-place blogger.

He needs to be in first place to win the scholarship, and you people have to vote. This doesn't even cost you money -- it will take 60 seconds to click here and vote for Mark Lamprecht.

Right now. This thing has a shelf life.

Sorry Dan -- they can get angry about their closet Charismaticism after they vote for Mark.

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Trusting: what it is and isn't

by Dan Phillips

After Tuesday's post, it occurred to me that perhaps I should try to do for the notion of trusting God the same sort of thing I did for (or, some would say, to) Christianoid notions of prayer. So here we go.

My wife and I both work, and even so California severely taxes our resources (pun noted in passing, not intended). But suppose I were suddenly to make this announcement:

For years I have been burdened by the paucity of emphatically Biblical teaching in the Eastern Sierra. The Word burns in my bosom, and I can't hold it in any longer. I'm weary of telling people to reboot their computers all day, when I could be teaching and preaching the Word. So as of this week, my wife and I are going to quit our jobs, put our house on the market, pack up the kids and everything, and drive to Bishop, California, to begin a new faith-based ministry. How we'll manage, what we'll do, where we'll live — we have no idea. We are stepping out on faith. We'll just be trusting God.

If I made that announcement, at least two things would happen:

1. Scores of folks would burst out, "Who are you, and what have you done with Dan Phillips?" (My dear wife would lead that chorus.)
2. Scads and scads and scads of Christians, if they heard of it, would glow, nod piously, and say "Ahh, 'tis so sweet to trust in Jesus!"

But it's good to trust, isn't it? Aren't trust and faith and believing God all Biblely pictures? So what is wrong with that picture? Anything? Anyone? Bueller?

It is a pretty good hermeneutical principle that the first occurrence of a major concept controls and informs subsequent Biblical occurrences. I think that holds in this case, where faith makes its first appearance in Genesis 15:6. Let's set it in context.

After these things the word of the LORD came to Abram in a vision: “Fear not, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great.” 2 But Abram said, “O Lord GOD, what will you give me, for I continue childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?” 3 And Abram said, “Behold, you have given me no offspring, and a member of my household will be my heir.” 4 And behold, the word of the LORD came to him: “This man shall not be your heir; your very own son shall be your heir.” 5 And he brought him outside and said, “Look toward heaven, and number the stars, if you are able to number them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your offspring be.” 6 And he believed the LORD, and he counted it to him as righteousness. (Genesis 15:1-6)

What are the essential elements? There are only two:

1. An explicit word from God
2. Believing embrace of that word

So that is what faith is: it is trusting an explicit word from God. We could say a lot more about it, but we must say at least that much, and shouldn't let ourselves stray far from it.

Fast-forward a couple of millennia, and we see Jesus saying to Martha, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?” (John 11:25-26). Nothing has changed. Jesus makes an explicit statement, fastens Martha's attention on it, asks if she embraces it, if she believes it to be true.

The related word trust is not fundamentally different, except that it emphasizes the element of dependence on the truth, leaning and relying on it. But it still is directed towards the Word (Psalm 119:42), and the truth it reveals.

Other similar statements are simply shorthand for the same idea. For instance, when David sings, "O my God, in you I trust" (Psalm 25:2), we must understand this in the background. David isn't saying, "God, I have great self-esteem, and I've plunged myself into the Cloud of Unknowing, listening in the mystic stillness for that still small voice." Such thought would have been foreign to him, repellant. Rather, he is saying in effect "I know what Scripture says about You to be true, and I rest my full weight on it."

So let's move to the bottom-line. This whole area of faith and trust provides yet more rich and verdant pastureland for Christianoid nonsense. Like other pious nonsense phrases ("The Lord told me...."), we're supposed to just grunt and nod piously. We certainly shouldn't ask questions.

But — as with Schuller, as with Chan, as with random anonymous Charismatic-types, as with the Blackabys — I think we should ask questions. I think we must.

In this case, it really isn't rocket-science. I just don't (and never have) seen Biblical Christianity as a "Get-out-of-thinking" ticket. Quite the reverse; I think Christians who practice their professed faith are hard, rigorous thinkers. Have to be.

So in this particular, two questions. Just two simple, straightforward, perfectly-Biblely questions. To wit:

1. For what?
2. On what specific Biblical basis?

Let's apply.

Brother Arni M. Pulsive announces he's quitting his job, packing his family up, and hitting the road with the Gospel. How will he feed, clothe, and care for his wife and children?

"We're just trusting God," Arni grins.

And so you cock an eyebrow and ask: "For what?"

Is Arni "trusting God" to drop food into their mouths, clothes onto their backs, and medicine into their glove compartments? Or is he "trusting God" to move people with real jobs to foot his bills? Well then, let's have him say so. Let's press him to be specific, shall we? Why not?

And then, if that's what Arni answers, we follow up: "On what specific Biblical basis?" Because "God" is not another name for "My Good Luck," or "Omnipotent Rubber Stamp of Me." I mean, it simply does not make sense to "trust" a person to do what that person has never promised to do, does it?

Suppose you seminarians "trust" me to write your theses for you. Or you husbands "trust" me to teach your sons for you. Or you pastors "trust" me to compose your sermons for you. I suppose that I could do those things, you know. I have the ability.

So what's missing?

Well, what's missing of course is that I have neither offered nor promised to do any of those things for you. You have no grounds, no basis for that "trust." So the concept of "trusting" me to do something I never said I'd do — well, it's just absurd and silly. You would end up looking ridiculous.

Or not? Suppose a nightmare Bizarro world, where everyone imagined that I was obliged to come through for everyone who concocted some scheme, and then committed me to it in absentia. Why, in that case, I would just look more and more pathetic as people across the globe announced things they were "trusting" me for, and I kept failing to deliver, over and over again.

It could ruin my good name, my reputation, if people were lazy and sloshy-minded enough not to think through what "trust" implies and assumes.

Hold that thought.

So we have asked Arni to identify where God promised to foot the bill for any scheme Arni "imagineered." That's where Arni's going to be in trouble. See, he's going to be confronted with a Bible that puts a grand premium on people making careful and responsible plans (Proverbs 16:1, 3, 9), and commends hard and skilled labor, while warning of idle dreaming (Proverbs 12:24; 14:23; 28:19). He'll have to answer to texts that say that men who don't provide for their family are worse than infidels (in the KJV of 1 Timothy 5:8; or, as a lady I once knew appropriately had it, "imbecile"). Arni will have to imagine explaining how he is "trusting" the Lord who urged people to count the cost (Luke 14:28ff.) for his refusal to do that very thing.

Examples could be multiplied until this column would be measured by the foot rather than the inch, but I trust (hope?) that you take my point. Think about it, take it, keep it.

For yourself, don't shame the name of God by broadcasting that you are "trusting" him for things He has not specifically promised (the in-this-life healing of an ill loved one, the numeric growth of a church, the salvation of a friend or child). Do glorify Him for trusting Him in those areas where he has left us precious promises — such as trusting the utter sufficiency of His word for all of Christian life (2 Timothy 3:15-17).

For others, when you hear someone say that (s)he is "trusting God" for X, just nicely ask two questions.

You know which two.

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Only your weaker eye

by Frank Turk

Those of you not following me on Twitter may have seen my link to "I AM" in the sidebar sometime in the last two days, with the threat that I'm going to blog it. The blog entry follows here, but some preface is necessary.

The first part of the preface has to be this: I think the church, overall, is in trouble. The church is not actually very careful these days about being the church or even knowing what it means to be "the church." I think it's generous to call what passes for Christianity these days "moralistic, therapeutic deism" because "moralistic, therapeutic deism" indicates that the people who practice this stuff think there is actually a moral standard, there is actually a difference between being well and being unwell, and that there is actually a Deity rather than just an invisible rabbit we can talk to or just a vague sense that duckies and puppies are nice. The church is in trouble because its ability to define itself is really as bad as its ever been, but probably not any worse than the worst it has ever been.

So in that sense, with the church in trouble, the second part of my preface here is this: somebody ought to do something about it. Many people look like they are trying, but let's be honest: with all the trying, it's not getting any better. The church is not actually any better off because of the Gospel Coalition; it's not any better off because of Together for the Gospel. The church is not any better off, btw, because of Crossway Publishing or Harvest House or Zondervan; it's not any better off for TBN, CBN, or even our beloved friends at Wretched. So let me suggest something in that vein: continuing to do what we're doing when it's yielding the same ineffectual results is, as it says on the coffee cup, the definition of insanity. We ought to do something, but how about we try something that isn't what is already not working.

So the end of my preface is actually the beginning of my post, which is this video excerpt from an interview with the creators of the movie "I AM".



Now look: the place where that blonde guy loses me entirely is when he starts talking about "the faith world". Personally, I have no interest in "the faith world," as that's perhaps the most nondescript way of saying anything about anything that I can imagine. What is "the faith world"? Is it all religious belief? Is it all merely-optimistic belief? If this fellow, John Ward, wanted to suck all the substance out of the possibility of "conversation" -- conversation being his primary motivator -- from his movie, I think he couldn't have done better than to make this movie for "the faith world".

See: I think the irony is that this video, which claims to be the mission statement behind this movie, has a lot of things right.



That trailer actually gets the plight of the unbeliever exactly right, psychologically if not spiritually. But the problem is that the movie itself doesn't have a different view of God than the unbelievers in that clip.

Look: this movie is a symptom of what's wrong with the church. The problem is not that people think little of church -- that's a symptom, and it's a symptom that the church itself doesn't do anything to overcome. The Problem is that the church is going to wrap itself around this thing which has nothing to do with the church (take notice Lifeway and SBC) and then hope that this vacant, contextless, undeclarative 86 minutes of inconclusive sentimentality will bring people to some closer idea of who and what God is.

And then after that, the people whose hobby it is to care about the church are going to complain that this is not the church, and this is not the Gospel, and this is not Christ -- and nothing will change.

But why? Why, do you think, nothing will change even though some people will engage the subject with theology and apologetics?

This is what I'm thinking: arguments are not going to change the mind of people like the ones who made this movie, and they are also not going to change the minds of those who are in the clip about the empty chair. I know: it's a disaster and it must be a sign of the times that even if van Til and Machen were here to tell these people off, they wouldn't change their minds.

But here's the thing -- it seems to me that if Christ died for our sins in accordance with Scripture, and was buried, and then raised on the third day in accordance with Scripture, our primary job is not to argue with people who think that the primary objective of church is to make it go poorly for those who are gay; our job, if Christ is seated at the right hand of the Father, is not to convince others that we don't have defective and submissive genes which force us to seek out a reward for doing good things; our job, if Christ is coming again to judge the living and the dead, and his kingdom will have no end, is not to start a conversation.

Our job is to tell them that Christ is Real, and show them that Christ is Real.

It's stunning to me that we can show everyone we think the politics of our nation is real by always and in every way being on about it -- the debt is too high, our freedom is in jeopardy, the Constitution is violated, and so on. We can make much out of making sure Harry Reid doesn't get re-elected.

But how, exactly, do we make much out of Christ? By making the service on Sunday longer or shorter, more or less boring or more or less emotive? Or showing a movie? Or by starting arguments with nitwits who don't really understand that their creative efforts are filthy rags?

Really -- that's how we demonstrate that Christ is the most precious thing in all creation?

Listen: I know you want TeamPyro to blog this movie and tell you that your version of Christianity is better than this version of "the faith world", but I'm not going to do that. I'm going to tell you that unless your righteousness exceeds that of the script-writers and Producers, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven -- and that goes for all manner of Script-writers, and all manner of Producers, including the ones you think you like and are like.

You are not more faithful because you can see the flaws in this movie from a mile away using only your weaker eye. You are more faithful when you bring the actual Gospel to actual people who are actually dying because it's real, and because they need it as much as you do.

If you will do that rather than sort of huffily object to this movie, you will suddenly be doing something more important than apologetics: you will be preaching the Gospel to all living things, and making disciples of them.

That would be something new to try for all of us. I wonder if you're up to it?

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The Robert Schuller saga, and questions it provokes

by Dan Phillips

I'm sure you've all heard this: Robert Schuller's Crystal Cathedral declared bankruptcy last week. The church is seeking protection regarding $7.5 MILLION that it owes creditors who, according to Senior Pastor Sheila Schuller Coleman (!), have filed lawsuits. In all, the Cathedral is apparently $55 MILLION in debt. The Wall Street Journal speaks of "a trail of hundreds of [i.e. 550] unpaid creditors from California to Washington, D.C." (Here is a partial list of top creditors.)

The CC had apologized to creditors, but you can't live on apologies.

In a notable paragraph from the WSJ article, we read:

The church's style may seem extravagant, but it brought worship to life, said Brett Judson, a member who is listed as a creditor for pipe-organ performances. Pageantry, he said, "is something the congregation wants. All the musical and dramatic outlets are a way to open people up to a positive Christian message." (Emphases added.)

Right; because it takes expensive music and entertainment to bring worship to life (pace Colossians 3:16; 1 Timothy 4:13; 2 Timothy 4:1-4), and that's what non-Christians really need (pace Romans 10:17).

There will now be abundant material for tracing the CC's financial downfall — but that isn't my main focus. My interest turns to Schuller himself, in two particulars, from the second of which I'll launch a bit more broadly.

First — huh? Schuller's daughter is pastor of the church? How did that happen? Her only degree that I know of is a doctorate in business administration... and there's that whole she's a woman thing.

Happily, we need not speculate, because the senior Schuller explains to us exactly how this happened: God told him to have his daughter replace him. Oh, don't take my word for it. Here we go:

The Rev. Schuller shared in yesterday's ministry announcement that, after he told God he was too old to lead, God told him, "Give me two more years - 24 more months. . . . Don't worry. I have called your daughter Sheila, too. She is equipped and she will be your legs."

So there you go. It's all Charismaticky. Schuller had a word from "God," which he quotes verbatim, in which "God" says a doctorate in BA is jake with Him, and that whole ban on female pastors thingie can be waived. ("God" didn't explain when He'd changed His mind on 1 Timothy 2:8-15 [I speak as a leaky-Canoneer].)

If Scripture isn't enough, something else will take its place. No large surprise that the "something" came from within Schuller's mind.

Second, Schuller has himself now spoken publicly about the bankruptcy.

And what did Schuller say? Dare we hope? Did he express broken repentance for years of preaching false doctrine, lifting up man, twisting or altogether ignoring Scripture, effectively denying the Gospel? Did he lament such opulent waste, such fleecing of sheep, such wasted years? Did he beg his listeners to forgive him, warn them of the wrath to come, and plead with them to flee to Christ alone for salvation by His blood?

Well, Schuller did plead, all right — but what he pled for was more money and more support. Because, by yiminy, he's earned it! Again, don't take my word for it, hear Schuller himself:

"I need more help from you," Schuller said, according to the Orange County Register. "If you are a tither, become a double-tither. If you are not a tither, become a tither. This ministry has earned your trust. This ministry has earned your help."

Yes, well... my, my — "broken" and "repentant" aren't the words that leap to one's mind, are they?

Which brings me to my launching-off point. Surely someone has asked, but I can't find any article (except Al Mohler's post, to a degree) posing what is to me the biggest and most obvious, pressing question that should come from this.

The question is: how could this happen?

I don't mean, "What bad business-decisions and financial practices led to this?" I mean, if what Schuller has preached for decades is true, how could this happen?

For decades and decades Schuller has urged vast audiences of complete strangers, about whom he knew absolutely nothing and for whom he takes absolutely no responsibility, to become "possibility thinkers." He has unconditionally and unqualifiedly exhorted each and every last one of them to adore themselves, believe in themselves, embrace themselves, dream really really big, and launch — assuring them that God will foot the bill.

Now, I don't recall Schuller ever saying, "Dream big, launch — and if you don't get there just go beg for money from working people." Maybe he did. I don't think so.

Here's what I wonder, though. How many poor folks took Schuller at his word, adored themselves, embraced their drives, "trusted" God (to rubber-stamp their plans), launched — and ruined themselves, their families, their reputations, their health, their lives?

I imagine that I'm pretty safe so far, with this readership. And if I throw in Joel Osteen's name, again I'll get nothing but nods.

But what if I then toss in Rick Warren? What if I specifically refer to his talk at the 2010 Desiring God conference, at John Piper's invitation, followed by Piper's admiration for what a wonderful communicator Warren was?

What are the total strangers who heard Warren's plea for "imagineers" — an ironic borrowing of the term from Disney — going to do with his exhortation, delivered as it was under the auspices of Piper and all? What reporter is going to trace out downloads of that message, and see what the fruits are in the hearers? No doubt, some will filter the charge through a Biblical grid, and accomplish great things. But who will find the family, for instance, where the frantic wife wonders how she'll feed and clothe the children while her husband is off "imagineering" himself (and themselves) into financial and social ruin?

I know one isn't supposed to ask these questions, but my mind just runs that way. I asked questions like these when Francis Chan released his (to my mind) bizarre and troubling letter about walking away from his ministry. Some cheered, some movingly bore confirming witness, others roared in outrage, others ignored. But I can't help wondering, and marvel when others don't. It isn't rocket science.

Every time I hear a story of someone who faced the odds, held on in the face of ruin and pulled it off, I wonder how many will be emboldened by that story to follow that example — and will themselves fall into shameful, miserable ruin, instead of the bright happy ending they (ahem) imagined?

You're bright folks, you don't need me to go on and on about this.

Contrast all this with being a minister of the Gospel. I remember some really terrific counsel I received from one of my first pastors, back in the seventies. He said something like this: if you can't preach the same Gospel in the mansions of Beverly Hills or the trenches of Vietnam, you aren't preaching the real Gospel. The Gospel is trans-cultural, trans-temporal, and trans-situational.

So what should we do? Oh, golly (he said innocently), I don't know. Just off the top of my head?

1. Believe, study and live God's Word, the Bible.
2. Preach the Gospel; in fact
3. Preach the whole Word as absolutely vital, essential, sufficient.
4. Use the brains God gave us (as His word orders us to do) to fill in the gaps, taking responsiblity for the decisions you make.

Do that in trusting, prayerful, Christ-centered faith, and you're far likelier to reach the end of your life with God glorified, rather than needing to apologize and beg.

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"Tolerance" vs. Truthfulness

Your weekly dose of Spurgeon
posted by Phil Johnson








The PyroManiacs devote some space each weekend to highlights from The Spurgeon Archive. The following excerpt is from an article titled "Ministers Sailing under False Colours," originally published the February 1870 Sword and Trowel:




ur forefathers were far less tolerant than we are, and it is to be feared that they were also more honest. It will be a sad discount upon our gain in the matter of charity if it turn out that we have been losers in the department of truthfulness.

There is no necessary connection between the two facts of growth in tolerance and decline in sincerity, but we are suspicious that they have occurred and are occurring at the same moment.

We freely accord to theological teachers a freedom of thought and utterance which in other ages could only be obtained by the more daring at serious risks, but we also allow an amount of untruthfulness in ministers, which former ages would have utterly abhorred. . . .

Our love to the most unlimited religious liberty incites us to all the sterner abhorrence of the license which like a parasite feeds thereon.

the plea of spiritual liberty, of late years certain teachers who have abjured the faith of the churches which employ them, have nevertheless endeavored, with more or less success, to retain their offices and their emoluments. . . .

Our complaint is . . . not that the men changed their views, and threw up their former creeds, but that having done so they did not at once quit the office of minister to the community whose faith they could no longer uphold; their fault is not that they differed, but that, differing, they sought an office of which the prime necessity is agreement.

All the elements of the lowest kind of knavery meet in the evil which we now denounce. Treachery is never more treacherous than when it leads a man to stab at a doctrine which he has solemnly engaged to uphold, and for the maintenance of which he receives a livelihood. . . .

It is frequently bewailed as a mournful circumstance that creeds were ever written; it is said, "Let the Bible alone be the creed of every church, and let preachers explain the Scriptures as they conscientiously think best." Here again we enter into no debate, but simply beg the objector to remember that there are creeds, that the churches have not given them up, that persons are not forced to be ministers of these churches, and therefore if they object to creeds they should not offer to become teachers of them; above all, they should not agree to teach what they do not believe.

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What Does Worldliness Look Like?

by Phil Johnson

What is worldliness, and when is it sinful?

A reminder about a forgotten sin.

(First posted 1 December 2005)

hristians in earlier generations were a lot more concerned about worldliness than we typically are. Many evangelicals these days don't even seem to be aware that worldliness is still a sin.

A major shift seems to have occurred in less than three decades' time. I have vivid recollections of the two semesters in I spent in fundamentalist purgatory in the mid-1970s. Worldliness was one of the most oft-mentioned sins by chapel speakers at the Baptist college where I was enrolled.

To hear them describe it, worldliness was essentially the sin of being too cool. An acquaintance of mine—a rigidly old-fashioned middle-aged woman—once scolded me as a worldling for wearing contact lenses. She was certain my motives for wearing them were driven only by carnal vanity. She pleaded with me to opt for thick bifocals instead. "I like you the way God made you," she protested.

"He didn't make me with eyeglasses," I reminded her.

"You know what I mean," she said, waving her hand, as if the point should be obvious.

Sure. Makes perfect sense.

Our Amish friends take it even further. Their strategy for avoiding worldliness involves eschewing all modern conveniences.

The same sort of thinking culminates in austere forms of monasticism, where poverty, celibacy, and ascetic solitude are seen as sure means of avoiding worldly influences.

The truth is, you can live a totally cloistered life or be as unhip as a Stephen Foster song and still be worldly.

That's not to deny that worldliness poses a particular threat to those who are obsessed with being fashionable. There's no question that a fixation with being hip and trendy has made the evangelical movement itself worldly. If you need evidence of that, find the posts on "The Fad-Driven Church" in the archives of PyroManiac, or search the archives there for "Biblezines®."

Worldly simply means "pertaining to this earth." On the one hand, Hebrews 9:1 speaks of "a worldly sanctuary"—i.e., an earthly and material one, contrasted with the "True tabernacle"—the heavenly temple, "which the Lord pitched, and not man" (8:2). So something can be "worldly" (like the Tabernacle) without being sinful.

On the other hand, Titus 2:12 speaks of "worldly lusts," meaning passions that are set on earthly and temporal things. Love for earthly things is inconsistent with true love for God, because the passions that drive this world's philosophies and value-systems are all characterized by pride and sinful lust (1 John 2:15-17).

The sin of "worldliness" is the tendency to set one's affections on things of the earth rather than on heavenly things (cf. Colossians 3:2). "Friendship with the world is enmity with God" (James 4:4). It is positively sinful to love this present world and imbibe its values more than we love heaven and order our lives according to heavenly values (cf. Philippians 1:23; Romans 8:5-6; Matthew 6:19-21; 16:23).

In other words, worldliness is a sin of the heart.

Conversely, worldliness isn't necessarily related to movies, music styles, the latest fashions, or other typical fundamentalist taboos. Those things certainly can be worldly and obviously do have a tendency to provoke sinful worldliness insofar as they naturally appeal to our passions and tempt us to become obsessed with earthly things.

But there's an even worse kind of worldliness than that. Religion—even conservative, doctrinally-sound religion—can be worldly too.

Think about it: if a person cares less for heaven and heaven's values than for the trappings of "a worldly sanctuary"—be it an ornate cathedral, a megachurch with a Starbucks kiosk in the foyer, or a lowbrow church where snake-handling provides the entertainment—that person is worldly and living in disobedience to God.

As a matter of fact, I know some hard-core fundamentalists who are the rankest kind of worldlings, because they imagine that holiness consists only in external and cultural things, and they have not cultivated a genuine love in their hearts for that which is spiritual.

So you cannot discover whether you are worldly merely by seeing how you look or what kind of lifestyle you live. If you want to recognize true worldliness, you have to assess your desires and passions. What do you truly love? Since worldliness is inherent in the bent of the old man, when you examine your heart honestly, you're virtually certain to discover a degree of worldliness there.

The biblical instructions for how to deal with worldliness are surprisingly simple:

"Put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and . . . put on the new man which was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness" (Ephesians 4:22-24).

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