Consider God! “God is a Spirit, infinite, eternal, and unchangeable, in his being, wisdom, holiness, justice, goodness and truth.”[1] God created the heavens and earth and all that is in them out of nothing by the Word of His power. God’s eternal glory is declared by the rising of the sun He created, the ebb and flow of the oceans He controls, and by the grandeur of the highest mountains that speak of the majesty of his name. “Since the perfection of blessedness consists in the knowledge of God, he has been pleased, in order that none might be excluded from the means of obtaining felicity, not only to deposit in our minds that seed of religion of which we have already spoken, but so to manifest his perfections in the whole structure of the universe, and daily place himself in our view, that we cannot open our eyes without being compelled to behold him.”[2]
God needs nothing nor does He draw anything from that which He created. God is self-existent.[3] He is without beginning or end. “From everlasting to everlasting you are God.” God is necessary. “Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created.” [4] And God is non-contingent. God is not limited in any way by man, the devil, or any other created thing. “For his dominion is an everlasting dominion, and his kingdom endures from generation to generation; all the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing, and he does according to his will among the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth; and none can stay his hand or say to him, ‘What have you done?’”[5] The God of Christian faith “is not an abstraction, but a Person – with a right arm and a voice.”[6] God the Father - He is there and He is not silent![7]
Consider God! In times past God spoke by prophets and phenomena; by miracle and manifestation. But in these last days God has spoken completely, comprehensively, and finally by His Son; who is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature. The Son of God speaks by his virgin birth, sinless life, vicarious death, bodily resurrection, glorious ascension, and everlasting mediation of the covenant of grace. He tells us that all which was lost in the 1st Adam is redeemed in the 2nd Adam. Through Him we learn of the utter sinfulness of our sin and the absolute sufficiency of our Savior. God the Son – He came down and His gospel saves!
Consider God! Proceeding from the Father and the Son is the Holy Spirit who brings every decree of God to its appointed end. Most importantly, the Holy Spirit fully persuades and assures us of the infallible truth and divine authority of the Word of God. He convinces us of our sin and misery, enlightens our minds to the knowledge of Christ, and renews our wills enabling us to believe, trust, and embrace the gift of God as offered to us in the gospel.[8] God the Holy Spirit – He is here and He will not fail!
Consider God! “He is the source of all things in that they have proceeded from him; he is the Creator. He is the agent through whom all things subsist and are directed to their proper end. And he is the last end to whose glory all things redound.”[9]
“For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be glory forever. Amen.”
[1] Westminster Shorter Catechism, Q&A #4
[2] John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, 2 vols. (1845; reprint, Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1964), 1:51.
[3] Psalm 90:2
[4] Revelation 4:11
[5] Daniel 4:34-35
[6] Harry Blamires, The Christian Mind, (Servant Publications, Ann Arbor, MI 1963) p. 111
[7] Francis Schaeffer
[8] Westminster Shorter Catechism, Q&A #30,31
[9] John Murray, quoted by John D. Hannah, How Do We Glorify God?, P&R Publishing (Phillipsburg, New Jersey 2000) p.42
Thursday, December 25, 2008
Our Only Means
The most important doctrinal question of the Reformation was “How does God save sinners?” To say it another way, “How are sinners justified in the sight of God?” The answer to these questions is only found in a salvation that comes in Christ by grace through faith alone. The doctrine of justification by faith alone was and remains the defining tenet of Protestant evangelical Christianity. At the heart of this doctrine was the issue of whether righteousness of God was infused in us or imputed to us. R. C. Sproul said it this way, “The crucial issue of infusion or imputation of righteousness remains irreconcilable. We are either justified by a righteousness that is in us or a righteousness that is apart from us. There is no third way.”
The Westminster Shorter Catechism defines justification as, “An act of God’s free grace, wherein he pardons all our sins, and accepts us as righteous in his sight, only for the righteousness of Christ imputed to us, and received by faith alone.” Christ is our mediator and all sufficient merit. His birth, life, death and resurrection fully propitiated the judgment of God and expiated our sins. Grace is the unmerited favor of God who pardons our sins and accepts us as righteous for Christ’s sake. Faith is the persuading power of the Holy Spirit that convinces us of the incarnation of Christ, what Christ did as our substitute on the cross, what Christ is doing as mediator of the new covenant, leading us to offer to God our “Amen” for all the promises that are ours in Jesus.
Salvation by grace through faith in Christ plus something is not the gospel. Only the work of the Son of God, freely given by the grace of God, appropriated through the faith of God alone, in any way can be called “good news.”
“We shall possess a right definition of faith if we call it a firm and certain knowledge of God’s benevolence toward us, founded upon the truth of the freely given promise in Christ, both revealed to our minds and sealed upon our hearts through the Holy Spirit.” John Calvin
The Westminster Shorter Catechism defines justification as, “An act of God’s free grace, wherein he pardons all our sins, and accepts us as righteous in his sight, only for the righteousness of Christ imputed to us, and received by faith alone.” Christ is our mediator and all sufficient merit. His birth, life, death and resurrection fully propitiated the judgment of God and expiated our sins. Grace is the unmerited favor of God who pardons our sins and accepts us as righteous for Christ’s sake. Faith is the persuading power of the Holy Spirit that convinces us of the incarnation of Christ, what Christ did as our substitute on the cross, what Christ is doing as mediator of the new covenant, leading us to offer to God our “Amen” for all the promises that are ours in Jesus.
Salvation by grace through faith in Christ plus something is not the gospel. Only the work of the Son of God, freely given by the grace of God, appropriated through the faith of God alone, in any way can be called “good news.”
“We shall possess a right definition of faith if we call it a firm and certain knowledge of God’s benevolence toward us, founded upon the truth of the freely given promise in Christ, both revealed to our minds and sealed upon our hearts through the Holy Spirit.” John Calvin
Our Only Method
Thoughts on grace -
“Long my imprisoned spirit lay, fast bound in sin and nature’s night; Thine eye diffused a quickening ray, I woke the dungeon flamed with light; My chains fell off my heart was free; I rose, went forth, and followed Thee.” Charles Wesley
"Like a spiritual corpse, a sinner is unable to make a single move toward God, think a single thought about God, or even correctly respond to God—unless God is first present to bring the spiritually dead person to life, which is what Paul says he does do." James M. Boice
“Now let us cast ourselves down before the majesty of our good God with acknowledgment of our faults, praying him to make us so to feel them that it makes us not only confess three or four of them, but also go back even to our birth and acknowledge that there is nothing but sin in us, and that there is no way for us to be reconciled to our God, but by the blood, death and passion of our Lord Jesus Christ.” John Calvin
“There are two great truths which from this platform I have proclaimed for many years. The first is that salvation is free to every man who will have it; the second is that God gives salvation to a people whom He has chosen; and these truths are not in conflict with each other in the least degree.” Charles Spurgeon
“Do not stand still disputing about your election, but set to repenting and believing. Cry out to God for converting grace. . . . Whatever God’s purposes may be, I am sure His promises are true. Whatever the decrees of heaven may be, I am sure if I repent and believe I shall be saved.” Joseph Alleine
“Long my imprisoned spirit lay, fast bound in sin and nature’s night; Thine eye diffused a quickening ray, I woke the dungeon flamed with light; My chains fell off my heart was free; I rose, went forth, and followed Thee.” Charles Wesley
"Like a spiritual corpse, a sinner is unable to make a single move toward God, think a single thought about God, or even correctly respond to God—unless God is first present to bring the spiritually dead person to life, which is what Paul says he does do." James M. Boice
“Now let us cast ourselves down before the majesty of our good God with acknowledgment of our faults, praying him to make us so to feel them that it makes us not only confess three or four of them, but also go back even to our birth and acknowledge that there is nothing but sin in us, and that there is no way for us to be reconciled to our God, but by the blood, death and passion of our Lord Jesus Christ.” John Calvin
“There are two great truths which from this platform I have proclaimed for many years. The first is that salvation is free to every man who will have it; the second is that God gives salvation to a people whom He has chosen; and these truths are not in conflict with each other in the least degree.” Charles Spurgeon
“Do not stand still disputing about your election, but set to repenting and believing. Cry out to God for converting grace. . . . Whatever God’s purposes may be, I am sure His promises are true. Whatever the decrees of heaven may be, I am sure if I repent and believe I shall be saved.” Joseph Alleine
Our Only Salvation
The central theme of Scripture is God’s redemptive purposes through Jesus Christ. From Gen. 3:15 through the end of Revelation the theme is Jesus Christ. In the Old Testament the promise of Jesus Christ was made. In the New Testament the promise of Jesus Christ was kept. In this sense all of the scriptures are Christian in that they speak of the centrality of Christ.
The primary purpose of Christ was not to give us purpose, self-esteem, or success in life. His primary purpose was to save us from our sins and reconcile us to God. This He did by a taking upon himself flesh, by living a sinless life we could not live, by dying a vicarious death in our place, by rising from the dead for our justification, by ascending to the Father to plead our case in the court of heaven, and with the Father, by sending the Holy Spirit to bring us to salvation by grace, through faith, in Christ, alone!
John Calvin once said, “We must be careful not to look for Him anywhere else, for apart from Christ whatever offers itself to us in the name of God will turn out to be an idol.”
The primary purpose of Christ was not to give us purpose, self-esteem, or success in life. His primary purpose was to save us from our sins and reconcile us to God. This He did by a taking upon himself flesh, by living a sinless life we could not live, by dying a vicarious death in our place, by rising from the dead for our justification, by ascending to the Father to plead our case in the court of heaven, and with the Father, by sending the Holy Spirit to bring us to salvation by grace, through faith, in Christ, alone!
John Calvin once said, “We must be careful not to look for Him anywhere else, for apart from Christ whatever offers itself to us in the name of God will turn out to be an idol.”
Our Only Foundation
Sola Scriptura has been called the “formal principle” of the Reformation. At the heart of the Reformation was the issue of authority; or, to be more specific the issue of final authority. While both Church and creed carry with them a measure of secondary authority, for the Reformers the Word of God alone was the “only rule of faith and practice” for the Christian.
After being convinced by Holy Scripture that popes, councils, and creeds do error, Luther posited the radical conviction that only the Word of God alone was without error and was the final authority on all matters on which it speaks. Charged with heresy and threatened with death, Luther stood before the ultimate “powers that be” of his day to defend his conviction that the Bible had led him to doctrinal positions contrary to the Church at Rome. When commanded to recant his convictions and doctrines Luther said,
“Unless I am convinced of error by the testimony of Scripture or by manifest reasoning I stand convicted by the Scriptures to which I have appealed, and my conscience is taken captive by God’s word. I cannot or will not recant anything. For to act against conscience is neither safe for us, nor open to us.”
So strong was the Protestant conviction of the necessity of the Bible that many died in defense of the doctrine of sola Scriptura. We forget the human cost that gives us the privilege of holding in our hands an English Bible that we might hear the voice of God as we read, pray and preach the Word of God.
One of those martyrs was William Tyndale whose passion to translate the scriptures into English led him into direct opposition with Rome. In response to a challenge to the supremacy of God’s Word over both pope and church, Tyndale said, “I defy the Pope, and all his laws, and if God spares my life, I will cause the boy that drives the plow in England to know more of the Scriptures than the Pope himself!" Charged with heresy in 1536 and sentenced to die it was recorded that as Tyndale faced death "at the stake with a fervent zeal, and a loud voice", he said "Lord! Open the King of England's eyes." He "was strangled to death while tied at the stake, and then his dead body was burned". Tyndale was martyred for the Word of God. Where is our zeal, our commitment to the Word of God in our generation?
After being convinced by Holy Scripture that popes, councils, and creeds do error, Luther posited the radical conviction that only the Word of God alone was without error and was the final authority on all matters on which it speaks. Charged with heresy and threatened with death, Luther stood before the ultimate “powers that be” of his day to defend his conviction that the Bible had led him to doctrinal positions contrary to the Church at Rome. When commanded to recant his convictions and doctrines Luther said,
“Unless I am convinced of error by the testimony of Scripture or by manifest reasoning I stand convicted by the Scriptures to which I have appealed, and my conscience is taken captive by God’s word. I cannot or will not recant anything. For to act against conscience is neither safe for us, nor open to us.”
So strong was the Protestant conviction of the necessity of the Bible that many died in defense of the doctrine of sola Scriptura. We forget the human cost that gives us the privilege of holding in our hands an English Bible that we might hear the voice of God as we read, pray and preach the Word of God.
One of those martyrs was William Tyndale whose passion to translate the scriptures into English led him into direct opposition with Rome. In response to a challenge to the supremacy of God’s Word over both pope and church, Tyndale said, “I defy the Pope, and all his laws, and if God spares my life, I will cause the boy that drives the plow in England to know more of the Scriptures than the Pope himself!" Charged with heresy in 1536 and sentenced to die it was recorded that as Tyndale faced death "at the stake with a fervent zeal, and a loud voice", he said "Lord! Open the King of England's eyes." He "was strangled to death while tied at the stake, and then his dead body was burned". Tyndale was martyred for the Word of God. Where is our zeal, our commitment to the Word of God in our generation?
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