Setting aside

R. A. Huebner says

There is a fact to be observed with attention in the book of Genesis the special blessing is not given to the firstborn son. This setting begins with Cain and is seen in every case where there is sufficient information given so that this phenomenon in Genesis may be observed. We should see in this a foreshadow that God’s purpose is to set aside the firstborn. (God’s Sovereignty and Glory in the Election and Salvation of Lost Men, p. 31, downloaded 2016-09-05)

Galatians 4:21–24 supports his view that there is an allegorical truth here.

1 Corinthians 15:42–49 give two descriptions of Christ in contrast to Adam: there is the "last Adam" (v. 45) and the "second man" (v. 47). The "last Adam" carries the idea that Christ is the end of Adam's race, the "second man" carries the idea that Christ is the start of something new.

We see the same pattern in Matthew 27:15–23. Pilate presents Barabbas and Jesus in that order. Of course the crowd chose the first man over the second Man.

Their choice of the first over the second carries on the pattern from Genesis. When Joseph saw that Israel's right hand was on Ephraim's head, it was "evil in his eyes" (Genesis 48:17). Joseph wanted his older son to get the older son's blessing (quite naturally!). Jacob chose the second over the first (v. 20)

When God told Abraham that He would give him a second son (Genesis 17:15–21), Abraham's response was "Oh that Ishmael would live before You" (v. 18). This is remarkable: God is telling Abraham that He would provide the "son of promise" (Galatians 4:28), but Abraham wants the "son according to flesh" (Galatians 4:23) to please God. God certainly promised to bless Ishmael, but He insisted it was Isaac with whom He would establish a permanent covenant (vv. 20–21).

Let's pause and say that it was good and right for Abraham to long for Ishmael to please God. And we don't want to downplay the blessing of God on Ishmael. But we want to see the truth of Galatians 4 here: these things have an allegorical sense, and the Spirit of God is teaching us something in this story.

By the time we come to Genesis 22:2, we have God referring to Isaac as Abraham's "only son". God is no longer acknowledging the first man, only the second.

I fall into the trap of Abraham again and again, as I suspect most of us do. I long to see the "first man" walk with God. What I fail to see is that God is no longer acknowledging that man: He only acknowledges the "second Man." I, like Abraham, have to see that God is now dealing with the son of promise, not the son of flesh.

If you look at Facebook, or listen to so much so-called Christian ministry, you'll see people say things like, "we have two natures within us, the one we feed is the one that grows." I suppose there's a grain of truth there, but it's not at all what Scripture actually teaches. Scripture teaches that in God's sight, there is only the second Man. When we start down the path of thinking we have a choice between "two natures", we leave the teaching of Scripture behind. We aren't to choose between two natures, we are to consider ourselves to have died (Romans 6:11), and to be entirely new creatures (2 Corinthians 5:17). Of course I'm not denying that we have "the flesh" in us, but we are to consider that as a dead thing (Galatians 5:24). To think of ourselves as some sort of umpire between two warring sides is to give a place to "the flesh" that Scripture doesn't give it. J. N. Darby wrote,

Other differences have disappeared: there remains but the old man, which we only acknowledge as dead, and the new man. [emphasis added] (J. N. Darby, Synopsis of the Books of the Bible, Volume 5, last checked 2016-09-05)

So this is a challenge to me: don't fall into the trap of Genesis 17:18. Don't think the "first man" will walk before God. He won't. Don't think God will acknowledge anyone except the "second Man". God has found in Christ what He was looking for, and He's stopped looking. My only place before God is "in Christ", which means I've given up on myself (Philippians 3:9), and – by extension – on Adam's race.

Sovereignty (Reprise)

I finished reading God's Sovereignty and Glory in the Election and Salvation of Lost Men by R. A. Huebner (from Present Truth Publishers and available as a free PDF download). It is a good book, but not a perfect book. I thought I'd write down some of my impressions here.

There are very few topics so divisive as the question of God's sovereignty in salvation. People throw around terms like 'calvinist' and 'arminian', which I'd prefer to avoid. But the first question everyone is going to ask is, 'Calvinist or Arminian?' So let's briefly answer that question and get it out of the way: RAH's view definitely tends to the 'calvinist' side of things. He thoroughly condemns the notion that man has freewill, insists that men are entirely lost, defends the notion of 'unconditional election', and clearly teaches that it is only through God's effectual (i.e. compelling) call to the elect that any are saved. Interestingly, he doesn't really address the question of 'Limited Atonement', although he does spend just a small amount of time discussing 'Eternal Security'. The book does address the question of the 'Doctrine of Reprobation' and condemns it as non-scriptural. In other words, RAH presents a view we might describe as 'single predestination', or perhaps 'moderate Calvinism'.

So now that's out of the way, let's look at some of my impressions.

The Good

To start, RAH has a necessary ministry in reminding us of man lost-ness. This is one of the most important teachings of Scripture, because it touches every single facet of the Christian life. As RAH points out– as JND and WK pointed out before him– Christianity starts with man entirely lost. "[T]he mind of the flesh is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God; for neither indeed can it be: and they that are in flesh cannot please God" (Romans 8:7–8). The Christian life isn't the life of the forgiven sinner, it's the life of someone who has realized he cannot please God, and so he accepts Christ as his life (1 Corinthians 1:30–31; Galatians 2:20; Philippians 3:8–11). The Christian is "in Christ" where he has no righteousness of his own.

Of course the majority of Christendom doesn't accept that man is totally lost. So they spend a lot of time and effort trying to improve what God has already condemned (Romans 8:1–4). Ask me how I know… I've spent an awful lot of time down that path.

The single best thing about this book, in my opinion, is showing that man is completely lost.

Again, I don't want to use sectarian language, but many of the self-described 'calvinists' I have known seem to have a pretty mild view of man's lost-ness that doesn't quite seem to measure up to Scripture. Ephesians presents men as 'dead in trespasses and sins', from which some of my Calvinist friends conclude that unregenerate men and women are somehow in a passive state. They are not: consider Romans 1–3, where fallen men and women are very much alive in sins. The problem with fallen man isn't that he hasn't a will, it's that he is self-willed. And so some have concluded that God actively prevents the non-elect from repentance, as though a fallen man might actually be in danger of repenting without God's active intervention! But now I rant.

God's Sovereignty and Glory in the Election and Salvation of Lost Men is valuable solely on the basis that it sums up so well the teaching of Scripture that fallen man has absolutely nothing to offer God: neither before nor after God forgives us of our sins. And it points out some subtleties, including that Scripture doesn't view man as lost until Christ is rejected. God has put man on trial (not because God didn't know what fallen man is, but because He wanted to demonstrate it), and the trial wasn't over until the Son of God came here to be rejected. RAH points out that if Christ had come and hadn't been rejected, that would have proven that man wasn't entirely lost: that there is still something there God can work with.

The Bad

All of RAH's books suffer from two characteristic faults: they are repetitive and hyper-focused. Honestly, this is nothing that couldn't be fixed with a good editor. I think if RAH's books were cut down in length, they'd be better books. Don't get me wrong: I appreciate that he is zealous for the truth, but at some point it gets hard to keep my attention. Doubtless he repeats himself to make a point, but there comes a point where the constant repetition actually gets in the way.

Hyper-focus isn't quite as big a problem in this book as in some of his others, but RAH has a strong tendency to tunnel-vision. That is, he tends to see everything as somehow a symptom of whatever he's addressing. This can make it easy to dismiss his writing at times. Again, this could easily be fixed by an editor. Simply reducing the length of these books would have the effect of removing some of the words and clarifying his message.

The Ugly

Roy Huebner's books tend to be more like scrapbooks than actual books. That is, he has a tendency to cut and paste huge quotations from J. N. Darby, William Kelly, F. G. Patterson, W. T. Turpin, A. P. Cecil, and H. H. Snell into his books. Some of those quotations occupy more than a single page! He's not trying to plagiarize, he's not trying to be dishonest, he's just recognizing that someone else has already said something so well there's no point in trying to restate it. The problem with this is that the books are choppy and long. It would have been better in, in my opinion, to try and reduce the quotes to a sentence or two and cite liberally. There comes a point where the extensive quotations actually make it hard to read.

That brings up another 'ugly' aspect of this book: the language isn't the most consistent. Huebner sometimes writes like a 19th Century writer, probably because he invested so much of his time reading them. I think it might have been a good investment of effort to rework his language and try to bring it up to the 20th or 21st Century.

In the end, there's nothing here that a decent editor couldn't fix. It would require some deep surgery of the text, perhaps; but I'm afraid there is some very valuable truth in this book that will be lost on people who might've read it, but for the awkward wording and [far too] extensive quotations.

Should I read it?

I found this a helpful book. Of course, with a title like God's Sovereignty and Glory in the Election and Salvation of Lost Men, some of my more 'freewill' friends won't even bother picking it up. More's the pity: there is a lot of truth in here that's been lost or forgotten. I would definitely recommend this book to a friend (and, in fact, I have), but I would caution them to read it slowly and try not to miss the forest for the trees.

Honestly, I think RAH has put together a good outline of what Scripture teaches when it comes to election. He addresses common objections from the 'freewill' point of view, while at the same time standing firm against ideas like a 'decree of reprobation' that Scripture simply doesn't teach.

One more thing I'd notice: I can't recall any discussion of the whole question of 'Limited Atonement' in this book. RAH is now asleep in Christ, so he can't comment on it. But I suspect I know what he'd say: Darby has answered that question quite ably in his little paper "Propitiation and Substitution". I'd definitely encourage reading this short article: well worth the time.

Sovereignty

I've been reading another book by R. A. Huebner recently: God’s Sovereignty and Glory in the Election and Salvation of Lost Men. What an amazing book! I highly recommend downloading it and giving it a look.

Free PDFs!

My good friend Rodger posted this to Facebook, and I thought I should repost it here. Present Truth Publishers has posted many of their books online as PDF for free download: Free PDF Downloads.

I definitely recommend From New Birth to New Creation, and I've been interested in reading God’s Sovereignty and Glory in the Election and Salvation of Lost Men for quite some time.

Time to get reading! I've loaded several of them into the Kindle app on my phone for the commute.