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.

Salvation (reprise)

I've posted about this before (probably more than once). I'm starting to sound like a broken record here, but this needs to be said. More, it needs to be heard. When scripture used the words "saved" and "salvation", it is not using them as synonyms for words like "born again" or "justified" or "regenerated". "Saved" includes those ideas:  anyone saved is justified, anyone saved is regenerate; but scripture uses the word "saved" to indicate that someone has arrived at the end of the path.

For some reason, Christians (especially here in America) have adopted the expression "so-and-so got saved" to mean someone has been born again. I don't know where this came from: it's not in scripture. The closest I can come up with its in Acts 16:30–31, and it's not very close.

Romans 5:10–11 makes it very clear what it means to be saved. Having been justified, we shall be saved. Having been reconciled, we shall be saved. Titus 3:5 says that there are two parts to salvation: there is a "washing of regeneration" and a "renewal of the Holy Spirit."

If we consider what the Scripture says about salvation in the context of the whole counsel of God, the idea that someone went to a gospel meeting and "got saved" is an unscriptural idea. I have no doubt that man has been forgiven and has peace with God: but Scripture doesn't ever use the word "saved" to mean that. Scripture uses the word "saved" to mean that a man has been brought all the way from sinner-ness to being in God's presence. That's why Paul says, "now [is] our salvation nearer than when we believed" (Romans 13:11). Peter says we are "kept guarded by [the] power of God through faith for salvation ready to be revealed in [the] last time" (1 Peter 1:3–9).

William Kelly put it this way:

[Christ] is the power of God not merely to justification, but to salvation; and salvation, while it includes justification, goes far beyond it, because it takes in all the course of a christian man till he is actually in the resurrection state along with Christ. This is the meaning of the verse, "Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling" — not your own forgiveness, but your own salvation. It is said to those who were already forgiven. Thus, salvation, in the sense spoken of there, implies the whole conflict with the power of evil we are passing through.
Lectures on the Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Galatians, p. 153

Why do I make a big deal about this? Because if we use Scriptural terms in non-Scriptural ways, we get ourselves into trouble. We end up having to fudge what Scripture says in one place because we adjusted what it says somewhere else. Indeed, many "trouble passages" are trouble passages only because we misquote them.

Let's take an example: 1 Peter 3:21 and Mark 16:16 both say we are saved by baptism. These are difficult passages for several reasons, let's consider just a couple: First, Scripture very plainly says that we are justified not through baptism, but through faith (Acts 13:38–39; Romans 4:5). Second, Scripture gives a clear example of a man who believed, was not baptized, and was given a personal guarantee that he would be with Christ in Paradise (Luke 23:39–43). So what gives? Does baptism save or not?

The problem here is confusing "salvation" with "justification", "new birth", "regeneration", etc. Scripture doesn't teach baptism justifies, regenerates, gives new life, gives eternal life, but it does teach baptism saves. These are not the same thing.

Of course baptism saves! Scripture teaches clearly salvation by baptism (Mark 16:16, 1 Peter 3:21). It doesn't teach justification by baptism, it doesn't teach regeneration by baptism; but it teaches salvation by baptism. If we start to confuse these things, we start to deny the gospel.

Of course, many who use the word "saved" incorrectly will insist that scripture doesn't teach salvation by baptism. They're wrong: it does. What it doesn't teach is an equivalence between salvation and justification. Their attempts not to teach baptismal regeneration are actually amusing, if you can laugh at that sort of thing.

Here's another example: what does Romans 10 teach?

8 But what says it? The word is near thee, in thy mouth and in thy heart: that is, the word of faith, which we preach: 9 that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth Jesus as Lord, and shalt believe in thine heart that God has raised him from among [the] dead, thou shalt be saved. 10 For with [the] heart is believed to righteousness; and with [the] mouth confession made to salvation.
Romans 10:8–10

I had trouble with those verses for a long time, because they sure sound like justification by works. I couldn't get over the "with the mouth confession is made to salvation" clause. Does that mean we have to do something to earn forgiveness? That doesn't seem to jive too well with Romans 4, does it? In fact, it doesn't jive with itself.

The two clauses in verse 10 are read as equivalent, but they're not. There are two blessings taught in verse 10: righteousness and salvation. We are righteous by believing "with the heart", we have salvation by confession "with the mouth". In one verse we have justification and salvation both. They're not the same thing, and the idea that they are equivalent is carefully guarded against when we consider one is in the heart and the other in the mouth.

Does scripture ever use the word "saved" as the present possession of the believer? It does, particularly in Ephesians, where God's eternal counsels are the subject. In God's eternal counsels we are already saved. And this might give us a hint as to the distinctions between Romans and Ephesians. Romans, the most careful exposition of the gospel in scripture, only uses "salvation" as a future thing.

I should probably mention 2 Thessalonians 2:13–14 here. The subject is salvation, and it's certainly eternal salvation: the Thessalonians were chosen by God "from the beginning" to salvation. But there are two parts to salvation here, just like in Titus 3:5. The two parts in 2 Thessalonians are "sanctification of the Spirit" and "belief of the truth". The second is what we call justification: God freely forgives all who believe. The first is the present work of the Holy Spirit in the life of the believer, sanctification. Again, "salvation" doesn't mean new birth or regeneration, it means the whole package: it means God's taking a sinner, forgiving him, giving him eternal life, and bringing him eventually to full maturity in Christ.

Here's the thing: we don't want to make a man a transgressor for a word. At the same time, I hear teachers among God's people going around with careless language and sloppy exposition. When the apostles we asked,  "what must I do to be saved?" they didn't launch into a  dissertation of soteriology. But when they taught the people of God, they were extremely careful of their language. Nothing makes this more evident than the epistles.

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.

Impossibility

I found this while reading on the train this morning:

It is important to know that the effect of the new birth, and of the grace of God, is not to bring about some change in us on which we could rest, but to convince us of the impossibility of finding righteousness, or suitability to the favour of God, in ourselves.

C. A. Coates, Spiritual Blessings (p. 31)

Futility

A couple weeks ago I put this post up… well, a version of it. There were some definite problems with the original post, so I've done some editing. And some more editing.

Luke 13:6–9; Ezekiel 11:16–21; Colossians 3:1–5

When I was around 20 I could quote Romans 6. Eventually I started believing it. Many years later I realized it's not only true, but also inevitable.

Scripture presents man's heart as incurable (Jeremiah 17:9). Of course God knew this from the very start: God tells the end from the beginning. God has known from the Fall in the Garden that man's was incurably wicked. But the Old Testament is largely the story of God convincing us of what He already knew. I suppose that's really an act of grace on His part.

Johnny D. put it this way:

What then was God doing with men before? Quickening souls assuredly from Adam on; but in His dispensations with men testing their state for their own instruction; in the former world setting them in innocence in the garden of Eden, where they fell, and then on to the flood without any special institution, though not without testimony. That world became so bad, that it was destroyed by the flood. Then in the new world came government in Noah; promise to Abraham called out from the midst of universal idolatry; the law, testing men and bringing in transgression; the prophets, to recall to the law and testify of Christ. Then God said, I have yet one Son: it may be they will reverence my Son. And when they saw Him they said, Come let us kill Him, and the inheritance shall be ours. Not only was man lawless without law, and a transgressor under law, but when grace came in the Person of the blessed Son of God, they would none of it. The presence of a divine Person drew out the enmity of the heart of man against God: "Now they have both seen and hated both me and my Father." So far from their being a link with humanity, or man as a race, it was the final test of their state: God come in grace, as a man in their midst. The result was: Now is the judgment of this world.

(Union in Incarnation, the root error of modern theology, Collected Writings of J. N. Darby, Volume 29, p.193)

So God spent many, many years demonstrating that man is thoroughly evil. The Old Testament prophets give us the conclusion: Isaiah says it this way, "What was there yet to do to my vineyard that I have not done in it?" (Isaiah 5:4). Jeremiah says our hearts are incurably evil (Jeremiah 17:9). But I find Ezekiel's presentation the most striking.

Ezekiel presents God's findings in chapter 11. When things have gotten so bad that the glory of God is leaving the temple in Jerusalem, the Lord tells Ezekiel that He will still bless Israel, but it will require a drastic measure: "And I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you; and I will take away the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them a heart of flesh" (Ezekiel 11:19). When Jeremiah says man's heart is "incurable", he really means it. God looks on our hearts and He doesn't see a project for renovation. When God considers our hearts, He says the solution is a total replacement.

Human nature is like the fig tree that the Lord Jesus talked about (Luke 13:6–9). When a fig tree doesn't bear any fruit, there's no point having it. You might as well cut it down. Not only is it fruitless, but it makes the ground useless, because it's using up space, water, and sunlight that could be producing something else.

In the parable, the vine-dresser asks the vineyard owner to give the tree one last chance. We don't really know how the story ends, the Lord Jesus didn't tell that far. But we do know how the vineyard in Isaiah 6 ended: eventually the Owner said, "I will send my Son, perhaps they will respect Him" (Luke 20:13). But we didn't respect Him, did we? The Son of God came here and walked with men and women, and told them heavenly truth. And almost from the beginning, they tried to kill Him. They finally took the Son of God, nailed Him to a tree, and left Him to die.

This is the point that is so easy to miss: God Himself has tried to work with human nature. He has given them His Word, He gave them His Law, and He sent them His Son. The end result is that His Son was killed. And notice that it wasn't just the lawless Gentiles who killed the Son of God: it was God's own chosen people who handed Him over to be killed (Acts 2:23). God Himself has been unable to make human nature good. It's simply not possible.

Again I'll point out that this wasn't a surprise to God. He didn't set out to try and fix human nature and then give up when He found it was too hard. That's not what happened. He knew from the start how this would end. The point of the whole history of God's dealing with man was to convince us what He already knew.

So what does God do? Does He give up? In a way He does. He is not trying to reform human nature. He says, "you are dead, and your life is hidden with Christ in God" (Colossians 3:3). God has only one solution for sinful flesh. God forgives sinners, but He doesn't fix them. So He looks at me and He says, "as far as I am concerned, you are dead". And this is the key to the Christian life. I have died, and now Christ is my life (Galatians 2:20). I can't ever be good: God Himself hasn't been able to make me good. But He has offered me something else: He won't make me good, but He will kill me off.

In a way, God has actually gotten what He wanted from Man, but only exactly one Man. The Lord Jesus came here as a Man and did everything God wanted. And really, this was God's plan all along, wasn't it? God has placed no demands on us that He didn't intend actually to fulfill in Christ.

God has found what He was looking for in man, and He has stopped looking. So the real question is, since God is content with Christ, are we? Are we still looking for good in fallen man? Or have we agreed with God that all our goodness is in that one Man who has completely pleased the heart of God?

I know I keep harping on about this: really, I do. But that's because it needs to be harped on about. The fact is that this is foundational truth. The Christian life begins with God giving up on Adam's race. Fools that we are, we generally keep trying the very things that God has demonstrated don't work.

Worthy reads

From time to time I get email from someone who's read my blog. A surprising percentage seems to come from people who've read Miles Stanford's books. Perhaps that shouldn't surprise: Stanford liked to quote J. N. Darby, and I'd imagine searches for J. N. Darby online would eventually include this blog.

I was once a much bigger fan of Stanford's than I am now: I think someone could do a lot worse than reading Stanford's books, but someone could do a lot better too. So without picking too much on Stanford, there are some resources that I think are very worthwhile for the believer.

When it comes to the Christian life, Scripture presents both positive and negative truth. Very little "ministry" addresses both the negative and positive aspects of the truth: on the negative side, I am crucified with Christ. I am thus free from sin (in the sense that I am no longer under its power, Romans 6:7). I am no longer under its dominion (Romans 6:14). There is a human responsibility: I must reckon on the truth of my death with Him (Romans 6:10–11). Note that I don't become dead to sin by reckoning: I am dead to sin, the reckoning is merely bringing my thoughts into line with God's.

The positive truth is the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. It's necessary because the believer who has been freed from sin (by his death with Christ) is not empowered to live the Christian life by that same death. My having died with Christ doesn't give me power to walk godly in this world. Dying doesn't imply life. The positive truth is that I have been indwellt by the Spirit of God. I am free from sin because I have been crucified with Christ (Romans 6:6–11), but I am only able to walk the Christian life because I have the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus (Romans 8:2).

Romans doesn't stop in chapter 6. The believer who has learned that he has died with Christ still needs to learn the truth of Romans 7 & 8. Even a man who has died with Christ has the flesh in him. There is still the "law of sin in my members" (Romans 7:21–23). There is only one answer to the "law of sin" in our members, the "law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus" (Romans 8:1–2).

What Scripture teaches is a two-part solution to the problem. First, the believer has died with Christ. This is absolutely necessary to accept. It is not that the believer must die with Christ, but that the believer has died with Him. The Scripture does not even hint that we must die with Christ: it teaches very clearly that we have died with Him. Our responsibility is not to die, but to reckon on the truth that we have died.

But there is a second part: the man who has died with Christ still needs to active and constant intervention of the Spirit of God. Galatians 2:20 connects both these truths in a single verse, Romans spends three chapters explaining them in detail.

If you're wanting some books that cover more or less the same material in a little more depth (and accuracy), I'll recommend a few titles here:

1. From New Birth to New Creation by R. A. Huebner. This is probably the most complete book on the subject I've ever read. It's not perfect by any means, but it's really an excellent book. I've written a little about it before.
2. The Gospel of Our Salvation by H. F. Witherby. This isn't nearly so meaty as Huebner's book, but it's still very good. I wrote about this one too. I ended up giving away my copy before I finished it. Yes, it's that good.
3. The Normal Christian Life by Watchman Nee. People start to tune you out when you bring this one up, but it really is an amazing book. It's not without fault, but it's an absolutely excellent book. If you haven't read this one, you need to read it right away.
4. Finally, there are a few papers by J. N. Darby that must be mentioned in this category. I've listed them last, because they're Darby – they're not the easiest reading:
   1. Forgiveness and liberty
   2. Deliverance
   3. On sealing with the Holy Ghost
   4. Deliverance from the Law of Sin
   5. Cleansing and Deliverance
   6. Cleansing by Water: and what it is to walk in the light.

Deliverance from the Law

I've been reading everything I can find by J. N. Darby on deliverance. I've been reading, re-reading, highlighting, and taking notes. There's a story there, but I haven't time to tell it tonight.

But I wanted to take a break and share something that I feel really must be shared: "Deliverance from under the Law, as stated in the Holy Scriptures" (Collected Writings of J. N. Darby, Volume 7, pp. 127–138), of course available from STEM Publishing. This is a really excellent article, and you should read it.

Here are some quotes to tantalize you:

All hope of deliverance is shewn, in chapter 5, to flow out of justification. But this is not man's thought. He would wish to deliver himself actually from the law of sin by his own effort, and thus be without fault before God; but God will not have it so, and it never could be according to His truth, because that, on the one hand, the work of Christ would have been in vain, and, on the other, man would not have known what is the true nature and sinfulness of sin. If by efforts in the conscience we could find deliverance before God, the work of justification, though it might not be by strength of man, would at least be by the work of the Holy Spirit, and not by the work of Christ. But God will not; and for man it is impossible to have it so; because the work of the Spirit of God is to shew him how intolerable sin is to God, and that the nature of man is not changed. Now his very nature is sin. Man must submit himself to the righteousness of God. Convinced of sin, condemned by the law, he must find his righteousness in another — in Christ, who died for him, and is now risen and in the presence of God. This is the reason why chapters 3 and 5 come before chapters 6 and 7, and verse 1 of chapter 8 before verses 2 and 3. (p. 133)

And another paragraph on the next page:

[I]t ought to be remarked, before going farther, that there are some who make a law of Christ Himself. They acknowledge His love; they see in His work on the cross, how great is His love. They find in it a reason why they should love Christ perfectly, with their whole hearts; but they cannot find this love in themselves. They ought to love Christ with their whole heart, but they do not love Him thus. Now it is precisely the law which commands that we should love God with all our heart. We have found in Christ a new motive, we have perhaps given a new form to the law, but we find ourselves still under the law, though we have clothed it with the name of Christ. (p. 134)

All of J. N. Darby's teaching on practical Christian living can be summed up with one verse:

"I am crucified with Christ, and no longer live, *I*, but Christ lives in me; but [in] that I now live in flesh, I live by faith, the [faith] of the Son of God, who has loved me and given himself for me" (Galatians 2:20, Darby Translation)

The more I read Scripture, the more I recognize Darby is right. The striking character of the Christian life (as taught in the Epistles) is that I have died with Christ. God is not dealing with me as such: my place is in Christ (Philippians 3:9).