Theological & Doxological Meditation #30
Q. How doth the Spirit apply to us the redemption purchased by Christ?
A. The Spirit applieth to us
the redemption purchased by Christ,
by working faith in us (Eph 2:8),
and thereby uniting us to Christ
in our effectual calling (Eph 3:17; 1 Cor 1:9).
By Grace I’m Saved, Grace Free and Boundless
#456, The Trinity Hymnal (© 1990)
Christian L. Scheidt, 1742, centro
Alt. 1990, mod.
By grace I’m saved,
grace free and boundless;
my soul, believe and doubt it not.
Why stagger at this word of promise?
Has Scripture ever falsehood taught?
No; then this word must true remain:
by grace you too shall heav’n obtain.
By grace! None dare lay claim to merit;
our works and conduct have no worth.
God in his love sent our Redeemer,
Christ Jesus, to this sinful earth;
his death did for our sins atone,
and we are saved by grace alone.
By grace! O mark this word of promise
when you are by your sins oppressed,
when Satan plagues your troubled conscience,
and when your heart is seeking rest.
What reason cannot comprehend
God by his grace to you will send.
By grace! This ground of faith is certain;
so long as God is true, it stands.
What saints have penned by inspiration,
what in his Word our God commands,
what our whole faith must rest upon,
is grace alone, grace in his Son.
Theological and Doxological Meditation #29
Redemption Applied
The Cambridge Declaration of the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals
Speaking of the Solas, there are a few bloggers out there wondering, “Who devised the ‘Five Solas of the Reformation’ in the first place?” I’ll direct you to one post, and you can follow the trail of links if you are so inclined.
Furthermore, since I’ve finally put in writing how the historic evangelical distinctive of Sola Scriptura has devolved in the life of many evangelicals, I would now like to not merely “curse the darkness” (if you will–Baptist readers, try not to take this reference too personally or literally) but “light a light.” I affirm the following declaration and believe the essence of its theses is vital to a genuine reformation of contemporary evangelical traditions of every variety.
John D. Chitty
April 20, 1996
Evangelical churches today are increasingly dominated by the spirit of this age rather than by the Spirit of Christ. As evangelicals, we call ourselves to repent of this sin and to recover the historic Christian faith.
In the course of history words change. In our day this has happened to the word “evangelical.” In the past it served as a bond of unity between Christians from a wide diversity of church traditions. Historic evangelicalism was confessional. It embraced the essential truths of Christianity as those were defined by the great ecumenical councils of the church. In addition, evangelicals also shared a common heritage in the “solas” of the sixteenth century Protestant Reformation.
Today the light of the Reformation has been significantly dimmed. The consequence is that the word “evangelical” has become so inclusive as to have lost its meaning. We face the peril of losing the unity it has taken centuries to achieve. Because of this crisis and because of our love of Christ, his gospel and his church, we endeavor to assert anew our commitment to the central truths of the Reformation and of historic evangelicalism. These truths we affirm not because of their role in our traditions, but because we believe that they are central to the Bible.
Sola Scriptura: The Erosion of Authority
Scripture alone is the inerrant rule of the church’s life, but the evangelical church today has separated Scripture from its authoritative function. In practice, the church is guided, far too often, by the culture. Therapeutic technique, marketing strategies, and the beat of the entertainment world often have far more to say about what the church wants, how it functions and what it offers, than does the Word of God. Pastors have neglected their rightful oversight of worship, including the doctrinal content of the music. As biblical authority has been abandoned in practice, as its truths have faded from Christian consciousness, and as its doctrines have lost their saliency, the church has been increasingly emptied of its integrity, moral authority and direction.
Rather than adapting Christian faith to satisfy the felt needs of consumers, we must proclaim the law as the only measure of true righteousness and the gospel as the only announcement of saving truth. Biblical truth is indispensable to the church’s understanding, nurture and discipline.
Scripture must take us beyond our perceived needs to our real needs and liberate us from seeing ourselves through the seductive images, cliches, promises and priorities of mass culture. It is only in the light of God’s truth that we understand ourselves aright and see God’s provision for our need. The Bible, therefore, must be taught and preached in the church. Sermons must be expositions of the Bible and its teachings, not expressions of the preacher’s opinions or the ideas of the age. We must settle for nothing less than what God has given.
The work of the Holy Spirit in personal experience cannot be disengaged from Scripture. The Spirit does not speak in ways that are independent of Scripture. Apart from Scripture we would never have known of God’s grace in Christ. The biblical Word, rather than spiritual experience, is the test of truth.
Thesis One: Sola Scriptura
We reaffirm the inerrant Scripture to be the sole source of written divine revelation,which alone can bind the conscience. The Bible alone teaches all that is necessary for our salvation from sin and is the standard by which all Christian behavior must be measured.
We deny that any creed, council or individual may bind a Christian’s conscience, that the Holy Spirit speaks independently of or contrary to what is set forth in the Bible, or that personal spiritual experience can ever be a vehicle of revelation.
Solus Christus: The Erosion of Christ-Centered Faith
As evangelical faith becomes secularized, its interests have been blurred with those of the culture. The result is a loss of absolute values, permissive individualism, and a substitution of wholeness for holiness, recovery for repentance, intuition for truth, feeling for belief, chance for providence, and immediate gratification for enduring hope. Christ and his cross have moved from the center of our vision.
Thesis Two: Solus Christus
We reaffirm that our salvation is accomplished by the mediatorial work of the historical Christ alone. His sinless life and substitutionary atonement alone are sufficient for our justification and reconciliation to the Father.
We deny that the gospel is preached if Christ’s substitutionary work is not declared and faith in Christ and his work is not solicited.
Sola Gratia: The Erosion of The Gospel
Unwarranted confidence in human ability is a product of fallen human nature. This false confidence now fills the evangelical world; from the self-esteem gospel, to the health and wealth gospel, from those who have transformed the gospel into a product to be sold and sinners into consumers who want to buy, to others who treat Christian faith as being true simply because it works. This silences the doctrine of justification regardless of the official commitments of our churches.
God’s grace in Christ is not merely necessary but is the sole efficient cause of salvation. We confess that human beings are born spiritually dead and are incapable even of cooperating with regenerating grace.
Thesis Three: Sola Gratia
We reaffirm that in salvation we are rescued from God’s wrath by his grace alone. It is the supernatural work of the Holy Spirit that brings us to Christ by releasing us from our bondage to sin and raising us from spiritual death to spiritual life.
We deny that salvation is in any sense a human work. Human methods, techniques or strategies by themselves cannot accomplish this transformation. Faith is not produced by our unregenerated human nature.
Sola Fide: The Erosion of The Chief Article
Justification is by grace alone through faith alone because of Christ alone. This is the article by which the church stands or falls. Today this article is often ignored, distorted or sometimes even denied by leaders, scholars and pastors who claim to be evangelical. Although fallen human nature has always recoiled from recognizing its need for Christ’s imputed righteousness, modernity greatly fuels the fires of this discontent with the biblical Gospel. We have allowed this discontent to dictate the nature of our ministry and what it is we are preaching.
Many in the church growth movement believe that sociological understanding of those in the pew is as important to the success of the gospel as is the biblical truth which is proclaimed. As a result, theological convictions are frequently divorced from the work of the ministry. The marketing orientation in many churches takes this even further, erasing the distinction between the biblical Word and the world, robbing Christ’s cross of its offense, and reducing Christian faith to the principles and methods which bring success to secular corporations.
While the theology of the cross may be believed, these movements are actually emptying it of its meaning. There is no gospel except that of Christ’s substitution in our place whereby God imputed to him our sin and imputed to us his righteousness. Because he bore our judgment, we now walk in his grace as those who are forever pardoned, accepted and adopted as God’s children. There is no basis for our acceptance before God except in Christ’s saving work, not in our patriotism, churchly devotion or moral decency. The gospel declares what God has done for us in Christ. It is not about what we can do to reach him.
Thesis Four: Sola Fide
We reaffirm that justification is by grace alone through faith alone because of Christ alone. In justification Christ’s righteousness is imputed to us as the only possible satisfaction of God’s perfect justice.
We deny that justification rests on any merit to be found in us, or upon the grounds of an infusion of Christ’s righteousness in us, or that an institution claiming to be a church that denies or condemns sola fide can be recognized as a legitimate church.
Soli Deo Gloria: The Erosion of God-Centered Worship
Wherever in the church biblical authority has been lost, Christ has been displaced, the gospel has been distorted, or faith has been perverted, it has always been for one reason: our interests have displaced God’s and we are doing his work in our way. The loss of God’s centrality in the life of today’s church is common and lamentable. It is this loss that allows us to transform worship into entertainment, gospel preaching into marketing, believing into technique, being good into feeling good about ourselves, and faithfulness into being successful. As a result, God, Christ and the Bible have come to mean too little to us and rest too inconsequentially upon us.
God does not exist to satisfy human ambitions, cravings, the appetite for consumption, or our own private spiritual interests. We must focus on God in our worship, rather than the satisfaction of our personal needs. God is sovereign in worship; we are not. Our concern must be for God’s kingdom, not our own empires, popularity or success.
Thesis Five: Soli Deo Gloria
We reaffirm that because salvation is of God and has been accomplished by God, it is for God’s glory and that we must glorify him always. We must live our entire lives before the face of God, under the authority of God and for his glory alone.
We deny that we can properly glorify God if our worship is confused with entertainment, if we neglect either Law or Gospel in our preaching, or if self-improvement, self-esteem or self-fulfillment are allowed to become alternatives to the gospel.
A Call To Repentance & Reformation
The faithfulness of the evangelical church in the past contrasts sharply with its unfaithfulness in the present. Earlier in this century, evangelical churches sustained a remarkable missionary endeavor, and built many religious institutions to serve the cause of biblical truth and Christ’s kingdom. That was a time when Christian behavior and expectations were markedly different from those in the culture. Today they often are not. The evangelical world today is losing its biblical fidelity, moral compass and missionary zeal.
We repent of our worldliness. We have been influenced by the “gospels” of our secular culture, which are no gospels. We have weakened the church by our own lack of serious repentance, our blindness to the sins in ourselves which we see so clearly in others, and our inexcusable failure to adequately tell others about God’s saving work in Jesus Christ.
We also earnestly call back erring professing evangelicals who have deviated from God’s Word in the matters discussed in this Declaration. This includes those who declare that there is hope of eternal life apart from explicit faith in Jesus Christ, who claim that those who reject Christ in this life will be annihilated rather than endure the just judgment of God through eternal suffering, or who claim that evangelicals and Roman Catholics are one in Jesus Christ even where the biblical doctrine of justification is not believed.
The Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals asks all Christians to give consideration to implementing this Declaration in the church’s worship, ministry, policies, life and evangelism.
For Christ’s sake.
Amen.
Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals Executive Council (1996)
Dr. John Armstrong
The Rev. Alistair Begg
Dr. James M. Boice
Dr. W. Robert Godfrey
Dr. John D. Hannah
Dr. Michael S. Horton
Mrs. Rosemary Jensen
Dr. R. Albert Mohler, Jr.
Dr. Robert M. Norris
Dr. R.C. Sproul
Dr. Gene Edward Veith
Dr. David Wells
Dr. Luder Whitlock
Dr. J.A.O. Preus, III
FOR FURTHER READING, SEE ALSO:
Highlights From The Cambridge Summit Meeting
An Introduction to The Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals, by James M. Boice
This declaration may be reproduced without permission. Please credit the source by citing the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals.
The Baptist Version of “Sola Scriptura”
Theological and Doxological Meditation #28
Alistair Begg Shows ‘Em How It’s Done
Go straight to Reforming Baptist and link to a local news interview featuring Alistair Begg answering all the hot potato questions that have gotten other megachurch pastors in trouble with their own people. Way to go, Pastor Begg!
Christmas Countdown
Theological and Doxological Meditation #27
Christ’s humiliation consist?
and that in a low condition (Luke 2:7),
made under the law (Galatians 4:4),
undergoing the miseries of this life (Isaiah 53:3),
the wrath of God (Matthew 27:46),
and the cursed death of the cross (Philippians 2:8),
in being buried,
and continuing under the power of death for a time (Matthew 12:40).
Captain Headknowledge for Kids
My Wednesday nights are dedicated to taking the truth of Scripture and learning how to effectively present it to kids. Working with kids reminds me that the lessons I teach must focus on one single point which is underscored by everything else in the lesson. I’m not always successful at this. After all, I’m Captain Headknowledge! I don’t talk long about much. I draw a blank when sports, politics, finances, etc. are the topics at hand, but if you get me on theology, unless I can tell you know more than me, I’m hard to shut up. That’s not conducive to highlighting one single point. I’m the theology geek your fundamentalist mother warned you about. But that’s why I work with kids in the AWANA program at my church. Captain Headknowledge remains a work in progress.
Another weakness in my teaching skills is my lack of interest in finding illustrative material to supplement my teaching. I relate well to what I once read about William Carey when he preached before the group of men charged with examining him in view of his ordination. After Carey’s sermon, one of the men critiqued his sermon by saying something like, “We see you are very capable of telling your hearers what the truth is, but you need to learn to also tell them what the truth is like.” Right there with ya’, Will!
Occasionally, as I’m preparing my AWANA lessons, and others I’ve taught in other classes in the past, an illustration or, in this case, an analogous object lesson of sorts, will give me a particular thrill. I would like to share my most recent one with you today.
I’ve been teaching “expository” lessons on a significant portion of Paul’s second letter to Timothy, leading up to the famous verse after which AWANA is named. As most of you probably know, AWANA stands for “Approved Workers Are Not Ashamed.”
While I started at the beginning of the school year at 2 Timothy 1:7, I have finally arrived at the final paragraph, in which is contained the verse for which the children’s program is its namesake.
“Remind them of these things, and charge them before God not to quarrel about words, which does no good, but only ruins the hearers. Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth. But avoid irreverent babble, for it will lead people into more and more ungodliness, and their talk will spread like gangrene. Among them are Hymaneus and Philetus, who have swerved from the truth, saying that the resurrection has already happened. They are upsetting the faith of some. God’s firm foundation stands, bearing this seal: ‘The Lord knows those who are his,’ and, ‘Let everyone who names the name of the Lord depart from iniquity.'”
As I considered verses 14 through 16, I observed that the AWANA verse, verse 15, is “sandwiched” between two verses which seem to provide the photographic negative of one or the other of the two components I’d been drilling into my boys’ heads all year (“Approved Workers . . . (1) Believe the Gospel, and (2) Live Godly.”). Thus came to me my object lesson. I went to the store and bought a loaf of bread, went to the cabinet and grabbed the peanut butter, then to the refrigerator for a squeeze bottle of jelly, scooped up the wife and the three school-age members of my bevy of five children, and hit the road for the Wednesday night service (ask me to forward you a copy of my pastor’s PowerPoint outline introducing his current exposition on the book of Romans, from which I am providentially “let hitherto” in God’s goodness and wisdom).
The Approved Worker Sandwich
1. Unapproved Workers Rewrite the Gospel and Can Ruin Your Faith(“Foundational” Slice of Bread) ” . . . charge them before God not to quarrel about words, which does no good, but only ruins the hearers.”
2. Approved Workers Believe the Gospel (Peanut Butter–the Protein in PB Satisfies Your Hunger) ” . . . rightly handling the word of truth.”
3. Approved Workers Live Godly (Jelly–Jelly is Sweet, Just Like Godly Lives) “Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed . . . “
4. Unapproved Workers’ Irreverent Babble Promotes Ungodliness (Top Slice of Bread) “But avoid irreverent babble, for it will lead people into more and more ungodliness, and their talk will spread like gangrene.”
Hymaneus and Philetus are prime examples of “unapproved workers.” They are an example of what not to be and do. They don’t believe the good news that Jesus died for our sins and rose for our justification, so they rewrite their doctrine about the resurrection, which is so closely tied to Christ’s resurrection, which is one aspect of the Gospel. By this false teaching, Hymaneus and Philetus ruined the faith of those who received their teaching.
Hymaneus and Philetus also served as examples of “unapproved workers” in that their irreverent babble spread like gangrene and undermined the godliness of those who followed their teaching and example.
Paul instructed Timothy to charge the Ephesians to neither “argue about words,” and thereby corrupt the purity of the Gospel, nor engage in irreverent babble and thereby promote ungodliness in their own behavior and the behavior of those who may be influenced by their example. Consider, for instance, my kid-friendly illustration–how that they do this on TV all the time. Sometimes they show people doing bad things in a funny way; or they show people do good things in a goofy way. Either way, we laugh about it, and if we’re not careful to keep in mind what’s really right and wrong, we can be led to think the bad thing isn’t that bad and the good thing isn’t that good. False teachers are irreverent about the gospel and godly living. They’ll make fun of those who believe the true gospel and they’ll make fun of those who try to show they believe the true gospel by living godly. They’ll laugh at them and get others laughing at them and all the time they are losing more and more faith in the gospel and respect for godly believers.
But Paul does not just load Timothy down with such a pile of imperatives alone. His instructions are explicitly based (as ours should ALWAYS be! Ahem!!) on some very edifying indicatives, which, speaking of sandwiches, both proceed and follow the present passage (an imperative sandwich! Mmm!!)
Notice that verse fourteen begins with “Remind them of these things.” What things? “If we have died with him, we will also live with him; if we endure, will also reign. (vs. 11, 12) and in keeping with a popular form of Pauline homiletics, “But God’s firm foundation stands sure, having this seal, ‘The Lord knows those who are his’ (v. 17). Professing believers may far too often be led astray by ungodly and argumentative irreverends of spiritual ruination, but, take heart, says Paul, none of God’s elect will ever be irrevocably lost after this manner! God preserves his elect and they will persevere in their belief in the Gospel, the end of the right handling of the Word of truth, and they will persevere in their “experimental Calvinism,” their godly lives, until the end of the age, at which time they will be able to present themselves to God once and for all as workers who have no need to be ashamed! Thus Paul encouraged Timothy to serve the flock of God under his charge by the power of the indwelling Spirit, guarding the good deposit (another term for the Word of truth, the central point of which is the good news of redemption in the Person and Work of the Lord Jesus Christ) which has been entrusted to him.
I offer this presentation to my fellow Reformed bloggers not, as some may assume, to glory in what a great exeget, expositor and homileticist I am, but for your collective constructive criticism. I’m out to continue learning how to teach God’s Word God’s way with the help of those of you who are a little further down the Reformation trail.
The End of the Romans Revolution 2006
7 What then shall we say? That the law is sin? By no means! Yet if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin. I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, “You shall not covet.” 8 But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. Apart from the law, sin lies dead. 9 I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin came alive and I died. 10 The very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me. 11 For sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me. 12 So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.
13 Did that which is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin, producing death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure. 14 For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin. 15 I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. 16 Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. 17 So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. 18 For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. 19 For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. 20 Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.
21 So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. 22 For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, 23 but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. 24 Wretched man that I am!
Again, for this revolutionary truth found in the book of Romans and the rest of the Bible, we can only give thanks to God through Jesus Christ our Lord, because “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” (notice the period at the end of this sentence!)
Technical Difficulties–Please Stand By
For those of you who enjoyed my recent post on Harold John Ockenga, I want you to know that human error is to blame for its subsequent disappearance. I may replace it soon, but, not today.
Enjoyed all the comments it generated! Sorry for the inconvenience.
Thus concludes this misadventure . . .
A Plea for Inconsistency
I had a conversation with a friend of mine a few weeks ago. He’s a Southern Baptist who, as so many of them do today, holds to four of Arminius’ five points. Fortunately, his thinking is inconsistent enough to affirm “eternal security.” But he told me a relative of his was sharing some scripture with him that was beginning to persuade him to believe that a believer just might lose his salvation (“Danger, Will Robinson! Danger!!”) if he refuses to confess his sin. While he already believes that man is fallen, but not so fallen that he can’t do any good accompanying salvation, God’s election of him is conditioned on his decision to receive Christ, Jesus died to make everyone in the world “saveable,” and that, just because the Holy Spirit may be the divine source of faith, and may have awakened you to your need for Christ, that doesn’t mean you have to receive him, my poor friend was in danger of becoming a consistent, five-point Arminian. Now, we just can’t have that!
The saving grace of the overwhelming majority of Southern Baptists is that they haven’t fallen so far from their Calvinist heritage that they’ve enmasse denied the truth that once God has regenerated you, you can “fall from grace” and lose your salvation. They are saved from five-point Arminianism by their logical inconsistency. Of course, it is consistent with a self-centered worldview. Many believers may be offended by the total depravity of the sinner, the sovereignty of God in his unconditional election, the particular redemption of Christ, and the effectual call of the Holy Spirit, because that’s not fair to whomever God was pleased to leave to receive justice, but they’re certainly not offended when the grace over which they’re ultimately sovereign is promised to keep them for eternity! Oh, the blessed consistency of the self-centered four-point Arminian. His focus on his sovereignty and his benefit may be consistent, but his soteriology is definitely (no pun intended) inconsistent.
I attempted to share with my friend some truths from the book of Romans that affirm the Southern Baptist doctrine of “eternal security,” and argued that it goes along with another truth of which he may not have been familiar; namely, the four and a half points of Calvinism to which he currently objects!
I jotted down a short outline of the book of Romans, a survey of the doctrines of grace in each section of the book, and a “moral” or application which underscores his security in the light of the justification which was unconditionally and effectively applied to him. Thought I’d share them with you for your edification and, if need be, scrutiny. Please share with me your thoughts. What did I miss? Did I cover the bases thoroughly enough? Did I strike out? You be the judge.
One of the best ways to get election and eternal security straightened out, and God’s absolute sovereignty over both, is to study the book of Romans. The book of Romans is primarily concerned with the doctrine of justification by faith. If you notice the general outline of Romans, that condemnation and justification are two objective opposites, all the rest falls into place.
Romans 1-3 Condemnation in Adam
Romans 4-8 Justification in Christ
Romans 9-11 Justification and the Jews
Romans 12-16 Living in the Light of Justification in Christ
1-3 Condmenation is our natural state from conception, imputed to us because of our covenantal relationship with God in Adam;
4-8 Christ came as the last Adam to keep the Law, which Adam failed to keep, and to thereby earn eternal life as a man, that his righteousness may be imputed to all whom God has foreknown (defined as, “The Father’s savingly loving the elect before creation”), predestined (defined as, “The Father’s appointing the elect to obtain salvation”), called (defined as the Holy Spirit’s effectively applying the benefits of Christ’s redemption to the elect), justified (defined as “the Father’s declaring believers righteous in Christ”), and glorified (defined as, “The believers’ ultimate conformity to the image of Christ, morally and physically”). Paul applies our justification not only to our initial repentance toward God and faith toward Christ, but to the elect’s whole life of repentance and faith.
9-11 Paul raises and answers the question of God’s faithfulness to the Abrahamic covenant, considering the fact that Gentiles now predominate in “the Israel of God.” Paul’s answer is that God’s Israel are not those who are genealogical children of Abraham, but all who share Abraham’s faith by the sovereign, electing mercy of God, whether Jew or Gentile;
12-16 After eleven chapters of solid theology on the objective doctrine of justification by faith and lays the foundation for the believer’s subjective experience of progressive sanctification, Paul now gets “practical.” In view of the mercies of God (in other words, in view of the doctrine of justification by faith in Christ), Paul beseeches his readers to present themselves as living sacrifices, to exercise the gifts God has given each for the good of the many, gives a list of marks of the true Christian, appeals to us to submit to authority, to fulfill the Law through love, to refrain from judging brothers in Christ, to avoid offending brothers in Christ, or influencing them to violate their conscience and sin against God, to do all as eternally justified believers in the light of Christ’s example, looking forward to the mutual hope shared by believing Jews and Gentiles.
“Now to him who is able to strengthen you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery that was kept secret for long ages, but has now been disclosed and through the prophetic writings has been made known to all nations, according to the command of the eternal God, to bring about the obedienc of faith–to the only wise God be glory forevermore through Jesus Christ. Amen” (Romans 16:25-27)
Moral
Allow the objective fact of justification to reassure you in the face of the fact of your subjective failure to be perfectly obedient now. Even though you fail, because of your justification, you walk according to the Spirit, have your mind set on the things of the Spirit, are under grace and free from the condemnation of the Law. And that’s the truth (raspberry)!
postscript: for a great sermon by John Piper on the doxology which closes the book of Romans, and how God strengthens believers, not by anything apart from the gospel, but by the gospel itself (and, like Luther, may I add, the gospel alone–solus benedictus? Somebody help me out with my Latin for “The Gospel Alone”!) click here. There you go, Bob, this post makes me first loser!
What Do You Listen For?
“In all our preaching, we must never lose sight of the hill called Calvary, where the Son of Man was killed in our place. Regardless of the text or topic at hand, there must be some view of Calvary in every sermon. Your congregation should experience the amazing and comforting sight of the crucified Savior each and every time you preach. They sould anticipate the sight of Calvary in every sermon, and rejoice when it comes into view. And all the more, when the cross is not immediately obvious in the text. ‘Where is the hill?’ they should be asking. ‘Where is that blessed hill on which our precious Savior died?’ We should exalt Christ’s finished work in our sermons so as to comfort the converted and convict the unbeliever.
“Spurgeon’s example should inspire us: ‘I received some years ago orders from my Master to stand at the foot of the cross until he comes. He has not come yet, but I mean to stand there until he does’ (C. H. Spurgeon, “The Old, Old Story,” The Spurgeon Archive, http://www.spurgeon.org/sermons/0446.htm (accessed July 2006)). Let us stand with the Prince of Preachers, gentlemen. As we preach the whole counsel of God, let us keep the cross central–by doing so, we will indeed be watching our doctrine.”
Theological and Doxological Meditation #26
The Misadventures of Captain Headknowledge 
Lex Talionis: From the Palace, to the Rabbit Hole, to the Courtroom, To the Gallows
13:1 Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. 2 Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment. 3 For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval, 4 for he is God’s servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God’s wrath on the wrongdoer. 5 Therefore one must be in subjection, not only to avoid God’s wrath but also for the sake of conscience. 6 For the same reason you also pay taxes, for the authorities are ministers of God, attending to this very thing. 7 Pay to all what is owed to them: taxes to whom taxes are owed, revenue to whom revenue is owed, respect to whom respect is owed, honor to whom honor is owed.8 Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. 9 The commandments, “You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,” and any other commandment, are summed up in this word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” 10 Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.
Share this: