J.D. Greear on Assurance

In his book, Stop Asking Jesus Into Your Heart, J.D. Greear writes,

The Enemy – one of whose names in Scripture is “the Deceiver” – loves to keep truly saved believers unsure of their salvation because he knows that if he does they’ll never experience the freedom, joy, and confidence that God wants them to have. But he also loves to keep those on their way to hell deluded into thinking they are on their way to heaven, their consciences immunized from Jesus’ pleas to repent. (p.6)

How ironic that so often it does seem to be the case that many sincere believers in Christ who have no biblically valid reason to doubt their salvation lack assurance, while others who actually have every reason to doubt the validity of their own profession of faith often continue on in a blissful state of ignorance & delusion about the true state of their souls.

For the former, it is a painfully discouraging situation; for the latter it is truly, sadly, and (if left unchanged) eternally disastrous.

What solution does Greear suggest?  That we stop asking Jesus into our hearts over and over again (which is something far too many a modern evangelical can identify with) and “start resting in the finished work of Christ” (p.11).

In other words, remind yourself often, not of some past (and sometimes often-repeated!) experience or decision (i.e. walking an aisle, praying the sinner’s prayer, etc.), but of the gospel itself – the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ on your behalf!  At the end of the day, the way to assurance is not so much to look within (essentially to look to yourself!), but rather to look to Jesus Christ and His perfect righteousness and death on the Cross for sinners.

Boice on Theistic Evolution

Reblogged from The Reformed Reader:

I found J. M. Boice’s critiques of theistic evolution quite helpful. Here’s a shortened and edited version. You can find the entire argument in volume 1 of his commentary on Genesis (p. 52-55).

“First, there is a problem with the supposed truth of evolution itself. The theistic evolutionist believes in evolution, as we have seen. But evolution is not necessarily true, as we have also seen.

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Helpful words on a very important & timely topic. (Plus I highly recommend anything written by James Boice.) :)

John Murray on Sanctification

In his book, Redemption Accomplished and Applied, John Murray writes the following about the sanctification of the believer in Christ:

There is a total difference between surviving sin and reigning sin, the regenerate in conflict with sin and the unregenerate complacent to sin. It is one thing for sin to live in us: it is another for us to live in sin. (p.145)

If you are a Christian and you struggle with sin . . . welcome to the club!  That is not a cause for worry or despair.   The work of the Lord in your sanctification is ongoing; it is lifelong.  You will spend the rest of your life repenting of sin, and you will do that because of the grace of God at work in you!

The time to worry (as Murray says) is if you are complacent in and about your sin.  That is a sign that sin is still reigning in your life.  It is a sign that, despite whatever profession of faith you may have made, you are simply not yet a Christian.

But if you are a believer in Christ, you are no longer a slave to sin.  As Paul writes in Romans 6:20-23,

For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. But what fruit were you getting at that time from the things of which you are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death. But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the fruit you get leads to sanctification and its end, eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

It is vitally important that we understand the difference between “surviving sin and reigning sin.”  The better we understand not only the nature of our justification, but our sanctification in Christ as well, the better equipped we will be to deal with our sins and the doubts that sometimes accompany them.

Justification is 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” (Westminster Shorter Catechism Q.33).  So we are not justified by anything that we do (not by any righteousness of our own!), but only on the basis of the perfect righteousness of Christ, accounted to us by faith alone!

And sanctification is “the work of God’s free grace, whereby we are renewed in the whole man after the image of God, and are enabled more and more to die unto sin, and live unto righteousness” (Westminster Shorter Catechism Q.35).  So, unlike justification (which is a one-time act of God’s grace), sanctification is the ongoing work of God’s free grace in the life of a believer, conforming us more and more into the image of Christ.

Understanding the work of God’s grace in our sanctification (like the act of His grace in our justification) is a key to experiencing the assurance of our salvation in Jesus Christ.  In fact, truly understanding the difference between the two (our justification and our sanctification) is one of the keys to experiencing the assurance of our salvation.

And God most certainly does want every one of us who believes in the name of Jesus Christ to know that we have eternal life (1 John 5:13).

Who said that theology wasn’t practical!

God the Judge

“From thence He shall come to judge the living and the dead.” (The Apostles’ Creed)

The just judgment of God on sinful humanity is one of the essential doctrines of the Christian faith.  It is found again and again in Scripture, and is featured prominently in three of the four great ecumenical Christian creeds.

The Apostles’ Creed, Nicene Creed, and Athanasian Creed all explicitly state that the Lord Jesus Christ Himself will come again “to judge the living and the dead.” (Chalcedon being the only exception, which was not a broad summation of the faith like the other three, but was primarily written to state and defend the orthodox understanding of the hypostatic union of the two natures of Christ.)

And yet the popular misconception has seemingly always persisted that God will not surely judge sinners.  Rob Bell (in his book, Love Wins) is certainly no innovator in that regard.  In fact, the idea that God will not judge sinners is practically the original lie of Satan himself.  In Genesis 3:1 the serpent questioned the Word of God (specifically the commandment against eating the forbidden fruit, which certainly also implied the punishment threatened for transgressing that commandment – death), and then in v.4 flatly denied the just judgment of God, saying, “You will not surely die.”

That lie has been repeated in one form or another again and again throughout history, with deadly results.

J.I. Packer writes,

“People who do not actually read the Bible confidently assure us that when we move from the Old Testament to the New, the theme of divine judgment fades into the background. But if we examine the New Testament, even in the most cursory way, we find at once that the Old Testament emphasis on God’s action as Judge, far from being reduced, is actually intensified.” (Knowing God, p.140)

God does not change (Numbers 23:19; Malachi 3:6; Hebrews 13:8).  The idea that God is somehow different now than He was during the Old Testament is simply untrue.  The idea that the God of the Old Testament was the harsh God of wrath and judgment, while the God of the New Testament is the nice God of love is simply untrue.  God was gracious in the Old Testament, and God is still the righteous Judge of all the earth in the New Testament.

The gospel comes to us and says not “You will not surely die” (Genesis 3:4), but rather that Jesus has died in the place of sinners.  The good news is not that the judgment of God has somehow been done away with or abrogated, but that it has been fulfilled – God’s wrath has been poured out upon Jesus Christ on the Cross!  A sinless substitute has been fully punished for our sins in our place!

We are not only saved from judgment, but saved through (or by) judgment – through the Son of God Himself (the Judge!) taking the punishment for our sins!  So if you are a believer in Jesus Christ, you no longer need to fear the final judgment, for the Judge of the living and the dead is the One who died for your salvation!  As Paul writes in Romans 8:31-34,

What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us.

Who shall bring a charge against God’s elect when the Judge Himself is the One who died for our sins and was raised from the dead, and is also the One who ever lives to intercede for His people at the right hand of God the Father!

The Lord's Supper and Assurance

Reblogged from The Reformed Reader:

The Lord’s Supper is a holy sacrament that Jesus gave to his church to help strengthen us in the Christian faith.  If you’re a Christian who is weak, weary, full of doubts, and in need of God’s love and grace, don’t avoid the table – go to it with repentant faith.  Thomas Brooks put it this way.

“ was the principle end of Christ’s institution of the sacrament of the Supper that he might assure them of his love, and that he might seal up to them the forgiveness of their sins, the acceptance of their persons, and the salvation of their souls (Matt.

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A good reminder about one of the primary purposes of the Lord's Supper as a sign and seal of God's grace to us in Jesus Christ!

“At Home” In Sin?

Some strong, but ever-so-timely words from the late John Murray (1898-1975) regarding the effectual calling of the Holy Spirit in the lives of believers:

“If we find ourselves at home in the ungodliness, lust, and filth of this present world, it is because we have not been called effectually by God’s grace.” (John Murray, Redemption Accomplished and Applied, p.92)

What is effectual calling?  The Westminster Shorter Catechism (Q.31) defines it as “the work of God’s Spirit, whereby, convicting us of our sin and misery, enlightening our minds in the knowledge of Christ, and renewing our wills, He does persuade and enable us to embrace Jesus Christ, freely offered to us in the gospel.”

So in other words, if we (to use Murray’s phrase) still “find ourselves at home in the ungodliness, lust, and filth of this present world” it shows that the Holy Spirit has not worked in us to convict us of our sin and misery.  Sinners who are “at home” in sin do not perceive the sinfulness of sin.  Sinners who are “at home” in sin do not see it as the source of their misery.

And so Murray is also saying that being “at home” in sin is also evidence that one has not truly been enlightened in the knowledge of Christ, nor has he or she truly embraced Jesus Christ by faith as He is freely offered to us in the gospel.  All this is to say that being “at home” in sin is evidence that one is not yet truly a believer in Christ at all.

Are you “at home” in sin?  Then, simply put, you are not yet a Christian.

But there is a world of difference between being “at home” in sin (in other words, seeing nothing wrong with it, being quite comfortable in it), and being a believer who simply struggles with sin.  Struggling with sin shows that one is convicted that it is, in fact, sin.  Struggling with sin shows that one is convicted of the misery of sin.

If you are a believer in Jesus Christ and are struggling with sin, welcome to the club!  You are in some pretty good company.  Even the Apostle Paul himself struggled with sin!  Look at his words in Romans 7:15-23 (ESV):

For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. 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. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.
So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, 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.

Sound familiar? Feel familiar?

And what was his solution?  Look at what he wrote in the next two verses:

Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin. (Romans 7:24-25 ESV)

When you feel the weight of your struggle with sin, let that drive you all the more to Jesus Christ.  Cling to Him by faith.  Thanks be to God through Jesus our Lord, for He is the One who will deliver us from this body of death!

John Calvin on Prayer

Anyone who thinks that Calvinism is somehow antithetical to prayer simply has not read Calvin.   They certainly have not read what he has written about the subject of prayer.

Chapter XX (approximately 70 pages long) of his Institutes of the Christian Religion is all focused on the great subject of prayer as a means of grace.  In the opening pages of this chapter, he writes:

“Words fail to explain how necessary prayer is, and in how many ways the exercise of prayer is profitable.” (Vol.2, p.851)

So Calvin not only believed in the necessity of prayer, but he practically didn’t know where to begin to explain just how necessary and how helpful it is to us as believers in Jesus Christ!