Separation from Error
A Confession of Faith is a summary of God’s most vital truth to man. It deflects major falsehoods, be they straightforward or sophisticated. A falsehood that I was burdened to separate from some time ago, which I did with help from a Confession or two, is a major one. The inevitable concessions that follow from that falsehood are surprisingly serious. These concessions follow from trying to reconcile the irreconcilable—a foolish endeavor that was attempted by three men whose anxiety about what the Bible says overcame their reverence for God. The following verses contain the two lines of truth that they undertook to harmonize:
“Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will, and whom he will he hardeneth. Thou wilt say then unto me, why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will? Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, why hast thou made me thus? Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour?” (Romans 9. 18-21.)
The two pillars alluded to here are the Sovereignty of God and the Responsibility of Man. Both are true to the fullest extent that can be derived from what it means to be sovereign and responsible. God is totally sovereign. Man is utterly responsible. God hardens a man’s heart. But he still finds fault with this man for not repenting. Sovereignty is a word that we use to describe the right and exercise of supreme authority. We have that in, “Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will.” Man’s reply is the problem, “Why doth he yet find fault?” And the answer to this impetuous objection is the rhetorical question, “O man, who art thou that repliest against God?” In other words, “Never mind, for God does as he pleases.” There is no reply allowed in the face of what God does. And therefore man is simply responsible to God, even if God has not chosen him to a merciful end. Man’s mouth should be stopped right here, as it will certainly be on Judgment Day. That God is sovereign is the only answer to, “Why doth he yet find fault?” There is no conflict or friction between Sovereignty and Responsibility unless we ask that question. “Why doth he yet find fault?” Since God has mercy on whomever he chooses to have mercy on, why does he yet find fault with persons he has not chosen to be merciful toward? Try to settle that question (with some other answer than ‘God is Sovereign’) in order to satisfy your overcurious mind, and you will distort the doctrines of Sovereignty and Responsibility both. You will have to undervalue one line of truth in your effort to bring the two together; and while you are busy belittling the one, the other will become a monster behind your back. The temptation is to say that God is unfair and that man is not responsible to him, unless God chooses, or has chosen, to have mercy on all, and that it is the sinner’s prerogative to conform to, or else frustrate, the divine will by either believing or not believing. The revelation is that God is sovereign to not choose every person to a good end—to pass by a segment of sinners, whose destiny, determined from eternity, is everlasting misery. Who are we to question his sovereign decrees? God’s answer to our questioning is, “Nay, but O man, who art thou that repliest against God?” Before examining and criticizing the error of persisting against God’s answer concerning his right over his creatures, here is a brief commentary by C. H. Spurgeon on the issue in question:
“The system of truth is not one straight line, but two. No man will ever get a right view of the gospel until he knows how to look at the two lines at once…Now, if I were to declare that man was so free to act, that there is no presidence of God over his actions, I should be driven very near to Atheism; and if, on the other hand, I declare that God so overrules all things, as that man is not free to be responsible, I am driven at once to Antinomianism or fatalism. That God predestinates, and that man is responsible, are two things that few can see. They are believed to be inconsistent and contradictory; but they are not…These two truths, I do not believe, can ever be welded into one upon any human anvil, but one they shall be in eternity: they are two lines that are so nearly parallel, that the mind that shall pursue them farthest, will never discover that they converge; but they do converge, and they will meet somewhere in eternity, close to the throne of God, whence all truth doth spring” (C. H. Spurgeon, Sovereign Grace and Man’s Responsibility.)
C. H. Spurgeon is an authority whose ministry was authenticated by the Holy Ghost. His judgment on a matter like this should not be taken lightly. He would have looked into it; he would have meditated on it; he would have prayed about it; and he often did preach and write about it. God chooses whom to have mercy on; but he finds fault with the souls that he has not chosen to a merciful end. The Bible’s answer to the apparent unfairness of that is to never mind: “Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus?” So man should leave the puzzle alone, and continue to preach: “Whosoever believeth in him shall receive remission of sins” (Acts 10.43.) It is not for us to find out why man is responsible to come to God even if he cannot—even if he’s not among the elect. We simply accept that man’s willingness to believe and repent depends on God’s choice: “And the Lord added to the church daily such as should be saved” (Acts 2.47.) In other words, God grants the increase (1 Corinthians 3.6.) But along come these minor scholars. Imagine their stubborn arrogance. They are going to appease the apparent contradiction between Sovereignty and Responsibility—something that the greatest theologians do not attempt, not even the apostle Paul, and they will do it in a booklet, in 63 small pages of script! Yet they are not ashamed to say, “This is a matter that cannot be approached in a spirit of nonchalance.” I may not be charged with doing the same in this article, for I am not attempting the impossible and forbidden, only exposing the folly of three men who tried. From the back cover, their objective is:
“The authors of this book on Election and Free Will have attempted to find the balance between two lines of truth which may seem to be contradictory. Their desire is to help some believers who have been confused by too much emphasis on either” (Franklin Taylor, Harold Mackay, Robert McClurkin, Biblical Balance on Election & Free Will.)
Election involves Sovereignty; the Will of man, whether free or not, involves Responsibility. These three men will transform the apparent clash existing between these concepts into a dovetail! Serious repercussions result from the indiscretion of trying to understand how God is sovereign to choose, while man is responsible to a God who does not choose him—how God can choose to withhold mercy, and how man must be responsible to repent anyway. The negative deductions could be easily avoided by simply resting satisfied in God being sovereign. I will line up some of what these men say in their less than precious booklet, and place the sayings beside my Westminster Confession in order to show what document agrees most with Scripture. First, I will line up statements about Election, and comment a little; then I will line up statements on Sovereignty in particular, and comment on that. The order will be: Misters Taylor, McClurkin, and Mackay (X); Scripture (Y); The Westminster Confession of Faith (Z.)
(X) “Individuals are not in the church because they are elect. They are elect because they are in the Church…As each individual believer trusts Christ, he is put ‘into Christ’ and is therefore part of God’s elect…Take destiny out of the doctrine of election and most difficulties would fade away…Keep in mind then that election is ‘IN CHRIST.’ We are not among the elect until we come into Christ by repentance and faith.”
(Y) “Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 1.2.) “According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world” (Ephesians 1.4.) “God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation” (2 Thessalonians 2.13.)
(Z) “Those of mankind that are predestinated unto life, God, before the foundation of the world was laid, according to his eternal and immutable purpose, and the secret counsel and good pleasure of his will, hath chosen in Christ, unto everlasting glory.”
‘Chosen’ and ‘elected’ are synonymous terms, which the three men denominated by the letter X, aver. Now compare what is said by X: ‘we are not among the elect until…repentance and faith’; compare this, I say, with what is said by Y?—: ‘chosen in him before the foundation of the world…from the beginning chosen to salvation.’ And then observe that the idea in Y is repeated by Z, almost word for word: ‘predestinated unto life…before the foundation of the world was laid.’ Yea, observe that ‘predestinated unto life’ is just another way of saying ‘chosen…before the foundation of the world’ (Ephesians 1.4.) From the full statement of X, it is obvious that by ‘we are not among the elect until’ is meant: not elect until faith, not elect until faith in Christ, not elect until we are in the Church. Scripture and the Confession (Y and Z) are in agreement against that. Y: ‘chosen…before the foundation of the world’; Z: ‘predestinated unto life…before the foundation of the world was laid.’ Whatever it means to be chosen ‘IN CHRIST’—whether by Christ, because of Christ, for Christ, or even ‘in Christ,’ we are bound to interpret that in light of the phrase, ‘before the foundation of the world.’ A decision was made, a choice, an election, ‘before the foundation of the world.’ Certain persons, the elect, were never outside of Christ in some sense. They were ‘in him [Christ] before the foundation of the world’ (Ephesians 1.4.) The elect were always elect in God’s mind, before they were born, before they were created—before they became members of the Church by repenting and believing. By ‘take destiny out of the doctrine of election,’ Misters X mean to erase election from eternity past and to make it to begin in time. By capitalizing ‘IN CHRIST,’ they mean to deemphasize the eternality of election, as if Jesus Christ has nothing to do with eternity. This is the ‘sleight of men’ and ‘cunning craftiness’ that we are warned of in Ephesians 4. By this move, they make faith the basis of election. Mr. McClurkin does that very plainly on page 30 of his booklet. If election is merely the result of faith, as they say, then that can be no election ‘before the foundation of the world,’ as the Bible says. We can be certain of this because faith happens in the world. Faith happens in the world; but election happens ‘before the foundation of the world.’ If destiny (by which is meant ‘eternality’) is taken out of election, it is impossible and untrue that God has chosen any person at all ‘before the foundation of the world,’ like the Scripture says. By trying to put something together that God has warned to leave apart—by trying to reconcile the seeming disharmony between the doctrines of Sovereignty and Responsibility, these men wind up squared off against the word of God and God himself. Why did they handle the doctrine of election like this? They handled it like this because they believe that God is guilty if he has determined ‘before the foundation of the world’ to have mercy on certain persons but not others. They put election after faith in order to avoid the fact that God’s election is an eternal choice to have mercy on a select portion of humanity. It must be God’s will to have mercy on all—that is their doctrine, which is contrary to, ‘hath he mercy on whom he will,’ (Romans 9.18), which statement implies that it is God’s will to have mercy on select persons before the actual mercy is granted in the world. God must have elected it so to be, only for some, before faith; this is the truth.
The answer to, “Why doth he yet find fault?” (Romans 9.19) is, “O man, who art thou that repliest against God” (verse 20.) These men will not accept that, but persist with, “Why doth he yet find fault?” Their sinful persistence is the reason their booklet was written. They stand in for the hypothetical stubborn man of that verse; they personify him. On page 40, Mr. McClurkin says, “Pharaoh hardened his own heart first before it is said that God hardened his heart.” But then he contradicts himself further down when he says, “Hardness follows when God withholds his softening grace.” If hardness ‘follows’ the withholding of grace, how could Pharaoh have hardened his heart ‘first’? Any heart will harden, without effort, when God withholds grace. And a graceless heart is the definition of a hard heart, if anything is; that heart is hard which has not grace. Pharaoh had no grace. Therefore, his heart was hard already, was hardened by God’s continued withholding, and was hardened the more by Pharaoh’s disobedience. From eternity God purposed to withhold his mercy in the case of Pharaoh. “Even for this same purpose have I raised thee up,” says God, “that I might shew my power in thee” (Romans 9.17.) In other words, God raised him up in order to show his sovereign power and right over his creature by exercising wrath instead of mercy. The problem of how Pharaoh’s heart was hardened, if it is even a problem, is easily addressed by Stephen Charnock:
“If hardness follows upon God’s withholding his softening grace, it is not by any positive act of God, but from the natural hardness of man. If you put fire near to wax or rosin, both will melt; but when that fire is removed, they return to their natural quality of hardness and brittleness; the positive act of the fire is to melt and soften, and the softness of the rosin is to be ascribed to that; but the hardness is from the rosin itself, wherein the fire hath no influence, but only a negative act by a removal of it: so, when God hardens a man, he only leaves him to that stony heart which he derived from Adam, and brought with him into the world” (Stephen Charnock, The Existence and Attributes of God.)
The reason the three amigos give for taking up their fool’s errand is to save the preaching ministry. They suppose that while the two concepts of Sovereignty and Responsibility remain apparently discrepant there can be no motive to preach. They are stuck on that question, “Why doth he yet find fault with sinners that he wills not to have mercy on?” In their booklet (though not in so many words) they repeatedly ask this question. That is what they do by trying to force these two lines of truth into visible harmony. They ask, “Why doth he yet find fault?” Then they force an answer—an answer that is more satisfying to them than the assertion that God is sovereign to make vessels according to his will, whether unto honor or dishonor. They need an answer, you see, because if the question of whether or not there will be mercy for a sinner depends on God having chosen him or not, this means, to them, that God is unfair, and that the sinner can’t be held responsible. “It takes away the guilt of sin,” they say, “and lifts the blame of hell from the souls of men and lays it at the feet of God.” (And therefore we can’t preach anymore.) The answer, “O man, who art thou that repliest against God?”—in other words, the sovereign God will do as he pleases—that is not good enough for this trio. Their desire that Scripture be more palatable is the very attitude that is reproved in Romans 9. Their attempt to come up with another answer than the one that is given is rebellion. And their booklet is the teaching of rebellion against the LORD, even though it may be unintentionally done. The same thing that the prophet Jeremiah said to Hananiah should be said to them: “The LORD hath not sent thee; but thou makest this people to trust in a lie” (Jeremiah 28.15.) These men want a different answer than ‘who art thou that repliest against God?’—even if it means that they must bend the Scriptures to their will. They do not like man to be dependent on God’s choice to show mercy or not. It must be man who must choose the merciful God because if it is God’s choice to save some persons and not others, God is guilty and man is blameless. This is their view. It is not a biblical view, but a psychological complaint. Their scheme is blasphemous in that it cannot be executed without canceling out glorious doctrines such as predestination, election, and even sovereignty. The lesser sin is that Calvinism must be misrepresented in the process, and stated as ‘a theology which totally eliminates human choice.’ They call men who believe like Spurgeon on this issue ‘extreme Calvinists’ and ‘hyper-Calvinists,’ and count on the reader being too ignorant to know better. They pretend that Calvinism imputes guilt to God, then say, “Did God cause sin? No!” They further pretend that Calvinists offer the gospel only to select people, then say, “This gospel message excluded no one.” They pretend that Calvinists do not believe the Sacrifice of Christ is of infinite worth, and that Calvinism ‘robs humanity of all morality and all responsibility.’ They state that Calvin’s doctrine ‘is an absolute perversion of the Scriptural teaching regarding predestination.’ Anyone acquainted with Calvinism knows that every one of these accusations is false. God is sovereign and just; man is responsible and guilty; the gospel should be extended to all; the sacrifice of Christ is sufficient to cleanse every sin that has ever been committed; and predestination is accepted according to Scripture—that is Calvinism. It is not hyper, extreme, or profane; it is not a perversion of Scripture, but an honest exposition of what the richest pockets of revelation contain. Without a Confession to turn to, it is easy to be deceived by pseudo-scholars, which deception may cause us to be too proud to accept who God is, and then coerced into becoming as slanderous as these three men are toward some of the most honorable names in the history of Christendom. These angry, spiteful writers turn the better men that they disagree with into wild-eyed extremists; and the uneducated members of churches who are given their material will believe that they have done well to defend the holy, the good, and the true. The doctrines of God are transfigured into the teachings of man, and readers will not even notice. The slander in this booklet would be hard to rebut without a historical knowledge of theology. Without such knowledge, the reader will not know that the authors of it slant and spin the works of those they dislike, and his guard would be down. Once it is known, however, that they falsify the religious beliefs of others, a righteous rage is born. Competent scholars do not have to lie and defame in order to defend truth and to convince people to believe what is right. Most of our righteous indignation, though, should come from noticing that these Christian men do not like who God is.
Acts 4.27, 28: “For of a truth against thy holy child Jesus, whom thou hast anointed, both Herod, and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles, and the people of Israel, were gathered together, for to do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined before to be done.” The predetermining counsel of God in choosing Christ to suffer is here put side by side with responsibility on the part of the persons who put Jesus to death. God’s predetermination, even for the greatest evil deed in the history of the world to be done, does not negate responsibility in them who did the evil deed. We know this because the persons who crucified Jesus, their deed having been determined beforehand by God to be done, are stated as having done it ‘by wicked hands’ (Acts 2.23.) Since God predetermined the death of his only begotten Son, for which deed men are nevertheless held responsible, why question the responsibility of sinners on the ground that God, from eternity, has not chosen them for salvation? God’s choice from eternity, whether for Jesus to be crucified, or for mercy to be withheld from certain sinners, involves responsibility on both counts: as pertains to Jesus’ murderers, and as pertains to hardened sinners. The doctrine of a discriminate election from eternity does not, as misters Taylor, McClurkin, and Mackay allege, “take away the guilt of sin and lift the blame of hell from the souls of men and lay it at the feet of God.” It does not take away guilt for sin or lay blame on God any more than Jesus’ crucifers are cleared of guilt or any more than God can be held guilty for predetermining that his only begotten Son be crucified.
It is idolatry to make the infinite God into an image that our finite minds can be at ease with. It is wickedness to limit the sovereign God to what we believe ‘God is love’ means. ‘I am that I am’ will do what he will. Would it not be more honorable to reject him than to convince men that he is different from what his word says he is? “It will not be denied that God has commanded mankind not to kill. Yet, in putting our Saviour to death, the Jews did no more than God had determined, before, should be done. He determined, therefore, that his law should be broken” (Josiah Hopkins, The Doctrine of Decrees Essential to the Divine Character.) Are we going to blame God? Or will we accept who he is and what he does? The answers to some questions are as forbidden to us as ‘the fruit of the tree…in the midst of the garden’ (Genesis 3.3) was forbidden to Adam and Eve. “Whence it strictly follows that if these questioners could be gratified by giving them a religion without a mystery, verily they ‘should be as gods’” (R. L. Dabney, Discussions, Volume 3, p. 347.)
No comments:
Post a Comment