Presbyterianism Pt.3/ Catechism Q7

The powers therefore, exercised by our ruling elders are powers which belong to the lay members of the Church. What, then, are the powers of our ruling elders?

1. As to matters of doctrine and the great office of teaching, they have an equal voice with the clergy in the formation and adoption of all symbols of faith. According to Presbyterianism, it is not competent for the clergy to frame and authoritatively set forth a creed to be embraced by the Church, and to be made a condition of either ministerial or Christian communion, without the consent of the people. Such creeds profess to express the mind of the Church. But the ministry are not the Church, and therefore cannot declare the faith of the Church without the cooperation of the Church itself. Such Confessions, at the time of the Reformation, proceeded from the whole Church; and all the Confessions now in authority, in the different branches of the great Presbyterian family, were adopted by the people, through their representatives, as the expression of their faith So, too, in the selection of preachers of the Word—in judging of their fitness for the sacred office, in deciding whether they shall be ordained, in judging them when arraigned for heresy, the people have, in fact, an equal voice with the clergy. 38

2. The same thing is true as to the jus liturgicum, as it is called, of the Church. The ministry cannot frame a ritual, or liturgy, or directory for public worship, enjoin its use on the people to whom they preach. All such regulations are of force only so far as the people themselves, in conjunction with their ministers, see fit to sanction and adopt them.

3. So, too, in forming a constitution, or in enacting rules of procedure, or making canons, the people do not merely passively assent, but actively cooperate. They have in all these matters, the same authority as the clergy.

4. And, finally, in the exercise of the power of the keys, in opening and shutting the door of communion with the Church, the people have a decisive voice. In all cases of discipline they are called upon to judge and to decide.

A.A. Hodge, Charles Hodge and A.A. Hodge, The Confession of Faith : With Questions for Theological Students and Bible Classes, With an appendix on Presbyterianism by Charles Hodge. Index created by Christian Classics Foundation., electronic ed. based on the 1992 Banner of Truth reprint., 403 (Simpsonville SC: Christian Classics Foundation, 1996).

Q:What are the decrees of God?
A:The decrees of God are his eternal purpose, according to the counsel of his will, whereby, for his own glory, he hath foreordained whatsoever comes to pass. (Eph. 1:4,11, Rom. 9:22–23)


The Westminster Shorter Catechism : With Scripture Proofs., 3rd edition., Question 7 (Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1996).

4 just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him. 

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, Eph 1:4 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

11 also we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to His purpose who works all things after the counsel of His will,

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, Eph 1:11 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

22 What if God, although willing to demonstrate His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction?
23 And He did so to make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory,

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, Ro 9:22-23 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

Presbyterianism Pt.2/ Catechism Q6

"I. The first of these principles relates to the power and rights of the people. As to the nature of Church power, it is to be remembered that the Church is a Theocracy. Jesus Christ is its head; all power is derived from him; his Word is our written constitution. All Church power is, therefore, properly ministerial and administrative. Everything is to be done in the name of Christ and in accordance with his directions. The Church, however, is a self–governing society, distinct from the State, having its officers and laws, and therefore an administrative government of its own. The power of the Church relates—1. To matters of doctrine. She has the right to set forth a public declaration of the truths which she believes, and which are to be acknowledged by all who enter her communion—that is, she has the right to frame creeds or confessions of faith, as her testimony for the truth and her protest against error. And as she has been commissioned to teach all nations, she has the right of selecting teachers, of judging of their fitness, of ordaining and vending them forth into the field, and of recalling and deposing them when unfaithful. 2. The Church has power to set down rules for the ordering of public worship. 3. She has power to make rules for her own government, such as every Church has in its took of discipline, constitution, or canons, etc. 4. She has power to receive into fellowship, and to exclude the unworthy from her own communion.

Now, the question is, Where does this power vest? Does it, as Romanists and Prelatists affirm, belong exclusively to the clergy? Have they the right to determine for the Church what she is to believe, what she is to profess, what she is to do, and whom she is to receive as members and whom she is to reject? Or does this power vest in the Church itself—that is, in the whole body of the faithful? This, it will be perceived, is a radical question—one which touches the essence of things and determines the destiny of men. If all Church power vests in the clergy, then the people are practically bound to passive obedience in all matters of faith and practice, for all right of private judgment is then denied. If it vests in the whole Church, then the people have a right to a substantive part in the decision of all questions relating to doctrine, worship, order, and discipline. The public assertion of this right of the people, at the time of the Reformation, roused all Europe. It was an apocalyptic trumpet—that is, a trumpet of revelation, tuba per sepulchra sonans —calling dead souls to life; awakening them to the consciousness of power and of right—of power conveying right, and imposing the obligation to assert and exercise it. This was the end of Church tyranny in all truly Protestant countries. It was the end of the theory that the people were bound to passive submission in matters of faith and practice. It was deliverance to the captive; the opening of the prison to those who were bound; the introduction of the people of God into the liberty wherewith Christ has made them free. This is the reason why civil liberty follows religious liberty. The theory that all Church power vests in a divinely constituted hierarchy begets the theory that all civil power vests of divine right in kings and nobles; and the theory that Church power vests in the Church itself, and all Church officers are servants of the Church, of necessity begets the theory that civil power vests in the people, and that civil magistrates are servants of the people. These theories God has joined together, and no man can put them asunder. It was, therefore, by an infallible instinct the unfortunate Charles of England said, “No bishop, no king”; by which he meant that if there is no despotic power in the Church, there can be no despotic power in the State; or if there be liberty in the Church, there will be liberty in the State.

But this great Protestant and Presbyterian principle is not only a principle of liberty, it is also a principle of order—1. Because this power of the people is subject to the infallible authority of the Word; and, 2. Because the exercise of it is in the hands of duly–constituted officers. Presbyterianism does not dissolve the bands of authority, and resolve the Church into a mob. Though delivered from the autocratic authority of the hierarchy, it remains under the law to Christ. It is restricted in the exercise of its power by the Word of God, which bends the reason, heart, and conscience. We only cease to be the servants of men that we may be the servants of God. We are raised into a higher sphere, where perfect liberty is merged in absolute. As the Church is the aggregate of believers, there is an intimate analogy between the experience of the individual believer and of the Church as a whole. The believer ceases to be the servant of sin that he may be the servant of righteousness: he is redeemed from the law that he may be the servant of Christ. So the Church is delivered from an illegitimate authority, not that she may be lawless, but subject to an authority legitimate and divine. The Reformers, therefore, as instruments in the hands of God, in delivering the Church from bondage to prelates, did not make it a tumultuous multitude, in which every man was a law to himself, free to believe, and free to do what he pleased. The Church, in all the exercise of her power, in reference either to doctrine or discipline, acts under the written law of God as recorded in his Word.

But besides this, the power of the Church is not only thus limited and guided by the Scriptures, but the exercise of it is in the hands of legitimate officers. The Church is not a vast democracy, where everything is decided by the popular voice. “God is not the author of confusion, but of peace” (that is, of order), “as in all churches of the saints.” The Westminster Confession, therefore, expressing the common sentiment of Presbyterians, says: “The Lord Jesus Christ, as King and Head of his Church, hath therein appointed a government in the hand of Church officers, distinct from the civil magistrate.” The doctrine that all civil power vests ultimately in the people is not inconsistent with the doctrine that that power is in the hands of legitimate officers—legislative, judicial, and executive—to be exercised by them according to law. Nor is it inconsistent with the doctrine that the authority of the civil magistrate is jure divino. So the doctrine that Church power vests in the Church itself is not inconsistent with the doctrine that there is a divinely appointed class of officers through whom that power is to be exercised. It thus appears that the principle of liberty and the principle of order are perfectly harmonious. In denying that all Church power vests exclusively in the clergy, whom the people have nothing to do but to believe and to obey, and in affirming that it vests in the Church itself, while we assert the great principle of Christian liberty, we assert the no less important principle of evangelical order.
It is not necessary to occupy your time in quoting either from the Reformed Confessions or from standard Presbyterian writers, that the principle just stated is one of the radical principles of our system. It is enough to advert to the recognition of it involved in the office of ruling elder.

Ruling elders are declared to be the representatives of the people. They are chosen by them to act in their name in the government of the Church. The functions of these elders, therefore, determine the power of the people: for a representative is one chosen by others to do in their name what they are entitled to do in their own persons; or rather, to exercise the powers which radically inhere in those for whom they act. The members of a State Legislature, or of Congress, for example, can exercise only those powers which are inherent in the people."

A.A. Hodge, Charles Hodge and A.A. Hodge, The Confession of Faith : With Questions for Theological Students and Bible Classes, With an appendix on Presbyterianism by Charles Hodge. Index created by Christian Classics Foundation., electronic ed. based on the 1992 Banner of Truth reprint., 400 (Simpsonville SC: Christian Classics Foundation, 1996).

Q:How many persons are there in the Godhead?
A:There are three persons in the Godhead; the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost; and these three are one God, the same in substance, equal in power and glory. (1 John 5:7, Matt. 28:19)


The Westminster Shorter Catechism : With Scripture Proofs., 3rd edition., Question 6 (Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1996).

7 For there are three that testify:

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, 1 Jn 5:7 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

19 “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit,

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, Mt 28:19 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

Have You Heard Of 9 Marks?

I happened across 9 Marks site today, I have heard of them, they do wonderful work in helping Churches. If you are not familiar with them 9 Marks is a reference to the 9 marks of a healthy church. What caught my attention today though was the first mark. The first mark of a healthy church is expository preaching. Do you know how many people would disagree with this? It boggles my mind to think of the number of churches out there that think mishandling the word of God does not qualify them for the unhealthy church heap. My pastor in St. Louis said once, "It is okay to preach a topical sermon now and then as long as you repent immediately afterward." Do you get it? Deciding what you want to preach about and then going to the scriptures to find support is exactly the opposite way of rightly dividing the word of Truth. That is where eisegesis becomes one's focus instead of exegesis. I simply will not understand those who do not understand that expository preaching is actually the only kind of preaching there is. If you are not preaching expository sermons guess what? You are not preaching.

Westminster Shorter Catechism Q5/What Is Presbyterianism?

I have realized that I have been prefacing these questions with comments and thought it might become difficult to preface 107 questions so I have decided to introduce each new question from now on with Charles Hodges' "What Is Presbyterianism." I felt these two fit well together so here is the first part along with the next catechism question, enjoy.

"Setting aside Erastianism, which teaches that the Church is only one form of the State; and Quakerism, which does not provide for the external organization of the Church; there are only four radically different theories on the subject of Church polity.

1. The Popish theory, which assumes that Christ, the apostles, and believers constituted the Church while our Savior was on earth, and that this organization was designed to be perpetual. After the ascension of our Lord, Peter became his vicar, and took his place as the visible head of the Church. This primacy of Peter, as the universal bishop, is continued in his successors, the bishops of Rome; and the apostleship is perpetuated in the order of prelates. As in the primitive Church no one could be an apostle who was not subject to Christ, so now no one can be a prelate who is not subject to the Pope; and as then no one could be a Christian who was not subject to Christ and the apostles, so now no one can be a Christian who is not subject to the Pope and the prelates. This is the Roman theory of the Church: A vicar of Christ, a perpetual college of apostles, and the people subject to their infallible control.

2. The Prelatical theory assumes the perpetuity of the apostleship as the governing power in the Church; which therefore consists of those who profess the true religion and are subject to apostle–bishops. This is the Anglican or High Church form of this theory. In its Low Church form the Prelatical theory simply teaches that there was originally a threefold order in the ministry, and that there should be now; but it does not affirm that mode of organization to be essential.

3. The Independent or Congregational theory includes two principles: first, that the governing and executive power in the Church is in the brotherhood; and, secondly, that the Church organization is complete in each worshipping assembly, which is independent of every other.

4. The fourth theory is the Presbyterian, which it is our present business to attempt to unfold. The three great negations of Presbyterianism—that is, the three great errors which it denies—are:

(1) That all Church power vests in the clergy;
(2) That the apostolic office is perpetual;
(3) That each individual Christian congregation is independent.

The affirmative statement of these principles is:

(1) That the people have a right to a substantive part in the government of the Church;
(2) That presbyters, who minister in word and doctrine, are the highest permanent officers of the Church, and all belong to the same order;
(3) That the outward and visible Church is, or should be, one, in the sense that a smaller part is subject to a larger, and a larger to the whole. It is not holding one of these principles that makes a man a Presbyterian, but his holding them all."

A.A. Hodge, Charles Hodge and A.A. Hodge, The Confession of Faith : With Questions for Theological Students and Bible Classes, With an appendix on Presbyterianism by Charles Hodge. Index created by Christian Classics Foundation., electronic ed. based on the 1992 Banner of Truth reprint., 399 (Simpsonville SC: Christian Classics Foundation, 1996).

Q:Are there more Gods than one?
A:There is but One only, the living and true God. (Deut. 6:4, Jer. 10:10)

The Westminster Shorter Catechism : With Scripture Proofs., 3rd edition., Question 5 (Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1996).

4 “Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord is one!

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, Dt 6:4 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

10 But the Lord is the true God;
He is the living God and the everlasting King.
At His wrath the earth quakes,
And the nations cannot endure His indignation.

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, Je 10:10 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

Westminster Shorter Catechism Q4

I think I am becoming a master of giving false impressions. I do believe the catechism should be taught in the church, however, I did not mean as opposed to it being taught at home. It should be taught at home of course AND at the church. Imagine teaching your child at home the catechism questions and answers and delving into the scriptures with them explaining how we come to the conclusions we do and then on Sunday they have the opportunity to feel as if they accomplished something when in catechism class they get the answer right!

Q:What is God?
A:God is a Spirit, (John 4:24) infinite, (Job 11:7–9) eternal, (Ps. 90:2) and unchangeable, (James 1:17) in his being, (Exod. 3:14)wisdom, (Ps. 147:5) power, (Rev. 4:8) holiness, (Rev. 15:4) justice, goodness, and truth. (Exod. 34:6–7)


The Westminster Shorter Catechism : With Scripture Proofs., 3rd edition., Question 4 (Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1996).

24 “God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, Jn 4:24 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

7 “Can you discover the depths of God?
Can you discover the limits of the Almighty?
8 “They are high as the heavens, what can you do?
Deeper than Sheol, what can you know?
9 “Its measure is longer than the earth
And broader than the sea.

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, Job 11:7-9 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

2 Before the mountains were born
Or You gave birth to the earth and the world,
Even from everlasting to everlasting, You are God.

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, Ps 90:2 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

17 Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow.

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, Jas 1:17 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

14 God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM”; and He said, “Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you.’ ”

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, Ex 3:14 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

5 Great is our Lord and abundant in strength;
His understanding is infinite.

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, Ps 147:5 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

8 And the four living creatures, each one of them having six wings, are full of eyes around and within; and day and night they do not cease to say,
“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God, the Almighty, who was and who is and who is to come.”

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, Re 4:8 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

4 “Who will not fear, O Lord, and glorify Your name?
For You alone are holy;
For all the nations will come and worship before You,
For Your righteous acts have been revealed.”

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, Re 15:4 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

6 Then the Lord passed by in front of him and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord God, compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in lovingkindness and truth;
7 who keeps lovingkindness for thousands, who forgives iniquity, transgression and sin; yet He will by no means leave the guilty unpunished, visiting the iniquity of fathers on the children and on the grandchildren to the third and fourth generations.”

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, Ex 34:6-7 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

By The Way

We are selling our home in Cedar Rapids. If any of you are interested in a 3 story, 5 bedroom house about 100 years old let us know. It's a great place to live and has plenty of room for expanding families. There is not much in the way of Reformed Churches in the area but the one we go to in Cedar Falls, about an hour north, is a great church.

Westminster Shorter Catechism Q3

I have to say after my last post that I am not against kids having fun. I don't even think I hinted at that. What I am against is replacing doctrinal training up of our children with fun. The kids at my church in St. Louis have more fun, and productively I might add, than most I have seen elsewhere. For the most part they are homeschooled, which I think breeds more intelligent, talented children than public schools. I have noticed this at both of my former churches in St. Louis. I am very impressed with the intelligence and talent of every homeschooled child I have encountered. I digress, modern evangelical churches in general, there are exceptions, do not train their adults in doctrine let alone their children. Along with catechizing the children these churches would be well served doing away with all their 13 week, prepackaged fluff books with a year studying Calvin's "Institutes," or Warfield's discourses. I suggest if you want a starting point try Machen's "Christianity and Liberalism." It is short but packed with theology as well as much content that, although written 80 years ago, is remarkably relevant to today's church.

Q:What do the scriptures principally teach?
A:The Scriptures principally teach what man is to believe concerning God, and what duty God requires of man. (2 Tim. 1:13, 2 Tim. 3:16)


The Westminster Shorter Catechism : With Scripture Proofs., 3rd edition., Question 3 (Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1996).

13 Retain the standard of sound words which you have heard from me, in the faith and love which are in Christ Jesus.

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, 2 Ti 1:13 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

16 All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness;

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, 2 Ti 3:16 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

Westminster Shorter Catechism Q2

I failed in my last post to explain what a catechism is. A catechism is what Christians for centuries have used to train up their children in the faith. It seems to have mostly gone by the wayside in the modern evangelical church. It seems pastors today, and more specifically youth pastors, seem to have a better way of teaching youth. The way of the catechism has given way to attending rock concerts, playing broomball and seeing how much stuff can be crammed into a blender, drank and kept down. Now these things certainly will attract more kids to your youth events but they do nothing to teach the sacred doctrines of the Bible.

Q:What rule hath God given to direct us how we may glorify and enjoy him?
A:The Word of God, which is contained in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, (2 Tim. 3:16, Eph. 2:20) is the only rule to direct us how we may glorify and enjoy him. (1 John 1:3–4)


The Westminster Shorter Catechism : With Scripture Proofs., 3rd edition., Question 2 (Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1996).

16 All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness;

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, 2 Ti 3:16 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

20 having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the corner stone,

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, Eph 2:20 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

3 what we have seen and heard we proclaim to you also, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ.
4 These things we write, so that our joy may be made complete.

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, 1 Jn 1:3-4 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

Westminster Shorter Catechism Q1

I have come to realize that many of my readers do not understand what a confession or catechism is. Many look down on them for various reasons and also I think many have never taken the time to even look at them. I am beginning a series today on the shorter catechism and will probably do a separate series on the confession as well. I urge you to read these with an open mind and look at them with the scripture proofs. Any questions will be answered. Read, enjoy, learn.

Q: What is the chief end of man?
A: Man’ s chief end is to glorify God, (1 Cor. 10:31, Rom. 11:36) and to enjoy him for ever. (Ps. 73:25–28)

The Westminster Shorter Catechism : With Scripture Proofs., 3rd edition., Question 1 (Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1996).

31 Whether, then, you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, 1 Co 10:31 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

36 For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen.

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, Ro 11:36 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

25 Whom have I in heaven but You?
And besides You, I desire nothing on earth.
26 My flesh and my heart may fail,
But God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.
27 For, behold, those who are far from You will perish;
You have destroyed all those who are unfaithful to You.
28 But as for me, the nearness of God is my good;
I have made the Lord God my refuge,
That I may tell of all Your works.

New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update, Ps 73:25-28 (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995).

Now This Is Exegesis!

I mentioned exegesis and eisegesis in a previous post. Let me explain, exegesis is pulling the meaning out of the text, it is getting to the proper meaning. Eisegesis is putting onto the text a preconceived notion, making the text say what you want it to say. I have had much experience with the latter, we all have to some degree, we like to practice it, it is something we do without even realizing it. Now I had help from my church and the school I was attending but I have to say both institutions drove me to the scriptures until I got the hang of exegesis and then my world changed. This video is an example of precision exegesis, I hope you will watch and learn.

Hitting Nails On Their Heads

I am so tired of arguing and debating with people to lazy to learn the rules of Hermeneutics or to understand exegesis takes work, eisegesis does not so they end up using the latter. I am tired of people who push the American Democratic mindset onto the Church of Jesus Christ who could not care less if we are Americans. I am tired of talking with people who are so arrogant as to say they just need their Bible and do not need creeds, confessions or to read any of the great theologians who have come before us. Why do I call them arrogant? Because what they are really saying is they are better suited to interpret the scriptures than Augustine, Calvin, Luther, Edwards et al.

What got me so worked up? You may ask. Well it was this video from James White. He is absolutely correct with everything he said and if we could get people to start teaching the Heidleberg Catechism or the Westminster Confession of Faith instead of 12 weeks "Seeking Him," or "7 Steps to Financial Freedom" the Church would not be in this mess it is in now.

One more note before the video. I once had a pastor who told me I did not need the "Early Church Fathers," because I might look at them only once or twice in my lifetime. I think that is indicative of a serious problem when a pastor thinks that way about the great men who laid the foundations of our faith. Once or twice in my lifetime? Are you kidding me? I now own them and look at them once or twice a day! Enough babbling, please watch this video and hear what he is saying.



HT:Truth Matters

Speaking Of Heretics

I have never, and I mean NEVER, heard Rick Warren properly handle the Word of God. He rips verses out of context, uses selected versions that support his presuppositions or agendas and has never, that I have heard, preached the true gospel of Jesus Christ crucified for sinners and resurrected on the third day. Do you really need more evidence? Well just in case you do here it is complete with commentary by Todd Friel pointing out the error of his ways.





HT:Truth Matters

So I Have Not Called Anyone A Heretic In Awhile

I went to a church last weekend for a specific reason. It was not my church, but a church I had attended before and I know some who attend there as well. The sermon was on Mark 4:1-20. This man read the entire passage, you know about the seed and thorns and rocky soil and all, and then looked the congregation in the eye and told them that they need to stop being in the first three categories and stay in the fourth. Well if you have not gone to look up the passage yet let me help you out. This parable is about different people, not different categories we are in at different times. The first three groups that this pastor put believers in is made up of unbelievers. The last group are the believers. Do you know what it is called when one take the God-breathed scriptures and make them say something God did not intend for them to say? Do you know what it is called when one takes the gospel and makes it law? Do you know what it is called when one takes the good-news and turns it into good advice? Do you know what it is called when one takes indicatives and makes them imperatives?

IT'S CALLED HERESY!!!!!

We had one couple come up to us and the wife said "Wow, that sermon was really good for you to hear wasn't it?" I had no self-control at the time and told her in no uncertain terms, "It was horrible, he made the text say something it did not say." I then got ahold of myself and kept quiet the rest of the conversation. By the way, this was at a church that has "reformed" in their name. How utterly sad.

As an aside, we were at this church last year and they had a pulpit supply pastor preach the same text and do the same damnable job handling it.

Truth Withdrawal

Ok, it's 35 days until we move to Mississippi and we are feeling the crunch. I am still going to PT 2-3 times a week and the DO twice a month. I am teaching myself Greek, about 2/3 done with that, and Hebrew, 1 of 14 lessons done. I know it sounds impressive that I am teaching myself but I am using a Greek and Hebrew tutor software along with help from a wonderful scholar living in England named George. He has helped quite a bit with some timely tips as I head down the stretch with Greek. So if you are suffering from withdrawal from my blog I do apologize and I think once we get moved and class begins I should have plenty to blog about.

Warfield On Renewal

So my pastor, Stephen Oharek, preached on Titus 3 this week and boy was it timely. I will try and post this excellent sermon on my box later this week. After the sermon he asked for my opinion on the renewal mentioned in the passage, basically he wanted to know if he conveyed the fact that this is a single event in our past and not an ongoing process as some would contend. I thought he conveyed it well and without confusion. I happened across this article by B. B. Warfield today and thought it worthy of posting.


"The terms “renew,” “renewing,” are not of frequent occurrence in our English Bible. In the New Testament they do not occur at all in the Gospels, but only in the Epistles (Paul and Hebrews), where they stand, respectively, for the Greek terms ajnakaino>w (2 Corinthians 4:16, Colossians 3:10) with its cognates, ajnakaini>zw (Hebrews 6:6) and ajnaneo>omai (Ephesians 4:23), and ajnakai>nwsiv (Romans 12:2, Titus 3:5). If we leave to one side 2 Corinthians 4:16 and Hebrews 6:6, which are of somewhat doubtful interpretation, it becomes at once evident that a definite theological conception is embodied in these terms. This conception is that salvation in Christ involves a radical and complete transformation wrought in the soul (Romans 12:2, Ephesians 4:23) by God the Holy Spirit (Titus 3:5, Ephesians 4:24), by virtue of which we become “new men” ( Ephesians 4:24, Colossians 3:10), no longer conformed to this world (Romans 12:2, Ephesians 4:22, Colossians 3:9), but in knowledge and holiness of the truth created after the image of God (Ephesians 4:24, Colossians 3:10, Romans 12:2). The conception, it will be seen, is a wide one, inclusive of all that is comprehended in what we now technically speak of as regeneration, renovation and sanctification. It embraces, in fact, the entire subjective side of salvation, which it represents as a work of God, issuing in a wholly new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17, Galatians 6:15, Ephesians 2:10). What is indicated is, therefore, the need of such a subjective salvation by sinful man, and the provision for this need made in Christ (Ephesians 4:20, Colossians 3:11, Titus 3:6).
The absence of the terms in question from the Gospels does not in the least argue the absence from the teaching of the Gospels of the thing expressed by them. This thing is so of the essence of the religion of revelation that it could not be absent from any stage of its proclamation. That it should be absent would require that sin should be conceived to have wrought no subjective injury to man, so that he would need for his recovery from sin only an objective cancelling of his guilt and reinstatement in the favor of God. This is certainly not the conception of the Scriptures in any of their parts. It is uniformly taught in Scripture that by his sin man has not merely incurred the divine condemnation but also corrupted his own heart; that sin, in other words, is not merely guilt but depravity: and that there is needed for man’s recovery from sin, therefore, not merely atonement but renewal; that salvation, that is to say, consists not merely in pardon but in purification. Great as is the stress laid in the Scriptures on the forgiveness of sins as the root of salvation, no less stress is laid throughout the Scriptures on the cleansing of the heart as the fruit of salvation. Nowhere is the sinner
permitted to rest satisfied with pardon as the end of salvation; everywhere he is made poignantly to feel that salvation is realized only in a clean heart and a right spirit.
In the Old Testament, for example, sin is not set forth in its origin as a purely objective act with no subjective effects, or in its manifestation as a series of purely objective acts out of all relation to the subjective condition. On the contrary, the sin of our first parents is represented as no less corrupting than inculpating; shame is as immediate a fruit of it as fear (Genesis 3:7). And, on the principle that no clean thing can come out of what is unclean (Job 14:4), all that are born of woman are declared “abominable and corrupt,” to whose nature iniquity alone is attractive (Job 15:14-16). Accordingly, to become sinful, men do not wait until the age of accountable action arrives. Rather, they are apostate from the womb, and as soon as they are born go astray, speaking lies (Psalm 58:3): they are even shapen in iniquity and conceived in sin (Psalm 51:5). The propensity (rx,ye ) of their heart is evil from their youth (Genesis 8:21), and it is out of the heart that all the issues of life proceed (Proverbs 4:23, 20:11). Acts of sin are therefore but the expression of the natural heart, which is deceitful above all things and desperately sick (Jeremiah 17:9). The only hope of an amendment of the life, lies accordingly in a change of heart; and this change of heart is the desire of God for His people (Deuteronomy 5:29) and the passionate longing of the saints for themselves (Psalm 51:10). It is, indeed, wholly beyond man’s own power to achieve it. As well might the Ethiopian hope to change his skin and the leopard his spots as he who is wonted to evil to correct his ways (Jeremiah 13:23); and when it is a matter of cleansing not of hands but of heart—who can declare that he has made his heart clean and is pure from sin (Proverbs 20:9)? Men may be exhorted to circumcise their hearts (Deuteronomy 10:16, Jeremiah 4:4), and to make themselves new hearts and new spirits (Ezekiel 18:31); but the background of such appeals is rather the promise of God than the ability of man (Deuteronomy 5:29, Ezekiel 11:19, cf. Keil in loc.). It is God alone who can “turn” a man “a new heart” ( 1 Samuel 10:9), and the cry of the saint who has come to understand what his sin means, and therefore what cleansing from it involves, is ever, “Create ( ar;B; ) in me a new heart, O God, and renew (vdæj; ) a steadfast spirit within me” (Psalm 51:10 [12]). The express warrant for so great a prayer is afforded by the promise of God who, knowing the incapacity of the flesh, has Himself engaged to perfect His people. He will circumcise their hearts, that they may love the Lord their God with all their heart and with all their soul; and so may live (Deuteronomy 30:6). He will give them a heart to know Him that He is the Lord; that so they may really be His people and He their God (Jeremiah 24:7). He will put His law in their inward
parts and write it in their heart so that all shall know Him (Jeremiah 31:33, cf. 32:39). He will take the stony heart out of their flesh and give them a heart of flesh, that they may walk in His statutes and keep his ordinances and do them, and so be His people and He their God (Ezekiel 11:19). He will give them a new heart and take away the stony heart out of their flesh; and put His Spirit within them and cause them to walk in His statutes and keep His judgments and do them: that so they may be His people and He their God (Ezekiel 36:26, cf. 37:14). Thus the expectation of a new heart was made a substantial part of the Messianic promise, in which was embodied the whole hope of Israel.
It does not seem open to doubt that in these great declarations we have the proclamation of man’s need of “renewal” and of the divine provision for it as an essential element in salvation. [356] We must not be misled by the emphasis placed in the Old Testament on the forgiveness of sins as the constitutive fact of salvation, into explaining away all allusions to the cleansing of the heart as but figurative expressions for pardon. Pardon is no doubt frequently set forth under the figure or symbol of washing or cleansing: but expressions such as those which have been adduced go beyond this. When, then, it is suggested [357] that Psalm li, for example, “contains only a single prayer, namely, that for forgiveness”; and that “the cry, ‘Create in me a clean heart’ is not a prayer for what we call renewal” but only for “forgiving grace,” we cannot help thinking the contention an extravagance, — an extravagance, moreover, out of keeping with its author’s language elsewhere, and indeed in this very context where he speaks quite simply of the pollution as well as the guilt of sin as included in the scope of the confession made in this psalm. [358] The word “create” is a strong one and appears to invoke from God the exertion of His almighty power for the production of a new subjective state of things: and it does not seem easy to confine the word “heart” to the signification “conscience” as if the prayer were merely that the conscience might be relieved from its sense of guilt. Moreover, the parallel clause, “Renew a steadfast spirit within me,” does not readily lend itself to the purely objective interpretation. [359] That the transformation of the heart promised in the great prophetic passages must also mean more than the production of a clear conscience, is equally undeniable and indeed is not denied. When Jeremiah (Jeremiah 31:31-33), for example, represents God as declaring that what shall characterize the New Covenant which He will make with the House of Israel, is that He will put His law in the inward parts of His people and write it in their hearts, he surely means to say that God promises to work a subjective effect in the hearts of Israel, by virtue of which their very instincts and most intimate impulses shall be on the side of the law, obedience to which shall therefore be but the spontaneous expression of their own natures. [360]
It is equally important to guard against lowering the conception of the Divine holiness in the Old Testament until the demand of God that His people shall be holy as He is holy, [361] and the provisions of His Grace to make them holy by an inner creative act, are robbed of more or less of their deeper ethical meaning. Here, too, some recent writers are at fault, speaking at times almost as if holiness in God were merely a sort of fastidiousness, over against which is set not so much all sin as uncleanness, as all uncleanness, as in this sense sin. [362] The idea is that what this somewhat squeamish God did not find agreeable those who served Him would discover it well to avoid; rather than that all sin is necessarily abominable to the holy God and He will not abide it in His servants. This lowered view is sometimes even pushed to the extreme of suggesting [363] that “it is nowhere intimated that there is any danger to the sinner because of his uncleanness;” if he is “cut off” that is solely on account of his disobedience in not cleansing himself, not on account of the uncleanness itself. The extremity of this contention is its sufficient refutation. When the sage declares that no one can say “I have made my heart clean, I am pure from sin” ( Proverbs 20:9), he clearly means to intimate that an unclean heart is itself sinful. The Psalmist in bewailing his inborn sinfulness and expressing his longing for truth in the inward parts and wisdom in the hidden parts, certainly conceived his unclean heart as properly sinful in the sight of God (Psalm li). The prophet abject before the holy God (Isaiah vi) beyond question looked upon his uncleanness as itself iniquity requiring to be taken away by expiatory purging. It would seem unquestionable that throughout the Old Testament the uncleanness which is offensive to Jehovah is sin considered as pollution, and that salvation from sin involves therefore a process of purification as well as expiation.
The agent by whom the cleansing of the heart is effected is in the Old Testament uniformly represented as God Himself, or, rarely, more specifically as the Spirit of God, which is the Old Testament name for God in His effective activity. It has, indeed, been denied that the Spirit of God is ever regarded in the Old Testament as the worker of holiness. [364] But this extreme position cannot be maintained. [365] It is true enough that the
Spirit of God comes before us in the Old Testament chiefly as the Theocratic Spirit endowing men as servants of the Kingdom, and after that as the Cosmical Spirit, the principle of all world-processes; and only occasionally as the creator of new ethical life in the individual soul. [366] But it can scarcely be doubted that in Psalm 51:11 [13] God’s Holy Spirit, or the Spirit of God’s holiness, is conceived in that precise manner, and the same is true of Psalm 143:10 (cf. Isaiah 63:10, 11 and see Genesis 6:3, Nehemiah 9:20, 1 Samuel 10:6, 9). [367] It is chiefly, however, in promises of the future that this aspect of the Spirit’s work is dwelt upon. [368] The
recreative activity of the Spirit of God is even made the crowning Messianic blessing (Isaiah 32:15, 34:16, 44:3, on the latter of which see Giesebrecht, “Die Berufsbegabung,” etc., p. 144, 59:21, Ezekiel 11:19, 18:31, 36:27, 37:14, 39:29, Zechariah 12:10); and this is as much as to say that the promised Messianic salvation included in it provision for the renewal of men’s hearts as well as for the expiation of their guilt. [369]
It would be distinctly a retrogression from the Old Testament standpoint, therefore, if our Lord — Himself, in accordance with Old Testament prophecy (e.g., Isaiah 11:1, 42:1, 61:1), endowed with the Spirit (Matthew 3:16, 4:1, 12:18, 28, Mark 1:10, 12, Luke 3:22, 4:1, 14, 18, 10:21, John 1:32, 33) above measure (John 3:34) [370] — had neglected the Messianic promise of spiritual renewal. In point of fact, He began His ministry as the dispenser of the Spirit (Matthew 3:11, Mark 1:8, Luke 3:16, John 1:33). And the purpose for which He dispensed the Spirit is unmistakably represented as the cleansing of the heart. The distinction of Jesus is, indeed, made to lie precisely in this, — that whereas John could baptise only with water, Jesus baptised with the Holy Spirit: the repentance which was symbolized by the one was wrought by the other. And this repentance (meta>noia ) was no mere vain regret for an ill-spent past (meta>me>leia ), or surface modification of conduct, but a radical transformation of the mind which issues indeed in “fruits worthy of repentance” ( Luke 3:8) but itself consists in an inward reversal of mental attitude.
There is little subsequent reference in the Synoptic Gospels, to be sure, to the Holy Spirit as the renovator of hearts. It is made clear, indeed, that He is the best of gifts and that the Father will not withhold Him from those that ask Him (Luke 11:13), and that He abides in the followers of Jesus and works in and through them (Matthew 10:20, Mark 13:11, Luke 12:12); and it is made equally clear that He is the very principle of holiness, so that to confuse His activity with that of unclean spirits argues absolute perversion (Mark 12:31, Mark 3:29, Luke 12:10). But these two things do not happen to be brought together in these Gospels. [371]
In the Gospel of John, on the other hand, the testimony of the Baptist is followed up by the record of the searching conversation of our Lord with Nicodemus, in which Nicodemus is rebuked for not knowing — though “the teacher of Israel” — that the Kingdom of God is not for the children of the flesh but only for the children of the Spirit (cf. Mark 3:9). Nicodemus had come to our Lord as to a teacher, widely recognized as having a mission from God. Jesus repels this approach as falling far below recognizing Him for what He really was and for what he had really come to do. As a divinely sent teacher He solemnly assures Nicodemus that something much
more effective than teaching is needed: “Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born anew he cannot see the Kingdom of God” ( Mark 3:3). And then, when Nicodemus, oppressed by the sense of the profundity of the change which must indeed be wrought in man if he is to be fitted for the Kingdom of God, despairingly inquires “How can this be?” our Lord explains equally solemnly that it is only by a sovereign, recreating work of the Holy Spirit, that so great an effect can be wrought: “Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God”( Mark 3:5). Nor, he adds, ought such a declaration to cause surprise: what is born of the flesh can be nothing but flesh; only what is born of the Spirit is spirit. He closes the discussion with a reference to the sovereignty of the action of the Spirit in regenerating men: as with the wind which blows where it lists, we know nothing of the Spirit’s coming except Lo, it is here! (Mark 3:8). About the phrase, “Born of water and the Spirit” much debate has been had; and various explanations of it have been offered. The one thing which seems certain is that there can be no reference to an external act, performed by men, of their own will: for in that case the product would not be spirit but flesh, neither would it come without observation. Is it fanciful to see here a reference back to the Baptist’s, “I indeed baptise with water; He baptises with the Holy Spirit”? The meaning then would be that entrance into the Kingdom of God requires, if we cannot quite say not only repentance but also regeneration, yet at least we may say both repentance and regeneration. In any event it is very pungently taught here that the precondition of entrance into the Kingdom of God is a radical transformation wrought by the Spirit of God Himself. [372]
Beyond this fundamental passage there is little said in John’s Gospel of the renovating activities of the Spirit. The communication of the Spirit of John 20:22 seems to be an official endowment; and although in John 7:39 the allusion appears to be to the gift of the Spirit to believers at large, the stress seems to fall rather on the blessing they bring to others by virtue of this endowment, than on that they receive themselves. There remains only the great promise of the Paraclete. It would probably be impossible to attribute more depth or breadth of meaning than rightfully belongs to them, to the passages which embody this promise (John 14:16, 26, 15:26, 16:7, 13). But the emphasis appears to be laid in them upon the illuminating (cf. also Luke 1:15, 41, 67, 2:25, 26; Matthew 22:43) more than upon the sanctifying influences of the Spirit, although assuredly the latter are not wholly absent (Matthew 16:7-11).
Elsewhere in John, although apart from any specific reference to the Spirit as the agent, repeated expression is given to the fundamental conception of renewal. Men lie dead in their sins and require to be raised from the dead if they are to live
(John 11:25, 26); it is the prerogative of the Son to quicken whom He will (John 5:21); it is impossible for men to come to the Son, unless they be drawn by the Father (John 6:44); being in the Son it is only of the Father that they can bear fruit (John 15:1). Similarly in the Synoptics there is lacking nothing to this teaching, except the specific reference of the effects to the Holy Spirit. What is required of men is nothing less than perfection even as the heavenly Father is perfect (Matthew 5:48 — the New Testament form of the Old Testament “Ye shall be holy for I am holy, Jehovah your God,” Leviticus 19:2). And this perfection is not a matter of external conduct but of internal disposition. One of the objects of the “Sermon on the Mount” is to deepen the conception of righteousness and to carry back both sin and righteousness into the heart itself (Matthew 5:20). Accordingly, the external righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees is pronounced just no righteousness at all; it is the cleansing merely of the outside of the cup and of the platter (Matthew 23:25), and they are therefore but as whited sepulchres, which outwardly appear beautiful but inwardly are full of dead men’s bones ( Matthew 23:27, 28). True cleansing must begin from within; and this inward cleansing will cleanse the outside also (Matthew 23:26, 15:11). The fundamental principle is that every tree brings forth fruit according to its nature, whether good or bad; and therefore the tree must be made good and its fruit good, or else the tree corrupt and its fruit corrupt (Matthew 7:17, 12:33, 15:11, Mark 7:15, Luke 6:43, 11:34). So invariable and all-inclusive is this principle in its working, that it applies even to the idle words which men speak, by which they may therefore be justly judged: none that are evil can speak good things, “for it is out of the abundance of the heart that the mouth speaketh” ( Matthew 12:34). Half-measures are therefore unavailing (Matthew 6:21); a radical change alone will suffice — no mere patching of the new on the old, no pouring of new wine into old bottles (Matthew 9:16, 17, Mark 2:21, 22, Luke 5:36, 39). He who has not a wedding-garment — the gift of the host — even though he be called shall not be chosen ( Matthew 22:11, 12).
Accordingly when — in the Synoptic parallel to the conversation with Nicodemus —the rich young ruler came to Jesus with his heart set on purchase (as a rich man’s heart is apt to be set), pleading his morality, Jesus repelled him and took occasion to pronounce upon not the difficulty only but the impossibility of entrance into the Kingdom of heaven on such terms (Matthew 19:23, Mark 10:23, Luke 18:24). The possibility of salvation, He explains, just because it involves something far deeper than this, rests in the hands of God alone (Matthew 19:26, Mark 10:27, Luke 18:27). Man himself brings nothing to it; the Kingdom is received in naked helplessness (Matthew 19:21 ||). It is not without significance that, in all the Synoptics, the conversation with the rich young ruler is made to follow immediately
upon the incident of the blessing of the little children (Matthew 19:13 ||). When our Lord says, with reference to these children (they were mere babies, Luke 18:15), [373] that, “Of such is the kingdom of heaven,” he means just to say that the kingdom of heaven is never purchased by any quality whatever, to say nothing now of deed: whosoever enters it enters it as a child enters the world, — he is born into it by the power of God. In these two incidents, of the child set in the midst and of the rich young ruler, we have, in effect, acted parables of the new birth; they exhibit to us how men enter the kingdom and set the declaration made to Nicodemus (John 3:1sq.) before us in vivid object-lesson. And if the kingdom can be entered thus only in nakedness as a child comes into the world, all stand before it in like case and it can come only to those selected therefor by God Himself: where none have a claim upon it the law of its bestowment can only be the Divine will (Matthew 11:27, 20:15). [374]
The broad treatment characteristic of the Gospels only partly gives way as we pass to the Epistles. Discriminations of aspects and stages, however, begin to become evident; and with the increased material before us we easily perceive lines of demarcation which perhaps we should not have noted with the Gospels only in view. In particular we observe two groups of terms standing over against one another, describing, respectively, from the manward and from the Godward side, the great change experienced by him who is translated from the power of darkness into the kingdom of the Son of God’s love ( Colossians 1:13). And within the limits of each of these groups, we observe also certain distinctions in the usage of the several terms which make it up. In the one group are such terms as metanoei~n with its substantive meta>noia , and its cognate metanme>lesqai , and ejpistre>fein and its substantive ejpistrofh> . These tell us what part man takes in the change. The other group includes such terms as gennhqh~nai a]nwqen or ejk tou~ pneu>matov, palingenesi>a, ajnagenna~n, ajpokuei~sqai, ananeou~sqai, ajnakainou~sqai, ajnakai>wsiv . These tell what part God takes in the change. Man repents, makes amendment, and turns to God. But it is by God that men are renewed, brought forth, born again into newness of life. The transformation which to human vision manifests itself as a change of life (ejpistrofh> ) resting upon a radical change of mind (meta>noia ), to Him who searches the heart and understands all the movements of the human soul is known to be a creation (kti>zein ) of God, beginning in a new birth from the Spirit (‘ gennhqh~nai a]nwqen ejk tou~ pneu>matov ) and issuing in a new divine product (poi>hma ), created in Christ Jesus, into good works prepared by God beforehand that they may be walked in (Ephesians 2:10).
There is certainly synergism here; but it is a synergism of such character that not only is the initiative taken by God (for “all things are of God,” 2 Corinthians 5:18, cf. Hebrews 6:6), but the Divine action is in the exceeding greatness of God’s power, according to the working of the strength of His might which He wrought in Christ when He raised Him from the dead (Ephesians 1:19). The “new man” which is the result of this change is therefore one who can be described no otherwise than as “created” ktisqe>nta ) in righteousness and holiness of truth (Ephesians 4:24), after the image of God significantly described as “He who created him” ( tou~ kti>santov aujto>n , Colossians 3:10), — that is not He who made him a man, but He who has made him by an equally creative efflux of power this new man which he has become. [375] The exhortation that we shall “put on” this new man ( Ephesians 4:24, cf. 3:9, 10), therefore does not imply that either the initiation or the completion of the process by which the “new creation” ( kainh< kti>siv ; 2 Corinthians 5:17, Galatians 6:15) is wrought lies in our own power; but only urges us to that diligent coöperation with God in the work of our salvation, to which He calls us in all departments of life (1 Corinthians 3:9), and the classical expression of which in this particular department is found in the great exhortation of Philippians 2:12, 13 where we are encouraged to work out our own salvation thoroughly to the end, with fear and trembling, on the express ground that it is God who works in us both the willing and doing for His good pleasure. The express inclusion of” renewal” in the exhortation (Ephesians 4:23 aJnaneou~sqai ; Romans 12: metamorfou~sqe th~| ajnakainw>sei ) is indication enough that this “renewal” is a process wide enough to include in itself the whole synergistic “working out” of salvation ( katerga>zesqe , Philippians 2:12). But it has no tendency to throw doubt upon the underlying fact that this “working out” is both set in motion ( to< qe>lein ) and given effect (to< ejnergei~n ), only by the energizing of God (o[ ejnergw~n ejn uJmi~n ), so that all (ta< pa>nta ) is from God (ejk tou~ qeou~ , 2 Corinthians 5:18). Its effect is merely to bring “renewal” ( ajnakai>nwsiv ) into close parallelism with “repentance” (meta>noia ) — which itself is a gift of God ( 2 Timothy 2:25, cf. Acts 5:31, 11:18) as well as a work of man- as two names for the same great transaction, viewed now from the Divine, and now from the human point of sight.
It will not be without interest to observe the development of metanoei~n , meta>noia into the technical term to denote the great change by which man passes from death in sin into life in Christ. [376] Among the heathen writers, the two terms metame>lesqai, meta>me>leia and metanoei~n , meta>noia , although no doubt affected in their coloring by their differing etymological suggestions, and although metanoei~n , meta>noia seems always to have been the nobler term, were practically synonymous. Both were used of the dissatisfaction which is felt in reviewing an unworthy deed; both of the amendment which may grow out of this dissatisfaction.
Something of this undiscriminating usage extends into the New Testament. In the only three instances in which metame>lesqai occurs in the Gospels (Matthew 21:29, 32, 27:3, cf. Hebrews 7:21 from Old Testament), it is used of a repentance which issued in the amended act; while in Luke 17:3, 4 (but there only) metanoei~n , may very well be understood of a repentance which expended itself in regret.
Elsewhere in the New Testament metame>lesqai is used in a single instance only (except Hebrews 7:21 from Old Testament) and then it is brought into contrast with metanoei~n as the emotion of regret is contrasted with a revolution of mind (2 Corinthians 7:8 sq.). The Apostle had grieved the Corinthians with a letter and had regretted it (metamelo>mhn ); he had, however, ceased to regret it metame>lomai ), because he had come to perceive that their grief had led the
Corinthians to repent of their sin (meta>noia ), and certainly the salvation to which such a repentance tends is not to be regretted (ajmetame>lhton ). Here metame>lesqai is the painful review of the past; but so little is meta>noia this, that it is presented as a result of sorrow, — a total revolution of mind traced by the Apostle through the several stages of its formation in a delicate analysis remarkable for its insight into the working of a human soul under the influence of a strong revulsion (verse 11). Its roots were planted in godly sorrow, its issue was amendment of life, its essence consisted in a radical change of mind and heart towards sin. In this particular instance it was a particular sin which was in view; and in heathen writers the word is commonly employed of a specific repentance of a specific fault. In the New Testament this, however, is the rarer usage. [377] Here it prevailingly stands for that fundamental change of mind by which the back is turned not upon one sin or some sins, but upon all sin, and the face definitely turned to God and to His service, — of which therefore a transformed life ( eJpistrofh> ) is the outworking. [378] It is not itself this transformed life, into which it issues, any more than it is the painful regret out of which it issues. No doubt, it may spread its skirts so widely as to include on this side the sorrow for sin and on that the amendment of life; but what it precisely is, and what in all cases it emphasises, is the inner change of mind which regret induces and which itself induces a reformed life. Godly sorrow works repentance (2 Corinthians 7:10): when we “turn” to God we are doing works worthy of repentance (Acts 3:19, 26:20, cf. Luke 3:8).
It is in this, its deepest and broadest sense, that meta>noia corresponds from the human side to what from the divine point of sight is called ajnakai>nwsiv ; or, rather, to be more precise, that meta>noia is the psychological manifestation of ajnakai> - nwsiv. This “renewal” ( ajnakainou~sqai, ajnakai>nwsiv, ajnaneou~sqai ) is the broad term of its own group. It may be, to be sure, that palingenesi>a should take its place by its side in this respect. In one of the only
two passages in which it occurs in the New Testament (Matthew 19:28) it refers to the repristination not of the individual, but of the universe, which is to take place at “the end”: and this usage tends to stamp upon the word the broad sense of a complete and thoroughgoing restoration. If in Titus 3:5 it is applied to the individual in such a broad sense, it would be closely coextensive in meaning with the ajnakai>nwsiv by the side of which it stands in that passage, and would differ from it only as a highly figurative differs from a more literal expression of the same idea. [379] Our salvation, the Apostle would in that case say, is not an attainment of our own, but is wrought by God in His great mercy, by means of a regenerating washing, to wit, a renewal by the Holy Spirit.
The difficulty we experience in confidently determining the scope of palingenesi>a , arising from lack of a sufficiently copious usage to form the basis of our induction, attends us also with the other terms of its class. Nevertheless it seems tolerably clear that over against the broader “renewal” expressed by ajnakainou~sqai and its cognates and perhaps also by palingenesi>a, ajnagenna~n (1 Peter 1:23) and with it, its synonym ajkouei~sqai (James 1:18) are of narrower connotation. We have, says Peter, in God’s great mercy been rebegotten, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by means of the Word of the living and abiding God. It is in accordance with His own determination, says James, that we have been brought forth by the Father of Lights, from whom every good gift and every perfect boon comes, by means of the Word of truth. We have here an effect, the efficient agent in working which is God in His unbounded mercy, while the instrument by means of which it is wrought is “the word of good-tidings which has been preached” to us, that is to say, briefly, the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The issue is, equally briefly, just salvation. This salvation is characteristically described by Peter as awaiting its consummation in the future, while yet it is entered upon here and now not only (verse 4 sq.) as a “living hope” which shall not be put to shame (because it is reserved in heaven for us, and we meanwhile are guarded through faith for it by the power of God), but also in an accordant life of purity as children of obedience who would fain be like their Father and as He is holy be also ourselves holy in all manner of living. James intimates that those who have been thus brought forth by the will of God may justly be called “first fruits of His creatures,” where the reference assuredly is not to the first but to the second creation, that is to say, they who have already been brought forth by the word of truth are themselves the product of God’s creative energy and are the promise of the completed new creation when all that is shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the liberty of the glory of the children of God (Romans 8:19sq., Matthew 19:28).
The new birth thus brought before us is related to the broader idea of “renewal” (ajnakai>nwsiv ) as the initial stage to the whole process. The conception is not far from that embodied by our old Divines in the term “effectual calling” which they explained to be “by the Word and Spirit”; it is nowadays perhaps more commonly but certainly both less Scripturally and less descriptively spoken of as “conversion.” It finds its further explanation in the Scriptures accordingly not under the terms ejpistre>fein, ejpistrofh> , which describe to us that in which it issues, but under the terms kale>w, klh~siv [380] which describe to us precisely what it is. By these terms, which are practically confined to Paul and Peter, the follower of Christ is said to owe his introduction into the new life to a “call” from God — a call distinguished from the call of mere invitation (Matthew 22:14), as “the call according to purpose” ( Romans 8:28), a call which cannot fail of its appropriate effect, because there works in it the very power of God. The notion of the new birth is confined even more closely still to its initial step in our Lord’s discourse to Nicodemus, recorded in the opening verses of the third chapter of John’s Gospel. Here the whole emphasis is thrown upon the necessity of the new birth and its provision by the Holy Spirit. No one can see the Kingdom of God unless he be born again; and this new birth is wrought by the Spirit. Its advent into the soul is unobserved; its process is inscrutable; its reality is altogether an inference from its effects. There is no question here of means. That the ejx u[datov of verse 5 is to be taken as presenting the external act of baptism as the proper means by which the effect is brought about, is, as we have already pointed out, very unlikely. The axiom announced in verse 6 that all that is born of flesh is flesh and only what is born of the Spirit is spirit seems directly to negative such an interpretation by telling us flatly that we cannot obtain a spiritual effect from a physical action. The explanation of verse 8 that like the wind, the Spirit visits whom He will and we can only observe the effect and say Lo, it is here! seems inconsistent with supposing that it always attends the act of baptism and therefore can always be controlled by the human will. The new birth appears to be brought before us in this discussion in the purity of its conception; and we are made to perceive that at the root of the whole process of “renewal” there lies an immediate act of God the Holy Spirit upon the soul by virtue of which it is that the renewed man bears the great name of Son of God. Begotten not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God (John 1:13), his new life will necessarily bear the lineaments of his new parentage (1 John 3:9, 10; 5:4, 18): kept by Him who was in an even higher sense still begotten of God, he overcomes the world by faith, defies the evil one (who cannot touch him), and manifests in his righteousness and love the heritage which is his (1 John 2:29, 4:7, 5:1).
Undoubtedly the Spirit is active throughout the whole process of “renewal”; but it is doubtless the peculiarly immediate and radical nature of his operation at this initial
point which gives to the product of His renewing activities its best right to be called a new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17, Galatians 6:15), a quickening (John 5:21, Ephesians 2:5), a making alive from the dead (Galatians 3:21).
We perceive, then, that the Scriptural phraseology lays before us, as its account of the great change which the man experiences who is translated from what the Scriptures call darkness to what they call God’s marvellous light ( Ephesians 5:8, Colossians 1:13, 1 Peter 2:9, 1 John 2:8) a process; and a process which has two sides. It is on the one side a change of the mind and heart, issuing in a new life. It is on the other side a renewing from on high issuing in a new creation. But the initiative is taken by God: man is renewed unto repentance: he does not repent that he may be renewed (cf. Hebrews 6:6). He can work out his salvation with fear and trembling only because God works in him both the willing and the doing. At the basis of all there lies an enabling act from God, by virtue of which alone the spiritual activities of man are liberated for their work (Romans 6:22, 8:2). From that moment of the first divine contact the work of the Spirit never ceases: while man is changing his mind and reforming his life, it is ever God who is renewing him in true righteousness. Considered from man’s side the new dispositions of mind and heart manifest themselves in a new course of life. Considered from God’s side the renewal of the Holy Spirit results in the production of a new creature, God’s workmanship, with new activities newly directed. We obtain thus a regular series. At the root of all lies an act seen by God alone, and mediated by nothing, a direct creative act of the Spirit, the new birth. This new birth pushes itself into man’s own consciousness through the call of the Word, responded to under the persuasive movements of the Spirit; his conscious possession of it is thus mediated by the Word. It becomes visible to his fellow-men only in a turning to God in external obedience, under the constant leading of the indwelling Spirit (Romans 8:14). A man must be born again by the Spirit to become God’s son. He must be born again by the Spirit and Word to become consciously God’s son. He must manifest his new spiritual life in Spirit-led activities accordant with the new heart which he has received and which is ever renewed afresh by the Spirit, to be recognized by his fellow-men as God’s son. It is the entirety of this process, viewed as the work of God on the soul, which the Scriptures designate “renewal.”
It must not be supposed that it is only in these semi-technical terms, however, that the process of “renewal” is spoken of in the Epistles of the New Testament any more than in the Gospels. There is, on the contrary, the richest and most varied employment of language, literal and figurative, to describe it in its source, or its nature, or its effects. It is sometimes suggested, for example, under the image of a change of vesture (Ephesians 4:24, Colossians 3:9, 10, cf. Gal 3:27,
Romans 13:14): the old man is laid aside like soiled clothing, and the new man put on like clean raiment. Sometimes it is represented, in accordance with its nature, less figuratively, as a metamorphosis (Romans 12:2): by the renewing of our minds we become transformed beings, able to free ourselves from the fashion of this world and prove what is the will of God, good and acceptable and perfect. Sometimes it is more searchingly set forth as to its nature as a reanimation (John 5:21, Ephesians 2:4-6, Colossians 2:12, 13, Romans 6:3, 4): we are dead through our trespasses and the uncircumcision of our flesh; God raises us from this death and makes us sit in the heavenly places with Christ. Sometimes with less of figure and with more distinct reference to the method of the divine working, it is spoken of as a recreation (Ephesians 2:10, 4:24, Colossians 3:10), and its product, therefore, as a new creature (2 Corinthians 5:17, Galatians 6:15): we emerge from it as the workmanship of God, created in Christ Jesus unto good works. Sometimes with more particular reference to the nature and effects of the transaction, it is defined rather as a sanctification, a making holy (aJgia>zw ), 1 Thessalonians 5:23, Romans 15:16, Revelation 22:11; aJgia>zw , 1 Peter 1:22; aJgiasmo>v , 1 Thessalonians 4:3, 7, Romans 6:19, 22, Hebrews 12:14, 2 Thessalonians 2:13, 1 Peter 1:2; cf. Ellicott, on 1 Thessalonians 4:3, 3:13): and those who are the subjects of the change are, therefore, called “saints” ( a[gioi , e.g., Romans 8:27, 1 Corinthians 6:1, 2, Colossians 1:12). Sometimes again, with more distinct reference to its sources, it is spoken of as the “living” ( Galatians 2:20, Romans 6:9, 10, Ephesians 3:17) or “forming” (Galatians 4:19, cf. Ephesians 3:17, 1 Corinthians 2:16, 2 Corinthians 3:8) of Christ in us, or more significantly (Romans 8:9, 10, Galatians 4:6) as the indwelling of Christ or the Spirit in us, or with greater precision as the leading of the Spirit (Romans 8:14, Galatians 5:18): and its subjects are accordingly signalized as Spiritual men, that is, Spirit-determined, Spirit-led men (pneumatikoi> , 1 Corinthians 2:15, 3:1, Galatians 6:1, cf. 1 Peter 2:5), as distinguished from carnal men, that is, men under the dominance of their own weak, vicious selves (yucikoi> , 1 Corinthians 2:14, Jude 1:19, sarkikoi> , 1 Corinthians 3:3). None of these modes of representation more clearly define the action than the last mentioned. For the essence of the New Testament representation certainly is that the renewal which is wrought upon him who is by faith in Christ, is the work of the Spirit of Christ, who dwells within His children as a power not themselves making for righteousness, and gradually but surely transforms after the image of God, not the stream of their activities merely, but themselves in the very centre of their being.
The process by which this great metamorphosis is accomplished is laid bare to our observation with wonderful clearness in Paul’s poignant description of it, in the seventh chapter of Romans. We are there permitted to look in upon a heart into
which the Spirit of God has. intruded with His transforming power. Whatever peace it may have enjoyed is broken up. All its ingrained tendencies to evil are up in arms against the intruded power for good. The force of evil habit is so great that the Apostle, in its revelation to him, is almost tempted to despair. “O wretched man that I am,” he cries, “who shall deliver me out of the body of this death?” Certainly not himself. None knows better than he that with man this is impossible. But he bethinks himself that the Spirit of the most high God is more powerful than even ingrained sin; and with a great revulsion of heart he turns at once to cry his thanks to God through Jesus Christ our Lord. This conflict he sees within him, he sees now to bear in it the promise and potency of victory; because it is the result of the Spirit’s working within him, and where the Spirit works, there is emancipation from the law of sin and death. The process may be hard — a labor, a struggle, a fight; but the end is assured. No matter how far from perfect we yet may be, we are not in the flesh but in the Spirit if the Spirit of God dwells in us; and we may take heart of faith from that circumstance to mortify the deeds of the body and to enter upon our heritage as children of God. Here in brief compass is the Apostle’s whole doctrine of renewal. Without holiness we certainly shall not see the Lord: but he in whom the Holy Spirit dwells, is already potentially holy; and though we see not yet what we shall be, we know that the work that is begun within us shall be completed to the end. The very presence of strife within us is the sign of life and the promise of victory.
The church has retained, on the whole, with very considerable constancy the essential elements of this Biblical doctrine of “renewal.” In the main stream of
Christian thought, at all events, there has been little tendency to neglect, much less to deny it, at least theoretically. In all accredited types of Christian teaching it is largely insisted upon that salvation consists in its substance of a radical subjective change wrought by the Holy Spirit, by virtue of which the native tendencies to evil are progressively eradicated and holy dispositions are implanted, nourished and perfected.
The most direct contradiction which this teaching has received in the history of Christian thought was that given it by Pelagius at the opening of the fifth century. Under the stress of a one-sided doctrine of human freedom, in pursuance of which he passionately asserted the inalienable ability of the will to do all righteousness, Pelagius was led to deny the need and therefore the reality of subjective operations of God on the soul (“grace” in the inner sense) to secure its perfection; and this carried with it as its necessary presupposition the denial also of all subjective injury wrought on man by sin. The vigorous reassertion of the necessity of subjective grace by Augustine put pure Pelagianism once for all outside the pale of recognized Christian teaching; although in more or less modified or attentuated forms, it has
remained as a widely spread tendency in the churches, conditioning the purity of the supernaturalism of salvation which is confessed.
The strong emphasis laid by the Reformers upon the objective side of salvation, in the enthusiasm of their rediscovery of the fundamental doctrine of justification, left its subjective side, which was not in dispute between them and their nearest opponents, in danger of falling temporarily somewhat out of sight. From the comparative infrequency with which it was in the first stress of conflict insisted on, occasion, if not given, was at least taken, to represent that it was neglected if not denied. Already in the first generation of the Reformation movement, men of mystical tendencies like Osiander arraigned the Protestant teaching as providing only for a purely external salvation. The reproach was eminently unjust, and although it continues to be repeated up to to-day, it remains eminently unjust. Only among a few Moravian enthusiasts, and still fewer Antinomians, and, in recent times, in the case of certain of the Neo-Kohlbrüggian party, can a genuine tendency to neglect the subjective side of salvation be detected. With all the emphasis which Protestant theology lays on justification by faith as the root of salvation, it has never failed to lay equal emphasis on sanctification by the Spirit as its substance. Least of all can the Reformed theology with its distinctive insistence upon “irresistible grace” — which is the very heart of the doctrine of “renewal” — be justly charged with failure to accord its rights to the great truth of supernatural sanctification. The debate at this point does not turn on the reality or necessity of sanctification, but on the relation of sanctification to justification. In clear accord with the teaching of Scripture, Protestant theology insists that justification underlies sanctification, and not vice versa. But it has never imagined that the sinner could get along with justification alone. It has rather ever insisted that sanctification is so involved in justification that the justification cannot be real unless it be followed by sanctification. There has never been a time when it could not recognize the truth in and (when taken out of its somewhat compromising context) make heartily its own such an admirable statement of the state of the case as the following: [381] — “However far off it may be from us or we from it, we cannot and ought not to think of our salvation as anything less than our own perfected and completed sinlessness and holiness. We may be, to the depths of our souls, grateful and happy to be sinners pardoned and forgiven by divine grace. But surely God would not have us satisfied with that as the end and substance of the salvation He gives us in His Son. Jesus Christ is the power of God in us unto salvation. It does not require an exercise of divine power to extend pardon; it does require it to endow and enable us with all the qualities, energies, and activities that make for, and that make holiness and life. See how St. Paul speaks of it when he prays, That we may know the exceeding greatness of God’s power to usward who believe, according to that working of the strength of His might which he wrought in Christ when He raised Him from the dead.”"

Benjamin B. Warfield, BIBLICAL DOCTRINES (Volume II) (Joseph Kreifels).

Atheist Rap

There seems to be some confusion about this video on YouTube. Apparently many atheists do not seem to understand this video is actually making fun of them. I get it, I hope you get it also and enjoy this brilliant parody.



HT-Disillusioned Words

Don't Tell Me They Just Are Not Living Their Best Life Now!

I wonder why Benny Hinn or Kenneth Copeland do not visit these parts of the world. It makes me sick that these wolves are getting rich while true believers around the world suffer so.

We're Moving!

Ok, so I have been to physical therapy six times now and they are doing ultra-sound therapy, some kind of electrical therapy, and a bunch of exercises. My hip is really starting to feel better but we had a 20'X8'X8' dumpster delivered to our driveway this morning and we now have ten days to fill it with as much stuff as we can. I really would cherish prayers that I control myself, pace myself and do not overdo it. I could really take a few steps backwards and do not want to do that. I especially could use it next week during the day while I am here alone and apt to think I feel better than I do. I can see the day coming now when we will be moved and class will have started. Praise the Lord my mood is better and I am so very excited.

Spoonman

I have not lightened things up in a while so here is a video to help you unwind this weekend.

I Bet The Politicians Don't Let This See The Light Of Day!

Unbelievable Patented Technology - For more funny videos, click here

Entrecard Dropping Made Easy

Tysblog.com has made it incredibly easy to drop your entrecards. Just visit this blog, follow the instructions and in minutes you too can be a power dropper!