R.C. Sproul's Blog, page 117

Recovering the Teaching of the Fathers

The Reformers were not turning their backs on the church, but recovering its true teachings. In this brief clip, Sinclair Ferguson looks at the authority and clarity of Scripture.

This Reformation Month, watch a short video every day on the history and insights of the Protestant Reformation. And don't forget that for this month only, you can request your free digital download of R.C. Sproul’s video teaching series Luther and the Reformation plus the ebook edition of The Legacy of Luther, edited by R.C. Sproul and Stephen Nichols at ligm.in/Reformation. Offer ends October 31, 2019.

Transcript

You know one of the things particularly Calvin emphasized was—we are being accused of disrupting the traditions of the fathers. The problem is you men do not know the traditions of the fathers.

The Reformers view was not—we are turning our backs on the communion of the church. The Reformers view was—we’re actually recovering the core teaching of the communion of the church. The safeguard is that we read Scripture in the light of Scripture, using Scriptural principles to interpret Scripture. We shouldn’t be blindsided by these picky notions that are eating away at our confidence in Scripture and especially in its clarity. Because that is an area that is so often under attack today.

How Do We Share the Truth without Being Argumentative?

We do not need to be hostile in order to make sound arguments for the truth. From one of our Ask R.C. events, R.C. Sproul encourages us to clearly present the truth of Scripture without being mean-spirited.

To get real-time answers to your biblical and theological questions, just Ask.Ligonier.org.

Read the Transcript

What Does the Roman Catholic Church Believe About Justification?

The gospel of Jesus Christ is always at risk of distortion. It became distorted in the centuries leading up to the Protestant Reformation of the sixteenth century. It became distorted at innumerable other points of church history, and it is often distorted today. This is why Martin Luther said the gospel must be defended in every generation. It is the center point of attack by the forces of evil. They know that if they can get rid of the gospel, they can get rid of Christianity.

There are two sides to the gospel, the good news of the New Testament: an objective side and a subjective side. The objective content of the gospel is the person and work of Jesus—who He is and what He accomplished in His life. The subjective side is the question of how the benefits of Christ’s work are appropriated to the believer. There the doctrine of justification comes to the fore.

Many issues were involved in the Reformation, but the core matter, the material issue of the Reformation, was the gospel, especially the doctrine of justification. There was no great disagreement between the Roman Catholic Church authorities and the Protestant Reformers about the objective side. All the parties agreed that Jesus was divine, the Son of God and of the Virgin Mary, and that He lived a life of perfect obedience, died on the cross in an atoning death, and was raised from the grave. The battle was over the second part of the gospel, the subjective side, the question of how the benefits of Christ are applied to the believer.

The Reformers believed and taught that we are justified by faith alone. Faith, they said, is the sole instrumental cause for our justification. By this they meant that we receive all the benefits of Jesus’ work through putting our trust in Him alone.

The Roman communion also taught that faith is a necessary condition for salvation. At the seminal Council of Trent (1545–1563), which formulated Rome’s response to the Reformation, the Roman Catholic authorities declared that faith affords three things: the initium, the fundamentum, and the radix. That is, faith is the beginning of justification, the foundation for justification, and the root of justification. But Rome held that a person can have true faith and still not be justified, because there was much more to the Roman system.

In reality, the Roman view of the gospel, as expressed at Trent, was that justification is accomplished through the sacraments. Initially, the recipient must accept and cooperate in baptism, by which he receives justifying grace. He retains that grace until he commits a mortal sin. Mortal sin is called “mortal” because it kills the grace of justification. The sinner then must be justified a second time. That happens through the sacrament of penance, which the Council of Trent defined as “a second plank” of justification for those who have made shipwreck of their souls.

The fundamental difference was this. Trent said that God does not justify anyone until real righteousness inheres within the person. In other words, God does not declare a person righteous unless he or she is righteous. So, according to Roman Catholic doctrine, justification depends on a person’s sanctification. By contrast, the Reformers said justification is based on the imputation of the righteousness of Jesus. The only ground by which a person can be saved is Jesus’ righteousness, which is reckoned to him when he believes.

There were radically different views of salvation. They could not be reconciled. One of them was the gospel. One of them was not. Thus, what was at stake in the Reformation was the gospel of Jesus Christ. Though the Council of Trent made many fine affirmations of traditional truths of the Christian faith, it declared justification by faith alone to be anathema, ignoring many plain teachings of Scripture, such as Romans 3:28: “For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law.”

This excerpt is adapted from Are We Together? A Protestant Analyzes Roman Catholicism by R.C. Sproul. Learn more by watching R.C. Sproul's teaching series Justified by Faith Alone.

$5 Friday: Ethics, Baptism, & Sanctification

It’s time for our weekly $5 Friday sale. This week’s resources include such topics as baptism, evangelism, sanctification, George Whitefield, God's Will, ethics, abortion, and more

Sale runs through 12:01 a.m. — 11:59 p.m. Friday ET.

View today’s $5 Friday sale items.

Just Do Something

Here’s an excerpt from Just Do Something, Gene Edward Veith's contribution to the October issue of Tabletalk:

After I spoke at a Christian college about the doctrine of vocation, a student came up and asked if I could give him some guidance. He came to the school thinking that he wanted to be a pastor, but then he felt drawn to becoming a teacher. “How do I know what the Lord wants me to do?” he asked.

I gave him some advice about discerning his talents, but then he asked a question that revealed the underlying issue: “What if I make the wrong choice?” What if I decide to be a teacher, but God really wanted me to be a pastor? Or what if I decide to be a pastor, but God didn’t really want me to be one? How could I teach or preach if in doing so I might be outside of God’s will? And how could I possibly know either way?

And then the answer came to me. “You can’t make the wrong choice,” I told him. If you decide to go to into the ministry—and, importantly, since vocations come to us from outside ourselves, if you finish seminary and receive a call from a congregation—you can be sure that God has placed you in that pulpit. If you decide to go into teaching and a school hires you, then you can be sure that God has placed you in that classroom. God may even place you in the classroom now and then later call you into the ministry.

Continue reading Just Do Something, or begin receiving Tabletalk magazine by signing up for a free 3-month trial.

For a limited time, the new TabletalkMagazine.com allows everyone to browse and read the growing library of back issues, including this month’s issue.

Truth Is No Quibble. Build Your Christian Vocabulary with Simply Put.

Today, some people believe that the Protestant Reformation was a mere quibble about words—words like justification, grace, and imputed righteousness. However, the truth is no quibble. In order to know God and His gospel rightly, we must seek to understand what His Word teaches with precision and clarity.

Simply Put is a weekly podcast to help you build your Christian vocabulary. Each episode explains a different theological term in clear, precise language and uses stories and illustrations to apply these truths to your life. As we approach the 502nd anniversary of the Reformation, listen to these previous episodes to hear just what was at stake in the sixteenth century and today.

Justification
Imputed Righteousness
Authority of Scripture
The Five Solas
Total Depravity

With more than 25 episodes available, you can start building your theological vocabulary right away. Subscribe to Simply Put today to expand your understanding and deepen your faith, one word at a time. You can listen on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, RefNet, TuneIn, Stitcher, or RSS, or by visiting SimplyPutPodcast.com.

What Does "Simul Justus et Peccator" Mean?

By whose righteousness will we be judged? In this brief clip, R.C. Sproul shares the very heart of the gospel as he explains Martin Luther's Latin phrase, "Simul Justus et Peccator."

This Reformation Month, watch a short video every day on the history and insights of the Protestant Reformation. And don't forget that for this month only, you can request your free digital download of R.C. Sproul’s video teaching series Luther and the Reformation plus the ebook edition of The Legacy of Luther, edited by R.C. Sproul and Stephen Nichols at ligm.in/Reformation. Offer ends October 31, 2019.

Transcript

Perhaps the formula that Luther used that is most famous and most telling at this point is his formula simul justus et peccator. And if any formula summarizes and captures the essence of the Reformation view, it is this little formula. Simul is the word from which we get the English word simultaneously. Or, it means 'at the same time.' Justus is the Latin word for just or righteous. And you all know what et is. Et the past tense of the verb 'to eat.' Have you et your dinner? No, you know that's not what that means. You remember in the death scene of Caesar after he's been stabbed by Brutus he says, "Et tu, Brute?" Then fall Caesar. And you too Brutus? It simply means and. Peccator means sinner.

And so with this formula, Luther was saying, in our justification we are one and the same time righteous or just, and sinners. Now if he would say that we are at the same time and in the same relationship just and sinners that would be a contradiction in terms. But that's not what he was saying. He was saying from one perspective, in one sense, we are just. In another sense, from a different perspective, we are sinners; and how he defines that is simple. In and of ourselves, under the analysis of God's scrutiny, we still have sin; we're still sinners. But, by imputation and by faith in Jesus Christ, whose righteousness is now transferred to our account, then we are considered just or righteous. This is the very heart of the gospel.

Will I be judged in order to get into heaven by my righteousness or by the righteousness of Christ? If I had to trust in my righteousness to get into heaven, I would completely and utterly despair of any possibility of ever being redeemed. But when we see that the righteousness that is ours by faith is the perfect righteousness of Christ, then we see how glorious is the good news of the gospel. The good news is simply this, I can be reconciled to God, I can be justified by God not on the basis of what I did, but on the basis of what's been accomplished for me by Christ.

But at the heart of the gospel is a double-imputation. My sin is imputed to Jesus. His righteousness is imputed to me. And in this two-fold transaction we see that God, Who does not negotiate sin, Who doesn't compromise His own integrity with our salvation, but rather punishes sin fully and really after it has been imputed to Jesus, retains His own righteousness, and so He is both just and the justifier, as the apostle tells us here. So my sin goes to Jesus, His righteousness comes to me in the sight of God.

The Liberating Doctrine of Grace Alone

The Reformers’ tenacious insistence on grace alone is no relic of history. In this brief clip from his teaching series Reformation Truths, Michael Reeves reminds us that ultimate liberation is only found in the grace offered in the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Transcript

Those who have accepted that God saves by His grace alone have found the message to be one of unutterably sweet liberation. Martin Luther wrote, "I felt I was altogether born again, and had entered paradise itself through open gates." And so it remains today. The Reformers' tenacious insistence on grace alone is no relic of the history books to be looked on with embarrassment as the sorry squabble of pernickety theologians. It remains as the only message of ultimate liberation, the message with the deepest power to make humans unfurl and flourish. By grace alone, all those who know themselves as failures can know not just a bit of enabling from God, helping them to do a little better. They can know a wholly new and victorious identity in Christ, which we'll consider very soon. They can know assurance, relief from guilt, and sweet intimacy with an almighty Father who cares for them. And knowing that, they begin to find a hearty desire rising up in them to follow the One who is the source of all grace and every good. You see, once they would've attempted holiness out of the desperate desire to earn eternal life. With this gospel, they do so out of a heart transformed to want Christ, to see the beauty of His kindness, His goodness, His generosity, and all His holy ways.

Salvation from Start to Finish Is a Work of God for His Glory

We contribute nothing to our salvation. In this brief clip, Stephen Nichols explains that from start to finish, salvation is a work of God for His Glory.

This Reformation Month, watch a short video every day on the history and insights of the Protestant Reformation. And don't forget that for this month only, you can request your free digital download of R.C. Sproul’s video teaching series Luther and the Reformation plus the ebook edition of The Legacy of Luther, edited by R.C. Sproul and Stephen Nichols at ligm.in/Reformation. Offer ends October 31, 2019.

Transcript

Semper Reformanda in Context

The phrase ecclesia reformata, semper reformanda (the church reformed, always reforming) has been used so often as to make it a motto or slogan. People have used it to support a surprising array of theological and ecclesiastical programs and purposes. Scholars have traced its origins to a devotional book written by Jodocus van Lodenstein in 1674. Van Lodenstein, no doubt, had no intention of being a phrase-maker or sloganeer. What was his intention, and what did he mean by this phrase?

Van Lodenstein was a minister in the Reformed Church of the United Provinces in what we know today as the Netherlands. This church was born of decades of faithful preaching by ministers—many educated in Geneva—who risked their lives to carry the gospel, first into the French-speaking regions of the Low Countries, and later into the Dutch-speaking regions farther north. Some ministers were martyred for their faith, but they gathered a rich harvest of committed believers. Their message of the need for the reform of the church according to the Bible resonated with many who saw the corruptions of the old church.

Under the rulers Charles V and Philip II, the government of the Low Countries made every effort to suppress the Reformed religion, which was a large part of the reason for the Dutch revolt against their Spanish overlords. This revolt (1568-1648) became known as the Eighty Years' War, giving birth to a new state in the northern part of the Low Countries. In this new state—the Dutch Republic, also known as the United Provinces—the Reformed Church was dominant, receiving government support and becoming the church of the majority of the population by the middle of the seventeenth century.

This church subscribed to the Belgic Confession (1561) and the Heidelberg Catechism (1563), and had an essentially presbyterian form of government. Interference from the Protestant civil authorities of the new state limited the freedom of the Reformed Church, particularly in matters of discipline. That interference, in part, led to a crisis in the church in the early seventeenth century with the rise of Arminianism. That crisis was addressed and settled at the great international synod held in the city of Dordrecht in 1618-19. The Canons of Dort prepared at this synod became another doctrinal authority in the life of the church.

Jodocus van Lodenstein was born into a prominent family in the city of Delft in 1620. He was educated by two of the most distinguished Reformed professors of the day: the scholastic and pietist theologian Gisbertus Voetius of Utrecht and the covenant theologian Johannes Cocceius of Franeker. While being personally friendly with both theologians, he was more influenced by Voetius. Voetius stressed both precise theology and Christian living. Van Lodenstein was called to serve as a pastor in Utrecht, where he ministered from 1653 until his death in 1677. As a pastor, he always encouraged the faithful to disciplined, vital Christianity.

Van Lodenstein was an inheritor of a body clearly and fully reformed according to the Reformed or Calvinistic interpretation of the Bible. The Calvinists often described their vision of the church in three categories: doctrine, worship, and church government. In all three of these areas, the Dutch Reformed Church was thoroughly Calvinistic, similar in most ways to Calvinistic churches throughout the rest of Europe.

No church's life is ever static, however, and van Lodenstein certainly saw some changes in his lifetime. In doctrine, for example, Reformed theologians were developing a covenant theology that would give great insight into both the structure of the unfolding revelation of the Bible and the work of Christ. Most Reformed Christians have seen this as a real theological advance. Van Lodenstein also saw the increasing use of the organ in public worship in the Reformed churches in his time. He knew the debates as to whether this change was a reformation or a deformation in the worship of the church. Are these the kinds of changes that he had in mind when he wrote about a church reformed and always reforming?

The answer to this question is no. Van Lodenstein was not thinking about adjustments and improvements to the church's doctrine, worship, and government. These matters of external reform had been absolutely necessary when the Reformers accomplished them in the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. But for Calvinists like van Lodenstein, they had been definitively accomplished and settled. He was not contemplating the value of relatively minor changes. He was not a man of later centuries who believed progress and change were necessary and good in and of themselves. He believed the Bible was clear on the foundations of doctrine, worship, and government, and that the Reformed churches had reformed these things correctly. In this sense, reform was a return to the teaching of the Bible. The Reformers had gotten these things right, and they were settled.

The great concern of ministers like van Lodenstein was not the externals of religion—as absolutely important as they are—but rather the internal side of religion. Van Lodenstein was a Reformed pietist and part of the Dutch Second Reformation. As such, his religious concerns were very similar to those of the English Puritans. They all believed that once the externals of religion had been carefully and faithfully reformed according to the Word of God, the great need was for ministers to lead people in the true religion of the heart. They saw the great danger of their day not as false doctrine or superstition or idolatry, but as formalism. The danger of formalism is that a church member could subscribe to true doctrine, participate in true worship in a biblically regulated church, and yet still not have true faith. As Jesus had warned against the Pharisees of His day, citing the prophet Isaiah, "This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me" (Matt. 15:8).

The part of religion that always needs reforming is the human heart. It is vital religion and true faith that must be constantly cultivated. Formalism, indifferentism, and conformism must all be vigorously opposed by a faithful ministry.

Van Lodenstein and those who stood with him believed that the Canons of Dort presented a vision of true religion like their own. In the battle against Arminianism, one of the great issues had been the doctrine of regeneration. In sixteenth-century Reformed theology, theologians used regeneration as one of several synonyms for sanctification. So, for example, Article 24 of the Belgic Confession could state that we are regenerated by faith. But in the struggle against the Arminians, regeneration took on a more technical meaning, referring to the sovereign work of the Holy Spirit in planting the new life in the soul that is necessary for faith. This new use of regeneration explained how faith was a gift of God, not the work of human free will. But it also explained how Christians were, by the grace of God, able to live a new life, pursuing holiness. The Canons of Dort declared:

When God carries out this good pleasure in his chosen ones, or works true conversion in them, he not only sees to it that the gospel is proclaimed to them outwardly, and enlightens their minds powerfully by the Holy Spirit so that they may rightly understand and discern the things of the Spirit of God, but, by the effective operation of the same regenerating Spirit, he also penetrates into the inmost being of man, opens the closed heart, softens the hard heart, and circumcises the heart that is uncircumcised. He infuses new qualities into the will, making the dead will alive, the evil one good, the unwilling one willing, and the stubborn one compliant; he activates and strengthens the will so that, like a good tree, it may be enabled to produce the fruits of good deeds.

This doctrine of regeneration was used, then, to stress the new principle of life in the Christian and the need for that new life to be lived out. The Christian needed to eschew formalism and live out his faith in the daily struggle against sin, finding rest and hope in the promises and Spirit of God.

So what did van Lodenstein mean by his famous phrase reformed and always reforming? Probably something like this: since we now have a church reformed in the externals of doctrine, worship, and government, let us always be working to ensure that our hearts and lives are being reformed by the Word and Spirit of God. Whatever other meanings may be made of this phrase, this original meaning is well worth pondering and preserving.

This post was originally published in Tabletalk magazine.