R.C. Sproul's Blog, page 18

How Will We Become Sinless In Heaven?

No Christian is fully perfected until he or she is glorified in heaven. From our 2016 National Conference, R.C. Sproul and Ian Hamilton look to the moment when our sanctification will be complete.

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The Preface to the Canons of Dort

The synod of Dort approved the canons on April 23, 1619, and two days later adopted a preface to the canons as a brief historical and theological introduction to the work of the synod and the canons. This preface has seldom been reprinted and is not regarded as an official part of the canons. Nevertheless, it is a useful introduction to them and is included here in a new translation.

In the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen.

Among the many comforts which our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ gave to His church militant in its troubled sojourn, one in particular is rightly celebrated. That one He left behind as He departed to His Father in the heavenly sanctuary, saying, “I am with you every day until the end of the age.” The truth of this very delightful promise shines in the church of every time. She was attacked from the beginning not only in the open violence of enemies and the impiety of heretics, but also in the hidden cunning of seducers. Indeed, if ever the Lord had deprived her of the protection of the saving promise of His presence, long ago either the power of tyrants would have oppressed her or the fraud of deceivers would have seduced her to destruction. But the Good Shepherd has most constantly loved His flock for which He gave His life. He has always held back with His right hand at the right time the rage of persecutors, often openly and wonderfully. He has finished off and routed the crooked ways and fraudulent counsels of the seducers. Each time He showed His presence with His church. Clear proof of this truth stands in the histories of the pious emperors, kings, and princes, whom the Son of God so many times has raised up for the protection of His church. Inflamed with a holy zeal for His house, they restrained by their works the fury of the tyrants. “They also took care of the church with the remedies of holy synods when contending with false teachers and those who in various ways counterfeit religion. In these synods, faithful servants of Christ joined together in prayer, counsel, and labor. They stood strong and immovable for the church and truth of God, opposed undaunted the ministers of Satan transformed into angels of light, suppressed the seeds of errors and discord, preserved the church in the harmony of pure religion, and transmitted sound worship to posterity undiminished.

With the same favor, our faithful Savior in this time has shown His gracious presence to the Dutch church, which was for many years very afflicted. This church was set free from the tyranny of the Roman Antichrist and the horrible papal idolatry by the powerful hand of God. It was preserved wondrously many times in the dangers of the long war. It has flourished in the harmony of true doctrine and discipline to the praise of God, the admirable growth of Republic, and the joy of the whole Reformed world.

Then Jacob Arminius and his followers, named Remonstrants, attacked this church with various errors, some old and some new, first privately and then openly. Scandalous dissensions and obstinately disordered schisms led to such division that this most flourishing church would have been consumed in the horrible fire of these dissensions and schisms unless the compassion of our Savior had intervened at the right time. Blessed forever be the Lord, who after He had hidden His face for a moment from us (who had provoked His wrath and indignation in many ways), has shown the whole world that He does not forget His covenant and does not scorn the sighing of His people. When it appeared that there was hardly any human hope of remedy, He inspired the minds of the Most Illustrious and Mighty States General of the Dutch federation, together with the counsel and direction of the Most Illustrious and Mighty Prince of Orange, to use those legitimate means which the Apostles themselves practiced. Those means, followed as examples by those who came after the Apostles, came down to us, sanctioned by long use in the Christian church and practiced before this with great fruit also in the Dutch church. These civil governors decided to face the raging evils before them, declaring by their authority that a synod be convened in Dordrecht from all their provinces. They also requested and procured for this Synod many most important theologians by the favor of the Most Serene and Powerful King of Great Britain, James, and of various Most Illustrious Princes, Counts, and Republics.

By the common judgment of so many theologians of the Reformed church, the teachings of Arminius and his followers would be judged accurately and by the Word of God alone, true doctrine established and false doctrine rejected, and—by the divine blessing—harmony, peace, and tranquility be restored to the Dutch churches. This is that blessing of God in which the Dutch churches exult. They humbly acknowledge the compassions of their faithful Savior and gratefully preach them.

Before the meeting of this venerable Synod, the authority of the highest magistrates called for and held gatherings of prayer and fasting in all the Dutch churches to avert the wrath of God and to implore His gracious help. The Synod then gathered in the name of the Lord at Dordrecht, inflamed by love of the divine majesty and of the well-being of the church. After calling on the name of God, it bound itself by a holy oath to have for its judgment only the standard of Holy Scripture, and in its proceedings to understand and to act in judgment with good and honest conscience, and to do this diligently. It bound itself with great patience to persuade the leading advocates of that teaching cited before them to present their conviction about the Five Heads of Doctrine and to expound fully the reasons for that conviction. But when they repudiated the judgment of the synod and refused to respond to its questions, neither the warnings of the Synod nor the commands of the delegates of the Most Generous and Powerful States General could make progress with them. The Synod was forced to pursue another way by the order of their Lords and from the custom received from ancient synods. So the Synod examined their teachings on the five points from their writings, confessions, and declarations, some previously issued, others prepared for this Synod.

Through the singular grace of God, with the greatest diligence, faith, and conscience, this Synod achieved the absolute consensus of all and each member, to the glory of God. So, for the integrity of the truth of salvation, the tranquility of consciences, and the peace and well-being of the Dutch church, the Synod decided to promulgate the following judgment. By this judgment it both expounded the true conviction, which agreed to the Word of God about the previously mentioned Five Heads of Doctrine, and rejected the false conviction which differed from the Word of God.

This excerpt is adapted from Saving the Reformation by W. Robert Godfrey.

$5 Friday (And More): Ethics, Sin, & Theology

It’s time for our weekly $5 Friday sale. This week’s resources include such topics as ethics, sin, theology, the Psalms, Jonathan Edwards, benedictions, doxologies, and more.

Plus, several bonus resources are also available for more than $5. These have been significantly discounted from their original price. This week’s bonus resources include:

The Hunger for Significance: Seeing the Image of God in Man by R.C. Sproul, Paperback book $7 $8 A Heart for God by Sinclair Ferguson, Paperback book $11 $8 God’s High Calling for Women by John MacArthur, Paperback book $8 $5.50 The Consequences of Ideas by R.C. Sproul, Paperback book $17 $10 Preaching the Psalms by Steven Lawson, Paperback book $22 $15And More

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

View Today's $5 Friday Sale Items

 

After the Diet

Here’s an excerpt from After the Diet, Gene Edward Veith's contribution to the April issue of Tabletalk:

The diet at which Martin Luther made his stand concluded with the Edict of Worms, which declared Luther to be a heretic, banned his works, forbade anyone from giving him food or shelter, and called for his arrest.

Luther was allowed to travel back to Wittenberg under the safe conduct promised by the emperor, but he must have remembered what happened to Jan Hus, who, despite his safe conduct to the Council of Constance, was arrested and burned at the stake under the official church maxim that “faith is not to be kept with heretics.” That certainly flashed through Luther’s mind when the covered wagon in which he and his friends were traveling was attacked by a swarm of horsemen armed with crossbows. They pulled Luther from the wagon, threw him on a horse, and rode off with him.

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God's Global Work

Around the world, the number of professing Christians is on the rise. The Center for the Study of Global Christianity now estimates that the number of evangelicals and Protestants will grow by 50 percent from nearly one billion to more than 1.5 billion by 2050. Meanwhile, the United Nations anticipates the growth of the global population will continue to accelerate, forecasting that two billion additional souls will inhabit the planet as we race toward 9.8 billion people in the next thirty years. Remarkably, more than 50 percent of this growth will come from only nine countries.

Over the last several years, my ministry responsibilities have taken me to five different continents to meet with pastors and various ministry leaders, faithful servants living out their callings in obedience to the Great Commission. Many of them are weary in their labors, toiling with a dearth of resources in the midst of tempestuous and often hostile circumstances. The majority have not been formally trained. The lack of academic institutions combined with meager finances often requires that they study whatever they can find. Yet, through the power of the Holy Spirit, they are faithfully stewarding the mysteries of God (1 Cor. 4:1–2) among those whom He numbered among the stars when He blessed Abraham (Gen. 15:5). Despite their circumstances, God’s Word is indeed accomplishing His purpose (Isa. 55:11). Jesus is building His church.

Not long ago, I attended a covert gathering of pastors and leaders serving in the Middle East and North Africa. The gathering was by invitation only, requiring background checks to ensure the safety of all attendees. Testimonies of God’s saving grace were often shared against the backdrop of persecution. Beatings, imprisonment, job losses, and ruptured familial relationships were only a few of the hardships our brothers in Christ shared. Many of those in attendance risked imprisonment or death if the nature of their Christian service were to be discovered by the Islamic tyrants of their home countries. Many left behind family and livelihoods to escape the death warrants placed on them since they became Christians. Some were living in countries where they could worship Christ without fear of death but continued to share the gospel with Muslims who had similarly fled the cruel living conditions. Their trauma-marked testimonies were defined by sober courage in the Lord. Their chilling testimonies of the enemy’s evil intentions became the fertile soil in which they exalted God’s good intentions (Gen. 50:20). They no longer suffered alone but participated together in the sufferings of Christ (2 Cor. 1:5).

One Moroccan pastor I had the privilege of meeting shared his story of pastoring multiple home churches. Due to Islamic government restrictions, Moroccan Christians are able to gather only in homes. Conversely, Christian foreigners can assemble and worship publicly as long as the pastor is also a foreigner. Thus, Moroccan Christians are not allowed to be publicly visible or worship with their foreign brothers and sisters in Christ. Further, the shortage of space in homes constrains gatherings to small groups, and therefore pastors commonly shepherd multiple home gatherings of ten to twenty-five people. For this particular pastor, a typical Sunday begins well before sunrise and ends well into the evening, enabling him to minister to three gatherings at separate times. He shared sobering stories of several members of his church who had been arrested and interrogated for converting to Christianity. Despite the difficult ministry circumstances, he became visibly emotional as he recognized God’s saving grace at work in His church. Though the number of foreign Christians is still thought to outnumber Moroccan Christians, it’s estimated that Christianity is on the rise in spite of the country’s laws against evangelism. To be a Christian and have a conversation that “shakes the faith of a Muslim” is a criminal act that carries a sentence of six months to three years in prison.

In another meeting, an Algerian pastor provided an eye-opening report on the status of the church in his country. Since late 2019, the government has launched a public assault against Protestant Christianity, closing several churches indefinitely. Less than fifty Protestant churches are publicly registered in Algeria. Each must register by law, and those approved are officially added to the Protestant Church in Algeria, a national denomination. In 2012, a law was passed that required all churches to register again every year to maintain their approved status. When the latest government assumed control, it seized an opportunity to demonstrate its allegiance to Islam by taking a harsher position against Christianity. As a result, many churches were denied registration. Nevertheless, these churches continued meeting for corporate worship, knowing the risks of the increasingly volatile atmosphere. When closures of the churches began, raids often occurred in the middle of Sunday morning worship services, providing a public spectacle intended to bring shame on all the members of the church. Any who resisted were arrested. As a result, several churches have been forced to disperse as local officials locked and chained the church’s doors, often placing armed military personnel on guard as a visual warning of Islam’s authority. More than a few pastors have been detained by the police, and Christians connected to these churches have experienced an elevated number of threats from the greater community. In all, more than a dozen churches have been closed, with many still closed at the time of this writing. Despite these hardships, it’s been estimated over the last decade that the number of professing Christians in Algeria has grown from ten thousand to more than a half million. That’s a 5,000 percent increase in the world’s second most populous Arab country.

Less than a year ago, I visited the beautiful country of El Salvador. As in other parts of Central America, God’s redemptive plan is being revealed in the midst of calamity as gangs and cartels wield their systemic influence. Every level of government has been infiltrated and affected by bribes and extortion. Kidnapping, drug and sex trafficking, and merciless killings between gangs are just a few sinister ways that people are victimized. Teens and preteens are targeted for recruitment, as more than 60 percent of gang members join before the age of fifteen. Even more astounding is that one study estimates at least 10 percent of El Salvador’s 6.5 million citizens are involved in gang activity of some form.

I had the privilege of meeting with one pastor who shepherds a Reformed congregation in the middle of San Salvador while also ministering to other pastors in the jungles and villages of Guatemala and Honduras. For nearly two decades, the Lord has been using this pastor to equip disciples to make disciples and plant churches while giving him countless opportunities to teach untrained pastors—some even coming to faith in Christ after hearing and believing the gospel for the first time. In his own community, he started a classical Christian school using a rigorous academic and Bible curriculum combined with fine arts. The school is essentially at capacity for all ages K–12, with nearly three hundred students meeting in a space that would fit into most American high school gymnasiums. Some students leave their homes by five a.m., navigating the dangerous public transportation systems and congested traffic to begin their classes as early as seven a.m. The school’s facility would not be ideal by most Western standards, but ingenuity is a friend of necessity. The administrators found a way to retrofit three adjacent buildings, former residences, to host their classes. The week before my arrival was Reformation Week. Many of the students were eager to share their love for Reformed theology by showing the Post Tenebras Lux (after darkness, light) banners they created to commemorate Martin Luther’s posting of his Ninety-Five Theses. These unforgettable interactions with the students were stirring and edifying examples of God at work as He uses His Word to shed light on those engulfed in darkness.

In the midst of my travels, I’m occasionally reminded of C.S. Lewis’ beloved classic The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, when Mr. Beaver tells the four children, “They say Aslan is on the move—perhaps has already landed.” Though Aslan was unknown to them, the mysterious weight of his name for the first time produced an unexpected and emotional reaction in each of the children. Time and time again, I hear the precious testimonies of our brothers and sisters in Christ, and my emotions remind me of this: Jesus is on the move. Jesus is building His church, the captives are being set free, and His church is being sent to the end of the earth (Acts 1:8). The gospel is going out to the least and the greatest. Christians are picking up their crosses and following Christ in the midst of almost certain persecution. Minds are being renewed (Rom. 12:2) through the faithful preaching and teaching of God’s Word and the ordinary means of God’s amazing grace.

As I’m reminded of their stories, it’s like cold water for my thirsty soul, good news from far countries (Prov. 25:25). Be encouraged. Take heart. Take action. Pray for our brothers and sisters in Christ. In some of the most restricted regions of the world, the work of God is flourishing. In many of the darkest regions around the world, the light of the gospel is shining forth. In all these places, brothers and sisters in Christ are laboring unto the Lord, and their labors are not in vain (1 Cor. 15:58). Nevertheless, while the harvest is plentiful, the laborers remain few (Luke 10:2).

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What Is Providence?

One way in which the secular mind-set has made inroads into the Christian community is through the worldview that assumes that everything happens according to fixed natural causes, and God, if He is actually there, is above and beyond it all. He is just a spectator in heaven looking down, perhaps cheering us on but exercising no immediate control over what happens on earth. Historically, however, Christians have had an acute sense that this is our Father's world and that the affairs of men and nations, in the final analysis, are in His hands. That is what Paul is expressing in Romans 8:28—a sure knowledge of divine providence. "And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose."

Immediately thereafter, Paul moves into a predestination sequence: "For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified" (vv. 29–30). Then Paul concludes: "What then shall we say to these things?" (v. 31a). In other words, what should be our response to the sovereignty of God and to the fact that He is working out a divine purpose in this world and in our lives? The world repudiates that truth, but Paul answers this way:

If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? . . . No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. (vv. 31b–37)

One of the oldest sayings of the ancient church summarizes the essence of the relationship between God and His people: Deus pro nobis. It means "God for us." That is what the doctrine of providence is all about. It is God's being for His people. "What then shall we say to these things?" Paul asks. If God is for us, who can be against us, and who can separate us from the love of Christ? Is it going to be distress, peril, the sword, persecution, suffering, sickness, or human hostility? Paul is saying that no matter what we have to endure in this world as Christians, nothing has the power to sever the relationship we have to a loving and sovereign providence.

The word providence is made up of a prefix and a root. The root comes from the Latin videre, from which we get the English word video. Julius Caesar famously said, "Veni, vidi, vici"—"I came, I saw, I conquered." The vidi in that statement, "I saw," comes from videre, which means "to see." That is why we call television "video." The Latin word provideo, from which we get our word providence, means "to see beforehand, a prior seeing, a foresight." However, theologians make a distinction between the foreknowledge of God and the providence of God. Even though the word providence means the same thing etymologically as the word foreknowledge, the concept covers significantly more ground than the idea of foreknowledge. In fact, the closest thing to this Latin word in our language is the word provision.

Consider what the Bible says about the responsibility of the head of a family: "If anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for members of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever" (1 Tim. 5:8). The responsibility is given to the head of the household to be the one who provides and makes provision; that is, that person has to know in advance what the family is going to need in terms of the essentials of life, then meet those needs. When Jesus said, "Do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on" (Matt. 6:25), He was not advocating a careless approach to life. He was talking about anxiety. We are not to be frightened; we are to put our trust in the God who will meet our needs. At the same time, God entrusts a responsibility to heads of households to be provident, that is, to consider tomorrow and to make sure there is food and clothing for the family.

The first time we find the word providence in the Old Testament is in the narrative of Abraham's offering of Isaac upon the altar. God called Abraham to take his son Isaac, whom he loved, to a mountain and offer him as a sacrifice. Quite naturally, Abraham anguished under a great internal struggle with God's command, and as Abraham prepared to obey, Isaac asked him, "Behold, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?" (Gen. 22:7). Abraham replied, "God will provide for himself the lamb for a burnt offering, my son" (v. 8). Abraham spoke here of Jehovah jireh, "God will provide." That is the first time the Bible speaks of God's providence, which has to do with God's making a provision for our needs. And of course, this passage looks forward to the ultimate provision He has made by virtue of His divine sovereignty, the supreme Lamb who was sacrificed on our behalf.

This excerpt is from R.C. Sproul's newest book, Everyone's a Theologian.

There He Stood: Luther at Worms

Here’s an excerpt from There He Stood: Luther at Worms, W. Robert Godfrey's contribution to the April issue of Tabletalk:

On April 18, 1521, Martin Luther stood for the second day before Emperor Charles V at the diet being held in Worms. The diet anticipated hearing his answers to the two questions that had been put to him the day before: First, was he the author of the twenty-five works that had been gathered there, and second, would he now recant of the false teachings in them? Luther readily acknowledged the authorship of the works and then tried to engage in a discussion of what were the false teachings in his works. This ploy did not work, and he was informed that he was the theologian and knew full well the heresies that he had taught.

Luther then delivered one of the most important speeches in the history of the church. We have no full text of the speech, but we do have several accounts from various observers and so have quite a detailed record of what he said. But ironically, we are not certain about one of the most-quoted and well-known statements in the address: “Here I stand; I can do no other.” Not all the accounts include this declaration, and many historians doubt that Luther actually said it. But we do know that he stood there before the powers of the world and the church with remarkable courage and commitment.

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Should We Pray to the Father, To the Son, Or to the Holy Spirit?

When we pray, should we direct our prayers to the Father, to the Son, or to the Holy Spirit? From one of our live events, R.C. Sproul addresses how we are to bring our petitions to the triune God.

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The Christian's Duty to Hold Firm

The nineteenth-century philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche is famous for his declaration that “God is dead.” That brief dictum does not give the whole story. According to Nietzsche, the cause of the Deity’s demise was compassion. He said, “God is dead; He died of pity.” But before the God who was the God of Judeo-Christianity perished, Nietzsche said that there were a multitude of deities who existed, such as those who resided on Mount Olympus. That is, at one time there was a plurality of gods. All of the rest of the gods perished when one day the Jewish God, Yahweh, stood up in their assembly and said, “Thou shalt have no other gods before me.” Hearing this, according to Nietzsche’s satirical summary, all of the rest of the gods and goddesses died. They died of laughter.

In our day, where pluralism reigns in the culture, there is as much satirical hostility to the idea of one God as there was in Nietzsche’s satire. But today, that repugnance to monotheism is not a laughing matter. In the culture of pluralism, the chief virtue is toleration, which is the notion that all religious views are to be tolerated, all political views are to be tolerated. The only thing that cannot be tolerated is a claim to exclusivity. There is a built-in, inherent antipathy towards all claims of exclusivity. To say that there is one God is repulsive to the pluralists. To say that one God has not revealed Himself by a plurality of avatars in history is also repugnant. A single God with an only begotten Son is a deity who adds insult to injury by claiming an exclusive Son. There cannot be only one Mediator between man and God. There must be many according to pluralists today. It is equally a truism among pluralists that if there is one way to God, there must be many ways to God, and certainly it cannot be accepted that there is only one way. The exclusive claims of Christianity in terms of God, in terms of Christ, in terms of salvation, cannot live in peaceful coexistence with pluralists.

Beyond the question of the existence of God and of His Son, and of a singular way of salvation, there is also a rejection of any claim to having or possessing an exclusive source of divine revelation. At the time of the Reformation, the so-called solas of the Reformation were asserted. It was said that justification is by faith alone (sola fide), that it is through Christ alone (solus Christus), that it is through grace alone (sola gratia), and that it is for God’s glory alone (soli Deo gloria). But perhaps most repugnant to the modern pluralist is the exclusive claim of sola Scriptura. The idea of sola Scriptura is that there is only one written source of divine revelation, which can never be placed on a parallel status with confessional statements, creeds, or the traditions of the church. Scripture alone has the authority to bind the conscience precisely because only Scripture is the written revelation of almighty God. The implications of sola Scriptura for pluralism are many. Not the least of them is this: It carries a fundamental denial of the revelatory character of all other religious books. An advocate of sola Scriptura does not believe that God’s revealed Word is found in the Bible and in the Book of Mormon, the Bible and in the Koran, the Bible and in the Upanishads, the Bible and in the Bhagavad Gita; rather, the Christian faith stands on the singular and exclusive claim that the Bible and the Bible alone is God’s written word.

The motto of the United States is e pluribus unum. However, since the rise of the ideology of pluralism, the real Unum of that motto has been ripped from its foundation. What drives pluralism is the philosophical antecedent of relativism. All truth is relative; therefore, no one idea or source can be seen as having any kind of supremacy. Built into our law system is the idea of the equal toleration under the law of all religions. It is a short step in people’s thinking from equal toleration under the law to equal validity. The principle that all religions should be treated equally under the law and have equal rights does not carry with it the necessary inference that therefore all religions are valid. Even a cursory, comparative examination of the world’s religions reveals points of radical contradiction among them, and unless one is prepared to affirm the equal truth of contradictories, one must not be able to embrace this fallacious assumption.

Sadly, with a philosophy of relativism and a philosophy of pluralism, the science of logic doesn’t matter. Logic is escorted to the door and is firmly booted out of the house onto the street. There is no room for logic in any system of pluralism and relativism. Indeed, it’s a misnomer to call either a system, because it is the idea of a consistent, coherent view of truth that is unacceptable to the pluralist. The fact that people reject exclusive claims to truth does not invalidate those claims. It is the Christian’s duty to hold firm to the uniqueness of God and of His Christ and not compromise with the advocates of pluralism.

This post was originally published in Tabletalk magazine.

The Socratic Method

To this day, many gifted teachers use the Socratic method to lead their students into greater understanding. In this brief clip, R.C. Sproul considers how the ancient philosopher Socrates can help us think more deeply today.

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Transcript:

The Socratic method of discovering truth is the method of dialogue. He would engage people in dialogue and ask them probing questions. And as the person would respond, Socrates would help them move along in their own self-examination by asking more questions and deeper questions. In other words, he didn’t just stand in the middle of the town square and preach and deliver lectures. He was more like Lieutenant Colombo. He would say, “Do you mind if I ask you a personal question?” He would then engage people in dialogue. You see the value of that method of teaching when you see the vast corpus of writings that his most famous pupil wrote, Plato. When we think of Plato and his writings, what do we call them? The Dialogues of Plato. There is an issue that is introduced at the beginning of the dialogue, and then he moderates a discussion that goes on between representatives of different schools of thought. Then finally, Socrates comes in the dialogue and unravels the mystery of whatever issue it is that they are discussing. So, Socrates thought that by forcing people to think, he could move them from that superficial plane of sophism and get them into a deeper consideration of truth. He was what we might say is the original paradigm of education. His goal was to educate. And that word, “educate,” means literally, “to lead out of.” “El duce”—the leader, remember? “Ed,” or the “e” at the beginning, means “from” or “out of.” “E-duce,” educate—to lead out of. To lead out of what? To lead out of ignorance. Now, Socrates said that the very first thing that has to happen for any true knowledge to be gained, for anyone to ever become knowledgeable, to gain an understanding of virtue, and to truly be educated was the admission of ignorance. And that’s one of the hardest things for any of us to admit, that we are ignorant about anything. But Socrates said that once the person admits that he or she is ignorant, now the possibility is open to lead them to a deeper understanding of truth. Now again, his principal concern was to come to an understanding of virtue, virtue being the “good” or the “right.” And he believed this not only in an abstract way, but also in a very concrete way. He believed that how we act, how we behave is in the first analysis a matter of proper knowledge. He didn't embrace a biblical concept of original sin as we would. But what he was saying is that part of problem that we have with our behavior is that we don’t know what right behavior is. Before we can possibly act in a good way, we have to first understand what a good form of behavior is. So, he focuses attention on helping people understand virtue. What is honesty? What is industry? What is justice? He would push them beyond the idea of vested interests or self-interest to come to the deeper understanding of these concepts by which human life, human virtue, and the virtue of a society stand or fall.