R.C. Sproul's Blog, page 522

The High Cost of Ambivalence

Here's an excerpt from The High Cost of Ambivalence, Dan Dumas' contribution to the July issue of Tabletalk.

Walking away from gospel orthodoxy or disconnecting from the stream of church history should strike terror in our hearts. But because of personal compromise, far too many believers are found "walking in the counsel of the wicked, standing in the path of sinners and seated with the scoffers" rather than defending the faith to the death.

When was the last time you thought deeply about the consequences of "little" erroneous theological decisions that can subtly distort both your faith and practice? The Apostle Paul's grave concern in 2 Corinthians 11:3 was that we would be so easily led astray by the Devil from our "simplicity and devotion to Christ." The pastor who lacks theological discretion is of all men most pitied.

Continue reading The High Cost of Ambivalence.

What is the Rapture?

1 Thessalonians 4:13–18 is Paul's teaching about what is popularly called the rapture. The rapture is the miraculous transportation of all living Christians to heaven at the return of Jesus. There is a lot of misinformation about this event, but this passage gives us some definite truths about it. Paul made it clear that Jesus' return will not be secret but will be visible; it will be a bodily return; and it will be a triumphant return, for He will not come in lowliness and meekness as He did at His first advent, but in power and glory. The angels told the disciples, "This same Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will so come in like manner as you saw Him go into heaven" (Acts 1:11). Just as He left visibly on the shekinah cloud, so He will come again visibly on this cloud of glory.

There is a view, one that is very widespread in the church today, that holds that Jesus will come back to rapture the church out of the world, but that the great tribulation will then occur, after which Jesus will return again. I think this view is a result of a serious misunderstanding of what the Apostle described here in 1 Thessalonians.

I once spoke with one of the leading representatives of this school of thought, a man who teaches the "pretribulation" rapture. I said to him, "I do not know a single verse anywhere in the Bible that teaches a pretribulation rapture. Can you tell me where to find that?" I'll never forget what he said to me: "No, I can't. But that's what I was taught from the time I was a little child." I told him, "Let's get our theology from the Bible rather than from Sunday school lessons we heard years and years ago."

Let us look at the events Paul described. First he noted: "The Lord Himself will descend from heaven.… And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air" (1 Thess. 4:16–17). Here we see that the purpose of the dead rising and our being caught up into the sky is not to go away but to meet Jesus as He is returning. He will not be taking us out of the world to stay. He will be lifting us up to participate with Him in His triumphal return.

When the Roman legions were dispatched to go into a foreign country on a military campaign, their standards bore the letters SPQR, an abbreviation for Senatus Populus Que Romanus, which means "the Senate and the people of Rome." It was understood in Rome that the conquests of the military were not simply for the politicians who governed, but for all the citizens of the city.

The army might be gone for a campaign of two or three years. Finally, the soldiers would return, leading captives in chains. They would camp outside the city and send in a messenger to alert the Senate and the people that the legions had returned. When that news arrived, the people began to prepare to receive the conquering heroes. When everything was ready, a trumpet was sounded. With that, the citizens of the city went out to where the army was camped and joined the soldiers in marching into the city. The idea was that they had participated in the triumph of their conquering army.

This is exactly the language that Paul used here. He was saying that when Jesus comes back in conquering power, believers, both dead and alive, will be caught up in the air to meet Him, not to stay up there, but to join His return in triumph, to participate in His exaltation.

It seems that Paul's goal here was to comfort the Thessalonians, who were saddened that their dead loved ones were apparently going to miss the triumphal return of Christ, the great conclusion to the ministry of Jesus at the end of time. Paul assured them that the dead in Christ will not miss His return at all. In fact, they will be there first. The dead will rise first, and then those who are still alive and are Christ's will be caught up together with this whole assembly to come to the earth again in triumph.

Excerpt adapted from R.C. Sproul's The Work of Christ. Available now from the Ligonier Store.

Copyright 2012 R.C. Sproul. The Work of Christ published by David C Cook. Publisher permission required to reproduce. All rights reserved.

Twitter Highlights (7/15/12)

Here are highlights from our various Twitter accounts over the past week.

Knowledge may make thee a scholar, but not a saint; orthodox, but not gracious (William Gurnall).

— Ligonier Academy (@LigonierAcademy) July 9, 2012

"...the first thing you have to understand about the hidden will of God is that it’s hidden." —R.C. Sproul ligm.in/L6Dqvv

— Ligonier Ministries (@Ligonier) July 10, 2012

If there is anything worse than not praying, it is praying in an unworthy manner. —R.C. Sproul bit.ly/qFURja

— Reformation Trust (@RefTrust) July 10, 2012

John Calvin: A Heart for Devotion, Doctrine, and Doxology available in Korean thanks to @RNRBook instagr.am/p/M6eBShrbKO/

— Reformation Trust (@RefTrust) July 10, 2012

Future prospective @RefBibleCollege students: "We love to wear them and tell people about who John Calvin was!" twitter.com/RefBibleColleg…

— RefBibleCollege (@RefBibleCollege) July 10, 2012

One of the key means of cultivating humility is prayer. —Robert Godfrey

— Ligonier Ministries (@Ligonier) July 10, 2012

Longsuffering is a chief characteristic of God (R.C. Sproul).

— Tabletalk Magazine (@Tabletalk) July 11, 2012

We possess...the indwelling Holy Spirit of God Himself as God's promise to finish the job. —R.C. Sproul

— Ligonier Ministries (@Ligonier) July 14, 2012

You can also find our various ministries on Facebook:

Ligonier Ministries | Ligonier Academy | Ligonier Connect
Reformation Bible College | Reformation Trust | Tabletalk Magazine

Should Christians Refuse to Pay Taxes When They Are Used to Finance Abortions?

It is one of my great passions, the desire to see me, and the evangelical church take the evil of abortion more seriously, to have our hearts more deeply broken, and our actions more faithful. We have all, I fear, come to accept the status quo. We are content to vote for Republicans hoping they will give us justices that will slow down the horror. What we are generally unwilling to do is go through any kind of hardship to stop abortion. When I am asked about this, should we stop paying taxes, I am at least heartened to know that there are some willing to pay dearly to win this battle. Not paying taxes rarely ends up comfortably for those who won't pay.

That said I can say with confidence that Christians should in fact pay whatever taxes they owe even when that money ends up financing abortions. The Christian who pays such taxes has no need to feel guilty, while the Christian that refuses to pay, however well intentioned, ought to feel guilty.

Theologians have long understood the principle that must be applied here- we are responsible for our own actions, not the actions of others. In this instance, the Bible is quite clear about our obligation to pay our taxes (Mark 12:17). It is also clear that the proper function of the state is not to finance evil, but to punish it (Romans 13). Their failure to do what God calls them to do, however, does not mean I am free to not do what I am commanded to do. That they have so horribly misused the taxes that I have paid doesn't mean I am guilty of what they have done. I have been taxed, and when those taxes are paid, they are no longer mine. What the state does with them may be something I should speak against. It may be something I should condemn. But I am not guilty.

Remember that the same Caesar to whom Jesus commanded taxes be paid used those taxes for what may be the only thing worse than abortion. Those tax moneys financed the judgment of Pilate. They paid the salaries of the Roman soldiers. They purchased the nails that held our Lord on the cross. Those taxes crucified the Lord of Glory.

More close to home, suppose the more a husband loves his wife the less she respects him, or the more the wife respects her husband the less he loves her. In either instance we are not to try to guess the result of our behavior. We are supposed to do what God commands. We are not responsible for the results of what we do. We are responsible to obey whatsoever God commands. We are called not to success, but to obedience.

The state should repent for all misuses of taxes paid. Christians should prophesy against the state when they do evil, including financing evil. We should all be on our knees imploring God to stop the horror. But we should pay our taxes. March on Washington. Preach outside your local mill. Write your congressman. Support your local crisis pregnancy center. And, as painful as it may be, trusting in His providence, render unto Caesar the things that are Caesars, our taxes, and unto God the things that are God's- obedience.

There's Still Time to Study at Reformation Bible College This Fall

It's not too late for you to study at Reformation Bible College (RBC) this August. We are eagerly awaiting the arrival of our 2012 class of students. This year we were able to improve the use of our classroom space, making it possible to welcome additional students.

At RBC we offer courses focused on biblical and theological studies along with training in apologetics and Christian worldview. Perhaps God is calling you to be an engineer, a teacher, or a businessman. But, before God calls you to a vocation, He calls you to become like His Son, Jesus Christ.

RBC will equip you to be a godly leader, grounded in God's Word and able to engage and influence both church and society for Christ. Therefore, if you want to establish a foundation for a life that glorifies God in whatever He calls you to do, then we invite you to join tomorrow's leaders at RBC.

Don't delay, the new semester starts August 20th and space is limited.

Call 888-RBC-1517 (888-722-1517) or email admissions@ligonier.org to speak with one of our admissions counselors. For more information visit us at ReformationBibleCollege.org.

Jesus Christ: Our True Mercy Seat

In the tabernacle, the ark of the covenant was the place of propitiation. How could a holy God dwell in the midst of a sinful people? Further, how could a sinful people ever hope to approach a holy God and not be destroyed, as were Nadab and Abihu (Lev. 10:1–3)? That brings us to an unusual but important theological term that we need to know and experience: propitiation.

To understand this word, think about how a mother and father become angry when a child sins. How does the child persuade his parents to cease to be angry and become happy with him? In our home, our children have to sit in a timeout, then tell us what they did wrong, and finally ask for forgiveness. Then we give big hugs and kisses. That's propitiation. It means turning away anger. In the Bible, propitiation is an act by which God's wrath is turned away from us. The imagery is expressed in Psalm 85, which says,

Lord, you were favorable to your land;
    you restored the fortunes of Jacob.
You forgave the iniquity of your people;
    you covered all their sin.
You withdrew all your wrath;
    you turned from your hot anger. (vv. 1–3)

Toward this end, God gave a distinct set of instructions for the ark's lid (Ex. 25:17–22), called the kapporet in Hebrew. When the Old Testament was translated into Latin, this word was translated as propitiatorium, which means "the place of propitiation." The standard English translation is "the mercy seat" (KJV).

This lid, then, was the place of propitiation, the place where the wrath of God was turned away from His people. As John Calvin wrote about the mercy seat: "God was propitiated towards believers by the covering of the Law, so as to shew Himself favorable to them by hearing their vows and prayers. For as long as the law stands forth before God's face it subjects us to His wrath and curse; and hence it is necessary that the blotting out of our guilt should be interposed, so that God may be reconciled with us." But while there was a morning and an evening sacrifice on the altar in the courtyard every day, as well as the offerings of the individual worshipers, these merely covered over sins and pointed forward to one great propitiatory sacrifice. In contrast, there was only one day a year when sacrificial blood was offered on the kapporet to propitiate the wrath of almighty God. As Leviticus 16 describes in great detail, on the annual Day of Atonement, propitiation was made by means of a substitutionary sacrifice.

As new-covenant believers, we know that these annual sacrifices were only pictures of the propitiation of God's wrath. We see the powerlessness of the animal sacrifices in Hebrews 9:13–14, which says: "For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the purification of the flesh, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God." Just as Jesus alone can cleanse the soul and conscience, He alone can turn away the wrath of God, since He is our propitiation (Rom. 3:25; 1 John 2:2; 4:10).

The Lord is present in our midst in public worship just as He was in the tabernacle, but is He present to judge or to save? In a more personal way, will He look on our sins or will He look on Jesus Christ in our place? The Lord provided the Israelites a place of propitiation on the ark's lid, and He still provides a place today. That "place" is Jesus Christ. He offers Himself to us. He turns away the wrath of God from us. He cleanses us of our sins. He cancels them out. He nullifies their power. He brings us into the presence of God blameless and acceptable. Confess your sins to Him and believe that Jesus Christ will propitiate God's wrath against you. In this way, you shall be saved.

Learn more about the tabernacle, and how above-all it reveals Christ, in my new book, God in Our Midst: The Tabernacle & Our Relationship with God.

Adapted from God in Our Midst. Available now from ReformationTrust.com

$5 Friday: Theology, Missions, & Worldviews

It's time for our $5 Friday sale. This week's resources cover such topics as Puritanism, theology, missions, preaching, worldviews, music, and more.

We thank Desiring God and Reformation Heritage Books for their partnership this week.

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

View today's $5 Friday sale items.

Help Us Proclaim the Biblical View of Marriage

Since God instituted marriage, he has the authority to regulate it.

You don't have to be a Christian to affirm this. For millennia, even the irreligious have grasped what God says in nature—that marriage unites man and woman.

Yet God's sovereignty over marriage is being abandoned. I'm sure you've also been troubled to see courts and legislatures invent same-sex marriage. Elected leaders are evolving to affirm such unions as a public good, even something their faith endorses.

I'm not surprised. Our culture's rejection of biblical thinking made a push for same-sex marriage inevitable. Postmodern relativism is in full bloom, so men toy with marriage—as they do with life. Sadly, much of the visible church has gone down this road as well.

Ultimately, however, arguments over same-sex marriage are not really about vital issues such as constitutional rights, the welfare of children, the morality of certain sex acts, and legal tradition. The fundamental issue is God's right to structure human society.

The first ordering principle the Lord gave us was the marital union of one man and one woman. Before sin corrupted everything, God brought husband and wife together to fulfill His call that we multiply and rule the earth (Gen. 1:26–28; 2:18–25). Every other corporate institution is secondary to and built upon the family.

Change marriage and you change the world. Convince people that government, not God, lays down the rules for marriage, and they will believe more strongly that they determine right and wrong, that not even the world's rulers are subject to a higher authority.

The truth that marriage between one man and one woman forms the basic unit and foundation of human society is revealed throughout the Bible. It is an essential component of the biblical worldview, the basic beliefs that are to shape our understanding of life. No less an authority than our Savior Himself recognized God's definition of marriage at creation as normative (Matt. 19:1–12).

When it comes to same-sex marriage, we contend not only for a traditional value but for a worldview that understands human beings as creatures who are subject to their Creator. The battle is not finally about marriage itself; it is about two irreconcilable views of reality—reality as God established it versus reality as a mere human construction.

Restoring the biblical view of the world and marriage to society is the only answer. Ligonier Ministries fights daily to this end as we teach people to apply the Bible to all of life. We need your help to continue this mission, and you can support Ligonier's outreach through our secure website.

As a thank you for your gift of any amount, we will send you my book The Intimate Marriage and my 10-part CD teaching series Christian Marriage. Both resources include essential biblical teaching on the purpose and nature of marriage, marital communication, sex, male and female roles, and more.

Man is trying to put asunder what God has put together, but sinners will not see their foolishness unless God's people fight the real war—the war to promote and defend the biblical worldview. Ligonier is equipping Christians to fight this battle, and we need your support to continue this vital work. Your gift of any amount will help us. Thank you.

This resource offer expires August 31st, 2012.

Castles in the Sand

Here's an excerpt from Castles in the Sand, R.C. Sproul Jr.'s contribution to the July issue of Tabletalk.

There are, when we disagree, almost always two disagreements. Most of the time the smaller disagreement is the bigger one. Consider election. There are some in the church who believe that God chooses who will believe His gospel. There are others who believe God sees beforehand who will believe. This, on the surface, seems to be the root of the loss of peace between these two groups. The second disagreement, however, is over this question: just how important an issue is this?

Though there are surely exceptions, by and large those who don't believe in election are not known for zealously, aggressively not believing in election. Most don't meet a new Christian and seek to steer the conversation to election. Those of us who do believe in election, on the other hand, believe it to be an issue of great importance. Did we not so believe, were we able to believe in it silently, in the quiet of our own minds, the way non-election believers don't believe in election silently and in the quiet of their own minds, we might be able to get along better with others.

Continue reading Castles in the Sand.

Does R.C. Sproul Believe in Miracles?

"Therefore we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away from it… It was declared at first by the Lord, and it was attested to us by those who heard, while God also bore witness by signs and wonders and various miracles and by gifts of the Holy Spirit distributed according to his will." — Hebrews 2:1-4

I get this question all the time, "R.C., do you believe that miracles happen today?" If you want me to give the simple answer, the answer is no. Today, you can go into a pastor's office and see a sign that says, "Expect a Miracle." But if you expect a miracle—if miracles are expectable—there's nothing miraculous about them. If they're ordinary then they carry no certifiable weight. It's by their extraordinary character that they have sign power: sign-ificance.

If miracles are expectable—there's nothing miraculous about them. —R.C. Sproul

A Tight Definition of a Miracle

Now of course when people ask me, do I believe in miracles, they're asking one question and I'm answering a different one. If they're saying to me, "Do you believe that God is still working in the world supernaturally?" Of course I do. "Do you believe that God answers prayers?" Of course I do. "Do you believe that God heals people in response to prayer?" Of course I do. All miracles are supernatural, but not all supernatural acts are miracles. Theologians get real tight in their making of distinctions, and when I say I don't believe in miracles today, I don't believe in the tight kind of miracle in the very narrow sense where a miracle is defined as a work that occurs in the external perceivable world; an extraordinary work in the external perceivable world against the laws of nature, by the immediate power of God. A work that only God can do, such as bringing life out of death, such as, restoring a limb that has been cut off—by command—such as, walking on the water, such as, turning water into wine.

Why this is Important

Even some of the marvelous signs in the New Testament wouldn't qualify as a miracle in this tight definition. So why do we labor so hard for this tight definition? For this reason: if anybody can perform miracles, if a person who's not an agent of divine revelation can perform a miracle, then obviously a miracle cannot certify an agent of revelation. Let me say it again. If a non-agent of revelation can perform a miracle, then a miracle cannot authenticate or certify a bona fide agent of revelation. Which would mean that the New Testament's claim to be carrying the authority of God Himself, because God has certified Christ and the Apostles by miracles, would be a false claim and a false argument.

So what's at stake here is the authority, the authenticity, and the truthfulness of the Bible itself. That's why I have this tight definition, and why I don't expect miracles, because I don't expect to find Apostles running around today. So the narrow miracles, they stopped at the end of the Apostolic age.

God's Still Alive and Working

Now God's still alive, He's still working; He's still answering prayers in an amazing way. I've seen marvelous answers to prayers, I've seen people healed of so called terminal illnesses, I just have never seen anybody raised out of the cemetery, or an arm that is severed grow back, or a preacher walk on the water, or water turned into wine. But in any case, the Lord Jesus did these miracles not only in the broad sense, but also in the narrow sense. It's the miracles of the New Testament that are so important to us, because they are God's attestation of Jesus' and of the Apostles, before whose authority we submit.