R.C. Sproul's Blog, page 583

Repenting and Continuing to Repent

Can someone be damned if they repented and continue to repent of their sins?

Of course. Even Judas was sorrowful over his sin, according to the Bible. The world is full of people who are disgusted at at least some of their sins, who seek to put particular sins behind them. This kind of sorrow is not how we have peace with God. While repentance is intimately connected to how and why God forgives us, it is not at all by itself a sufficient cause.

Properly speaking that repentance which “saves” is not merely a turning from, but is a turning to. We have peace with God because Jesus suffered the wrath of the Father that is due to us for our sin, and because He lived a perfect life.  The work of Christ becomes ours when we, because of the work of the Holy Spirit in first regenerating us, repent and believe, or trust in the work of Christ. If we so trust all our sins are forgiven, because they have already been punished. This describes all our sins, past, present and future.

If our repentance includes turning to the finished work of Christ, if it includes trusting in His life and atoning death, the promise of God is that we will indeed be forgive (I John 1:9). Because His promises are true, we can and must trust them.

We do, of course, continue to sin. Satan, the accuser, delights to make much of this. He loves to rub our faces in our sins, to tell us that sinners such as we surely cannot be saved. If our response to this kind of assault is to deny the reality of our sin, he wins. If our response on the other hand is to wallow in our sin, he wins. The right response is, “I am a sinner. Worse even than you know Satan. But my Father sees me as pure and whole, a spotless bride, because He has dressed me in the perfect righteousness of His Son.” Telling the devil, “No, I am good” invites more attack. Telling the devil, “Yes, I am evil” only invites more attack. Telling the devil, “Jesus is righteous and I am in Him” will make him flee.

When we diminish our sin, we foolishly rest in ourselves. When we despair in our sins we foolishly diminish His grace. Our calling is to own our sin, to plum its depths, but then to know that God’s grace in Christ is greater still. Deep sorrow and repentance followed by deep confidence in His grace will lead to deep and immovable joy.

Continue to repent. We do so not because our future sins are not forgiven, but so that we might nor presume upon that grace, that we might rejoice in our forgiveness. Let us all, however, also continue to repent for our unbelief in His grace. When God says “I forgive you and I love you” to respond “I don’t believe you” is pure folly, To respond “I’m not worthy” is to belabor the obvious. To respond “Thank you” is to grasp the Good News.

Photoshopping God

Maybe because I think they don’t get enough attention, I find myself often drifting to the minor prophets.  A few verses in Amos 9 strike me.  They stand out because they seem to be playing off of Psalm 139. 

In Psalm 139 God’s omnipresence, omniscience, and omnipotence are all sources of great delight for the Psalmist.  There is nowhere we can go, nothing we can experience, to find ourselves beyond the reach of God’s protective hand.  But in the prophet Amos, these attributes of God strike the exact opposite reaction.  They strike terror.  In Amos 9, we learn that there is nowhere we can go to get beyond the reach of God’s wrath.  Read Psalm 139, especially verses 7-12.  Then consider Amos 9:2: 

If they dig into Sheol,
from there shall my hand take them;
if they climb up to heaven,
from there I will bring them down (ESV).

What is a source of comfort in Psalm 139 becomes a source of boot-shaking and knee-knocking fear in Amos 9.  Amos even adds this chilling point a few verses later in 9:5: “The Lord God of Hosts, he who touches the earth and it melts” (ESV).

Those of us who have been reconciled to God through the sacrifice of Christ on our behalf know what joy and comfort there is to be found in God.  In the Psalmist’s words, “How precious to me are your thoughts, O God!  How vast is the sum of them!” (Ps. 139:17). We like these kinds of passages.  We need Psalm 139 and we do well to return to it often. But we also need to return to Amos 9. It is every bit as much a revelation of who God is. We can’t photoshop out texts like Amos 9 in our portrait of God. 

The Bible offers a complex, full-orbed view of God. And though this full-orbed view of God is sometimes difficult for us to put together, it is exactly how God has revealed himself. We do ourselves no favors, and we do God no favor, by airbrushing the picture.

The Bible offers a complex, full-orbed view of God.

Stephen J. Nichols is research professor of Christianity and culture and chair of the biblical division of Lancaster Bible College and Graduate School. A regular contributor to reformation 21 and member of the American Christianity section of the Evangelical Theological Society, he has authored several books, including The Reformation, Jonathan Edwards: A Guided Tour of His Life and Thought, and Jesus Made in America: A Cultural History from the Puritans to the Passion of the Christ.

Best Resources on Reformed Theology

We are beginning a list of the best resources introducing Christians to Reformed theology and the doctrines of grace.

Please help us curate this list by voting for and adding your favorite resources.

If you cannot see the list click here to view this post at the Ligonier blog.

Keeping the Lord's Day

Burk Parsons begins this month's editorial introduction to Tabletalk magazine with a story. "In the summer of 1999, I was studying the Lutheran Reformation in eastern Germany with a group of fellow American graduate students. After attending a Sunday morning worship service at the Stadtkirche in Wittenberg, where Martin Luther often preached, we made our way south to Halle, the birthplace of G. F. Handel and seventeenth-century German pietism. Just ten years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, eastern Germany was at the height of its revitalization efforts, the Deutsche Mark was still the currency, and on Sundays most of the small-town shops and restaurants were closed in observance of the Lord’s Day. After I stepped off the train in Halle, I saw signs of protest everywhere I looked. The people of Halle were protesting the opening of a city-sanctioned, public marketplace on the Lord’s Day. What for centuries had been a quiet town square on Sundays was now a busy marketplace, and many of the citizens, whose heritage was being threatened, were protesting."

This story is an important point of reference for the topic of June's issue of Tabletalk. To find out more you will need to read Keeping the Lord's Day.

The Right Work

Worldly people assess the value of a job by the amount of money it pays or the prestige it offers. Surely, Christians will think differently. Our concerns should be:

Does this work glorify God?
Does it benefit my fellow man?
Do I consider myself called to this work, or can I at least do it well and find enjoyment in that?
Does it provide for material needs?
Does it permit me to lead a godly and balanced life?

Glorify God

The Lord made us and redeemed us that we might bear His image and serve the cause of His glory. This is why we exist. Because our work is so central to who we are, we must ask whether it opposes this purpose by bringing us into associations or activities that are sinful. Do my job requirements cause me to compromise truly biblical standards of behavior? A negative example would be a sales job that involves deception or a management position that requires employee abuse. A good question is, “Would I be embarrassed for my pastor to visit my workplace?”

The Bible says, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might” (Deut. 6:5). So we should ask, “Does my work honor God through integrity and decency?”

Serve Others

Christians also should seek to earn their living by making or doing something that benefits other people. To the Old Testament command to love God, Jesus added, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself ” (Matt. 22:39). With this in mind, I do not see how Christians can make their living doing work that provides no real benefit to other people. Modern-day snake-oil sales- men, hawking products they know are either worthless or vastly overpriced, are one example. Another would be a day-trader on the stock market who devotes all his energies to buying and selling his own holdings for personal gain with no intention of using the profits to help others. (This is very dif- ferent from stock brokers, who use their expertise to manage other peoples’ money skillfully.)

There are so many ways we can use our gifts and abilities to benefit oth- ers. Surely, as Christians, we can find something to do that will benefit other people while honoring God, even if in the end we make a smaller income. As Jesus bluntly put it: “You cannot serve God and money” (Matt. 6:24).

Calling and Enjoyment

The apostles were specially called by Jesus to serve him, and they knew it. Paul described himself this way: “Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God” (Rom. 1:1; see also Acts 9:15). Ministers of the gospel should have this sense of special calling to their work. Pastors and missionaries should find in their work a sense of divine appoint- ment—drawn from both inward motivation and spiritual equipping—that is confirmed by the church.

People in other professions can certainly feel a similar sense of being “right” for a specific position or type of career. This is often true of those who serve others in very direct ways—doctors and nurses, firefighters, and police officers, for example. Yet this pronounced sense of call is obviously not universal. So if, as a Christian, your non-ministerial job or career does not seem to come with a tangible “seal of approval,” it is not necessarily cause for concern. For you the question may simply be, “When I do this job well, is it satisfying?” A positive answer to that question is a good indication that what you do meets the mandate of Genesis 2.

Material Needs

If you find yourself in a job in which you are consistently unable to satisfy basic material needs—for yourself as a single man or as head of your house- hold—with enough left over to save some and tithe to your church, you need to ask yourself two questions. First, Am I striving for a lifestyle that is unreal- istic in light of my income-producing potential? If you are not overreaching in this area and not giving in to the powerful and often deluding temptations of materialism, then the second question becomes very significant. Why am I so obviously underemployed, and what do I need to do about it?

Godly and Balanced Life

If some men are underemployed, others are what might be called overem- ployed. These are men who find themselves so wrapped up in their jobs that their lives are regularly out of balance. As I said earlier, we should all expect from time to time to have to work long hours or take some business trips. But God never expects us to go for extended periods so consumed by work that we are forced to neglect family, friends, church life, or regular time with God.

Twitter Highlights (6/5/11)

Here are some highlights from the various Ligonier Twitter feeds over the past week.

Ligonier Academy "If there is a culture where truth has been trampled in the streets it's this one" -RC Sproul #thisisnext



Ligonier The American mind is closed and what it is closed to is objective truth. -RC Sproul #thisisnext



Ligonier There is nothing about reality that God does not know comprehensively -RC Sproul #thisisnext



Tabletalk Magazine "The road is provided by one who is himself both God and man. As God, He is the goal; as man, he is the way" - Augustine



Reformation Trust In the substitution that took place at the cross, we see the glorious grace of God—the very heartbeat of the Christian faith. -R.C. Sproul



Reformation Trust Only as we retain a sense of our own profound sinfulness can we retain a sense of the graciousness of grace. -Sinclair Ferguson



Tabletalk Magazine "Men who try to do something and fail are infinitely better than those who try to do nothing and succeed." - Lloyd Jones

You can also find our various ministries on Facebook:
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Reverberation

This is a fine little book.  I would happily recommend it to lay people, pastors and elders.  It is written with both ordained and lay people in view.  The style of the book is conversational rather than academic.  The book communicates well and includes a number of catchy phrases and memorable anecdotes.  Leeman is clearly a good story-teller.  He writes from a Reformed-Baptist perspective, as is evidenced by the majority of the book’s endorsers, citations, and especially his doctrine of the church.

The substance of the book mainly aims at exalting God’s word in the life of the church.  Leeman is convinced that much of what has motivated the church (broadly speaking) to engage in some of its current unhealthy practices is a loss of confidence in God’s word.  Reverberation is a welcome reminder that God’s word is powerful, active, essential, and especially—sufficient.  This last point is perhaps the underlying theme of the book.  Leeman makes a number of challenging observations about the church’s beliefs and practices, and responds to them in a biblical, conservative, reformed manner.  He makes a number of very refreshing exegetical observations regarding how God’s word works in us, even stringing together individual texts into a beautiful pearl necklace.  This is particularly true in relation to his discussion about the word and preaching.  Both minister and lay person will likely come away from this book sensing that God is really working through the ministry of the word, even when the evidence is not immediately visible.  This is a refreshing reminder!  Leeman heartily emphasizes the importance of Christ being at the center of each sermon as an implication of Christ being at the center of scripture and the Christian life.  May every Christian and preacher say “amen!”

The book is not without a few minor liabilities.  While its strength of style is its accessibility to all academic levels, the book has a ‘blog-like’ feel in that it is written from the first-person perspective and is heavily auto-biographical.  But again, some will likely find this a strength and not a weakness.  The first half of the book has a concise goal which is raised and addressed clearly and convincingly.  The second half of the book seems to quickly broaden to a wider range of topics, often raising questions and issues that some may find unconvincingly settled.  Church music and lay counseling are examples of issues that are raised but will perhaps leave the reader with more questions than answers.  Leeman does, however, give suggested reading on books that may address the issues he raises.  There are a number of quotations throughout the book for which no clear citation is given, thus making it impossible to study the source of the quote.  These are certainly minor criticisms that should not eclipse a favorable recommendation of a fine book.

Rev. Eric B. Watkins is senior minister of Covenant Presbyterian Church in Saint Augustine, Florida.

$5 Friday: Reformed Theology, Preaching & More

Find $5 Friday resources today on predestination, marriage and divorce, preaching, John Calvin, and more. Why Johnny Can't Preach provided courtesy of P&R Publishing, and What Is Reformed Theology? appears thanks to those who voted on Challies.com. Sale starts Friday at 8 a.m. and ends Saturday at 8 a.m. EST.

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Does the Bible say anything about cremation?

No. Cremation, however, may have something to say about the Bible. The proper handling of human bodies after death is not something the Bible expressly deals with.  There are sundry ceremonial laws in the Old Covenant about touching dead bodies, but no instruction on what to do with these bodies. As such we need to be careful not to condemn what the Bible does not condemn. How though, could cremation speak to the Bible?

Cremation, strange as it may sound, is a form of liturgy.  It is a form for dealing with matters of eternal consequence. As a form it in turn communicates a message. That message, it seems, does speak against the Bible’s understanding of death. Cremation, however subtly, suggests that our bodies are of no significance or import, that they are simply so much trash that must be burned.  It is implicitly a Gnostic practice, a denial of the goodness of the creation in general and the human body in particular.

Burial, on the other hand, communicates something far more consistent with the Bible. It affirms not only that the human body has dignity, but also that it has a future. It affirms that death is not the end of the body. Consider for a moment why so many cemeteries have in their name some variation on the notion of “Garden.” That cemeteries are well kept and green is consistent with our dignity, but that is not what “Garden” in this context communicates. Because of the promise of the gospel, because of the promise of the resurrection, we are not so much burying the bodies of our loved ones when they pass, as planting them. We are put in the ground to wait for the return of Christ when our corruptible bodies will be made incorruptible.

The practice of burial is so closely identified with the Christian perspective on death and the human body that anthropologists track the spread of the Christian faith westward across Europe through history by looking to the spread of cemeteries.  They know that Christianity came to dominate a given region at that time that cemeteries came into use.

Anytime we consider how our behavior communicates we need to be careful. On the one hand we don’t want to be Gnostic enough to suggest that our bodies, and how we treat them are meaningless and communicate nothing. On the other hand this does not mean that anyone who ever approved or requested a cremation has self-consciously denied the gospel and affirmed Gnosticism.  Of course buried bodies decompose. And of course, better still, cremated bodies will in fact be resurrected. Nothing we do can undo the promises of God and the glory of the resurrection. Balance, however, suggests that we think through our behavior, that we think deliberately. Balance also suggests that we ought to honor our fathers who gave us this liturgy in the first place.

One cannot say that cremation is a sin. One might say that burial better reflects the biblical perspective on life, death and the body. One can say with certainty that Christ will come again, and our bodies will be raised again, never to die again.

VIDEO: CrossReference: He Is Coming

Today brings the final preview in David Murray's new 10-part series on the Old Testament appearances of Christ as the Angel of the Lord. For the past nine weeks, we've been previewing messages from CrossReference: Discovering Christ in the Old Testament. You can still watch the first two episodes of here and will be able to view this last message for one week. 

We hope you've enjoyed the chance to check out this great series. The DVD and study guide (sample here) are now available for purchase. Or you can download the films in HD.

Episode 10: He Is Coming