R.C. Sproul's Blog, page 77

Why Does God Allow Evil?

It has been called the Achilles' heel of the Christian faith. Of course, I'm referring to the classical problem of the existence of evil. Philosophers such as John Stuart Mill have argued that the existence of evil demonstrates that God is either not omnipotent or not good and loving -- the reasoning being that if evil exists apart from the sovereign power of God, then by resistless logic, God cannot be deemed omnipotent. On the other hand, if God does have the power to prevent evil but fails to do it, then this would reflect upon His character, indicating that He is neither good nor loving. Because of the persistence of this problem, the church has seen countless attempts at what is called theodicy. The term theodicy involves the combining of two Greek words: the word for God, theos, and the word for justification, dikaios. Hence, a theodicy is an attempt to justify God for the existence of evil (as seen, for instance, in John Milton's Paradise Lost). Such theodicies have covered the gauntlet between a simple explanation that evil comes as a direct result of human free will or to more complex philosophical attempts such as that offered by the philosopher Leibniz. In his theodicy, which was satired by Voltaire's Candide, Leibniz distinguished among three types of evil: natural evil, metaphysical evil, and moral evil. In this three-fold schema, Leibniz argued that moral evil is an inevitable and necessary consequence of finitude, which is a metaphysical lack of complete being. Because every creature falls short of infinite being, that shortfall must necessarily yield defects such as we see in moral evil. The problem with this theodicy is that it fails to take into account the biblical ideal of evil. If evil is a metaphysical necessity for creatures, then obviously Adam and Eve had to have been evil before the fall and would have to continue to be evil even after glorification in heaven.

I have yet to find a satisfying explanation for what theologians call the mystery of iniquity. Please don't send me letters giving your explanations, usually focusing on some dimension of human free will. I'm afraid that many people fail to feel the serious weight of this burden of explanation. The simple presence of free will is not enough to explain the origin of evil, in as much as we still must ask how a good being would be inclined freely to choose evil. The inclination for the will to act in an immoral manner is already a signal of sin.

One of the most important approaches to the problem of evil is that set forth originally by Augustine and then later by Aquinas, in which they argued that evil has no independent being. Evil cannot be defined as a thing or as a substance or as some kind of being. Rather, evil is always defined as an action, an action that fails to meet a standard of goodness. In this regard, evil has been defined in terms of its being either a negation (negatio) of the good, or a privation (privatio) of the good. In both cases, the very definition of evil depends upon a prior understanding of the good. In this regard, as Augustine argued, evil is parasitic -- that is, it depends upon the good for its very definition. We think of sin as something that is unrighteous, involving disobedience, immorality, and the like. All of these definitions depend upon the positive substance of the good for their very definition. Augustine argues that though Christians face the difficulty of explaining the presence of evil in the universe, the pagan has a problem that is twice as difficult. Before one can even have a problem of evil, one must first have an antecedent existence of the good. Those who complain about the problem of evil now also have the problem of defining the existence of the good. Without God there is no ultimate standard for the good.

In contemporary days, this problem has been resolved by simply denying both evil and good. Such a problem, however, faces enormous difficulties, particularly when one suffers at the hands of someone who inflicts evil upon them. It is easy for us to deny the existence of evil until we ourselves are victims of someone's wicked action.

However, though we end our quest to answer the origin of evil, one thing is certain: since God is both omnipotent and good, we must conclude that in His omnipotence and goodness there must be a place for the existence of evil. We know that God Himself never does that which is evil. Nevertheless, He also ordains whatsoever comes to pass. Though He does not do evil and does not create evil, He does ordain that evil exists. If it does exist, and if God is sovereign, then obviously He must have been able to prevent its existence. If He allowed evil to enter into this universe, it could only be by His sovereign decision. Since His sovereign decisions always follow the perfection of His being, we must conclude that His decision to allow evil to exist is a good decision.

Again, we must be careful here. We must never say that evil is good, or that good is evil. But that is not the same thing as saying, "It is good that there is evil." Again, I repeat, it is good that there is evil, else evil could not exist. Even this theodicy does not explain the "how" of the entrance of evil into the world. It only reflects upon the "why" of the reality of evil. One thing we know for sure is that evil does exist. It exists, if nowhere else, in us and in our behavior. We know that the force of evil is extraordinary and brings great pain and suffering into the world. We also know that God is sovereign over it and in His sovereignty will not allow evil to have the last word. Evil always and ever serves the ultimate best interest of God Himself. It is God in His goodness and in His sovereignty who has ordained the final conquest over evil and its riddance from His universe. In this redemption we find our rest and our joy -- and until that time, we live in a fallen world.

This post was originally published in Tabletalk magazine.

True Faith Is More Than Emotion

R.L. Dabney once wrote, “All true worship is rational.” In this brief clip, W. Robert Godfrey reminds us that saving faith in Christ, acceptable worship, and real revival are much more than emotional experiences that come and go.

Transcript:

At one point, Dabney wrote: “Worship must be an act of personal homage to God, or it is a hypocrisy and offense. All true worship is rational. The truth intelligently known and intelligently uttered is the only instrument and language of true worship. Hence all social worship must be didactic. Blinded men are ever prone to imagine that they have religious feelings because they have sensuous animal feelings in accidental juxtaposition with religious places, words, or sights. This is the pernicious mistake which has sealed up millions of self-deceived souls for hell.” That is a very strong statement, but worth pondering. What he is really saying is, there are lots of people who have just had human feelings all worked up in a church setting and imagine that that’s true faith. He is saying, that is not necessarily so. If you think just emotion is true faith, you may be bound for hell. It is a very strong statement. It is his concern that we want real revival, but real revival is not just emotional experience that comes and goes. There was so much concern about this that there was a move to produce a youth hymnal for Presbyterian youth in 1872. The committee that prepared the youth hymnal, called The Voice of Praise, said they needed this youth hymnal because the youth had been exposed to so much bad music and it was having a bad impact on the youth. It is amazing: things never change, do they? The committee that prepared this youth hymnal said why it wanted this hymnal. It said, “One of the reasons why children in the Sabbath school do not like to go to church is that they are trained to a boisterous, sensational, and effervescent style of music in the Sabbath school, and by this their tastes are so perverted that the refined and elevated melodies used in singing the songs of Zion seem insipid and dull to them.” Haven’t we just been through that? Could not that sentence have been written yesterday? So, music really is a crucial matter for the life of the church.

How Do I Respond When an Atheist Asks, “Who Is the Father of Jesus?”

Whose Son is Jesus Christ? From one of our Ask Ligonier events, H.B. Charles Jr. explains how Scripture helps us to answer this question when it arises. To get real-time answers to your biblical and theological questions, just ask Ligonier.

Read the Transcript

Thinking Like Jesus

Several years ago, I was asked to give a convocation address at a major theological seminary in America. In that address, I spoke about the critical role of logic in biblical interpretation, and I pleaded for seminaries to include courses on logic in their required curricula. In almost any seminary’s course of study, students are required to learn something of the original biblical languages, Hebrew and Greek. They are taught to look at the historical background of the text, and they learn basic principles of interpretation. These are all important and valuable skills for being good stewards of the Word of God. However, the main reason why errors in biblical interpretation occur is not because the reader lacks a knowledge of Hebrew or of the situation in which the biblical book was written. The number one cause for misunderstanding the Scriptures is making illegitimate inferences from the text. It is my firm belief that these faulty inferences would be less likely if biblical interpreters were more skilled in basic principles of logic.

Let me give an example of the kind of faulty inferences I have in mind. I doubt I have ever had a discussion on the question of God’s sovereign election without someone quoting John 3:16 and saying, “But doesn’t the Bible say that ‘God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life’”? I immediately agree that the Bible says that. If we were to translate that truth into logical propositions, we would say that all who believe will have eternal life, and no one who has eternal life will perish, because perishing and eternal life are polar opposites in terms of the consequences of belief. However, this text says absolutely nothing about human ability to believe in Jesus Christ. It tells us nothing about who will believe. Jesus said, “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him” (John 6:44). Here we have a universal negative that describes ability. No person has the ability to come to Jesus unless a particular condition is met by God. Yet this is forgotten in light of John 3:16, which says nothing about a prerequisite for faith. So, John 3:16, one of the most famous texts in all of the Bible, is routinely, regularly, and systematically butchered with faulty inferences and implications.

Why do such illegitimate inferences happen? Classical Christian theology, particularly Reformed theology, talks about the noetic effects of sin. The English word noetic derives from the Greek word nous, which is often translated as “mind.” So, the noetic effects of sin are those consequences of the fall of man on the human intellect. The entire human person, including all of our faculties, was ravaged by the corruption of human nature. Our bodies die because of sin. The human will is in a state of moral bondage, in captivity to the evil desires and impulses of the heart. Our minds, likewise, are fallen, and our very ability to think has been severely weakened by the fall. I would guess that Adam’s IQ before the fall was off the charts. I doubt that he was given to making illegitimate inferences in his time of tending the garden. Rather, his mind was sharp and acute. But he lost that when he fell, and we lost it with him.

However, the fact that we are fallen does not mean that we no longer have the ability to think. We are all prone to error, but we also can learn to reason in an orderly, logical, and cogent fashion. It is my desire to see Christians think with the utmost cogency and clarity. So, as a matter of discipline, it is much to our benefit to study and master the elementary principles of reasoning so that we can, by the help of God the Holy Spirit, overcome to a certain degree the ravages of sin upon our thinking.

I do not think for a moment that any of us, as long as sin is in us, will never become perfect in our reasoning. Sin prejudices us against the law of God for as long as we live, and we have to fight to overcome these basic distortions of the truth of God. But if we love God, not only with all of our hearts, our souls, and our strength, but also with our minds (Mark 12:30), we will be rigorous in our attempts to train our minds.

Yes, Adam had a keen mind before the fall. But I believe the world has never experienced such sound thinking as was manifested in the mind of Christ. I think that part of the perfect humanity of our Lord was that He never made an illegitimate inference. He never jumped to a conclusion that was unwarranted by the premises. His thinking was crystal clear and coherent. We are called to imitate our Lord in all things, including His thinking. Therefore, make it a matter of chief and earnest business in your life to love Him with all of your mind.

This post was originally published in Tabletalk magazine.

Special $5 Friday (And More): Over 100 Discounted Resources

This week, we are holding a special $5 Friday (and More) sale. In addition to offering a variety of resources for $5 each and significantly discounting other teaching series and books, numerous resources are also available for as little as $1.

More than 100 items have been discounted for this special sale, including 13 unique editions of Bibles and Psalters—perfect gifts to give a friend this summer. Also available is the deluxe edition of Puritan: All of Life to the Glory of God. This feature-length documentary and hours of accompanying teaching sessions feature several of our Teaching Fellows and other gifted scholars and leaders. They will guide you through the Scripture-saturated lives of the Puritans and consider what lessons we can learn from the legacy of these faithful witnesses to Christ.

This week’s bonus resources include:

Puritan: All of Life to the Glory of God deluxe edition $150 $75 (Save 50%)
The Gospel Comes with a House Key by Rosaria Butterfield $20 $12 (Save 40%)
The Moment of Truth audiobook by Steven Lawson $20 $11 (Save 45%)
The Hunger for Significance: Seeing the Image of God in Man by R.C. Sproul $17 $7 (Save 58%)
Select issues of Tabletalk magazine $3 $1 (Save 66%)

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

View today’s $5 Friday collection.

The Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy

Here’s an excerpt from The Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy, John R. Muether's contribution to the May issue of Tabletalk:

Modern scholars who study contemporary American Protestantism commonly divide the movement into two main groups. Mainline Protestantism is a broadly inclusive group of theologically liberal denominations such as the Episcopal Church, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the United Church of Christ, and the Presbyterian Church (USA). “Sideline” Protestants are members of smaller, breakaway denominations or independent churches that are “Bible believing.” This division is roughly a century old, and it reflects the outcome of what is commonly called the Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy (modernism, in this context, is the equivalent of theological liberalism). The conflict began in the Northern Presbyterian church, officially known at the time as the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America (PCUSA); it was separated from Southern Presbyterians from 1861 to 1983. However, the controversy would ultimately disrupt every Protestant denomination in North America. As we survey this controversy, we will see that a proper assessment of the conflict suggests that the name of the controversy is misleading.

Continue reading The Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy, 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.

Leaning Forward to Serve in This Crisis

You and I have seen how this COVID-19 pandemic has swiftly brought the fragility and brevity of life into focus for seven billion souls on this planet. We mourn with everyone who has experienced loss, and we marvel at the courage of those in the medical community. Families, communities, and nations have had their worlds upended and church services have been interrupted. May the Lord have mercy and sustain His people.

Keeping track of the medical and economic news can feel like standing on shifting sand. Yet Christians stand on the unchanging, authoritative Word of God. I believe that in a moment like this, Dr. Sproul would tell us that we must go back to first principles. God is holy, and we’re not. We must remember that Jesus Christ is building His church as we proclaim the gospel and the whole counsel of God. We must teach it with unflinching confidence and courage—never obscuring the only hope for a lost and dying world.

Knowing this, Ligonier Ministries is leaning forward to serve in this crisis. Through the generosity of our Ministry Partners and financial supporters, we’ve been able to help Christians who are weary, anxious, and fearful, calling them to renewed strength and dependence on the Lord. We have also been answering the questions of unbelievers and pointing them to the one and only Savior.

We may not know all that the Lord is doing in and through this global crisis, yet we do recognize that this moment affords significant opportunities for the gospel to advance in communities around the world. Many of our visionary donors have expressed their encouragement for Ligonier to speed into this storm with urgently needed help—uncharted waters, to be sure. Thank you for your faithful support.

We know the Lord answers prayer, and many of us have been praying for a gospel awakening. Could it be that we’re witnessing an answer? Few of us have in our lifetime seen such openness to matters of eternal consequence. The fields are white for harvest, and the Lord of the harvest is on the move (John 4:35).

“Right now counts forever,” Dr. Sproul said. We see that now more than at any time in Ligonier’s history. This is no time to pause outreach. It is God’s gospel, and it is never quarantined. Serving as many people as possible in this time of isolation has been at the forefront of our thinking.

As a result, the team at Ligonier has adapted our outreach and responded with agility. To serve growing Christians around the world and bring the reinforcements of God’s Word to parched souls, for the first time ever we’ve made our ministry’s deep library of teaching series available to stream for free. Tens of thousands of people are being helped every day with these discipleship resources. In fact, access to our teaching series online has more than doubled—and it is increasing steeply.

However, “free” comes with significant cost to the ministry.

We entrust our financial needs to the Lord and make them known plainly to you. For nearly fifty years, Ligonier has been able to serve countless people through the generosity of friends like you who see the pressing need for our work not only to continue, but also to grow and expand.

We are all feeling the effects of this global health and economic crisis. Some will feel it more than others. If you are able, will you step forward with a generous gift that helps to carry Ligonier Ministries through this period of unprecedented demand for our outreach? Your donation will immediately go to helping God’s people around the world.

Please support your local church first. But if you can help us move forward with strength in this season of awakening, it is greatly needed and deeply appreciated.

In ways that we are just beginning to understand, it seems the Lord has prepared Ligonier for this challenging moment to help God’s people. R.C. fixed our purpose as a ministry to awaken as many people as possible to the holiness of God by proclaiming, teaching, and defending God’s holiness in all its fullness. We have been doing that since 1971, and it is a kindness from the Lord that He allows us to do that now in these turbulent times.

All of us at Ligonier Ministries are praying for people everywhere during this trial. Remember that, for a Christian, nothing—including a novel coronavirus—“will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom. 8:39).

Thank you for giving your prayerful consideration to this request for financial support.

Beware the "Damnable Plus"

When it comes to our justification, we must be wary of anyone who replaces “Christ alone” with “Christ plus…” In this brief clip, Derek Thomas considers the subtle danger of relying on our works or preferences to obtain a righteous standing before God.

Transcript:

There were those who were saying that in order to be right with God, in order to be in a righteous standing with God, it wasn't enough to believe in Jesus. Yes, you need to believe in Jesus, but you need to believe in Jesus “and…” You need to believe in Jesus “plus” observe the law, “plus” be circumcised, “plus” follow the dietary laws, “plus” obey the Jewish calendar, and “plus” and “plus” and “plus.” And that's a damnable “plus” for Paul. It's Jesus only. It's solus Christus of the Reformation: by faith alone, in Christ alone, and apart from the works of the law. And those who were advocating the necessity to obey the law were preaching a different “gospel,” a “gospel” that isn't a gospel, a “gospel” that isn't good news. It's the gospel “plus” tradition. For us, it might be something a little different, a little more subtle. It's the gospel “plus” a certain degree of emotional reaction to your sin, a certain quality of repentance. The gospel “plus” the King James version. The gospel “plus” women should wear hats in church. The gospel “plus” you must do it this way and not that way. The gospel “plus” a worship style that conforms more to prejudice than to principle. And so on. It can be very subtle, and it creeps in. It creeps in by little gossipy statements that we make. "You know that church that we went to, that group of Christians? You know, they didn't do X or they didn't do Y." And these are not issues of first principle. These are secondary things. They're issues of prejudice. Before long we're saying, "You cannot possibly be a Christian unless you do X or you do Y or you do Z." And Paul is addressing that subtlety.

God Orders Events for the Good of His People

Joseph has just revealed his true identity to his astonished brothers. It had been a tearful moment (Gen. 46:2, 14; cf. 42:24; 43:30). He is about to engage in a discourse on predestination and the divine decree (yes, really!), but this is no abstract theological exercise; it is theology engaging the harshest of realities — betrayal, false imprisonment, and injustice!

Joseph had, from one point of view, every right to think that life made no sense at all because there was no controlling power governing the course of events. He might have been tempted to think along the lines of “open theism,” that there were certain events in his future that God did not know or had the power to control in a preconditioned way. True, things had improved for him in ways that must have caused him much joy. But the road to this point had been very hard. He had become the prime minister of Egypt, but he could still remember those days when, as a slave, he had languished in a rotting cell wrongly accused of rape. Joseph has been meditating upon divine providence, asking the hard questions about why things happen the way they do.

Joseph has grown in grace; the somewhat self-centered, pampered mother’s teenager has now become the forgiving, theologically astute man that is revealed in the words he now utters to his brothers: “God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive for you many survivors. So it was not you who sent me here, but God” (Gen. 45:7–8). Several matters are worth reflecting upon.

The first clear feature of these words is the way in which Joseph views the entirety of his life as one that is in every way ordered by God. “God sent me…it was not you who sent me here, but God.” The clarity of this perspective is breathtakingly clear: Joseph believes that God is in ultimate control of all that happens. Things happen because God orders them to happen. God is not lost in some numinous world, unreachable by us and impenetrable by him. This is no deistic belief in a divine watchmaker who has made the world and then allowed it simply to tick according to a set of identifiable scientific rules.

Secondly, Joseph asserts a divine pre-determination. Things happen because God has ordered them to happen before they happen. God is not simply reacting to events as they happen; He has determined how the events themselves come to pass. There is a cause, and there is an effect. God orders and things happen.

Thirdly, and this is where we hold our breath, Joseph asserts God’s sovereignty in relation to bad things. The fact that they were in Egypt was due to the evil machinations of Joseph’s brothers. They had done an evil thing for which they were entirely responsible and culpable. Part of Joseph’s recent strategy in withholding his identity from his brothers and adding to their fear by the suggestion that they had not paid for the grain they had acquired was to bring them to own up to their sin. His tactic was designed to bring them to confess their sin and seek forgiveness. It had worked! But this does not prevent Joseph from asserting that even this evil thing that they had done was also a part of God’s divine plan and purpose. The sovereignty of God is total.

This raises the perennial theological and philosophical issue of the relationship of God to evil. If God is sovereign, does this mean that He is the author of sin? And if God is sovereign, does this not make our decision-making a fiction and not a reality? And does this not also imply that the universe is like a computer, carrying out the pre-programming of a sovereign software specialist with no real liberty of its own? To all three questions, the Westminster Confession of Faith responded with a negative: “God, from all eternity, did, by the most wise and holy counsel of His own will freely, and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass: yet so, as thereby neither is God the author of sin, nor is violence offered to the will of the creatures; nor is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established” (3.1). Of course, critics have responded to these words by saying that this doesn’t answer any of the questions posed. And they are correct; it doesn’t! It merely asserts that the alternatives are not true without explaining exactly how God can order events, including evil ones, without being the cause of them.

But a fourth lesson emerges, too. God orders events for the good of His people. Joseph’s family will join him in Egypt in the next chapter (Gen. 46) and thereby survive the famine that will run its course for five years. They find themselves in Egypt because God intends to keep His promise to Abraham.

What we have here, then, is a cameo of Romans 8:28: “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.” Christians, even those who may deny these words on philosophical grounds, have always clung to them for the comfort they provide in the midst of the most devastating events. We are always better on our knees before God, acknowledging His sovereignty and basking in its reassurance.

This post was originally published in Tabletalk magazine.

Study with Reformation Bible College Faculty for Free

As the circumstances surrounding the coronavirus (COVID-19) have resulted in the cancellation of many Bible studies and Sunday school classes, free study groups at Ligonier Connect can help you stay connected online.

Beginning the week of May 18, join one of our 6-week study groups moderated by Reformation Bible College faculty on Ligonier Connect. In these moderated courses, you’ll have the opportunity to grow with fellow Christians as you interact with study questions at your own pace and read contributions from the RBC faculty.

Try these study groups led by Reformation Bible College’s faculty:

Beginning Monday, May 18

Hath God Said? with R.C. Sproul

Moderated by Dr. John Tweeddale

Questions about the authority and trustworthiness of God’s words are as old as the garden of Eden. Christians need to know what they believe about the Bible. In this course, R.C. Sproul defends Scripture as the inspired, infallible, and inerrant Word of God, helping us to boldly proclaim its truth to the world around us.

Beginning Tuesday, May 19

Prayer with R.C. Sproul

Moderated by Dr. Ben Shaw and Mrs. Lynn Shaw

Christians have the privilege of communicating with the Creator and Sustainer of the universe—a privilege we too often neglect. In this course, R.C. Sproul shows us how to develop a faithful prayer life, demonstrating that intimate communication with God is at the heart of our relationship with Him.

Beginning Wednesday, May 20

Pleasing God with R.C. Sproul

Moderated by Professor Anthony Salangsang

What higher satisfaction is there in knowing that what we do and think is pleasing to God? But how can we, as imperfect Christians, ever hope to please a perfect God? In this course, R.C. Sproul identifies the struggles that believers share in our lifelong pursuit of holiness and offers insights on how to overcome them.

Study groups will remain free for the duration of these courses. Join a group today by clicking on one of the courses above.