R.C. Sproul's Blog, page 91

Columns from Tabletalk Magazine, March 2020

The March issue of Tabletalk focuses on the topic of fear. In this world, there is much to be afraid of, and most of us go through life with many fears on our hearts. Some of these fears are conscious, and others we may not be aware of; nevertheless, we are a fearful people, often driven by our fears to do foolish things. Importantly, Christians do not escape the reality of fear. We can be just as fearful as nonbelievers, though we often do not admit or confront our fears, believing that walking by faith means never acknowledging what we are afraid of. The answer to fear, however, is not to deny that it exists but to look to the Lord, who commands us again and again to “fear not.” Knowing who God is and that He is for His people is the only way to find lasting comfort. This issue of Tabletalk seeks to help Christians understand their fears better, to be willing to admit their fears, and to find comfort for their fears in God.

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. You can also purchase the issue or subscribe to get the print issue every month.

Freedom from Fear by Burk Parsons
The Reality of Fear by Ed Welch
Fear of a Changing World by Keith A. Evans.
Fear of Financial Loss by Mike Emlet
Fear of Not Being a Christian by John P. Sartelle Sr.
Fear of Children’s Not Knowing the Lord by Rebecca VanDoodewaard
Fear of Being a Bad Parent by Jon Nielson
Fear of Being Disliked by Jeremy Pierre
Fear of Being Alone by Jayne V. Clark
Fear of Not Measuring Up by Kevin Struyk
Fear of Disease and Disability by John Perritt
Fear of Dying by Lou Priolo
Fear Not, for I am With You by Eric B. Watkins

Read the Entire Issue

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Do Christians Go Immediately to Heaven When They Die?

What happens to a Christian at the moment of death? From one of our Ask R.C. events, R.C. Sproul examines what it means for the souls of believers to be “away from the body and at home with the Lord” (2 Cor. 5:8).

Do you have a biblical or theological question? We invite you to ask Ligonier.

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Which Comes First: Repentance or Faith?

When the gospel is proclaimed, it seems at first sight that two different, even alternative, responses are called for. Sometimes the summons is, "Repent!" Thus, "John the Baptist came preaching in the wilderness of Judea, 'Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand'" (Matt. 3:1–2). Again, Peter urged the hearers whose consciences had been ripped open on the day of Pentecost, "Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ" (Acts 2:38). Later, Paul urged the Athenians to "repent" in response to the message of the risen Christ (Acts 17:30).

Yet, on other occasions, the appropriate response to the gospel is, "Believe!" When the Philippian jailer asked Paul what he must do to be saved, the Apostle told him, "Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved" (Acts 16:31).

But there is no mystery or contradiction here. Further on in Acts 17, we discover that precisely where the response of repentance was required, those who were converted are described as believing (Acts 17:30, 34).

Any confusion is surely resolved by the fact that when Jesus preached "the gospel of God" in Galilee, He urged His hearers, "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel" (Mark 1:14–15). Here repentance and faith belong together. They denote two aspects in conversion that are equally essential to it. Thus, either term implies the presence of the other because each reality (repentance or faith) is the sine qua non of the other.

In grammatical terms, then, the words repent and believe both function as a synecdoche—the figure of speech in which a part is used for the whole. Thus, repentance implies faith and faith implies repentance. One cannot exist without the other.

But which comes first, logically? Is it repentance? Is it faith? Or does neither have an absolute priority? There has been prolonged debates in Reformed thought about this. Each of three possible answers has had advocates:

First, W. G. T. Shedd insisted that faith must precede repentance in the order of nature: "Though faith and repentance are inseparable and simultaneous, yet in the order of nature, faith precedes repentance" (Dogmatic Theology, 2.536). Shedd argued this on the grounds that the motivating power for repentance lies in faith's grasp of the mercy of God. If repentance were to precede faith, both repentance and faith would be legal in character, and they would become prerequisites for grace.

Second, Louis Berkhof appears to have taken the reverse position: "There is no doubt that, logically, repentance and the knowledge of sin precede the faith that yields to Christ in trusting love" (Systematic Theology, p. 492).

Third, John Murray insisted that this issue raises

an unnecessary question and the insistence that one is prior to the other is futile. There is no priority. The faith that is unto salvation is a penitent faith and the repentance that is unto life is a believing repentance . . . saving faith is permeated with repentance and repentance is permeated with saving faith. (Redemption—Accomplished and Applied, p. 113).

This is, surely, the more biblical perspective. We cannot separate turning from sin in repentance and coming to Christ in faith. They describe the same person in the same action, but from different perspectives. In one instance (repentance), the person is viewed in relation to sin; in the other (faith), the person is viewed in relation to the Lord Jesus. But the individual who trusts in Christ simultaneously turns away from sin. In believing he repents and in repenting believes. Perhaps R. L. Dabney expressed it best when he insisted that repentance and faith are "twin" graces (perhaps we might say "conjoined twins").

But having said this, we have by no means said everything there is to say. Entwined within any theology of conversion lies a psychology of conversion. In any particular individual, at the level of consciousness, a sense of either repentance or trust may predominate. What is unified theologically may be diverse psychologically. Thus, an individual deeply convicted of the guilt and bondage of sin may experience turning from it (repentance) as the dominant note in his or her conversion. Others (whose experience of conviction deepens after their conversion) may have a dominant sense of the wonder of Christ's love, with less agony of soul at the psychological level. Here the individual is more conscious of trusting in Christ than of repentance from sin. But in true conversion, neither can exist without the other.

The psychological accompaniments of conversion thus vary, sometimes depending on the dominant gospel emphasis that is set before the sinner (the sinfulness of sin or the greatness of grace). This is quite consistent with the shrewd comment of the Westminster Divines to the effect that faith (that is, the trusting response of the individual to the word of the gospel) "acteth differently upon that which each particular passage thereof [of Scripture] containeth" (WCF 16.2).

In no case, however, can real conversion take place apart from the presence of both repentance and faith, and therefore both joy and sorrow. A "conversion" that lacks all sorrow for sin, that receives the word with only joy, will be temporary.

Jesus' parable of the sower is instructive here. In one type of soil, the seed sprouts quickly but dies suddenly. This represents "converts" who receive the word with joy—but with no sense of fallow ground being broken up by conviction of sin or any pain in turning from it (Mark 4:5–6, 16–17). On the other hand, a conversion that is only sorrow for sin without any joy in pardon will prove to have been only "worldly grief" that "produces death" (2 Cor. 7:10). In the end, it will come to nothing.

This, however, raises a final question: Does the necessity of repentance in conversion constitute a kind of work that detracts from the empty-handedness of faith? Does it compromise grace?

In a word, no. Sinners must always come empty-handed. But this is precisely the point. By nature, my hands are full (of sin, self, and my own "good deeds"). However, hands that are full cannot hold on to Christ in faith. Instead, as they take hold of Him, they are emptied. That which has prevented us from trusting Him falls inevitably to the ground. The old way of life cannot be retained in hands that are taking hold of the Savior.

Yes, repentance and faith are two essential elements in conversion. They constitute twin graces that can never be separated. As John Calvin well reminds us, this is true not only of the beginning but of the whole of our Christian lives. We are believing penitents and penitent believers all the way to glory.

This post was originally published in Tabletalk magazine.

The Depraved State of 18th-Century England

In this brief clip from his teaching series A Survey of Church History, W. Robert Godfrey explains the depraved state of 18th-century England that set the stage for the emergence of John Wesley and George Whitefield. Watch this entire message for free. 

Transcript

By the early eighteenth‑century, religious and moral life in England was reaching a fairly low point, there was serious moral degeneration in England.  Sexual immorality was flaunted at court and in the theater and in literature.  An invitation to a masked ball of the aristocracy was sent out with the promise of champagne, dice, music, or your neighbor's spouse.  There was widespread drunkenness amongst the lower classes, and gambling and drink had become a national disgrace.  Many houses in London were turned into gin mills, producing "bathtub gin," probably not with bathtubs, but homemade gin, in any case.  Drunkenness was becoming a great problem amongst the English people.  The state government had established lotteries that were encouraging gambling.  There were cruel and degrading sports, cock‑fighting, bull‑baiting.  Hangings had become so frequent that Dr. Johnson quipped that he was afraid the Royal navy would run out of rope, and jails were over‑crowded.  There was indifferentism to religion. 

Can you imagine a society so degenerated?  Widespread sexual immorality, cruel sports, gambling, drunkenness; it's hard to imagine a society in such a state, but that's where England was early in the eighteenth‑century. 

And the church, the official Church of England, in particular, seemed paralyzed to be helpful in any way.  Someone remarked that the church ‑‑ the sermons in churches were like a winter's day: Cold and short, and they weren't doing any good.  One observer remarked, "Their discourses from the pulpit are generally dry, methodical and unaffecting, delivered with the most insipid calmness."

What Can We Learn from the Bible’s Benedictions and Doxologies?

Not only are the Bible’s benedictions and doxologies rich statements of God’s grace and glory, they’re also teaching tools for the church. From one of our Ask Ligonier events, H.B. Charles Jr. considers what we can learn from these significant passages in Scripture.

Ask your biblical and theological questions live online at ask.Ligonier.org.

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Is It Just That in Adam All Die?

I think the New Testament does teach that the whole world is born into the consequences of a fallen nature because of the sin of Adam and Eve. The New Testament repeats this idea frequently—“that through the disobedience of one man, death comes into the world.” This has been an occasion for much theological protest. What kind of a God would punish all people with the consequences of one individual’s sin? In fact, it seems to go contrary to the teaching of the prophet Ezekiel. He rebuked the people of Israel when they said that the fathers had eaten sour grapes and the children’s teeth were set on edge. The prophet said that God treats every person according to his own sin. He doesn’t punish me for what my father did, nor does he punish my son for what I did, although the consequences may spill out into three or four generations. That the guilt is not transferred from one person to another seems to be the message in Ezekiel.

It makes the question all the more puzzling. In protest we want to say, “No damnation without representation.” We don’t like to be held accountable for what somebody else did, although there are occasions in our own system of justice where we recognize a certain level of culpability for what another person does through the means of criminal conspiracy.

For example, I might hire you to kill somebody. Even though I’m far away from the scene of the crime and don’t pull the trigger, I can still be tried for first-degree murder. All you did was carry out my desire. Even though I didn’t pull the trigger, I’m guilty of the intent and malice of forethought that you actually exercised.

You might say that’s a poor analogy of the Fall because nobody hired Adam to sin against God in my name. Obviously we didn’t. He was appointed to be the representative of the whole human race. Again, we tend to find that difficult to swallow because I don’t like to be held accountable for what my representative does if I don’t have the opportunity to choose my representative. I certainly didn’t choose Adam to represent me. That’s one of the reasons we like to have the right to elect our representatives in government: The actions that they take in the political realm have tremendous consequences on our lives. We can’t all be in Washington enacting legislation. We want to elect our representatives in the hope that they will accurately represent our desires and our wishes.

There is no time in human history when you were more perfectly represented than in the Garden of Eden because your representative was chosen infallibly by a perfectly holy, perfectly just, omniscient God. So I cannot say that I would have done differently than Adam did.

One last point: If we object in principle to God’s allowing one person to act for another, that would be the end of the Christian faith. Our whole redemption rests on the same principle, that through the actions of Christ we are redeemed.

$5 Friday (And More): Providence, the Letter of James, & John Calvin

It’s time for our weekly $5 Friday sale. This week’s resources include such topics as providence, the Letter of James, John Calvin, sanctification, salvation, baptism, 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 Gospel: 2016 National Conference , DVD $75 $15 (Save 80%)
Hymns , CD $16 $10 (Save 37%)
Let’s Study James by Sinclair Ferguson, Paperback $14 $10 (Save 28%)
John Calvin: A Heart for Devotion, Doctrine, & Doxology by Burk Parsons, Audiobook CD $22 $15 (Save 31%)
Finally Alive by John Piper, Audiobook CD $22 $15 (Save 31%)
What We Believe: Understanding and Confessing the Apostles’ Creed by R.C. Sproul, Paperback $17 $10 (Save 41%)
Dispatches from the Front: Stories of Gospel Advance in the World's Difficult Places , Paperback $18 $9 (Save 50%)
November 2012 Tabletalk: The Five Solas , Magazine $3 $1 (Save 67%)
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What is Providence? Basics of the Reformed Faith by Derek Thomas, Paperback $5 $3 (Save 40%)

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

View today’s $5 Friday sale items.

The Parable of the Seed Growing

Here’s an excerpt from The Parable of the Seed Growing, Matthias Lohmann's contribution to the February issue of Tabletalk:

As I’m writing this, I’m sitting at my desk in my office in Munich, Germany, thinking about the newest statistics about Christianity in Germany. According to the numbers in front of me, Christianity is in rapid decline. The country where the Reformation began five hundred years ago will soon have a majority of the population who don’t call themselves Christians. Even seventy years ago in post–World War II Germany, 95 percent of the people were members either of the Roman Catholic Church or of a Protestant church. Just in 2018, the Protestant state churches lost another 2 percent of their members. But even more alarming is that of members of the Protestant state churches, an average of only 3.4 percent attend a church service on any given Sunday, which amounts to less than 1 percent of the population in Germany. The number of Christians in free (non-state) churches continues to be negligible. Even more alarming is the trend toward liberalism in nearly all denominations. At times, it seems as if preaching the gospel in Germany is a waste of time. Should I simply give up and go to a place where the good news will be more eagerly received?

Continue reading The Parable of the Seed Growing, or begin receiving Tabletalk magazine by signing up for a free 3-month trial.

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Understanding God's Character Aids Assurance

God is merciful, assuring, and loving toward His people in Christ. In this brief clip from his teaching series Assurance of Faith, Joel Beeke encourages Christians who doubt their salvation to remember God’s character.

Transcript:

Dear doubting believer, understanding who God is in Christ will give you a huge boost to your assurance. God is a loving Father looking for the prodigal son, running to him with legs of mercy, wrapping around him with arms of mercy, weeping over him with tears of mercy, kissing him with lips of mercy, saying, “This is My son, who was lost and is found! Let’s rejoice and be merry and slay the fatted calf.” God loves to receive sinners. You need to understand that, you need to understand Micah 7:18, “He delights in mercy.” Thomas Watson said it so beautifully, “God is just, and justice is one of God’s essential attributes.” “But the exercising of justice,” he said, is His strange work; His familiar work is mercy. He said, “God is like a like a bee; it only stings when it’s provoked.” He delights in mercy. Praise God that He is the true, the faithful, the merciful, the assuring, the loving God in Christ Jesus, and ask God to show that to you. Once you understand the character of God, that may help you a great deal.

The Holy One of God

The title "Holy One of God" means that Jesus is infinitely and absolutely holy, fully and perfectly divine. He is transcendent and majestic. He came down from above to save sinners, yet He is set apart from sinners in that He is completely sinless, without any moral blemish, perfect in all of His ways. His being is holy. His character is holy. His mind is holy. His motives are holy. His words are holy. His actions are holy. His ways are holy. His judgments are holy. From the top of His head to the bottom of His feet, every inch, every ounce, the totality, the sum and the substance of the second person of the Godhead is equally holy with God the Father.

What is the holiness of God? First, it has to do with "apart-ness" or "other-ness." The idea of holiness speaks to the profound difference between Him and us. Holiness encompasses His transcendent majesty, His august superiority. He is distinctly set apart from us. As one infinitely above us, He alone is worthy of our worship and our adoration. Moses asked: "Who is like you, O LORD, among the gods? Who is like you, majestic in holiness, awesome in glorious deeds, doing wonders?" (Ex. 15:11). This is the holiness that the demon recognized; he knew that Jesus is the high, lifted up, supreme being of heaven and earth.

Second, it speaks to His untainted purity, His sinless perfection. God is morally flawless, blameless in all of His ways. The prophet Isaiah stressed this aspect of His character through repeated use of a formal title for God, "the Holy One of Israel." It has been well said that the book of Isaiah is divided into two halves, the first thirty-nine chapters and the last twenty-seven chapters. In the first thirty-nine chapters, this title is found twelve times in reference to God. In the last twenty-seven chapters, this title is found seventeen times. Twenty-nine times in the book of Isaiah, God is identified as "the Holy One of Israel." Some examples include: "They have despised the Holy One of Israel" (1:4); "For great in your midst is the Holy One of Israel" (12:6); and "Your redeemer is the Holy One of Israel" (41:14).

No doubt Isaiah’s use of this title flowed out of his encounter with the living God, recorded in Isaiah 6, when he went into the temple and saw the Lord, high and lifted up, and the seraphim surrounding the throne, crying out to one another day and night, "Holy, holy, holy," declaring by their repetition that God is the holiest being, supreme in His holiness in the entire created order. Given that experience, it is no surprise that Isaiah so frequently identified God as the "the Holy One of Israel." Franz Delitzsch, the great Old Testament commentator, writes that this title "forms an essential part of Isaiah's prophetic signature." In other words, this is the unique imprint of Isaiah, stamped on the pages of his book, identifying God as holy again and again.

When the demon in Mark 1 used a title that was very similar to Isaiah's—"the Holy One of God"—he left no question as to the identification he was making. Let us think about the meaning of this title as applied to the Lord Jesus.

First, it is a title of deity. We have already seen how similar this title is to the title Isaiah assigned to God. In a similar way, God calls Himself "I AM WHO I AM" in Exodus 3:14, then Jesus takes that title to Himself and says, "I am the bread of life" (John 6:48), "I am the light of the world" (John 8:12), and "I am the resurrection and the life" (John 11:25, emphasis added in all references). He takes the divine title of the Old Testament for Himself to show that He is equal to God. Something similar is happening here, though in this case the title for Jesus is voiced by a demon.

The title "Holy One of God" is found in only one other place in the New Testament. When some of Jesus' disciples decided to stop following Him, Jesus asked the Twelve, "Do you want to go away as well?" (John 6:66-67). Peter replied: "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God" (vv. 68-69). With these words, Peter accurately identified their Master as God incarnate, for that is what this title signifies.

Second, it is a title of humble humanity. It acknowledges that the holy God, who is enthroned in the heavens, has come down to be among unholy men. It speaks of the fact that the transcendent, majestic, regal God of heaven has taken on human flesh, yet without sin. Jesus Himself said, "I have come down from heaven" (John 6:38). Jesus was holy God in human form.

Third, it is a title of sinless perfection. If He is God, even though He is a man, Jesus is infinitely pure. Scripture affirms this repeatedly: "In him there is no sin" (1 John 3:5); "He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth" (1 Peter 2:22); "him … who knew no sin" (2 Cor. 5:21). Likewise, Jesus said: "The ruler of this world is coming. He has no claim on me" (John 14:30). The Lord was saying here: "There is no point of access that Satan has gained into My being. He has established no beachhead. There are no satanic strongholds in which he has hatched the poison of hell within Me.” He steadfastly resisted every temptation. Jesus could say to His enemies, "Which one of you convicts me of sin?" (John 8:46) because He had no sin.

At Calvary, all of our sins were laid on the sinless Lamb of God, and He gave to us His pure, sinless, perfect obedience to the law of God. This is the great exchange of Calvary: "For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God" (2 Cor. 5:21). Jesus had to come as He did, born of a virgin, in order to be what He was, sinless and perfect, in order to do what He, the Holy One, did—die on the cross as the sinless Lamb of God, in order to become sin for us.

Through death, the Bible says, Jesus destroyed the one who has the power of death, the Devil (Heb. 2:14). He bound the strong man, plundered his house at the cross, and set the captives free (Matt. 12:29; Eph. 4:8). His victory shows that "He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world" (1 John 4:4). Therefore, we ought to cry out, "Thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ" (1 Cor. 15:57).

This excerpt is adapted from Holy, Holy, Holy: Proclaiming the Perfections of God.