THE GOSPEL as Spoken by Spurgeon

"Now if you are not clear as to the plan of salvation, you will have many jolts, much shaking, many doubts, many fears. Let me ask and entreat you, then, to search the Scriptures. For in them you think you have eternal life and they are they which testify of Christ. And let me beg you to endeavor, by God’s help, always to keep in mind a clear view of the fact that you are to be saved, if saved at all, by trusting in Jesus Christ and in Jesus Christ, alone. The plan of salvation is, “Trust in Jesus.”

Make mistakes about other things, you will suffer inconvenience. But make a mistake here and it will be fatal to you. Methinks I hear some man saying, “Sir, I have longed to be saved, but I am still uneasy and troubled in my mind. I think if I were to do good works and then to save myself by them, I might trust in Christ.” Stand back, Uzzah, stand back! You are about to touch the ark of God, beware, lest you should die while you are doing it. Other mistakes will make you uneasy—that mistake will be fatal to you. Touch the atonement of Jesus Christ and there is no salvation if you touch it with a legal hand, seeking to add to it your own self-righteousness—

“None but Jesus, none but Jesus,
Can do helpless sinners good.”

He wants no help from you. Leave Him to do it all. Take Him as He is and go to Him just as you are—do not seek to bring anything—but go as you are and you will be saved. Seek to help Christ and saved you cannot be. Until you have done with that thought, you must abide in your sorrow and in your death. No mixing with Jesus. He never came to be a makeweight. Christ must be All and you must be nothing at all. If you attempt to patch His perfect robe, that robe shall never cover your nakedness. It is covered with jewels—put one paste jewel of yours upon it and it is not yours. You must have a whole Christ and nothing but Christ.

You know the old proverb, “Betwixt the two stools he came to the ground.” When a man hopes to rely partly on Christ and partly on himself, he will come to the ground with a vengeance. Rest on Jesus simply and you are saved. Rest on Christ and self and you are like Uzzah—you have touched the ark, you have sought to mingle man’s works with God’s works—man’s merits with Christ’s merits. And tremble, lest the wrath of God should come forth against you and destroy you.

But after all, my dear Friends, you have no merits. Christ freely offers Himself to you, if you will take Him for nothing. You thought to buy Him with your merits. Why you have no merits! Shall I tell you a little parable which shall show you your position. There was a rich man who had a generous heart and once upon a time he resolved to give a large estate to a poor neighbor, so he sent for him and said, “My friend, I am willing to give you a large estate for nothing.” The man felt grateful and retired home, but as he lay in his bed he thought, “I should like that estate, but I should not like to be beholden to anybody for it. I think I will pay for it.”

So he set out the next morning with a heavy bag on his back and when he came to the rich man’s door and the friend came out, he said, “Sir, I value your estate very highly. You promised to let me have it for nothing—but I do not want to be obliged to you—so I have brought a bag all full of gold to buy it with.” The rich man said, “I never offered to sell it to you. I said I would give it to you. But come, let us look at your bag of gold.” So the poor man opened wide the mouth of the sack. He blushed and stammered and said, “Oh, Sir, be not angry with me. Now that I see it, it is nothing but a bag of silver.”

The friend said, “Look at it again.” He looked again and blushed and cried, “Let not my lord be angry, but I find it is nothing but a bag of copper.” “Look once more,” said he. He looked once more into it and he fell down on his knees and said, “Forgive me, forgive me. I find, Sir, it is a bag of filth. You see I have brought you a bag of filth with which to buy your rich estate.” You know the meaning of that parable, do you not? You have brought to God what you thought were good works, golden works—look at them—you will see them pale before you and you will say, “My Lord, they are not so good as I thought they were, they are only silver works after all.”
Look at them again and they will become dirty, brown, copper works. “Oh,” you say, “they are not worth more than a farthing now.”

Look again and you will see that your prayers, your tears, your good works, are nothing better
than filth, after all. They are only another form of sin, another shape of iniquity. Oh, Sinner, take Christ as He is—take Him now—just as you are. The Gospel is just this—trust Christ and you are saved. Rely on what He did and you are delivered. Just leave off trusting to any ceremonies, to any doctrines, to any forms, to any works, but rely on Jesus and you are saved.

“Well,” says one, “but what if I go on in sin.” After you have relied on Jesus, you cannot go on living in sin—believing in Jesus will stop you—nothing else can. “No,” says another, “but I have nothing in the world; no reason why I should be saved, I have no good thing.” Just so, I know you have not. But still you are told to trust Jesus whether you have any good thing or not. Methinks I hear someone say, “I must not trust Jesus, I have no right to do it.” But, my dear
Friend, you are commanded to do it. “God commands all men everywhere to repent.”

This is the commandment—that you believe on Jesus Christ whom He has sent. Is not this the very Gospel—“Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved”? Now what God commands me to do I have a right to do! It cannot be wrong for me to do what God tells me to do. The minister who tells a man he has a right in his own sense of need, makes the sinner look to himself. But if he tells him, “Feel or not feel, God has commanded you to believe,” that makes the sinner turn to Christ and Christ, only. This turns his eye from himself to the Savior.

To conclude, I will tell you a little anecdote which I have often told before—it brings to mind more clearly than any other—our right to believe in Christ. I am speaking to those who say, “I have no right to trust Christ.” But if Christ commands you to do it and if, moreover, He tells you, “you are condemned already because you do not believe,” you certainly have a right to believe.
Sitting one day in Court with a Judge, interesting myself with some trials that were going on, there was wanted a witness. I am not clear about his name, but I think it was Brown. So it was said from the bench that Brown was wanted next. The usher down in the Court cried out “Brown!” Someone nearer the door cried, “Brown!” and I could hear them calling out in the street two or three times, “Brown! Brown! Brown!”

The Court was very crowded. By-and-by there came in at the Court door with a great deal of difficulty, a little, ugly, mean-looking creature. He came pushing and elbowing his way. There was a fine tall gentleman standing in the Court, looking on. He did not like to be pushed about and he said in a very peremptory manner, “Who are you?” “Brown,” said the man, “I am Brown.” “Well,” said the other, “Who is Brown?” “Nobody,” said he, “only I was told to come.”
It was wonderful how everybody made way for Brown, because he was told to come. They just cleared a lane for him and I do not suppose for my lord and duke they would have made room—they were so tightly packed—but Brown must come in anyhow, because he was wanted. It did not matter how poor he looked, how ragged, how greasy, how dirty—Brown was wanted and he had a right to come.

So now, God commands you to trust Christ. But you say, “I have committed a great big sin.” And He says, “Who are you?” You say, “A poor sinner.” “And what is a poor sinner?” says He. “Nothing at all,” you say, “but Jesus Christ told me to trust in Him. If He is wrong I leave the blame with Him, I will not keep back from Him.” He says, “Leap into My arms.” I am at the top of a burning house, Jesus Christ cries, “leap and I will catch you.” Then down I go. Dashed to pieces, or saved, I have no other way of salvation—down I go into His arms.

I am sinking, the floods are ready to swallow me up. Christ says, “Lay hold of that rope.” It looks like a frail rope, but I lay hold of it. Sink or swim I will not lay hold of anything else—but that and that alone—and I am safe. Do that, poor sinner, whoever you may be. If you have not entered a place of worship for the last six months, trust Christ now. Now, I beseech you, while the accepted hour is here, may God the Holy Spirit enable you to trust Christ.

And, though you have come in here covered with sin, you may go out with your sin washed away, peace and joy in your hearts, because the Spirit of God has sweetly led you to trust Jesus and you are saved.

May God now add his blessing, for Jesus’ sake. Amen."

The preceding quote was from an excellent sermon (which I highly recommend to you) titled "Importance of Small Things in Religion". Read the entire sermon here.

Why Is Preaching So Important?

I read a fascinating article today that I want to share with you underscoring the importance of sitting under true biblical preaching. The title of the article is Dangerous Times for the Church. It is by Mike Ratliff, a member of the discernment team at Christian Research Network. Here is an excerpt:

Being Reformed in my theology, I adhere to the Sovereignty of God in all things. He keeps remnants of believers even in the most apostate of times. He always has pockets of genuine believers who know their Lord by His grace through the faith He gives no matter what darkness is attacking the Church.

In this post we will look at the different epochs or eras that have not only come to attack the Church down through the ages, but have remained and are still with us now. They have accumulated now so that there is much overlap between them and this complicates the task of explaining these things to you my brethren. However, it is vital at this time that we take the covers off of what is hidden behind religiosity in order to direct our devotion to the Lord alone, not a local church or a pastor or a denomination or a certain set of religious rules or any other thing that are in actuality only distractions sent from the enemy to muddy the waters and draw believers into a from of Christianity that neither edifies us or glorifies God.

Before I begin, I would like to acknowledge the source of the rough outline for what is to follow. I was driving to work this morning as I listened to John MacArthur on Bott Radio here in the Kansas City area. He is working through a series on the necessity of preaching and in today’s sermon he gave a form of the following outline. This outline has 10 main points and gives us a general breakdown of 10 definable eras or epochs or seasons that have attacked the church since the end of the Apostolic and Church Father eras. It is based on the following passage.

But understand this, that in the last days there will come times of difficulty. (2 Timothy 3:1 ESV)

The Church was persecuted from the beginning and this has continued in all parts of the world into our own time, however, persecution of the Church actually strengthens it. It cleanses it in the sense that false believers flee while God grows the faith of those who go through it. This does not sap the strength of the Church, it actually makes it deeper and stronger. On the other hand, our enemy continually attacks the Church from within using false prophets and the doctrines of demons to cause the dry rot of apostasy to do its evil work. In this we have 10 general eras that would be ages of apostasy that have stayed, accumulated and are each still attacking the Church.

The first era began when the Roman Empire ceased persecuting the Church and made it the state religion of the Holy Roman Empire. This ended the persecution, which actually took away the one thing that God was using to strengthen it. This was replaced with an era of Sacramentalism. This period is also called the Dark Ages. In this time, the Word of God was taken away from the people. Sermons were in Latin. Only the Church itself was allowed to hold and interpret Scripture. The people were taught that to be a Christian they must perform external things like lighting candles, genuflecting, bowing, praying according to some beads, and even enduring self-inflicted pain. This is externalism and those who are part of this are walled off from knowing or even hearing about the Gospel itself. If one is simply in good standing with the “Church” through sacramentalism then they are considered good Christians. Is this still with us today my brethren?

The second era began in response to the Protestant Reformation. The Reformation recovered the Gospel and put the Word of God into the hands of the people. This was a time of light and a move of the Church back into the truth. The attack to counter this came soon after this through things like the Renaissance and the Age of Reason. This second era is called Rationalism. It is actually a worship of the Human mind. This is most certainly still with us in the form of liberal, dead churches and denominations that were neutralized by the encroachment of liberal theology that has taken over Europe’s and America’s seminaries and Churches to the point that these people do not believe the Bible is the Word of God nor do they believe in the Deity of Christ. It is all about what men can do.

After this attack of rationalism, there was another push back by men such as Charles Spurgeon. During this time, Bibles became even more plentiful. However, the third era of attack on the Church began. It is the era of Shallow Spirituality and Dead Orthodoxy. It is from this that we have the Fundamentalist movement that began with the right motives, but soon succumbed to this shallow spirituality as the focus of their being together was simply to express anger over the attack by Rationalism. They lost their focus and became a self-focused religiosity that was all about having the right Bible version, the right clothes, the right building, the right rules…et cetera. I have ministered to many people who have escaped from these churches and from that I learned that pharisees are still with us. This dead orthodoxy only puts people into the bondage of religiosity.

The fourth dangerous era for the Church is Politicism. This started in the 20th Century. This is the era of the state Church. These have political and social agendas. From this we have inherited things like the Social Gospel, Liberation Theology, et cetera. This era is most definitely still with us because it and the era of Shallow Spirituality are combined with the later eras in ways that makes untangling them very difficult.

The fifth dangerous era for the Church is Ecumenicalism which began in the 1950’s. Have you noticed how the time span between the eras has shortened? The Ecumenicalism era was all about God being love and so we just need to follow the parts of the Bible that speak of His love. Then we can work with other religions and simply get along because all we will do is just love, love, love one another. This is the era in which sentimentalism and tolerance became the byword of the Church. Doctrines were viewed as unnecessary and actually the cause of divisiveness in the Church. Now, is this still with us today my brethren?

The sixth dangerous era for the Church is Experientialism. This started in the 1960’s. This is the era in which the Church went after knowing God through experience. This is the era from which we get the emphasis on speaking in tongues and having ecstatic experiences and this defined the validity of ones profession of faith. To these people truth is in the experience. We are still dealing with this in the Health, Wealth and Prosperity “gospel” as well.

Continue reading entire article here.

Here is the link to the sermon by John MacArthur that was referenced above.

HT: DefCon

Sovereign Mercy

We live in a generation when it seems that many (most) evangelical preachers are preaching a savior and christ that is not the Savior and Christ of the Holy Scripture. This christ that is commonly preached is a christ that is sovereign over all of creation but not over the will of man. It is said that he loves us so much he would never impose his will on us in regards to our salvation. It must be our choice. Can you picture it? This loving savior is begging and pleading that his creation (man) will choose to love him and accept him as lord. He would love to save you if you will just let him. Well who is really sovereign is this setting? Obviously, it is the will of the man.

THIS IS NOT THE CHRIST OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURE. Nowhere in scripture do we see such a weak attribute of our God and Savior. He is omnipotent from Genesis to Revelation. He is Author and Finisher. He is Alpha and Omega. He is Almighty and Glorious and worthy of infinitely more glory and honor than the vast majority of professing believers even attempt to ascribe to Him. He is not a God in bondage to the will of man. He will have mercy on whom He will and He will harden whom he will. To be Sovereign is to be sovereign over all! And friends, all means all.

In his book, The Sovereignty of God (Chapter 4), A. W. Pink stated:

What was there in the elect themselves which attracted God's heart to them? Was it because of certain virtues they possessed? because they were generous-hearted, sweet-tempered, truth-speaking? in a word, because they were "good," that God chose them? No; for our Lord said, "There is none good but one, that is God" (Matt. 19:17). Was it because of any good works they had performed? No; for it is written, "There is none that doeth good, no, not one" (Rom. 3:12). Was it because they evidenced an earnestness and zeal in inquiring after God? No; for it is written again, "There is none that seeketh after God" (Rom. 3:11). Was it because God foresaw they would believe? No; for how can those who are "dead in trespasses and sins" believe in Christ? How could God foreknow some men as believers when belief was impossible to them? Scripture declares that we "believe through grace" (Acts 18:27). Faith is God's gift, and apart from this gift none would believe. The cause of His choice then lies within Himself and not in the objects of His choice. He chose the ones He did simply because He chose to choose them.

"Sons we are by God's election
Who on Jesus Christ believe,
By eternal destination,
Sovereign grace we now receive,
Lord Thy mercy,
Doth both grace and glory give!"

I understand that the Lord Jesus Christ is also a gentle Shepherd. I understand that He exemplifies what it means to truly love. I understand that He has many tender qualities. But, to focus on some of His attributes without considering all of His attributes which are revealed in scripture is misrepresent who He really is (remember the golden calf incident?). To misrepresent Him is to make an idol out of what becomes of the remaining attributes. It is likely that most churches on Sunday morning are paying homage to an idol that they have created in order to appease what their itching ears want to hear. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but {wanting} to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths. (2 Timothy 4: 3-4, NASB).

Here are some recommended sermons for more on Sovereign Mercy:



Soli Deo Gloria!

A. W. Tozer on Worship

A. W. Tozer had much to say to his generation regarding worship practices that were being embraced by most churches. God had given him discernment to see what was creeping into churches in the name of worship. The warnings he spoke in his day need to be boldly proclaimed today.

Tozer on Worshipping God

For thirty-one years A. W. Tozer was pastor of Southside Alliance Church in Chicago. Few preachers then, much less today, were more penetrating in what they had to say, to both unbelievers and believers. Indeed, those who have read any of Tozer’s more than forty books often do so because they learn truths from him that they don’t hear from anyone else.

Prior to his death in 1963, Tozer declared his belief that "worship acceptable to God is the missing crown jewel in evangelical Christianity." He intended to write one last book, a book focusing on attitudes, beliefs, and practices in Christian worship. He did not have the opportunity to write that book, but in 1962 he preached a series of messages entitled, "Worship, the Chief End of Man." He was very concerned about the fact that the "war" had been lost, a reference to the invasion of the world into the church. His use of the word "war" in this context was almost prophetic to what would be, decades later, termed the "worship wars." Tozer strongly believed that in the early 1960s in America’s churches, "Christianity has been watered down until the solution is so weak that if it were poison it would not hurt anyone, and if it were medicine it would not cure anyone!" Because Tozer died in 1963, he did not live to see the rise of seeker-sensitive worship services, but he did live long enough to observe the beginnings of an emphasis on "entertainment" and "self-centered" worship, and the danger of worshiping a god who is not God.

Of course, this problem has significantly increased since Tozer’s day. For example, the title of Steven J. Lawson’s book echos Tozer’s warning: Made in Our Image: What Shall We Do with a "User-Friendly" god? (Multnomah, 2000), as does that of a book edited by D. Brent Laytham: God is not...Religious, Nice, "One of Us," an American, a Capitalist (Brazos, 2004). However, even though such books have been around for many years, most people in the church think man-centered worship and theology is someone else’s problem, not their’s, and few of these books sell very well.

Always known for his frank and straightforward preaching, Tozer referred to such worship as "irresponsible, amusement-made, paganized pseudo-religion which passes today for the faith of Christ and which is being spread all over the world by unspiritual men employing unscriptural methods to achieve their ends" (Tozer, The Root of Righteousness, 110).

Tozer’s insights and warnings from his writings and sermons about worship practices that have been increasingly popular since the early 1960s have been helpfully compiled and edited into two books: Tozer on Worship and Entertainment (WingSpread Publishers, 2006), compiled by James L. Snyder, and Whatever Happened to Worship: A Call to True Worship (WingSpread Publishers, 2006), compiled and edited by Gerald B. Smith. Every pastor, associate pastor, youth pastor, and worship leader who reads these two books will, without question, feel like he or she has been under a penetrating light of revelation and judgment. But, given how far modern evangelicals have moved away from biblical worship, our tendency is to easily push aside Tozer’s warnings and condemnations and argue they are dated. Even so, it is embarrassing to explain why modern evangelical worship has so much in common with pagan worship, and ignores clear biblical teaching on how the God of the Bible should be worshiped.

In his writings and sermons, A.W. Tozer repeatedly emphasizes that many people in the church today "worship" God and are satisfied with that worship, moved by such "worship," inspired by such "worship," encouraged by such "worship," but, in reality, they are not worshiping the God of the Bible. This is exactly the problem dealt with by Lawson and Laytham, as well as many other evangelical authors whose books have never made the best-seller lists. In his day, Tozer declared many churches were growing and adding hundreds and thousands of members, but they were not leading people to worship the biblical God. He said the people may be satisfied, uplifted, and excited by their "worship," but the fact remains that they do not have a clue to the nature of worshiping God in spirit and in truth. Wow! There is little doubt that if Tozer were on the scene today in America, his criticism would be even more blunt and direct, all in an effort to help the church see the "ditch" (grave) it is digging for herself.

In perhaps his most classic book, The Pursuit of God, Tozer articulated his belief that entertainment in worship is a symptom of idolatry:

This is the cause of a very serious breakdown in modern evangelicalism. The idea of cultivation and exercise, so dear to the saints of old, has now no place in our total religious picture. It is too slow, too common. We now demand glamour and fast-flowing dramatic action. A generation of Christians reared among push buttons and automatic machines is impatient of slower and less direct methods of reaching their goals. We have been trying to apply machine-age methods to our relations with God. We read our chapter, have our short devotions and rush away, hoping to make up for our deep inward bankruptcy by attending another gospel meeting or listening to another thrilling story told by a religious adventurer lately returned from afar.

The tragic results of this spirit are all about us: shallow loves, hollow religious philosophies, the preponde-rance of the element of fun in gospel meetings, the glorification of men, trust in religious externalities, quasi-religious fellowships, salesmanship methods, the mistaking of dynamic personality for the power of the Spirit. These and such as these are the symptoms of an evil disease, a deep and serious malady of the soul (Tozer, The Pursuit of God, 62-63).

Regarding the pressure on pastors to produce "successful" or growing churches, Tozer wrote:

Pastors and churches in our hectic times are harassed by the temptation to seek size at any cost and to secure by inflation what they cannot gain by legitimate growth. The mixed multitude cries for quantity and will not forgive a minister who insists upon solid values and permanence. Many a man of God is being subjected to cruel pressure by the ill-taught members of his flock who scorn his slow methods and demand quick results and a popular following regardless of quality. These children play in the market-places and cannot overlook the affront we do them by our refusal to dance when they whistle or to weep when they, out of caprice, pipe a sad tune. They are greedy for thrills, and since they dare no longer seek them in the theater, they demand to have them brought into the church (Tozer, The Next Chapter After the Last, 8).

Long before today’s worship wars, Tozer made it clear where he stood as an evangelical in the holiness tradition:

A church fed on excitement is no New Testament church at all. The desire for surface stimulation is a sure mark of the fallen nature, the very thing Christ died to deliver us from. A curious crowd of baptized worldlings waiting each Sunday for the quasi-religious needle to give them a lift bears no relation whatsoever to a true assembly of Christian believers. And that its members protest their undying faith in the Bible does not change things any. "Not everyone that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter the kingdom of heaven but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven" (Tozer, The Next Chapter After the Last, 14).

In a sermon entitled, "The Holy Spirit," (Sermon #6, on Romans 12:1-2), Tozer declared:

The old writers talked about the dark night of the soul. A time of emptying. A time when it became dark all around us. But we’re too carnal to allow our hearts to get dark longing for God now. We’re so determined we want to be happy that if we can’t be happy by the Holy Ghost we’ll drum up our happiness. Religious "Rock and Rollers"! We’re going to get happy somehow if we’ve got to beat it up with a tom-tom. You can have that kind of happiness if you want it, but if you don’t want it and are dissatisfied with it and you want the joy that comes out of Joseph’s new tomb open now forever, if you want the joy that comes from the Holy Ghost, a well of water springing up within you forever, then you will likely have a loneliness and an inner darkness and a despair with self and you’ll wonder what happened to you and you’ll say, "Am I backsliding?" No, you’re not backsliding. You are going on with God (Tozer, "The Holy Spirit," Sermon #6, Romans 12:1-2, Toronto).

In another sermon based on Hebrews, Tozer contrasted believers seeking entertainment to taking up Christ’s cross:

There is a cross for you and me and there is a cross for every one of us. And that cross is subjective and internal and experiential....That cross is that which we voluntarily take up - that’s hard and bitter and distasteful - that we do for Christ’s sake and suffer the consequences and despise the shame....

But the evangelicals of which we are a part say, "Let the cross kill Jesus but we will live on and be happy and have fun." But the cross on the hill has got to become the cross in the heart. When the cross on the hill has been transformed by the miraculous grace of the Holy Ghost into the cross in the heart, then we begin to know something of what it means and it will become to us the cross of power (Tozer, Sermon #40 on Hebrews, Toronto).

In Tozer’s day there was some debate about whether or not worship and entertainment overlapped to any degree. As the above quotations illustrate, Tozer argued there is a distinct difference and no overlap. For example, he did not view the singing of a hymn as entertainment. He wrote:

When you raise your eyes to God and sing, "Break thou the bread of life, dear Lord to me," is that entertainment - or is it worship? Isn’t there a difference between worship and entertainment? The church that can’t worship must be entertained. And men who can’t lead a church to worship must provide the entertainment. That is why we have the great evangelical heresy here today - the heresy of religious entertainment (Tozer, Success and the Christian, 6-7).

Sounding much like Os Guinness in his book, The Grave-digger File: Papers on the Subversion of the Modern Church (InterVarsity, 1983), Tozer was very concerned in his day that modern culture was modifying (subverting) and changing the Christian faith. Tozer said:

The devil is busy brainwashing us and conditioning us little by little and feeding his ideas into the church. The counsel of the ungodly comes and as the ideas of the ungodly enter the church the ideas of God go out. My crusade in the day in which I live is to wake the church and rouse it to the fact that it is being brainwashed and propagandized into accepting that which it would never accept if it were a law in Washington (Sermon, "Resisting the World’s Propaganda," General Council).

In one of his many books, Tozer talked about the effort to make Christ popular:

The modern effort to popularize the Christian faith has been extremely damaging to that faith. The purpose has been to simplify truth for the masses by using the language of the masses instead of the language of the church. It has not succeeded, but has added to rather than diminished religious confusion (Tozer, The Set of the Sail, 159).

Long before modern evangelical authors begin to articulate the dangers of bringing popular culture into the church in order to attract seekers, Tozer was vocalizing the same warning. The "health and wealth" gospel of Joel Osteen, Benny Hinn, and Kennth Copeland would come after Tozer, but that teaching had its precursors all through Tozer’s lifetime. In emphasizing holiness, the "deeper life," and the place of suffering in the faith, Tozer wrote:

Another reason for the absence of real yearning for Christ’s return is that Christians are so comfortable in this world that they have little desire to leave it. For those leaders who set the pace of religion and determine its content and quality, Christianity has become of late remarkably lucrative. The streets of gold do not have too great an appeal for those who find it so easy to pile up gold and silver in the service of the Lord here on earth. We all want to reserve the hope of heaven as a kind of insurance against the day of death but as long as we are healthy and comfortable, why change a familiar good for something about which we actually know very little? So reasons the carnal mind, and so subtly that we are scarely aware of it.

Again, in these times religoin has become jolly good fun right here in this present world, and what’s the hurry about heaven anyway? Christianity, contrary to what some had thought, is another and higher form of entertainment. Christ has done all the suffering. He has shed all the tears and carried all the crosses; we have but to enjoy the benefits of His heartbreak in the form of religious pleasures modeled after the world but carried on in the name of Jesus. So say the same people who claim to believe in Christ’s second coming (Tozer, Born After Midnight, 134).

I strongly encourage you to finish reading this insightful article here. It is very applicable in our day.

Excerpted from the Nov. 2008 bulletin of Sylvania Christain. (Note: Though this is a very good article, I do not know enough about this church to give it a hearty endorsement.)

Soli Deo Gloria

Generational Curses by Bob DeWaay

Biblical Answers to Questions Raised by the phrase "visit the inquities to the third and fourth generation"

“You shall not worship them or serve them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, on the third and the fourth generations of those who hate Me, but showing lovingkindness to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments.” (Exodus 20:5,6)

“Know therefore that the Lord your God, He is God, the faithful God, who keeps His covenant and His lovingkindness to a thousandth generation with those who love Him and keep His commandments; but repays those who hate Him to their faces, to destroy them; He will not delay with him who hates Him, He will repay him to his face.” (Deuteronomy 7:9,10)

Oftentimes when a passage is unclear it is used to support false teachings. Because when many Christians are unsure of the meaning of a passage, they are less able to discern erroneous teaching based on the verses in question. This is surely the case for the popular teaching on generational curses that is based on the Biblical passages cited above. Many popular books published in the last thirty years claim that Christians are subjected to unknown generational curses that have detrimental effects on their lives. The writers of the books offer their special knowledge that can break the curses.

In this article we will examine the Old Testament passages about generational curses. By careful exegesis centering around the whole counsel of God, we shall show that these passages do not support the idea that Christians are cursed because of the sins of their parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents. We shall also make it clear that these verses do not teach that demons have the right or ability to inhabit Christians because of generational curses nor that Satan has the right to inflict curses upon Christians because of ancestral sins. On the contrary, Christians have the “blessing of Abraham” because of their relationship to Christ.

The Sins of the Fathers

The first passage in the Bible that mentions God's warning about the consequences of idolatry affecting the third and fourth generation is found in the Decalogue (the Ten Commandments). It says “I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, on the third and the fourth generations of those who hate Me” (Exodus 20:5b). This is a warning about the grave consequences of worshiping other gods. The Old Testament record is replete with such warnings as well as narrative passages that describe the horrible consequences of idolatry in the life of Israel. Even this warning is tempered with a greater promise of God's mercy: “But showing lovingkindness to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments” (verse 6). This will be important to our understanding of the second commandment and similar passages.

At Sinai, God entered into a covenant relationship with Israel and took her to be His own people. They were to honor that covenant from their hearts, by loving God and obeying Him. Worshiping other gods was covenant-breaking in its worst form, analogous to spiritual adultery. They were persistently warned of the consequences of such behavior, yet it was all too common. The consequences would even mean that God would “visit the iniquities to the third and fourth generation.” What does this mean? On the surface it appears that God would punish the children and grandchildren for sins that they did not personally commit. But Deuteronomy 24:16 provides good reason to reject this interpretation: “Fathers shall not be put to death for their sons, nor shall sons be put to death for their fathers; everyone shall be put to death for his own sin.” Later we shall examine Ezekiel 18 which deals with this issue in more detail.

Biblical scholars have pointed out that if the children turn to God they shall avert this punishment. For example, John Calvin commented about Exodus 20:5 that, “[W]hen God declares that He will cast back the iniquity of the fathers into the bosom of the children, He does not mean that He will take vengeance on poor wretches who have never deserved anything of the sort; but that He is at liberty to punish the crimes of the fathers upon their children and descendants, with the proviso that they too may be justly punished, as being imitators of their fathers.1 Contemporary Old Testament scholar Walter Kaiser writes, “Children who repeat the sins of their fathers evidence it in personally hating God.”2 Kaiser takes “those who hate Me” to apply to the children as well as the fathers. The children themselves carry on with hating God as shown by their continued idolatry and covenant breaking. God is just and merciful and nothing in this passage suggests otherwise.

Jewish scholars make several interesting points concerning the sins of the fathers being visited to the third and fourth generations. One is based on this passage in Jeremiah:

'Ah Lord God! Behold, Thou hast made the heavens and the earth by Thy great power and by Thine outstretched arm! Nothing is too difficult for Thee, who showest lovingkindness to thousands, but repayest the iniquity of fathers into the bosom of their children after them, O great and mighty God. The Lord of hosts is His name; great in counsel and mighty in deed, whose eyes are open to all the ways of the sons of men, giving to everyone according to his ways and according to the fruit of his deeds; (Jeremiah 32:17-10)

Here is a Jewish interpretation of this passage: “Perhaps the strongest Scriptural support for the interpretation that ‘poqed 'avon abot 'al banim’ [visits the iniquities of fathers on sons] applies only to children who continue the sinful ways of their father has been brought from Jeremiah 32:18-19. There, in two consecutive verses, the prophet cites God's attribute of cross-generational reward and punishment immediately followed by the principle of individual accountability.”3

There is another mention of this principle in a passage that suggests that the key point is God's mercy, not His wrath. In this following section of Torah, God shows His great power through His mercy and pardon, with reference to the idea of the third and fourth generation:

“But now, I pray, let the power of the Lord be great, just as Thou hast declared, 'The Lord is slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, forgiving iniquity and transgression; but He will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generations.' Pardon, I pray, the iniquity of this people according to the greatness of Thy lovingkindness, just as Thou also hast forgiven this people, from Egypt even until now." So the Lord said, "I have pardoned them according to your word.” (Numbers 14:17-20)

What is so interesting here is that Moses cited the passage from the second commandment that warned about the consequences on the third and fourth generation when pleading for mercy and pardon from the Lord. This is strong evidence that Moses himself considered the passage to show a limitation on God's wrath and evidence of His mercy. Some Jewish scholars have seen it this way: Some have interpreted the concept of cross-generational retribution as associated with God's mercy. In Numbers 14:18 Moshe cites this characteristic of God in his prayer for forgiveness. This may be understood as asking God in His mercy to postpone punishment to later generations, to allow the present generation the opportunity to mend their ways or at least to keep the Covenant alive.4

As a matter of fact, in the case of those who came out of Egypt, God judged the parents for idolatry and unbelief, but it was the children who actually entered the promised land.5 God showed great patience with His chosen people. Rather than wipe out the unbelieving and idolatrous generation that grumbled in the wilderness, God allowed them to live and raise their children, so that the promise would be kept alive through a future generation that would be faithful to the covenant. As we shall see, God’s mercy goes much farther than his wrath. (Continue reading here.)

For Whom Did Christ Die? & What Did Christ Actually Achieve on the Cross for Those for Whom He Died?

by John Piper ©Desiring God Ministries. Website: www.desiringGOD.org. Email: mail@desiringGOD.org. Toll Free: 888-346-4700.

The atonement is the work of God in Christ on the cross whereby he cancelled the debt of our sin, appeased his holy wrath against us, and won for us all the benefits of salvation. The death of Christ was necessary because God would not show a just regard for his glory if he swept sins under the rug with no recompense

Romans 3:25-26 says that God "put Christ forward as a propitiation by his blood...This was to demonstrate God's righteousness because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to prove at the present time that he himself is righteous and that he justifies those who have faith in Jesus."

In other words the death of Christ was necessary to vindicate the righteousness of God in justifying the ungodly by faith. It would be unrighteous to forgive sinners as though their sin were insignificant, when in fact it is an infinite insult against the value of God's glory. Therefore Jesus bears the curse, which was due to our sin, so that we can be justified and the righteousness of God can be vindicated.

The term "limited atonement" addresses the question, "For whom did Christ die?" But behind the question of the extent of the atonement lies the equally important question about the nature of the atonement. What did Christ actually achieve on the cross for those for whom he died?

If you say that he died for every human being in the same way, then you have to define the nature of the atonement very differently than you would if you believed that Christ only died for those who actually believe. In the first case you would believe that the death of Christ did not actually save anybody; it only made all men savable. It did not actually remove God's punitive wrath from anyone, but instead created a place where people could come and find mercy -- IF they could accomplish their own new birth and bring themselves to faith without the irresistible grace of God.

For if Christ died for all men in the same way then he did not purchase regenerating grace for those who are saved. They must regenerate themselves and bring themselves to faith. Then and only then do they become partakers of the benefits of the cross.

In other words if you believe that Christ died for all men in the same way, then the benefits of the cross cannot include the mercy by which we are brought to faith, because then all men would be brought to faith, but they aren't. But if the mercy by which we are brought to faith (irresistible grace) is not part of what Christ purchased on the cross, then we are left to save ourselves from the bondage of sin, the hardness of heart, the blindness of corruption, and the wrath of God.

Therefore it becomes evident that it is not the Calvinist who limits the atonement. It is the Arminian, because he denies that the atoning death of Christ accomplishes what we most desperately need -- namely, salvation from the condition of deadness and hardness and blindness under the wrath of God. The Arminian limits the nature and value and effectiveness of the atonement so that he can say that it was accomplished even for those who die in unbelief and are condemned. In order to say that Christ died for all men in the same way, the Arminian must limit the atonement to a powerless opportunity for men to save themselves from their terrible plight of depravity.

On the other hand we do not limit the power and effectiveness of the atonement. We simply say that in the cross God had in view the actual redemption of his children. And we affirm that when Christ died for these, he did not just create the opportunity for them to save themselves, but really purchased for them all that was necessary to get them saved, including the grace of regeneration and the gift of faith.

We do not deny that all men are the intended beneficiaries of the cross in some sense. 1 Timothy 4:10 says that Christ is "the Savior of all men, especially of those who believe." What we deny is that all men are intended as the beneficiaries of the death of Christ in the same way. All of God's mercy toward unbelievers -- from the rising sun (Matthew 5:45) to the worldwide preaching of the gospel (John 3:16) -- is made possible because of the cross.

This is the implication of Romans 3:25 where the cross is presented as the basis of God's righteousness in passing over sins. Every breath that an unbeliever takes is an act of God's mercy withholding judgment (Romans 2:4). Every time the gospel is preached to unbelievers it is the mercy of God that gives this opportunity for salvation.

Whence does this mercy flow to sinners? How is God just to withhold judgment from sinners who deserve to be immediately cast into hell? The answer is that Christ's death so clearly demonstrates God's just abhorrence of sin that he is free to treat the world with mercy without compromising his righteousness. In this sense Christ is the savior of all men.

But he is especially the Savior of those who believe. He did not die for all men in the same sense. The intention of the death of Christ for the children of God was that it purchase far more than the rising sun and the opportunity to be saved. The death of Christ actually saves from ALL evil those for whom Christ died "especially." (Continue reading here.)

HT: Monergism

Augustus Toplady on Arminianism

"One great contest, between the religion of Arminius, and the religion of Jesus Christ, is, who shall stand entitled to the praise and glory of a sinner’s salvation? Conversion decides this point at once; for I think, that, without any imputation of uncharitableness, I may venture to say, that every truly awakened person, at least when he is under the shine of God’s countenance upon his soul, will fall down upon his knees, with this hymn of praise ascending from his heart, “Not unto me, O Lord, not unto me, but to Thy Name, give the glory: I am saved not for my righteousness, but for Thy mercy and Thy truth’s sake..”

And thus it will be when God has accomplished the number of His elect, and completely gathered in the fulness of His redeemed kingdom. What, do you think, your song will be, when you come to heaven? “Blessed be God, that He gave me free-will; and blessed be my own dear self, that made a good use of it”? O no, no. Such a song as that was never heard in heaven yet, nor ever will, while God is God, and heaven is heaven. Look into the Book of Revelation, and there you will find the employ of the blessed, and the strains which they sing. They cast their crowns before the throne, saying:

Thou art worthy, for Thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God, by Thy Blood, out of every kindred and tongue and people and nation (Revelation 9:10)."

Link to Augustus Toplady Bio

Gnostic Worship by Michael S. Horton

Americans are often accused by foreigners of expressing a "greasy familiarity," even with people they have met for the first time. Similarly, there is a greasy familiarity inherent to Gnosticism, based on the belief that we have direct and immediate access to God whenever and however we want. Whenever the children in the public school pray to whomever and however, God has to hear, and whenever sincere people gather in a building to worship according to their own personal tastes and opinions, God is impressed that we took the time and cared enough to worship from our hearts. It was real, and we were vulnerable, honest before God. Greasy familiarity.

Calvinism is the fundamental enemy of the American Religion. This is argued in nearly every recent work on the subject. Harold Bloom cites Swiss theologian Karl Barth and Presbyterian scholar J. Gresham Machen as two major antagonists of American Gnosticism. Similarly, Anne Douglas, Philip Lee, and Wade Clark Roof, flanked by a host of historians, all argue that the repudiation of Calvinism led to the feminization of religion and culture.

Ann Douglas, professor of English at Harvard and Columbia University, in her latest book, on New York City in the 1920's, writes,

"Calvinism...had suffered 'the most spectacular defeat in the history of American religious life.'...The Calvinists' liberal nineteenth-century descendants insisted that God was less a father than a mother,...an 'indulgent Parent' (the term is that of the clergyman Noah Worcester), offering love, forgiveness, and nurture to all who seek Him. The Connecticut theologian Horace Bushnell, known as the 'American Schleiermacher,' explained that true religious experience meant falling back 'into God's arms,' pressed to the divine breast, 'even as a child in the bosom of its mother.'"

God, she says, became "well behaved, even domestic." (1) In her provocative book, The Feminization of American Culture, Douglas demonstrates that Calvinism was unseated by an Arminian and Gnostic tidal-wave that refused to believe any longer in the value of matter, the depravity of the self, helplessness in salvation, total dependence on divine sovereignty, freedom, or mercy. Just as the mainline evangelicals failed to stand by J. Gresham Machen in his struggle for the Presbyterian Church during the 20's, and only rose up in defiance when theological error finally created moral compromises, many of today's evangelicals are ready to attack the blatant Gnosticism of "Sophia" worship in the mainline churches, while less obvious but equally disastrous forms of Gnosticism plague the evangelical world itself. (2)

It would seem that the critics of modern American religion are basically on target in describing the entire religious landscape, from New Age or liberal, to evangelical and Pentecostal, as essentially Gnostic. Regardless of the denomination, the American Religion is inward, deeply distrustful of institutions, mediated grace, the intellect, theology, creeds, and the demand to look outside of oneself for salvation. This, of course, has enormous implications for the Christian life and worship, as well as theology.

In this article we will first pursue the major Gnostic trends in Christian worship, then analyze these trends in the light of Scripture, concluding with suggestions for disentangling ourselves. (Continue reading here.)

HT: Cal.vini.st

Words4Life

"Remember the perfections of that God whom you worship, that he is a Spirit, and therefore to be worshipped in spirit and truth; and that he is most great and terrible, and therefore to be worshipped with seriousness and reverence, and not to be dallied with, or served with toys or lifeless lip-service; and that he is most holy, pure, and jealous, and therefore to be purely worshipped; and that he is still present with you, and all things are naked and open to him with whom we have to do. The knowledge of God, and the remembrance of his all-seeing presence, are the most powerful means against hypocrisy."

RICHARD BAXTER

1615-1691

The Legacy of Charles Finney by Michael S. Horton

HT: Grace Online Library

Jerry Falwell calls him 'one of my heroes and a hero to many evangelicals, including Billy Graham.' I recall wandering through the Billy Graham Center some years ago, observing the place of honor given to Finney in the evangelical tradition, reinforced by the first class in theology I had at a Christian college, where Finney's work was required reading. The New York revivalist was the oft-quoted and celebrated champion of the Christian singer Keith Green and the Youth With A Mission organization. Finney is particularly esteemed among the leaders of the Christian Right and the Christian Left, by both Jerry Falwell and Jim Wallis (Sojourners' magazine), and his imprint can be seen in movements that appear to be diverse, but in reality are merely heirs to Finney's legacy. From the Vineyard movement and the church growth movement to the political and social crusades, televangelism, and the Promise-Keepers movement, as a former Wheaton College president rather glowingly cheered, 'Finney lives on!'

That is because Finney's moralistic impulse envisioned a church that was in large measure an agency of personal and social reform rather than the institution in which the means of grace, Word and Sacrament, are made available to believers who then take the Gospel to the world. In the nineteenth century, the evangelical movement became increasingly identified with political causes--from abolition of slavery and child labor legislation to women's rights and the prohibition of alcohol. At the turn of the century, with an influx of Roman Catholic immigrants already making many American Protestants a bit uneasy, secularism began to pry the fingers of the Protestant establishment from the institutions (colleges, hospitals, charitable organizations) they had created and sustained. In a desperate effort at regaining this institutional power and the glory of 'Christian America' (a vision that is always powerful in the imagination, but, after the disintegration of Puritan New England, elusive), the turn-of-the-century Protestant establishment launched moral campaigns to 'Americanize' immigrants, enforce moral instruction and 'character education.' Evangelists pitched their American gospel in terms of its practical usefulness to the individual and the nation.

That is why Finney is so popular. He is the tallest marker in the shift from Reformation orthodoxy, evident in the Great Awakening (under Edwards and Whitefield) to Arminian (indeed, even Pelagian) revivalism, evident from the Second Great Awakening to the present. To demonstrate the debt of modern evangelicalism to Finney, we must first notice his theological departures. From these departures, Finney became the father of the antecedents to some of today's greatest challenges within the evangelical churches themselves; namely, the church growth movement, Pentecostalism and political revivalism.

Who Is Finney?

Reacting against the pervasive Calvinism of the Great Awakening, the successors of that great movement of God's Spirit turned from God to humans, from the preaching of objective content (namely, Christ and him crucified) to the emphasis on getting a person to 'make a decision.'

Charles Finney (1792-1875) ministered in the wake of the 'Second Awakening,' as it has been called. A Presbyterian lawyer, Finney one day experienced 'a mighty baptism of the Holy Ghost' which 'like a wave of electricity going through and through me...seemed to come in waves of liquid love.' The next morning, he informed his first client of the day, 'I have a retainer from the Lord Jesus Christ to plead his cause and I cannot plead yours.' Refusing to attend Princeton Seminary (or any seminary, for that matter), Finney began conducting revivals in upstate New York. One of his most popular sermons was, 'Sinners Bound to Change Their Own Hearts.'

Finney's one question for any given teaching was, 'Is it fit to convert sinners with?' One result of Finney's revivalism was the division of Presbyterians in Philadelphia and New York into Arminian and Calvinistic factions. His 'New Measures' included the 'anxious bench' (precursor to today's altar call), emotional tactics that led to fainting and weeping, and other 'excitements,' as Finney and his followers called them. Finney became increasingly hostile toward Presbyterianism, referring in his introduction to his Systematic Theology to the Westminster Confession and its drafters rather critically, as if they had created a 'paper pope,' and had 'elevated their confession and catechism to the Papal throne and into the place of the Holy Ghost.' Remarkably, Finney demonstrates how close Arminian revivalism, in its naturalistic sentiments, tends to be to a less refined theological liberalism, as both caved into the Enlightenment and its enshrining of human reason and morality:What's So Wrong With Finney's Theology?

First, one need go no further than the table of contents of his Systematic Theology to learn that Finney's entire theology revolved around human morality. Chapters one through five are on moral government, obligation, and the unity of moral action; chapters six and seven are 'Obedience Entire,' as chapters eight through fourteen discuss attributes of love, selfishness, and virtues and vice in general. Not until the twenty-first chapter does one read anything that is especially Christian in its interest, on the atonement. This is followed by a discussion of regeneration, repentance, and faith. There is one chapter on justification followed by six on sanctification. In other words, Finney did not really write a Systematic Theology, but a collection of essays on ethics.

But that is not to say that Finney's Systematic Theology does not contain some significant theological statements. First, in answer to the question, 'Does a Christian cease to be a Christian, whenever he commits a sin?', Finney answers:

"Whenever he sins, he must, for the time being, cease to be holy. This is self-evident. Whenever he sins, he must be condemned; he must incur the penalty of the law of God...If it be said that the precept is still binding upon him, but that with respect to the Christian, the penalty is forever set aside, or abrogated, I reply, that to abrogate the penalty is to repeal the precept; for a precept without penalty is no law. It is only counsel or advice. The Christian, therefore, is justified no longer than he obeys, and must be condemned when he disobeys; or Antinomianism is true...In these respects, then, the sinning Christian and the unconverted sinner are upon precisely the same ground." (p. 46)

Finney believed that God demanded absolute perfection, but instead of that leading him to seek his perfect righteousness in Christ, he concluded that

"...full present obedience is a condition of justification. But again, to the question, can man be justified while sin remains in him? Surely he cannot, either upon legal or gospel principles, unless the law be repealed...But can he be pardoned and accepted, and justified, in the gospel sense, while sin, any degree of sin, remains in him? Certainly not" (p. 57).

With the Westminster Confession in his sights, Finney declares of the Reformation's formula 'simultaneously justified and sinful', 'This error has slain more souls, I fear, than all the universalism that ever cursed the world.' For, 'Whenever a Christian sins he comes under condemnation, and must repent and do his first works, or be lost' (p. 60).

We will return to Finney's doctrine of justification, but it must be noted that it rests upon a denial of the doctrine of original sin. Held by both Roman Catholics and Protestants, this biblical teaching insists that we are all born into this world inheriting Adam's guilt and corruption. We are, therefore, in bondage to a sinful nature. As someone has said, 'We sin because we're sinners': the condition of sin determines the acts of sin, rather than vice versa. But Finney followed Pelagius, the 5th-century heretic, who was condemned by more church councils than any other person in church history, in denying this doctrine.

Instead, Finney believed that human beings were capable of choosing whether they would be corrupt by nature or redeemed, referring to original sin as an 'anti-scriptural and nonsensical dogma' (p. 179). In clear terms, Finney denied the notion that human beings possess a sinful nature (ibid.). Therefore, if Adam leads us into sin, not by our inheriting his guilt and corruption, but by following his poor example, this leads logically to the view of Christ, the Second Adam, as saving by example. This is precisely where Finney takes it, in his explanation of the atonement.

The first thing we must note about the atonement, Finney says, is that Christ could not have died for anyone else's sins than his own. His obedience to the law and his perfect righteousness were sufficient to save him, but could not legally be accepted on behalf of others. That Finney's whole theology is driven by a passion for moral improvement is seen on this very point: 'If he [Christ] had obeyed the Law as our substitute, then why should our own return to personal obedience be insisted upon as a sine qua non of our salvation?' (p. 206). In other words, why would God insist that we save ourselves by our own obedience if Christ's work was sufficient? The reader should recall the words of St. Paul in this regard, 'I do not nullify the grace of God; for if justification comes through the law, then Christ died for nothing.' It would seem that Finney's reply is one of agreement. The difference is, he has no difficulty believing both of those premises.

That is not entirely fair, of course, because Finney did believe that Christ died for something--not for someone--but for something. In other words, he died for a purpose, but not for people. The purpose of that death was to reassert God's moral government and to lead us to eternal life by example, as Adam's example excited us to sin. Why did Christ die? God knew that 'The atonement would present to creatures the highest possible motives to virtue. Example is the highest moral influence that can be exerted...If the benevolence manifested in the atonement does not subdue the selfishness of sinners, their case is hopeless' (p. 209). Therefore, we are not helpless sinners who need to be redeemed, but wayward sinners who need a demonstration of selflessness so moving that we will be excited to leave off selfishness. Not only did Finney believe that the 'moral influence' theory of the atonement was the chief way of understanding the cross; he explicitly denied the substitutionary atonement, which '...assumes that the atonement was a literal payment of a debt, which we have seen does not consist with the nature of the atonement...It is true, that the atonement, of itself, does not secure the salvation of anyone' (p. 217).

Then there is the matter of applying redemption. Throwing off the Calvinistic orthodoxy of the older Presbyterians and Congregationalists, Finney argued strenuously against the belief that the new birth is a divine gift, insisting that 'regeneration consists in the sinner changing his ultimate choice, intention, preference; or in changing from selfishness to love or benevolence,' as moved by the moral influence of Christ's moving example (p. 224). 'Original or constitutional sinfulness, physical regeneration, and all their kindred and resulting dogmas, are alike subversive of the gospel, and repulsive to the human intelligence' (p. 236).

Having nothing to do with original sin, a substitutionary atonement, and the supernatural character of the new birth, Finney proceeds to attack 'the article by which the church stands or falls'--justification by grace alone through faith alone.

The Protestant Reformers insisted, on the basis of clear biblical texts, that justification (in the Greek,'to declare righteous,' rather than 'to make righteous') was a forensic (i.e., 'legal') verdict. In other words, whereas Rome maintained that justification was a process of making a bad person better, the Reformers argued that it was a declaration or pronouncement that had someone else's righteousness (i.e., Christ's) as its basis. Therefore, it was a perfect, once-and-for-all verdict of right-standing at the beginning of the Christian life, not in the middle or at the end.

The key words in the evangelical doctrine are 'forensic' (meaning 'legal') and 'imputation' (crediting one's account, as opposed to the idea of 'infusion' of a righteousness within a person's soul). Knowing all of this, Finney declares,

"But for sinners to be forensically pronounced just, is impossible and absurd...As we shall see, there are many conditions, while there is but one ground, of the justification of sinners...As has already been said, there can be no justification in a legal or forensic sense, but upon the ground of universal, perfect, and uninterrupted obedience to law. This is of course denied by those who hold that gospel justification, or the justification of penitent sinners, is of the nature of a forensic or judicial justification. They hold to the legal maxim that what a man does by another he does by himself, and therefore the law regards Christ's obedience as ours, on the ground that he obeyed for us."

To this, Finney replies:

"The doctrine of an imputed righteousness, or that Christ's obedience to the law was accounted as our obedience, is founded on a most false and nonsensical assumption.' After all, Christ's righteousness 'could do no more than justify himself. It can never be imputed to us...It was naturally impossible, then, for him to obey in our behalf.' This 'representing of the atonement as the ground of the sinner's justification has been a sad occasion of stumbling to many' "(pp. 320-322).

The view that faith is the sole condition of justification is 'the antinomian view,' Finney asserts. 'We shall see that perseverance in obedience to the end of life is also a condition of justification.' Furthermore, 'present sanctification, in the sense of present full consecration to God, is another condition...of justification. Some theologians have made justification a condition of sanctification, instead of making sanctification a condition of justification. But this we shall see is an erroneous view of the subject' (pp. 326-327). Each act of sin requires 'a fresh justification' (p. 331). Referring to 'the framers of the Westminster Confession of faith,' and their view of an imputed righteousness, Finney wonders, 'If this is not antinomianism, I know not what is' (p. 332). This legal business is unreasonable to Finney, so he concludes, 'I regard these dogmas as fabulous, and better befitting a romance than a system of theology' (p. 333). He concludes in this section against the Westminster Assembly:

"The relations of the old school view of justification to their view of depravity is obvious. They hold, as we have seen, that the constitution in every faculty and part is sinful. Of course, a return to personal, present holiness, in the sense of entire conformity to the law, cannot with them be a condition of justification. They must have a justification while yet at least in some degree of sin. This must be brought about by imputed righteousness. The intellect revolts at a justification in sin. So a scheme is devised to divert the eye of the law and of the lawgiver from the sinner to his substitute, who has perfectly obeyed the law" (p. 339).

This he calls 'another gospel.' Insisting that Paul's rather realistic account of the Christian life in Romans 7 actually refers to the apostle's life before he had experienced 'entire sanctification,' Finney surpasses Wesley in arguing for the possibility of complete holiness in this life. John Wesley maintained that it is possible for a believer to attain full sanctification, but when he recognized that even the holiest Christians sin, he accommodated his theology to this simple empirical fact. He did this by saying that this experience of 'Christian perfection' was a matter of the heart, not of actions. In other words, a Christian may be perfected in love, so that love is now the sole motivation for one's actions, while occasionally making mistakes. Finney rejects this view and insists that justification is conditioned on complete and total perfection--that is, 'conformity to the law of God entire,' and not only is the believer capable of this; when he or she transgresses at any point, a fresh justification is required.

As the Princeton theologian B. B. Warfield pointed out so eloquently, there are two religions throughout history: Heathenism--of which Pelagianism is a religious expression--and supernatural redemption. And with Warfield and those who so seriously warned their brothers and sisters of these errors among Finney and his successors, we too must come to terms with the wildly heterodox strain in American Protestantism. With roots in Finney's revivalism, perhaps evangelical and liberal Protestantism are not that far apart after all. His 'New Measures,' like today's church growth movement, made human choices and emotions the center of the church's ministry, ridiculed theology, and replaced the preaching of Christ with the preaching of conversion.

It is upon Finney's naturalistic moralism that the Christian political and social crusades build their faith in humanity and its resources in self-salvation. Sounding not a little like a deist, Finney declared, 'There is nothing in religion beyond the ordinary powers of nature. It consists entirely in the right exercise of the powers of nature. It is just that, and nothing else. When mankind becomes truly religious, they are not enabled to put forth exertions which they were unable before to put forth. They only exert powers which they had before, in a different way, and use them for the glory of God' (emphasis in original). Thus, as the new birth is a natural phenomenon, so too a revival: 'A revival is not a miracle, nor dependent on a miracle, in any sense. It is a purely philosophical result of the right use of the constituted means--as much so as any other effect produced by the application of means.' The belief that the new birth and revival depend necessarily on divine activity is pernicious. 'No doctrine,' he says, 'is more dangerous than this to the prosperity of the Church, and nothing more absurd' (Revivals of Religion [Revell], pp. 4-5). When the leaders of the church growth movement claim that theology gets in the way of growth and insist that it does not matter what a particular church believes: growth is a matter of following the proper principles, they are displaying their debt to Finney. When leaders of the Vineyard movement praise this sub-Christian enterprise and the barking, roaring, screaming, laughing, and other strange phenomena on the basis that 'it works' and one must judge its truth by its fruit, they are following Finney, as well as the father of American pragmatism, William James, who declared that truth must be judged on the basis of 'its cash-value in experiential terms.'

Thus, in Finney's theology, God is not sovereign; man is not a sinner by nature; the atonement is not a true payment for sin; justification by imputation is insulting to reason and morality; the new birth is simply the effect of successful techniques, and revival is a natural result of clever campaigns. In his fresh introduction to the bicentennial edition of Finney's Systematic Theology, Harry Conn commends Finney's pragmatism: 'Many servants of our Lord should be diligently searching for a gospel that 'works,' and I am happy to state they can find it in this volume.' As Whitney R. Cross has carefully documented in The Burned-Over District: The Social and Intellectual History of Enthusiastic Religion in Western New York, 1800-1850 (Cornell University Press, 1950), the stretch of territory in which Finney's revivals were most frequent was also the cradle of the perfectionistic cults that plagued that century. A gospel that 'works' for zealous perfectionists one moment merely creates tomorrow's disillusioned and spent super-saints.

Needless to say, Finney's message is radically different from the evangelical faith, as is the basic orientation of the movements we see around us today the bear his imprint: revivalism (or its modern label, 'the church growth movement'), Pentecostal perfectionism and emotionalism, political triumphalism based on the ideal of 'Christian America,' and the anti-intellectual, anti-doctrinal tendencies of American evangelicalism and fundamentalism. It was through the 'Higher Life Movement' of the late 19th and early 20th centuries that Finney's perfectionism came to dominate the fledgling Dispensationalist movement through the auspices of Lewis Sperry Chafer, founder of Dallas Seminary and author of He That Is Spiritual. Finney, of course, is not solely responsible; he is more a product than a producer. Nevertheless, the influence he exercised and continues to exercise to this day is pervasive.

Not only did the revivalist abandon the material principle of the Reformation (justification), making him a renegade against evangelical Christianity; he repudiated doctrines, such as original sin and the substitutionary atonement, that have been embraced by Roman Catholics and Protestants alike. Therefore, Finney is not merely an Arminian, but a Pelagian. He is not only an enemy of evangelical Protestantism, but of historic Christianity of the broadest sort.

I do not point these things out with relish, as if to cheerfully denounce the heroes of American evangelicals. Nevertheless, it is always best, when one has lost something valuable, to retrace one's steps in order to determine when and where one last had it in his or her possession. That is the purpose of this exercise, to face with some honesty the serious departure from biblical Christianity that occurred through American revivalism. For until we address this shift, we will perpetuate a distorted and dangerous course. Of one thing Finney was absolutely correct: The Gospel held by the Westminster divines whom he attacked directly, and indeed held by the whole company of evangelicals, is 'another gospel' in distinction from the one proclaimed by Charles Finney. The question of our moment is, With which gospel will we side?

Unless otherwise specified, all quotes are from Charles G. Finney, Finney's Systematic Theology (Bethany, 1976).

Author

Dr. Michael Horton is the vice chairman of the Council of the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals, and is associate professor of historical theology at Westminster Theological Seminary in California. Dr. Horton is a graduate of Biola University (B.A.), Westminster Theological Seminary in California (M.A.R.) and Wycliffe Hall, Oxford (Ph.D.). Some of the books he has written or edited include Putting Amazing Back Into Grace, Beyond Culture Wars, Power Religion, In the Face of God, and most recently, We Believe.