Loveland Protestant
Reformed Church
709 East 57th Street;
Loveland, CO 80538
Services: 9:30 a.m. and
6:00 p.m. (7:00 p.m. June through August)
Vol. 5, No. 7 Pastor: Rev. G. Van Baren Phone: (970) 667-9481
Homepage on Internet: http://www.prca.org
Contents:
Knowledge and Faith
Turning God’s Grace into
Lasciviousness (4)
Does God Love All Children of
Believers?
In speaking of the activity of faith we believe that faith is first of all knowing. There have, however, always been those who wish to
separate faith from knowledge and to see faith as "blind" acceptance or trust. This is especially common today.
Roman Catholicism has always taught that faith and knowledge can be separated,
especially in its teaching about implicit faith (faith without any intellectual content). This, according to Rome, is the faith of many or
most laymen.
The tendency of modernism and neo-orthodoxy is to teach this also. One neo-orthodox theologian, for example,
described faith as a "leap into the dark" (one of his opponents said that
instead of being a leap into the dark, it was a leap into the light).
The charismatic movement and other "anti-doctrinal" movements do the
same. They do not actually deny that faith
includes knowledge, but separate faith and knowledge by denigrating and speaking
scornfully of "doctrine" and teaching.
Sadly, this inclination is also found among some Reformed theologians and teachers. They, too, do not explicitly deny that faith is
knowledge, but end up doing so nonetheless when they promote paradoxes and contradictions
as part of their theology.
These are the people who say that God loves all men (in the gospel) and does not
love all men (in election); that He wants to save all men (according to His revealed will)
and does not want to save all men (according to His secret will). He well-meaningly offers salvation to all and yet
has not determined to give faith to all.
Such talk is irrational and anti-intellectual.
No one can understand such contradictions.
They can only be implicitly accepted and faith then becomes a blind leap, not a
matter of knowing. Nor is there any
confidence in not knowing.
All this is contrary to Scripture. In
John 17:3 Jesus defines saving faith as "knowing" God and Jesus Christ whom God
sent. This knowledge, He says, is
eternal life. Not merely trusting, you
understand, but knowing!
In II Timothy 1:12 Paul speaks of his own faith as a "persuasion" but
says that he is persuaded because he first knows. Indeed,
it is impossible to be persuaded that Jesus Christ is able to keep us, unless we first
know that He is the only-begotten Son of God, the One come in the flesh, who suffered and
died on the cross for our sins.
We may not despise knowledge. All
alone it is profitless - there must also be trust.
But Scripture makes it clear that knowledge is nevertheless a good thing. Thus we read of "the light of the knowledge
of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ" (II Cor. 4:6 - cf. also Lk. 1:77.
Eph. 1:17, 4:13, Phil. 3:8, Col. 2:3, I Pet. 1:2, 3, etc).
Faith without knowledge is indeed a leap into the dark. But God is not in the dark. He dwells in the light! Nor is our Lord Jesus Christ to be found by
leaping into the dark. He is the Light of the
World and to believe in Him we must come to the light!
It is urgent, then, that we learn from God's Word - that we search and study the
Scriptures - that we may know Him whom we have believed.
Rev. R. Hanko
Turning God’s Grace into Lasciviousness
(4)
“For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained
to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and
denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Jude 4.
In our last three articles we were discussing
an important question sent in by a reader concerning the passage in Jude 4. I quote the entire question. “Of course, this verse is one of the
relatively few times the NT mentions reprobation. My
question is about the phrase, ‘turning the grace of our God into
lasciviousness.’ I have seen this phrase
used to teach that God’s sovereign grace is resistible when shown to the wicked
reprobate. I know that that explanation is in
error. But what does the phrase mean? And why is the phrase used in a verse about the
reprobate? Were the false teachers
antinomians who were perverting the truth of salvation by grace to excuse immoral
behavior? Does the ‘grace of our
God’ refer to the grace God has shown to the Christians in the church, which the
false teachers were distorting, rather than grace that was actually shown to the false
teachers (since they received none)?”
After discussing a few other important elements in this passage in Jude, we
discussed the main question of the reader: “What is meant by the clause which
describes these ungodly men as changing the grace of God into lasciviousness?”
It is correct, as the reader suggests, that the idea is that these ungodly men
change the doctrine of sovereign grace into lasciviousness. They were antinomians and, to use the expression
of the reader, they perverted the truth of salvation by grace to excuse immoral behavior.
It was the doctrine of grace which was distorted, a doctrine truly confessed by the
believers and a doctrine only outwardly confessed by these ungodly men. It was the doctrine of sovereign grace, not
only, but the doctrine of particular grace.
These men are described as "ungodly."
Literally that word means to denote a lack of reverence towards God. They profess to believe in God and in the truth. But their hearts are not right before God, for
they do not live in fear of Him. And this is
the reason why they feel perfectly free to change God's glorious truth of sovereign grace
into lasciviousness.
That great sin of lack of reverence is further described in the text as a denial of
"the only Lord God, and our Savior Jesus Christ."
That is indeed a striking expression. While
they profess to believe in the truth of God, by changing God's grace into lasciviousness,
they in fact deny God and deny Christ.
We ought to notice how serious this is because the sin of these men is very common
today. They deny God the only Lord, the text
says. The word "Lord" here is
really "Despot." That word is used
in several places in the NT as referring to God triune.
The word does not have the pejorative connotations which we give it, but the truth
that God is absolute Lord Who alone is to be worshipped, adored, and served in
faithful service.
When these ungodly men walk in all the lusts of the flesh, they in fact deny God,
even though they outwardly profess faith in Him. They
deny Him because they will not serve Him Who is Lord and Who demands such service.
But they also deny the Lord Jesus Christ.
The Lord Jesus Christ is the Savior of the church in Whom alone is found all of
salvation. Christ saves so completely that He
gives His people the grace of sanctification as well as all other graces. That means that Christ gives His people grace to
walk in holiness and obedience and to flee the lusts of the flesh and the wickedness of
the world.
But these ungodly men who claim to believe the truth walk in the very sins from
which Christ has delivered His people by grace. They
thus deny Christ by their life when in fact they claim to confess Him.
What scathing denunciation that is of
many in the church today who profess to believe the truth, but who walk in all the ways of
wickedness.
Prof. H.Hanko
Does God Love
All Children of Believers?
Our question this time is: "Can we say to our children - 'God loves you,'
i.e., to covenant children of believers?"
The answer to this question, very simply, is "No." Scripture does not teach a universal love of God
(Ps. 5:4-5, 11:5, Rom. 9:13) in any case. Nor
is God's love "universal" in the families of believers. No more than we may say to the ordinary man in the
street, "God loves you,” may we say it to our children.
To suggest that God loves all children of believers would conflict with Scripture's
teaching concerning a sovereign, discriminating love of God that is revealed in
predestination, in the atonement, and in the work of the Spirit. Notice:
(1) The doctrine of predestination, first of all then, forbids saying "God
loves you." Election and
reprobation run through the families of God's people and in the lines and generations of
the covenant. The family of Isaac and Rebekah
is the most notable example in Scripture. God
loved Jacob, but hated Esau (Rom. 9:13).
Where Isaac and Rebekah would have been telling a lie to say to Esau that God loved
him, we might very well be doing the same. We,
of course, do not know as Isaac and Rebekah did, the eternal destinies of our children,
but exactly because we do not know we may not say "God loves you."
(2) Nor does God reveal His love in sending Christ to die for every child of
believers. Christ died only for the elect and
as we have seen, not all the children of believers are elect. The cross, therefore, forbids our saying it also.
(3) Nor does God give salvation to every child of believing parents. Such is often the sad experience of godly parents
- even those who have been faithful in bringing up their children in the fear of the Lord. So the Spirit's work also forbids our saying it.
All this is best summed up in Romans 9:6-8. These
verses make it abundantly clear that both in the Old Testament and in the New, not all the
children who are born in the families of the covenant children are children of God, i.e.,
those whom God loves.
Some who believe in sovereign predestination and limited atonement think that the
Reformed doctrine of the covenant means a belief in the salvation of all children of
believers or a love of God for them without exception.
They then reject the Reformed doctrine of the covenant and baptism on this basis.
We do not believe that a universal love of God or a love of God for all covenant
children is the ground for infant baptism or for calling children of believers covenant
children. How could it be, when it is not
even the truth?
That leaves us with the question: What may believers say to their children?
They must tell them that those whom God loves are those who in turn love God and
obey Him. They must tell them that as
covenant children they have an obligation to love, fear and obey the Lord - that their
condemnation will be the greater for not doing so. And
they must tell them of God's great love, with which nothing can compare.
So too, they must show them that love of God in all their dealings with their
children. They must love them not only with a
love born of flesh and blood ties, but with a love that is in every respect like the love
of the Father for His children - a love that calls them to repentance and faith, that
forgives and receives them when they are repentant, which keeps fellowship with them in
the truth.
Rev. Ronald Hanko