A Brief Refutation of Legalism

What is surer evidence that the legalists are lost than the fact that they do all that is within their power to deny that justification is by grace alone through faith alone when the Scriptures clearly state it everywhere? Unfortunately, there are many who think themselves Christians who yet hope not in Jesus Christ’s atoning sacrifice, His all-sufficient blood, His boundless grace, but in their works, their self-scrutiny, their navel-gazing, and their quality of repentance. These men are lost, yet unaware of their true condition. Therefore, I thought it befitting to produce a short refutation of their errors, so that the Christian who is tempted to despair over their thoughts would be quickly brought back to his senses.

Since the legalists are fond of imperatives and refuse to believe the indicative statements of Scripture, I will refute their own blasphemous swill by means of the Law. For the Holy Spirit gives the following command through Paul, saying:

Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. [Col 3:12-13]

This one imperative destroys legalism of all sorts – whether it be the Pope’s form or the Federal Visionists’ – for the command is addressed to (a.)God’s chosen ones who are (b.)holy and (c.)beloved, and of whom Paul says (d.)the Lord has forgiven them. They are, therefore, already known to be elect, holy, loved of God, and forgiven in Christ and because of Christ. How then can the legalists claim that one is saved by his adherence to the Law? How can they claim that one is made holy by his deeds and not by the Spirit of God sanctifying him within? For Paul commands to put on compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, patience, and to be longsuffering and forgiving as God’s chosen ones, holy, beloved, and forgiven!

With these words, the argument is settled: Legalism of any kind is refuted, for this one command can only be followed by those who already are saved, who have been forgiven, and who are the objects of God’s eternal loving grace and mercy. But in order to further underscore the depth of their wicked teaching, I will bring one more Scripture to bear in mind. Considering that God does not count the wicked as His children but as children of the devil, as Christ says in John 8:42-44 and which Paul repeats in Ephesians 2:1-3, I wonder who it is whom our Lord commands when He says:

“Pray then like this:

‘Our Father in heaven…’”[Matt 6:9]

For if one is not sure of his status before God as God’s child or His enemy, then how can he identify God as his father? Prayer, therefore, cannot even be made if one is to be saved by his works, for prayer must be made in this way. God’s Fatherhood, therefore, must first be in place in order for one to fulfill this command. Yet if men are saved by their works, if their eternal destination depends upon their self-wrought righteousness, then this command cannot be fulfilled.

Therefore, if legalism is true, then by dint of these two commands legalism is also false. For if the unsaved person must fulfill God’s law, then he must also fulfill laws addressed to Christians; and yet if he cannot be saved apart from obedience to God’s Law, then he is not a Christian and cannot fulfill those laws which are addressed to Christians. Therefore, again, I can conclude simply: If legalism is true, then legalism is false.

-h.

The Journal for Trinitarian Studies and Apologetics (Volume 1)

I have been working with CARM.org and Michael Burgos for some time on different websites which deal with defending the faith. Recently, however, I was asked to contribute to CARM’s new journal, The Journal for Trinitarian Studies and Apologetics.

I submitted an article for publication titled “The Two Natures of Christ in Genesis 3.”  And the first journal has been published and is available for purchase!

You can pick up either a hard copy or kindle version from amazon.com. Here is the link to the first journal:

The Journal for Trinitarian Studies and Apologetics (Volume 1)

By purchasing a copy you will be supporting CARM.org, a massive and highly accessible apologetics and theology resource.

On a different note, I hope to post more on logical arguments that appear in Scripture next Monday.

Until then,

Soli Deo Gloria!

-h.

What’s Good for the Goose….

Having nothing else to listen to at work last week, I decided to re-listen to Dr. James White’s debate with Gerry Matatics, a Roman Catholic apologist. While I think the debate was over as soon as Dr. White finished his opening statement (seeing as he effectively anticipated and addressed almost all of what Gerry was going to throw at him), it was interesting to listen to, if only to take note of the various twists and turns the unbeliever will perform in order to justify his unbelief.

One clear example of the unbeliever digging himself into a deeper and deeper ditch can be found in Gerry Matatics’ rejection of the idea that Scripture is Self-attesting. In the debate, he objected to the idea that Scripture is self-attesting because this would establish Scripture’s authority on the Scripture’s authority – and such reasoning is circular. For Matatics, the Roman establishment attests to the Holy Scriptures. Circle avoided.

Right?

Well, no.

You see, Matatics goes on to say that tradition and the offices of the Roman organization also constitute the Word of God. Scripture is the Word of God, but Sacred Tradition and the authoritative proclamations of the Roman “church” are also the Word of God.

Therefore, he is also arguing in a circle by saying that the Word of God (the Scriptures) is shown to be the Word of God by means of the Word of God (i.e. Sacred Tradition, Official Church pronouncements, etc, etc, etc).

 Consequently, the circle is not at all avoided.

This is helpful to remember when engaging Roman Catholic apologists, if they follow the same pattern as Matatics. At some point, the issue between the Christian and the non-Christian (in this instance, the Roman Catholic) will be clearly be that of authority.

Christians hear the Voice of Christ; those who do not belong to Christ do not hear His Voice.

Sola. Scriptura.

Here is a link to the debate, available for purchase at aomin.org:

http://store.aomin.org/christian-apologetics/roman-catholicism-81/roman-catholicism/debate-sola-scriptura-i-white-vs-matatics.html

Unnecessary Concessions to Heretics

There is still talk about the Whipps/Date debate, so it’s been hard for me to dwell on much else besides the topic of annihilationism. And when I downloaded this Friday’s Dividing Line in order to avoid thinking about the subject, I was surprised to hear that Dr. White’s podcast was also about annihilationism. It seems that I can’t escape the topic!

Dr. White’s comments were helpful, as he underscored one of the main reasons why annihilationism is logically and theologically absurd – its hermeneuticaal procedure. But I was disappointed that White didn’t get to delve into the topic further, as I’m sure he would have presented an analysis of the texts under consideration that would have given Date and other annihilationists something to think about.

Also disappointing was the fact that White’s short criticism seemed to unnecessarily  concede ground to the annihilationists in the area of exegesis, and I have not yet encountered an annihilationist who accurately deals with Scripture. More commonly, they machine-gun-fire numerous Scripture references that seem to lend support to their error, but which do no such thing when read in their original contexts. This could have been due to the fact that he was not intending to deal with the subject for the whole time on his show. And that is understandable. I guess I just find it frustrating that annihilationists build their “exegetical case” from strands of images divorced from their contexts, as well as some phrases also taken out of their contexts, and then confidently assert that the bible teaches annihilationism.

Date, for instance, in his debate with Whipps referenced Matthew 18:7 and its use of the phrase eternal fire, but did not address the context in which it appeared. Christ’s use of that phrase (which He parallels with the phrase “fire of hell” in v.9) occurs in a discourse that Christ is giving to His disciples on the nature of His kingdom on earth and in heaven, His protection of His sheep on earth, the judgment of the wicked through the instrument of excommunication as exercised by the church, and the endless retributive suffering awaiting those who persist in sin, abuse Christ’s sheep, and show no mercy to them. The wicked are said to be “handed over to the torturers” by the Master until they have paid every last cent of a debt that they can never pay! (cf. Matt 18:15-35)

Date also neglected to deal with the fact Christ identifies the worst form of capital punishment (i.e. death by millstone drowning) as preferable to the judgment of God awaiting the wicked. Neither did Date deal with the fact that Christ also identifies self-mutilation as preferable to the eternal fire. Why does Christ choose among the most gruesome experiences a person can have, identifying them as preferable to the judgment of God?

Moreover, beyond his silence on the overall context of Matthew 18, Date also failed to explain how it is that he, on the one hand, sees eternal fire as signifying the literal extinction of the reprobate, and yet, on the other hand, interprets self-mutilation as a means of procuring one’s entrance into the kingdom of God in a figurative manner. There is absolutely no consistency to this particular way of reading the Scriptures. And yet, the claim is that annihilationism is the clear teaching of the Scriptures.

Who decides that self-mutilation as a means of procuring one’s entrance into God’s kingdom is only figurative, but being burnt to ashes is literal in this instance? The choice to switch from figurative to literalistic is not at all promtped by the text. Annihilationists simply want to read the text that way, so they do.

I don’t think we should concede even an inch of space to annihilationists in the area of exegesis. Why? Because I am stubbornly clinging to a false belief, a tradition that has no Scriptural foundation?

Not at all.

We should not concede even an inch to the annihilationists because, well, they are not dealing with the Scriptures accurately. To say that they have an exegetical case is to, in my opinion, concede the same exegetical case to many others who openly reject the Christian faith by means of argumentation arising from the same flawed and unbiblical hermeneutic utilized by Fudge & Co.

-h.