The Second Cause of Apostasy
By John Fast
For in the case of those who have once been enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift and have been made partakers of the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come, and then have fallen away, it is impossible to renew them again to repentance, since they again crucify to themselves the Son of God, and put Him to open shame. – Hebrews 6:4-6 (NASB)
In the previous study we saw that the only means which God has ordained for promoting, establishing, and preserving the truths and doctrines of the gospel is the same and only means which He has instituted for bringing people to a saving knowledge of the gospel, namely, the faithful, accurate, unadulterated, unedited, and diligent preaching and teaching of God’s Word found only in the Bible. When this means is neglected and abandoned, as we know to have been done by the bulk of modern evangelicalism, and other means and messages are substituted in its place by those who should be teaching and preaching the truth, this always leads to the apostasy which today is self-evident. When truth is neglected, dishonored, untaught, or corrupted, it is not replaced by a different kind of truth, but error rushes in to take its place. What else but darkness comes in when the light of day recedes? In this study I will examine the second cause of any kind of defection from the gospel, namely, the spiritual darkness and ignorance that remains in the minds of men and women under a profession of the truth. No amount of theological knowledge, education, or external evidence can remove this spiritual darkness. Knowledge and understanding are not synonymous with information, education, and learning. Far from it. It was no less than the foremost scholar and theologian of Israel that Jesus asked, “Are you the teacher of Israel, and do not understand these things” (Jn 3:10).
“It is one of the clearest principles of Divine revelation, that holiness is the fruit of truth; and it is one of the plainest inferences from that principle, that the exhibition of the truth is the best means of promoting holiness. Christians regard the word of God as the only infallible teacher of those truths which relate to the salvation of men. But are the Scriptures really a revelation from God? If they are, what do those doctrines teach? And what influence should those doctrines exert on our heart and life?”[1] These were the questions which the great 19th century theologian Charles Hodge sought to answer in his book The Way of Life, first published in America in 1841. It is conspicuously self-evident, however, that modern evangelicalism no longer considers the Word of God “as the only infallible teacher of those truths which relate to the salvation of men”, nor does it consider it an infallible revelation from God, but a fallible, malleable, and historically inaccurate product of men, the meaning of which can be shaped to conform to the whims of a person’s own ideas and experiences, the prevailing opinions of the culture, and the ‘new’ discoveries of ‘scholars’ and ‘theologians’. Reason, Scripture, and even God Himself must yield if they stand in the way of their false presuppositions, flawed methods, and erroneous views of God, Jesus, sin, faith, Christian, or salvation, no matter how ludicrous, wicked, and unbiblical those views may be. No longer content with “the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints” (Jude 3), modern evangelicalism has been busy inventing new opinions, new theories, new theologies, new doctrines, new methods, new definitions, new forms of worship, new interpretations of Scripture, new gospels, and new Jesus’. Consequently, the Bible and the doctrines, commands, principles, and truths which it teaches no longer exert any influence on the hearts, minds, lives, and consciences of individuals and society. When people deny what even on a natural level is obviously true, and are willing to believe things that even a natural mind can see are obviously false, then it is impossible for them to believe and understand spiritual truth, “If I told you earthly things and you do not believe, how shall you believe if I tell you heavenly things?” (Jn 3:12)
Modern evangelicalism has been more concerned with being relevant, popular, inclusive, and prosperous than with being biblical, holy, and faithful, and more concerned with showmanship and addressing the temporal and transitory issues of the day than with teaching, applying, and practicing the eternal and unchanging truths of God. Every false theology will in some way reflect the spirit of the age, and the spirit which characterizes this age is one of self. Therefore, it is no wonder that modern evangelicalism has turned the gospel of Jesus Christ into a means of self-fulfillment, self-importance, self-improvement, self-promotion, and self-gratification. There has never yet been a false doctrine, heresy, or error that has not had its share of learned theologians to promote and defend it with a multitude of sophisticated, ‘scholarly’, intellectual, philosophical, and Scripture-twisting arguments, and who “by their smooth and flattering speech deceive the hearts of the unsuspecting” (Rm 16:18), and “so as to mislead, if possible, even the elect” (Mt 24:24). For over a century, the sharp and clear distinction between Christian and non-Christian has been increasingly undermined and blurred. As a result, any distinction between the children of light and the children of this world has not only been erased, but is no longer tolerated. The words of Thomas Scott, the great 18th century pastor and commentator, are no longer acceptable by the bulk of modern evangelicalism, “When therefore one who has made a high profession, like Judas, apostatizes, or finally falls away, we ought to say, ‘A specious hypocrite is unmasked’; not, ‘A saint has fallen away’.”[2] We are told that we cannot be certain who is and who is not a Christian, despite the fact that the Scriptures command us to make a distinction, and provide numerous marks and criteria by which anyone who knows their Bible can discern who is and who is not Christian.
In an attempt to neutralize the clear teaching of the Scriptures, we are told we cannot be certain about the meaning of the Scriptures; they can mean different things to different people. Such uncertainty has become a virtue, the mark of a true ‘scholar’, and something in which to boast. The only certainty is we cannot know the meaning of the Scriptures with any certainty. When uncertainty becomes the new certainty then there no longer remains any truth for which we must contend. The result has been that the most insidious opposition to the gospel and to the infallibility and authority of the Scriptures now comes from within worldly churches, seminaries, and parachurch organizations. The study of theology is treated no differently than any other field of learning. The vast majority of people who now teach in seminaries, train pastors, and write books, articles, and commentaries no longer believe or teach the historical accuracy of the Bible. This is a fact to which modern evangelicalism has been totally indifferent. It is a spiritual and moral “crisis” which only a handful of faithful men have made any attempt to warn against; men such as the late Dr. Robert Thomas and Dr. David Farnell,
“The hazards of Historical Criticism have entered the evangelical camp, raising questions about how much of the Gospels is accurate history and how much is editorial embellishment …. Yes, a “Jesus crisis” does exist because evangelicals, the expected defenders of “Gospel truth,” have yielded important ground to enemies of the truth. Who will defend the integrity of the Synoptic Gospels if those expected to do so have gone over to the side of the enemy?”[3]
Intellectual Respectability
It is not uncommon for those who, in the eyes of men, possess the reputation, prestige, and credentials of wisdom and understanding, to express opposition, indifference, and even scorn for the truths revealed in Scripture. Just as it requires very little to make a Christian by the world’s standards, little is required to make one a scholar or theologian. Only let a person obtain a doctorate, discover something ‘new’ in the text of the Bible, find and solve some ‘difficulty’ in the Scriptures, and the requirements of the world are satisfied. Great minds congratulate themselves when they can concoct models and manipulate the Scriptures to support their theories that a gospel writer edited, corrected, or embellished another gospel writer, or when they discover something that supposedly invalidates the historical accuracy of the Bible. The histories and events recorded in the Bible are rudely contradicted and naysaid because some ‘scholar’ cannot make them compatible with his theory of literary dependence, or make them harmonize with their interpretation of some archeological discovery. So, our great minds are satisfied when they think their toy magic wand has made parts of the Bible disappear, and the parts they cannot make disappear, they say that part is not authentic. Thus, the biblical doctrine of creation, the Flood, the plagues of Egypt, the parting of the Red Sea, Jonah, the entire book of Daniel, the virgin birth of Jesus, the Sermon on the Mount, the histories of the Old Testament, the writings of the Apostle Paul, are all regarded as historically inaccurate, if not outright myths, fabrications, and historical fiction. These theologians tread over the pages of Scripture as if they were a professor’s classroom, and so they step on the authenticity of this, or the historical accuracy of that, or the authority of this, or the inspiration of the other. They sew for themselves fig-leaf distinctions, theories, and arguments to cover their naked unbelief. People who have never heard of Higher Criticism are quite prepared to say that the Bible contains some mistakes; that it can mean different things to different people; that we cannot be dogmatic about what the Bible teaches, and that much of what is attributed to the gospel writers was not written by them at all. No one less than Jesus Himself recognized this fact, “I praise You, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hid these things from the wise and intelligent and have revealed them to babes” (Mt 11:25).
There has always been, but much more so in the last one hundred and fifty years, a strong tendency on the part of theologians of every stripe, liberal and conservative, to strive after novelties, innovations, and academic respectability. An evolutionary view of Scripture now grips the minds of theologians and lay-persons alike, thereby providing a plausible justification for the pursuit of their novelties. Today we are told to listen to all views with an open mind, not to “test the spirits to see whether they are from God;” (1 Jn 4:1). There is a wide-spread belief that theology is a progressive science, and that old things must constantly yield to what is new and fresh, or, as one modern theologian has stated, “Views tolerable in the church in the year 200 are not necessarily tolerable in the year 2000, since God continually teaches his church new things out of the Scriptures.”[4] Consequently, the theologian must demonstrate his superiority to all who have ever gone before him by discovering in the Scriptures some ‘new thing’ which no one else has ever found before; or, if he fails at this, he must employ his own ingenuity to invent new methods of interpretation, a new system of theology, and a new form of Christianity, which, he asserts, is superior to the old. The more ‘scholarly’ he is, the more ingenious this will be. He then challenges people to ‘rethink’ some old truth or doctrine, and demonstrates his skill to twist the plain, obvious, and historical meaning of the Scriptures to support his new thing, his new system, and new definition of Christian, even going so far as to deny that Jesus actually said those things which his new thing, his new system, and his own human reason, intuition, and ethical standard tells him Jesus could not possibly have said; or if He did say them, He did not say them in the historical setting recorded by the gospel writers. Like Nicodemus, and other experts in Israel, they will reason and re-reason, interpret and reinterpret, distort and re-distort, until they lose themselves in a labyrinth of philosophical speculations and entangle themselves in a web of self-contradictory theories, and when they cannot make the Scriptures fit their models, they, like the theologians in Israel, become “experts at setting aside the commandment of God in order to keep your tradition” (Mk 7:9), thereby furnishing the strongest possible evidence that they are still in spiritual darkness. In short, they say that the Bible says no such thing, or if it says it, it does not mean what it says.
Historical Criticism, along with all other forms of so-called Higher Criticism, is simply another one of these many novelties invented by modern evangelicalism, cleverly cloaked and given legitimacy under the language and respectability of ‘scholarship’. It is a novelty that undermines and destroys the historical accuracy of the Synoptic Gospels, thereby undermining the writers of those gospels as reliable witnesses to the words and actions of Jesus and the doctrines He taught. Just as a scientist is regarded as ‘unscientific’ by his peers if he rejects the dogma of evolution, so a theologian is considered ‘unscholarly’ by his academic peers if he holds to the verbal inspiration, infallibility, inerrancy, historicity, and authority of all of Scripture. Historical Criticism is a novelty that ascribes the origin of the Scriptures not to their divine source, but to some literary source or early tradition which the gospel writers were dependent upon for their information, and to the fallible recollections and unhistorical literary embellishments of those writers. As a result, to assert that we can understand the Scriptures with certainty is now regarded as an act of extreme hubris and arrogance. But those who boast in their uncertainty place themselves in the category of a fool, “fools hate knowledge” (Pv 1:22); “a fool does not delight in understanding” (Pv 18:2); “So then do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is” (Eph 5:17). Thinking themselves too wise to believe all that the Bible clearly says and teaches, they become fools (Rm 1:22), and ignore the warning of the apostle Paul, “Let no man deceive himself. If any man among you thinks that he is wise in this age, let him become foolish that he may become wise” (1 Cor 3:18).
When ambiguity surrounds the meaning of the Scriptures, and when uncertainty becomes a virtue, then, as J.C. Ryle once said, “A fog has descended on the Book of God, and enveloped every chapter in uncertainty.”[5] Historical Criticism is a novelty which is dishonoring to both the Scriptures and to God. No one can question or undermine the historical accuracy of the Scriptures without denying their divine inspiration. As a result, commitment to and dependence on the inerrancy, infallibility, verbal inspiration, perspicuity, authority, historicity, and sufficiency of Scripture are no longer regarded as fundamentals of Christian faith and practice, or the mark of true Christianity. However, the doctrine of the inspiration of Scripture is not a doctrine that can be redefined, ignored, or laid aside as outdated, ‘unscholarly’, and unnecessary. It is a doctrine that is the very foundation of true Christianity. If Christians have no sure, certain, and authoritative Word of God to turn to as the basis for their faith and practice, then they have no solid ground for their hope and peace; their faith is in vain. Those who undermine and corrupt the inspiration, infallibility, historicity, and authority of Scripture are not to be regarded as ‘scholars’, but, as the great Puritan Steven Charnock bluntly stated, “All corrupters of divine truth, and troublers of the church’s peace, are no better than devils”,[6] or, as J.C. Ryle once wrote,
“Let us regard all who would damage the authority of the Bible, or impugn its credit, as spiritual robbers …. And what do these spiritual robbers give us in place of the Bible? What do they offer as a safer guide and better provision for our souls? Nothing! Absolutely nothing! Big, swelling words! Empty promises of new light! High sounding jargon; but nothing substantial and real! They would fain take from us the bread of life, and they do not give us in its place so much as a stone. Let us turn a deaf ear to them. Let us firmly grasp and prize the Bible more and more, the more it is assaulted.”[7]
If the writers of the New Testament were trustworthy men, and if, as Jesus promised, the Holy Spirit brought to their remembrance all that Jesus said to them (Jn 14:26), this would include the historical context in which Jesus spoke those words. Surely, no Bible-believing Christian would think, much less teach others, that the Holy Spirit provided a faulty and fallible recollection of the words Jesus said, the doctrines He taught, or the historical context in which He said them. Are the human authors of Scripture to be trusted as trustworthy teachers of doctrine, but not of the history to which they were eye-witnesses? No one can discredit them as reliable witnesses to history without also undermining their trustworthiness as teachers of doctrine. To believe and teach that the Synoptic Gospels, or any part of the Bible, is historically, or in any other way, inaccurate, is to accuse the Holy Spirit of ignorance and deception; it is to believe and teach that the Bible is not perfectly holy and a reflection of the nature, attributes, and character of God; it is to reject the internal evidence of the Scriptures to their own truthfulness. To disregard the evidence of truth and undermine the infallibility of the Scriptures, is the highest dishonor that anyone can show to truth. But, because this sin is so common, it is commonly disregarded, and even considered a mark of superior ‘scholarship’. The Scriptures are not merely true, accurate, and authoritative up to a certain point, and then inaccurate, defective, and in need of modification and correction, as we are being told by many today. B.B. Warfield correctly identified the reason behind this so-called ‘scholarly’ approach to the Bible in an article first published in 1893,
“Under whatever safeguards, indeed, it may be attempted, and with whatever caution it may be prosecuted, the effort to modify the teaching of Scripture as to its own inspiration by any appeal to the observed characteristics of Scripture, is an attempt not to obtain a clearer knowledge of what the Scriptures teach, but to correct that teaching. And to correct the teaching of Scripture is to proclaim Scripture untrustworthy as a witness to doctrine….Who does not see that underlying this whole method of procedure – in its best and worst estate alike – there is apparent an unwillingness to commit ourselves without reserve to the teaching of the Bible, either because that teaching is distrusted or already disbelieved; and that it is a grave logical error to suppose that the teaching of the Bible as to inspiration can be corrected in this way any otherwise than by showing it not to be in accordance with the facts? The proposed method, therefore, does not conduct us to a somewhat modified doctrine of inspiration, but to a disproof of inspiration; by correcting the doctrine delivered by the Biblical writers, it discredits those writers as teachers of doctrine.”[8]
Details, Details
Many have been misled by the idea that the Bible is more easily defended and received if it is not necessary to accept the inerrancy of every detail. The problem is, who determines what is a detail? Has God given us the authority to dictate the terms by which we will believe His Word? Has God given us permission to deny the truth and trustworthiness of parts of the Bible? Did Jesus teach and demand only a partial devotion to Him and His Word? How many details can a person disbelieve and still be a Christian? Are there some details which are not inspired by God? Did God inspire the authors of Scripture to write inaccuracies and embellishments? This ignores the fact that no one can deny one part of the Bible without denying many other truths, because the Bible is one long chain of truth, so that what injures one truth, in some way, injures and affects all. It ignores the fact that there is no such thing as uninspired Scripture. If to violate the law at one point is to be guilty of all, is it possible to deny the trustworthiness of the Bible at one point without denying the trustworthiness of all? By what criteria are we to determine what parts are trustworthy and which are not; what parts are worthy of our acceptance and trust and which are not; what is historically accurate and what is not? Certainly not by any biblical criteria, which means we are left with only our own human reason and the theories of ‘scholars’ as the criteria for determining what parts are trustworthy and true and what is historical fiction.
There is a great difference between not understanding the details, or being mistaken about details, or different interpretations of details, and rejecting the historical accuracy of details because we cannot reconcile them to our own human reason, or our own theories of literary dependency, any more than we can reject the doctrine of the virgin birth merely because we cannot explain it. The doctrine of verbal plenary inspiration demands paying attention to the details, not ignoring or dismissing them as unimportant and irrelevant. There are many passages of Scripture in which the entire force of its teaching rests on the meaning of a single word, and once on the use of the singular instead of the plural number (Gal 3:16). Given this fact, it is hard to see on what basis we can deny that every word and every detail of the Scriptures is inspired by God. True saving faith, the faith that is the gift of God and the work of the Holy Spirit, always produces the conviction that all, not just some of the Bible is true; it is the conviction expressed by a devout woman who when told by an acquaintance, “I can’t believe that an intelligent woman like you would believe that story of the whale swallowing Jonah,”, wryly replied, “If the Bible said Jonah swallowed the whale, I would believe it.” To disbelieve any of the details of the Scriptures is to deny the internal evidence of the Scriptures to their own truthfulness. As Charles Hodge once stated, “The best evidence of the Bible’s being the Word of God is to be found between its covers. It proves itself.” Jesus did not think it unnecessary to believe every detail of the Bible, “For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass away from the Law, until all is accomplished” (Mt 5:18).
It is the clear doctrine of the Scriptures that all, not just parts of the Scriptures, are inspired by God (2 Tm 3:16), and that no Scripture “was ever made by an act of human will, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God” (2 Pt 1:21); therefore, all of it is to be believed, even the details, because of the authority or command of God evidencing itself therein. True saving faith is “faith in the truth” (2 Thes 2:13), that is, in the truthfulness of all of the Scriptures. The Scriptures always treat unbelief as a sin against God, and the special reason for the condemnation of the world, because supreme truth and wisdom is revealed and disregarded. All of church history is littered with such novelties, but thanks to the fascination and affinity it has for these novelties and for those who propagate them, and the ease with which they can now be disseminated, these and other similar novelties now dominate modern evangelicalism. They provide a plausible and intellectually respectable justification for disbelieving all of the Bible.
We are experiencing the inevitable effects of this habitual neglect, corruption, disregard, and dishonoring of Scripture, effects which the great 19th century pastor J.C. Ryle once described,
“Just in proportion as the Bible is honoured or not, light or darkness, morality or immorality, true religion or superstition, liberty or despotism, good laws or bad, will be found in a land …. A church which does not honour the Bible is as useless as a body without life, or a steam engine without fire. A minister who does not honour the Bible is as useless as a soldier without arms, a builder without tools, a pilot without a compass, or a messenger without tidings.”[9]
It requires little or no discernment to see which of these – light or darkness, morality or immorality, true religion or superstition, liberty or despotism, good laws or bad – now dominates not just this nation in general, but evangelicalism in particular. It was the 19th century French pastor and theologian Adolphe Monod who said,
“If faith has not for its basis a testimony of God to which we must submit; as to an authority exterior to our personal judgement, superior to it, and independent of it, then faith is no faith.” [10]
It is self-evident that modern evangelicalism no longer honors the Bible, nor does it consider the Bible “a testimony of God to which we must submit,”; rather it is treated as a book, just like any other book, that is subject to our personal judgment, inferior to it, and dependent on it. Therefore, the faith which it professes is no faith at all; it is not the faith which is the fruit of regeneration, the gift of God, and the work of the Holy Spirit. It is this mixing of things human with things divine, no matter how slight, that defaces and destroys everything. It only takes a little leaven to eventually leaven the entire lump of dough. The leaven of Historical Criticism is just one of many false ideologies introduced decades ago that has now come to leaven and permeate the entire lump of modern evangelicalism. There is not one theory of inspiration that falls short, no matter how slightly, of a thorough and perfect verbal inspiration, that is not guilty of contributing to the consequences, namely, that the accuracy, authority, and sufficiency of the Bible suffers and deteriorates. They all, in one way or another, some more subtly than others, some more ‘scholarly’ than others, ask the same question which Satan first asked of Eve, “Indeed, has God said…?” (Gn 3:1). Consequently, this nation, along with much of the world, has plunged itself into evils previously unimagined or unknown even among the pagans, mainly because God’s Word has been dishonored, neglected, and rejected. The effect of most moral teaching today is to utterly destroy and eradicate any sense of morality, any sense of right and wrong, any sense of good and evil, any sense of the evil of sin, and any distinction between true and false and light and dark.
It is extremely obvious that our views regarding the punishment due to sin is inseparable from our views of sin itself. If we have defective and unbiblical views of the Bible, we will have defective and unbiblical views of the evil of sin, and of the punishment which sin deserves. This is why most professing Christians reject the teaching of Scripture on this subject. They cannot reconcile what the Bible clearly declares concerning the eternal torment of the unregenerate with their own defective and unbiblical views of God, and of His grace, mercy, and justice; therefore, they are unwilling to believe what the Bible clearly teaches. Instead, they will incriminate God as being unjustly severe, thereby evidencing their defective view of sin and the justice of God; that they regard as unjust what God declares to be just, and that their heart and mind are still hostile to His Word. Like apostate Israel they protest, “The way of the Lord is not right” (Ezk 18:29). When God’s moral law is ignored and rejected, then “justice is never upheld” and always “comes out perverted” (Hab 1:4). Justice and righteousness are moral practice that is the result of moral principles. When God’s moral law and His truth are rejected, and no longer have any influence on public or private life, then true justice and righteousness disappear from society. The forces of evil and immorality become so strong so as to constitute a threat to those who would even distance themselves from, and refuse to affirm what is wrong, “Yes, truth is lacking; and he who turns aside from evil makes himself a prey” (Is 59:15). Evil men do not understand the justice of God (Pv 28:5), because they do not understand the evil of sin.
God commands in His Word that we are to receive, believe, and trust all of Scripture because it bears the image of the divine nature. No amount of external evidence can produce true saving faith, “If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be persuaded if someone rises from the dead” (Lk 16:31). The Bible clearly teaches that the faith which it demands is not founded on any external evidence of its truthfulness, but on the authority of God manifesting itself in the Scriptures by the holiness, excellence, and power of the truth which they contain. Jesus Himself said, “He who is of God hears the words of God; for this reason you do not hear them, because you are not of God” (Jn 8:47). And again, “My sheep hear My voice” (Jn 10: 26, 27). The doctrine taught in these, and many other similar passages is, that there is in the Word of God, and especially in the person, nature, and character of Jesus Christ revealed in the Scriptures, a clear and marvelous manifestation of the divine glory. To this glory the natural man is blind, and therefore does not believe, but those who are truly regenerate and have the Spirit of God discern this glory and truthfulness, and therefore believe and come to Jesus as He really is and as He is offered in the gospel.
The Gospel
In our day of multiple gospels, endless false conceptions of what the gospel actually is, and the plethora of various and erroneous definitions and conceptions of ‘Christian’, it is necessary to clearly define what is meant by “the gospel”. The gospel may be considered from two aspects: First, there are the things which the gospel contains; the truths, doctrines, and commands which it reveals and proposes. These are the objects of our faith. The second aspect regards the way these truths and doctrines are preached, taught, and understood. With respect to the first, all people by nature are darkened in their understanding to spiritual truths (Eph 4:18), so that they cannot discern them in their own natural and intrinsic glory; “they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised” (1 Cor 2:14). Like most who witnessed the teaching and miracles of Jesus, they are unwilling to come to Jesus as He is revealed in the Scriptures (Jn 5:39-40).
With respect to the second, when someone intellectually knows the gospel, but does not truly understand and comprehend the words and the doctrines which those words teach and declare, they are said to be ignorant, and so perish for a lack of knowledge. Jesus did not tell the Sadducees that they did not know the Scriptures, for they knew them very well and could quote its words at will, but He accused them of “not understanding (eidotes – to comprehend the meaning of something) the Scriptures”, that is, the very Scriptures which they could quote and imagined they knew so well (Mt 22:29), which is why Jesus told them they were “mistaken” in their understanding of the Scriptures and the true nature of God. Jesus told the Pharisees, “But if you had known what this means, ‘I desire compassion, and not a sacrifice’, you would not have condemned the innocent” (Mt 12:7), thereby clearly stating that they did not know the true meaning of the Scriptures. It was not until Jesus opened the minds of His disciples that they “understood the Scriptures” (Lk 24:45). Jesus told the Jews, who knew the words of Scripture, that the reason they did not believe Him was because He told them the truth, that is, the correct meaning of Scriptures (Jn 8:45), which contradicted all their own preconceptions, traditions, opinions, and understandings. The reason they could not hear (akouo – to hear with understanding) the words of God, was because they were not of God (Jn 8:47). They had no true understanding of the Old Testament’s teaching regarding the Messiah (Mt 22:41-45; Jn 5:39, 40). They preferred to believe in a lie rather than the truth (Jn 8:44). Like scholarly Nicodemus, they had no spiritual ability to understand spiritual things (Jn 3:12). The Pharisees considered the common people to be “accursed” because they did not “know the Law” (Jn 7:49). And no wonder! Those who should have been teaching the Word of God were utterly ignorant of its true meaning; they were blind guides; they had invalidated it by their traditions, corruptions, assumptions, and false methods of interpretation (Mk 7:13).
Unregenerate people will always exchange the truth of God for a lie (Rm 1:25), and “will not endure sound doctrine; …. and will turn away their ears from the truth, and will turn aside to myths” (2 Tm 4:3, 4). Wrong belief which is believed as truth is always more dangerous than unbelief, and the more sincerely error is believed as truth, the deadlier it is, or as Jesus stated “If therefore the light that is in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!” (Mt 6:23). The darkness that infects the understanding of unregenerate men and women is so great that they can see nothing of God in God, nothing of holiness in holiness, nothing of good in good, nothing of truth in truth, nothing of evil in evil, nor anything sinful in sin. It is this darkness that characterizes not only our culture, our government, our courts, our education, and society in general, but most of professing Christianity. It is so darkened that they believe they see truth in error and error in truth, good in evil and evil in good, happiness and freedom in sin, and misery and oppression in obedience. When people are no longer willing or able to discern the clear distinctions between true and false teachers, truth and error, good and evil, Christian and non-Christian, or light and darkness, it is because they have abandoned the infallibility and authority of Scripture. True conversion is rare, but for those who have been deceived into believing that error is truth, that evil is good, and a false gospel is the true one, and have lived under this delusion for a period of time, true conversion is even more rare. Most professing Christians today believe they believe the gospel, when in fact, they do no such thing. This is because they think the gospel consists of nothing more than the message that “Jesus loves you and died on the cross for your sins”, and if someone “believes” this, then based on this “belief”, they think they believe the gospel and that all their sins are now forgiven. They believe that God is under some sort of obligation to forgive everyone, either in this life or the next, but, as the great Puritan John Owen once stated,
“The effects ascribed to this faith of forgiveness in God, and always produced by it, make it evident that the most of them who pretend unto it, who pretend to believe that there is forgiveness with God, do indeed believe no such thing …. I fear with many, things on the account of their pretended faith are quite otherwise. They love sin the more for it, and God never the better. Supposing that a few barren words will issue the controversy about their sins, they become insensibly to have slight thoughts of sin and of God also. This persuasion is not of him that calls us. Poor souls, your faith is the devil’s greatest engine for your ruin – the highest contempt of God, and Christ, and forgiveness also, that you can be guilty of – a means to let you down quietly into hell …. As none can be saved but by faith, so you, if it were not for your faith (as you call it), might possibly be saved …. If a man’s faith, which should be more precious than gold, be found rotten and corrupt, if his light be darkness, how vile is that faith, how great is that darkness! Such, it is evident, will the faith of too many be found in this business.”[11]
It is not just any and every faith that saves, but the faith which the Bible demands, commands, and defines; the faith which is the gift of God, and always produces the fruit of holiness, submissive obedience, and conformity to the truths revealed in Scripture. The faith that justifies a sinner is not a higher kind of faith, but is of a totally different kind or nature; it is not natural, but supernatural; it is a gift of God graciously given by Him to all those He has elected unto salvation before the foundation of the world (Eph 1:4). Any description or definition of the faith by which a sinner is justified in the sight of God that excludes or ignores the work of conviction of sin by the law of God and true repentance, is a false and erroneous definition. This is because there can be no true conviction of sin without some sense of the evil of sin, and the means which God has ordained for conveying and teaching a true understanding of the evil of sin is His moral law, “for through the Law comes the knowledge of sin” (Rm 3:20). Only when a person feels themselves to be under the condemnation of the law, and sees they can never free themselves from its condemnation by their own imperfect works of righteousness, will they flee to Christ from the wrath to come. The Apostle Paul admitted that at one time, even though he intellectually knew the law of God, and even considered himself to be blameless “as to the righteousness which is in the Law” (Phil 3:6), he was in fact totally ignorant of the extent and spiritual nature of the law, and consequently ignorant of sin (Rm 7:7-9). He thought himself to be as good as could be expected, if not better than most. He was content with his own righteousness derived from the law. But when the law was revealed to him in its true nature, his views of sin were radically changed, so that sin became exceedingly sinful. He saw his need for a righteousness that surpassed that of the scribes and Pharisees if he were to be justified in the sight of God.
On the other hand, even though they intellectually knew the words contained in the Scriptures, the Sadducees, Pharisees, Scribes, and Rabbis did not truly understand and comprehend the truths and doctrines which these words reveal. The Moses in which they had set their hope was not the Moses who wrote of Jesus, otherwise they would have believed Jesus. They did not believe what Moses had written, therefore they could not believe the words of Jesus (Jn 5:45-47). In other words, there was nothing in the teaching of Jesus that was incompatible with the writings of Moses; rather everything that Jesus taught was in complete agreement with the Old Testament, even the details. So it was with the Apostle Paul, “I stand to this day testifying both to small and great, stating nothing but what the Prophets and Moses said was going to take place;” (Ac 26:22). It was the false beliefs and corrupted interpretations of the scribes, Pharisees, and Sadducees that were incompatible with Moses, and therefore incompatible with the teaching of Jesus. By their hating Jesus and His words, they proved that despite all their outward profession and appearance, they hated God (Jn 15:23), because Jesus, being “the exact representation” (Hb 1:3; cf. Jn 14:9) of the nature of God, was a total contradiction of what they imagined God to be like. Their false understanding of the nature of God blinded them to the true understanding of God and the evil of sin. The God they loved was a god of their own imagination, not God as He has revealed Himself in His Word. Because they had a defective view of sin, they did not see their need for a Physician. Their man-made traditions, preconceptions, false interpretations, self-righteousness, spiritual pride, and false faith blinded them to the true meaning of Scripture.
Among professing Christians there is a universal, flagrant, and self-evident insensibility to the evil and sinfulness of sin, to the extent that many sins are now regarded as virtues, thereby calling evil good. A person who has no adequate sense of the sinfulness of sin, cannot believe in the true nature of God, much less in the justice, holiness, and righteousness of God. They will deny the reality of eternal torment in hell for all those who do not obey the gospel of Jesus Christ (2 Thes 1:8-10), because it is incompatible with their erroneous conceptions of Jesus and His gospel, and their defective and unbiblical ideas of grace, love, and mercy. They are ashamed of Jesus as He has revealed Himself in the Scriptures, and of His words that define faith, salvation, the gospel, and what He requires for anyone to be His disciple (Lk 9:26), so they invent a different Jesus and deny that Jesus ever said such things, or if He did say them, He did not mean what He said. Those who can only trust the truths of Scripture as far as their own reason can accept them, are not Christians. Those who reject the plain truth of Scripture merely because they do not like it, are not Christians.
A Roman Catholic’s understanding of the words of Scripture which teach the doctrine of justification by grace through faith, and the doctrine of Christ’s imputed righteousness, is far different than that of a true Christian whose mind has been illumined by the Holy Spirit. An Arminian understanding of the words which clearly teach the doctrine of God’s eternal predestination and sovereign election unto salvation, man’s total depravity and inability, the nature of saving faith, and the nature and necessity of regeneration, is vastly different than that of a person who submits their mind to the clear meaning of Scripture. The passages of Scripture which teach the doctrine of the Trinity and the deity of Jesus are not understood by those who reject these doctrines; instead they remain darkened in their understanding to the true divine nature of Jesus Christ. Denominations, churches, and people who condone women pastors and teachers are willingly ignorant of the clear teaching of Scripture on this subject. A few denominations, that years ago accepted the sin of allowing women to be preachers, are now splitting over the sin of accepting the sin of homosexuality. This is like cutting a rotten apple in half. The only difference between the halves is the degree of rottenness. People who believe that a person who lives in habitual unrepentant sin is a Christian, just a ‘carnal’ one, may know the words of the Bible, but they do not understand them, nor do they understand the necessity and nature of regeneration, because they have never experienced its power.
There is no delusion, no false teaching more inexcusable than this notion that true Christianity is consistent with a life of sin, because none is more directly opposed to the nature of God, the nature of regeneration, and every doctrine of the Bible. Likewise, the ‘scholar’ and ‘theologian’ who denies and undermines the historical accuracy, reliability, and infallibility of Scripture may know the words of the Bible, but they are devoid of the witness of the Spirit that all of the Bible is accurate and true; their faith rests on the wisdom of men, not on the power of God; they love the approval of men rather than the approval of God (Jn 12:43). Interpretations of the words of Scripture which force and twist them to conform to some preconceived ideas, unbiblical ideologies, human reason, man-made and man-centered systems of theology, personal experiences, and popular opinion will always prevent a right understanding of Scripture. Since these two things are distinct, and have different effects in leading to a defection from the gospel, the first one shall be considered first.
Blind by Nature
First, that there is a natural and inbred spiritual darkness which blinds the minds of all people to spiritual truth from birth, and which is the principle effect of our nature being depraved by sin, is a truth clearly taught in all of Scripture. Those who substitute error for truth are said to substitute darkness for light (Is 5:20). Those who “distort the gospel of Christ” are guilty of preaching “a different gospel” (Gal 1:6-7), thereby placing themselves under the curse of God (Gal 1:6-9). Not only are the minds of all people infected with this natural spiritual darkness, it is a darkness which they treasure and dearly love, “men loved the darkness rather than the light” (Jn 3:19). The minds of all unregenerate people are “darkened in their understanding,” to spiritual truth (Eph 4:18). Therefore, all people stand in need of spiritual illumination to enable us to correctly discern and understand spiritual things. To deny this is to deny the gospel and the necessity and nature of regeneration, and to make the promises of God meaningless. The need for spiritual illumination presupposes spiritual darkness, because the purpose of bringing in light is to dispel darkness. This being the case, it must be admitted that the minds of all people are by nature in spiritual darkness, or the work of God in illumination must be rejected.
There is no greater evidence that someone is in spiritual darkness than for them to reject the light, that is, the divine nature and true meaning of Scripture, and for them to deny their need for spiritual illumination to be given to them by the Holy Spirit. It was for this purpose Jesus sent the Holy Spirit into the world, “He will guide you into all the truth” (Jn 16:13). He is called, “the Spirit of truth” (Jn 14:17; 15:13), and “no lie is of the truth” (1 Jn 2:21); “And it is the Spirit who bears witness, because the Spirit is the truth” (1 Jn 5:7). On the other hand, Satan, who is the father of lies, and “there is no truth in him” (Jn 8:44), by means of his deceptions and counterfeits and other gospels, leads the mind “astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ” (2 Cor 11:3). Just as the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of truth, so Satan is the spirit of error and falsehood; just as the Holy Spirit illumines the mind of believers with the truth, so Satan darkens the understanding of unbelievers with error “that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God” (2 Cor 4:4). It is impossible to be devoted to Christ and His Word and yet dishonor, disbelieve, denigrate, and disparage Scripture, because the written and the Incarnate Word are in all things the same. It is impossible to be devoted to some false teacher, some worldly church, a false gospel, false doctrines, an apostate denomination, some sin, to love the approval of men rather than the approval of God, and be devoted to Christ. No one can serve two masters. No one can discern the glory, authority, infallibility, and divine origin of Scripture, and yet believe that it contains historical inaccuracies, misrepresentations, embellishments, or errors. An unshakable trust in the trustworthiness of all of Scripture, including its historical accuracy, is essential not only for the propagation, but for the preservation of true Christianity. The apostacy which characterizes modern Christianity should come as no surprise to those who know and believe the Bible. It is precisely what we should expect when concessions and allowances have been made to those who doubt, disparage, deny, and undermine the trustworthiness and authority of all of Scripture, and when divine wisdom becomes leavened with the human.
God’s divine work of illumination is not His revealing new, novel, and previously unrevealed “truths” which lead the mind astray from the true meaning, truthfulness, authority, and divine origin of Scripture; rather, it is His revealing the correct understanding of the truths He has already revealed in Scripture. It is an act of God’s power by which He “has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ” (2 Cor 4:6); an act of God’s power once described by Charles Hodge,
“We are clearly taught that saving faith rests on the witness of the Spirit by and with the truth. This is represented in Scripture as something different from the evidence which the word itself contains of its own truth. It is ‘an unction from the Holy One’. It is ‘the demonstration of the Spirit’. The Spirit produces in our minds the infallible conviction that the Bible is true. This conviction is not the process of reasoning, nor a conclusion from the facts or our own consciousness. If it were it would not be infallible, and our faith after all would rest in something human and not on the power of God …. When our Confession attributes saving faith to the witness of God not only by or through but with the truth, it does not teach that God makes any new revelation. The word is true. It declares itself objectively to the reason, the conscience, and the affections to be true, and God by His Spirit affirms it to be true. There is no new revelation there …. The Spirit produces assurance that what is true is true. The soul is not left to deductions from its own imperfectly understood or partially interpreted consciousness. God gives it a peace which passes understanding.” [12]
There are ‘pastors’, ‘theologians’, and ‘scholars’ who tell people to think for themselves, to lean on their own human reason, understanding, and experiences, and to accept nothing on the authority of Scripture alone. There are others who strain after novelty, intellectual respectability, originality, recognition, and admiration, and there are others who take a philosophical approach to Scripture and mingle God’s truth with the world’s philosophy and ideologies. Then there are people who belong to neither of these classes; people who have no desire or fondness for new doctrines, new methods, or new ways of presenting and teaching old ones. Their faith is founded on the demonstration of the Spirit, and therefore cannot be shaken or blown about “by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming;” (Eph 4:14). All the words of Scripture are received by them for what they truly are, “not as the word of men, but for what it really is, the Word of God,” (1Thes 2:13), that is, the only divine revelation of what is true from the highest source of truth and goodness. They will say with the Apostle John, “And we know that the Son of God has come, and has given us understanding, in order that we might know Him who is true,” (1 Jn 5:20), clearly teaching that, unless the Son of God illumines our minds to the true nature and meaning of Scripture, it is impossible to know Him who is true. Jesus clearly taught that no one knows “the Father, except the Son, and anyone to whom the Son wills to reveal Him” (Mt 11:27). When asked by Philip, “Lord, show us the Father,”, Jesus replied, “Have I been so long with you, and yet you have not come to know Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father;” (Jn 14:8, 9). What is it that qualifies the Son, and only the Son, to reveal the Father? John Murray answered this question when he wrote,
“Jesus provides the answers. He possesses the prerogative because all things have been delivered to him of the Father. All the mysteries of the Father’s love, all that comes within the scope of grace and truth, and to be made known, have been committed to the Son by the Father. And the equipment to ensure the fulness and veracity of the revelation which he gives is the unique, all-penetrating, all-inclusive knowledge that the Son possess of the Father – knowledge that is his because he is the Son, not gained by a process of revelation but belonging to him intrinsically, and knowledge which corresponds in both mode and extent to the knowledge which the Father has of the Son. It is knowledge that is his by his being the Son, just as that of the Father is his by being the Father. This correspondence is the guarantee that when the Son reveals the Father, he reveals the Father as he truly is, and the commitment is the guarantee that in revealing the Father he reveals the Father as the Father wills to be revealed.”[13]
More Severe Judgement
This explains why the Jews in hating Jesus were really expressing their hatred for God, because Jesus revealed God, not as they imagined or wanted Him to be, but as He truly is. When anyone expresses their opposition to the true meaning of Scripture and to the true nature and attributes of God, they express their hatred for the Scriptures and for God as He truly is. Their false conceptions of God, His nature, and His Word, blind them to the true knowledge of God and His Word. When anyone comes to see that the “truths” which they have been taught and believed are actually error, and they then submit their heart, mind, and life to the true meaning and nature of Scripture, and the true nature of God in Christ Jesus, this is an effect of the Son’s work of illumination on their minds. However, if they have “once been enlightened” (Hb 6:4 – the meaning of which I have already explained in the first study) to the true meaning and nature of Scripture, and still reject its true meaning and nature, then, according to Jesus, it will be more tolerable for the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment than for them (Mt 10:14, 15; 11:21-24), or, as the great Puritan Jeremiah Burroughs once wrote,
“It is a most dreadful curse of God upon a man that God will let a man go on smoothly in ways of sin without control, that he shall have liberty without control. If there is any brand of reprobation that one may give, this is it. This is as black a brand as can be given, that God suffers a man to go on smoothly in sin without any control so that he can have full liberty….God may be displeased with His children for sin, but He does not come to hate them. They are not children of hatred because of infirmity, but now when God suffers a wicked man to go on smoothly without any affliction in his way of sin, and so to take liberty in sin, this man’s sin, it is to be feared, has grown to the height that it comes to the very hatred of God, not just His displeasure.”[14]
This is one of the truths and doctrines of the gospel; it is a view of God that is rejected by modern evangelicalism. No place in hell is tolerable, but Jesus clearly taught that some places will be more intolerable than others. There is a “much severer punishment” (Hb 10:29) for those who despise, corrupt, dishonor, and reject the true gospel. To be more specific, according to Jesus it will be more tolerable for the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment than for Mother Teresa, who rejected the true gospel and true Jesus for a pantheistic gospel and Jesus; a gospel in which even those who have never heard the name of Jesus are saved.[15] It is self-evident that there are very few professing Christians who truly believe this, and most find it utterly offensive and totally incompatible with their own conception of Jesus. For most, Mother Teresa is a spiritual hero. This is because their conception of Jesus and what it is to be Christian is purely humanitarian, and has been shaped by the standards of the world, not the truths of the Bible. They are utterly ignorant of the fundamental difference between truth and error. That the condition of a sinner under the gospel who professes to believe in God, performs great works of charity and humanitarianism in the name of Jesus, and has no other fault other than they despise and reject truths and doctrines of the gospel which they find offensive to their own reason, their own sense of right and wrong, their own views of justice, and their own conceptions of Jesus; that this person’s state will be worse in the day of judgment than that of the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah whom God destroyed “by reducing them to ashes, having made them an example to those who would live ungodly thereafter;” (2 Pt 2:6), is a truth rejected by the mass of modern evangelicalism. As the great Puritan Robert Traill once wrote,
“Many of our gay professors, and civil moral men, would think themselves highly affronted and undervalued, to be put in the balance with filthy Sodomites. If it were possible that thou had no fault but only unbelief, thy sin is greater, thy judgment will be more dreadful, thy state worse for eternity, than that of the vilest nations to whom the throne of grace was never revealed.”[16]
The reason for this “much severer punishment”, becomes self-evident once we understand the true spiritual nature of the Scriptures which gives power and authority to its commands, doctrines, and claims. There is a divine glory and attractiveness in the spiritual things which comprise, and are the subjects of the truths of the gospel. In them there is the wisdom of God, “God’s wisdom in a mystery, …. the wisdom which none of the rulers of this age has understood;” (1 Cor 2:6-8); even, “the manifold wisdom of God” (Eph 3:10), and “the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God” (Rm 11:33). This wisdom consists “not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit,” (1 Cor 2:13); in other words, things explicitly beyond human discovery by any natural means or external evidences whatsoever, “For since in the wisdom of God, the world through its wisdom did not come to know God,” (1 Cor 1:21). Shall a fallen, darkened, depraved, uninspired, and mortal creature be wiser than divine revelation? Whatever truth is revealed concerning the glory and perfections of God, His divine nature and attributes, the manifestation of these in the Person of Jesus, His work in us of regeneration, justification, sanctification, and the conformity of our nature into the image God, and of the life of faith, holiness, and obedience, they are all revealed to us in the truths of the gospel. There is no way to justify the authoritative commands which the Bible makes on our lives and faith, except to admit that it contains within itself the proof of its divine origin. Unless we are prepared to restrict the obligation to believe all of Scripture, and the benefits of faith, only to those who are capable of examining and appreciating the external evidence of the Bible, we must admit that it contains its own irrefutable evidence for its divine origin, and therefore, provides no excuse for unbelief and disobedience.
Second, whatever doctrinal propositions may be proposed to the minds of people, the spiritual truths themselves cannot be understood or spiritually discerned without the illumination of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, it follows that people can be instructed in the doctrines of truth, and have an extensive theoretical, academic, philosophical, and intellectual knowledge of those doctrines, but because they are still under the power of natural darkness, they never discern the truths themselves in their spiritual nature and glory, nor do they have any experience of their power and efficacy; rather, they are “always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth” (2 Tm 3:7). This both the Scriptures and history clearly teaches, and provide us with ample and abundant examples. In Corinth, this opposition to the true gospel was so evident that Paul could write, “For consider your calling, brethren, that there were not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble;” (1 Cor 1:26).
One consideration is sufficient for our purpose, and that is, whoever has a true spiritual understanding of spiritual truths, their mind will certainly be changed, transformed, and conformed into the image of them. This the apostle Paul clearly teaches, “But we all, with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed” (present tense – habitually, constantly, continuously) “into the same image from glory to glory,” (2 Cor 3:18). Their mind and life are no longer being conformed to this world – its values, standards, priorities, opinions, wisdom, methods, ideologies, reasoning, fads, fashions, etc. – but are being transformed by the renewing of their mind (Rm 12:2). Like Jesus, they testify of the world, that its deeds are evil (Jn 7:7); they do not copy, imitate, or adopt them. They are cast into the same mold as the doctrines to which they are now committed (Rm 6:17, 18). Their mind is united to the spiritual truths discerned, and the image of those truths is so impressed on their lives that there is a conformity and correspondence, even if imperfect, between those truths and their lives. As a result, they have the mind of Christ (1 Cor 2:16), because their mind is conformed by and to the truths and doctrines taught by Christ. However, “If anyone advocates a different doctrine, and does not agree with sound words, those of our Lord Jesus Christ, and with the doctrine conforming to godliness, he is conceited and understands nothing;” (1 Tm 6:3, 4). Their mind is still under the power of natural darkness.
Someone may be a scholar in Hebrew or Greek or of the Old or the New Testament, just as one may be a scholar in Chinese or Russian or The Declaration of Independence or The Magna Carta. They can know all the histories of the Bible, just as one may know the history of their country. They may know the names of all of the people in the Bible, just as one may know the names of Washington, Jefferson, Napoleon, and Henry VIII. They may know and study the teachings of the Bible, just as one may the writings of Plato or Aristotle or Darwin. They may admire and dissect the literary art of the Bible, just as one may Shakespeare or Kipling or Bunyan. But for all of this, they remain in spiritual darkness.
Moved Away From Truth
Today we see by open and self-evident experience that, notwithstanding the knowledge which many people have of spiritual things, their minds are still worldly, carnal, and fleshly; they are worldly-minded, not spiritually-minded; they still set their minds on the things of this earth, not on things above, where Christ is; they still love the approval of men rather than the approval of God, and are in no way changed, transformed, and conformed into the image and likeness of the spiritual truths themselves. They not only do not agree “with sound words, those of our Lord Jesus Christ”, but they edit, correct, modify, and distort them, and in many cases deny Jesus ever said and taught such words. Would Jesus have ever taught that the Bible was historically inaccurate? Would He have taught that parts of the Bible were true and accurate and some were not? Would He have led people to believe they could live a life of sin, yet still go to heaven when they die, or that saving faith was to be had by simply saying a prayer and ‘inviting Jesus into your heart?’ Did He ever teach that someone could love Him and not obey His commandments, or have Him as Savior but not as Lord, or be His disciple without first denying self? Did He ever separate faith from repentance and obedience? Did He ever intimate that it was unnecessary for a Christian to be holy as He is holy? Did He ever teach that ‘love’ was accepting and affirming error and wicked lifestyles? Did He ever hint that the internal evidence of the Bible to its truthfulness and divine origin was insufficient to bring someone to saving faith; that it needed to be supplemented with external evidences? Did Jesus ever teach us to trust in our own hearts, our own mystical experiences and extra-biblical revelations, or to look for some personal guidance apart from His divine revelation in the Scriptures? No further evidence or demonstration is required to show that a person has never had a true spiritual understanding of the glory of the gospel and its truths, no matter how extensive their knowledge of the Bible and its doctrines may be, than this, that their minds are not renewed by those truths, nor transformed and conformed to the image of them. In spite of all their knowledge, they remain “darkened in their understanding” (Eph 4:18) to spiritual truth.
If the minds of people had truly been transformed in their regeneration so that they now “prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect” (Rm 12:2), and if by their true understanding of spiritual things they “are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory” (2 Cor 3:18), then they could not have abandoned the most important doctrines of the gospel, as it is obvious that they have done, nor could they have embraced the most unbiblical, foolish, and false teachings in their place. How is it that the mass of professing Christians have, under the current apostasy, come to gradually abandon and no longer endure the principal truths and doctrines of the gospel? It is because they never had a true spiritual view and love of these truths to guard them against all temptations, oppositions, and seductions which lead the mind astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ. Steadfastness in the truths and doctrines of the Scriptures must be the effect of the Holy Spirit on their minds convicting them that all of the Bible is true, and an unshakable conviction that will persevere against all the force, seduction, and deception by which they may be assaulted, and that will not allow them to be indifferent, careless, flippant, or negligent about any truth of Scripture. Paul told the Colossians that the proof of their regeneration would be “if indeed you continue in the faith firmly established and steadfast, and not moved away from the hope of the gospel that you have heard, … and of which I, Paul, was made a minister” (Col 1:23). It is self-evident that modern evangelicalism has been moved away from the truths and doctrines of the gospel and has substituted its own ideas, views, definitions, Jesus’, and gospels in its place.
From where does this steadfastness in the truth arise? The conviction and assurance that all of the Bible is true does not arise from any outward evidence or experiences, nor are its truths embraced by our minds by any rational arguments. All the conviction, and all the full persuasion that we can have that all of the Bible is true, and which will be effective against temptations, deceptions, seductions, oppositions, and modifications, arises from such a spiritual view of them that creates an experience of their reality, power, and authority on our minds. This experience respects the renewal of the mind itself in spiritual illumination and faith, the steadfast love and devotion of the will and affections to the things known and believed, and the constant approval of and submission to the good, acceptable, and perfect will of God in all things. This steadfast trust and conviction is far superior to any that is the product of natural and carnal sense and reason; it is far superior to that produced by external evidence, philosophical arguments, or intellectual investigation. It is of a different kind, being supernatural, not natural. It is a trust and conviction that looks “not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen” (2 Cor 4:18). It trusts in and is convinced of truths that are above human reason. Without this trust and conviction, it is impossible for men and women to attain any steadfastness in the truths they profess that will secure them against apostasy from the true gospel.
Herein lies another means and cause of apostacy from the truths of the gospel after it has been received and professed. Multitudes in all ages have been instructed in the truths of Scripture, some have been very learned in its doctrines, but, because they are still in darkness, being utterly destitute of any spiritual illumination, they did not truly understand the truths to which they assented in their true supernatural, divine nature and glory. Therefore, they had no experience of their power on their own minds, wills, affections, and lives. They had no evidence and conviction of the truth that would secure their steadfast love and devotion to it or keep them from apostasy; rather, they chose to listen to, consider, comply with, and adopt various teachings and errors whose outward attraction they could naturally discern, and that produced effects on their natural and carnal affections which they could experience. In this way, people in all ages who have been educated and skilled in the doctrines of the Bible, so that they are looked on as pillars of the truth, have often been among the first to apostatize from it when they have been tested by temptations, fleshly enticements, the things of this world, or threats to their own self-interests, and have been leaders in leading others into apostasy. So were many of this sort who in the past fell into Arianism and Pelagianism. So are many today who have fallen into Higher Criticism, liberalism, feminism, worldliness, antinomianism, skepticism, wokeness, or the plethora of other errors that dominate modern evangelicalism. When such fall away, they usually take many others away with them. One thing we can be sure of all such people, namely, that they never had that conviction and love of the truth that could secure their steadfastness; they never saw anything in the truths and doctrines of the Bible which could be preferred above all their own carnal self-interests and ambitions and their love of this world. No one who forsakes the truth and turns aside to myths and errors ever saw its glory, nor experienced its power. “They went out from us, but they were not really of us; for if they had been of us, they would have remained with us; but they went out, in order that it might be shown that they are all not of us” (1Jn 2:19).
In the same way, when the author of Hebrews described the tragic apostasy of some among them, he encourages the perseverance of those whose steadfastness he had observed, “But, beloved, we are convinced of better things concerning you, and the things that accompany salvation,” (Hb 6:9). Whatever knowledge someone may have of the Bible and its doctrines, whatever profession of faith they may make, whatever academic credentials they may possess, unless they possess those things that are inseparable from salvation, such as the saving illumination of the Holy Spirit which removes the darkness of our minds, and the love of the truth so as to be saved which removes our hostility to the law of God, there can be no assurance that they will persevere to the end and “continue in the faith firmly established and steadfast,” (Col 1:23). Herein lies one of the principle reasons for the defection from the truth which characterizes the days in which we live, and is the cause of all the unrestrained and unimagined evil we are now witnessing.
It is because of this defection that we have such a large number of sceptics among those who, despite their skepticism, still profess to be Christians. They pretend to believe the Bible, and they pretend not to renounce or forsake the truth, yet they will talk and argue and speculate and dispute with and philosophize and theorize and wax eloquent about it with the greatest indifference as to what is true or false. The doctrine of Creation, the nature and necessity of regeneration, the Trinity, the Holy Spirit, sin, sanctification, the person of Jesus, His offices, what is Christian, the inerrancy and authority of the Scriptures, the roles of men and women, are all weighed in the defiled, irreverent, and unstable scales of their own human reason, wisdom, self-interest, and the latest speculative theories. For some reasons known only to themselves, these people will profess to be Christian, perhaps be teachers and scholars in it, but on all occasions, they make it very evident that they are either unwilling to make any distinction between truth and error, or are utterly ignorant of the basic and fundamental difference between truth and error, and so give no firm and dogmatic assent to the truths they profess to believe. They are, as Jude described them, “wandering stars,” (Jude 13), that is, theologically, doctrinally, and in practice, they are all over the map. When they are with one group, they affirm what it believes, and when they are with another group, they affirm, or at least do not expose as error, what they believe. They are as comfortable associating and participating with false teachers as well as with those who are faithful and true, thereby manifesting that they are utterly ignorant of the fundamental difference between truth and error.
Truth is powerful and active and effective to conform the mind, heart, and soul to God, His Word, and His will, and to instill a principle of love for the truth, and the desire and power to obey the truth, not perfectly, but sincerely. Error turns the mind and heart away from truth into crooked paths of pride, or self-advancement, or superstition, or biblical ignorance, or indifference to the distinction between truth and error. If people were practically aware of and acquainted with this fundamental difference between truth and error, they could not be indifferent to or ignore the distinction between them; rather, they would make clear distinctions between the clean and unclean, the holy and the profane, the narrow and the broad way, and between truth and error. Truth that is truly known in its true nature and power will produce that holy fear, love, and reverence of the truth in the souls of men and women, to where they will not dare to prostitute it, peddle it, adulterate it, or twist and distort it to make it conform to every new whim and foolish speculation. Those who have no love of the truth are usually the most bold in censuring and condemning as narrow-minded, intolerant, ignorant, and unloving bigots, those who do. From such people, nothing is to be expected but a pragmatic and self-serving compliance with any form of apostacy from the truth which is advantageous to their own self-interests. They know of no truth for which it is worth suffering any loss to their own worldly and carnal self-interests. They refuse to make a clear distinction between truth and error; rather, they remain comfortably broad-minded, tolerant, and inclusive, thereby evidencing that they are still darkened in their understanding of spiritual truth.
By reason of this darkness, it is easy to understand how uncertain and unstable the minds of the generality of professing Christians must necessarily be in their belief and commitment to the truths, doctrines, and commands of the Bible. They are in no way able to know and understand the truth in a way that will keep them immovably steadfast in the face of all oppositions, temptations, and threats to their self-interests, nor can they have that love for the truth which will prevent their minds from being enticed, seduced, and led astray from it. All the difference they can discern between truth and error consists merely in different opinions, emphasis, and interpretations, so it is no wonder that they make an easy transition from one to the other. It is no wonder they can listen to and read teaching that is true, almost true, and outright heretical, and discern little or no distinction between them. No wonder the generality of professing Christians are tossed about by every new fad and teaching, no matter how obviously unbiblical, untrue, and foolish, but instantly embrace it, at least for a time and while it is new and popular, if it pretends to produce effects that are more advantageous to their self-interests over and above those produced by a love for and obedience to the truth.
There are multitudes who profess to be Christian and profess to believe the truth who have never had a true understanding of its spiritual glory because of the darkness of their minds; therefore, they have never experienced its power and life-transforming effects, nor are their hearts, minds, and lives influenced, guided, or governed by it. When new wine is put into old wineskins, then both are lost. The truths, doctrines, and commands of the gospel, taken theoretically and superficially into the old, unregenerate minds of men and women is utterly lost as to all its proper life-transforming ends. If we are to be preserved from the danger of defection and apostasy from the gospel to which the world is so prone, and is abundantly self-evident today, we must be diligent to seek and have a true spiritual understanding and love of the truths declared in the gospel, and to have an experience of their power on our own souls. We must strive to enter through the narrow door (Lk 13:24). Mere notions of truth, or knowledge of its doctrines which enable us to talk about them, teach them, or defend them, will not preserve us. This true knowledge and love of the truth is a gift of God’s grace and love, yet it is something we are commanded to strive after, and to “be all the more diligent to make certain about His calling and choosing you;” (2 Pt 1:10).
In the next study I will, by God’s grace, consider how the errors which now dominate the profession, practice, and professors of Christianity may be corrected. Where the mind and life is not governed by truth, it will always fall into a ditch.
[1] Charles Hodge, The Way of Life: Christian Belief and Experience (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 2020), v.
[2] John Scott, The Life, Letters, and Papers of the Late Rev. Thomas Scott (New Haven: Nathan Whiting, 1827), 493.
[3] Robert L. Thomas, F. David Farnell, Jesus Crisis: The Inroads of Historical Criticism into Evangelical Scholarship (Grand Rapids: Kregel, 1998), 27.
[4] John M. Frame, Evangelical Reunion (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1991), 90.
[5] J.C. Ryle, Expository Thoughts on John, vol 1 (Ipswich: Hunt, 1877), ix.
[6] Steven Charnock, The Existence and Attributes of God (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1996), 498.
[7] J.C. Ryle, Old Paths (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1999), 31.
[8] B.B. Warfield, The Works of B.B. Warfield, vol 1 (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, reprint 2003), 204-205.
[9] J.C. Ryle, Light from Old Times (Moscow, ID: Charles Nolan Publishers, 2000), 27, 28.
[10] Life and Letters of Adolphe Monod, Pastor of the Reformed Church in France, by one of his daughters (London: Forgotten Books, 2018, Reprint of 1885 edition), 224,
[11] John Owen, The Works of John Owen, Vol 6 (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1967), 425.
[12] Quoted in A.A. Hodge, The Life of Charles Hodge, (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 2010), 525, 526.
[13] John Murray, Collected Writings of John Murray, Vol 3 (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1982), 187-188.
[14] Jeremiah Burroughs, The Evil of Evils (Grand Rapids: Soli Deo Gloria Publications, 1992), 267.
[15] In answer to the question if people of pagan religions will be saved, Mother Teresa replied, “Yes, that is their faith. My own faith will lead me to God, … So if they have believed in their god very strongly, if they have faith, surely they will be saved.” This is just one of many quotes in which Mother Teresa espoused her pantheistic false gospel; a gospel in which faith in Jesus Christ as offered in the Gospel is not essential for salvation.
[16] Robert Traill, The Works of Robert Traill, Vol 1 (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1975), 56.