46 thoughts on “From DGH on Justification by Precision Alone Submitted on 2014/10/14 at 5:33 pm”

1. DG – For instance, is this a statement that we should greet with the warm fuzzy embrace of Reformed ecumenism?

   The exclusive ground of the justification of the believer in the state of justification is the righteousness of Jesus Christ, but his obedience, which is simply the perseverance of the saints in the way of truth and righteousness, is necessary to his continuing in a state of justification.

   Or how about this one?

   The righteousness of Jesus Christ ever remains the exclusive ground of the believer’s justification, but the personal godliness of the believer is also necessary for his justification in the judgment of the last day.

   Brian – Who are these quotes from?

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2. Brian,

   Norman Shepherd http://www.hornes.org/theologia/norman-shepherd/the-34-theses

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3. O yikes, well I was gonna say that it sounds like the last two chapters of a book I just read. But that may not be helpful to name. They are definitely vague-ish though, I suppose there is a way in which you could understand those to be true but…yeah not helpful. We need to get rid of any language of two-stage justification, or seeing any “not yet” in justification. This whole judgment “according to works” instead of judgment “on the basis of works” thing is helpful either. It either ends up being covenantal-nomism or dying the death of a thousand qualifications.

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4. You expect Jones to be precise about what he thinks about Shepherd? Hasn’t Jones already been precise about Tullian?

   what more can you want?

   as long as you had one parent who was Roman Catholic and the orthodox Trinitarian formula was declared, wouldn’t it be revivalist, pietist, baptist, gnostic ( insert swear word) to ask for anything more?

   but Jones has a phd

   but Jones is a “senior pastor” in the pca

   can’t Jones be precise for us without us being precise

   without giving us details about what he thinks of Shepherd?

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5. But the not yet aspect of justification highlights the priority of “union’ over the systematic and traditional and confession categories of a completed satisfaction of the law by Christ.

   How can gratitude be the motive when we are not yet justified?

   And how can we be justified without faith in the future efficacy of works the Spirit does in us?

   http://www.meetthepuritans.com/2014/05/28/good-works-necessary-for-salvation/

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6. Having read Shepherd’s 34 theses posted above I’m not sure how Jones and Gaffin are different in their formulations. It reads like something they, or any of the GRN guys, would sign onto.

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7. Chris, was that supposed to comfort me?

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8. Chris, what does GRN mean?

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9. Brian,

   I don’t think that it was supposed to be comforting – it sure wasn’t to me. It seems like the GRN doesn’t cross the line where Shepherd goes out of bounds, but their toes almost touch the line and they are bending over the line for sure, breaking the plane, so they do go over the line…….e.g. Sanctification is 100% God’s work and 100% my work/via Spirit (Harry Reeder) – bbbrrrrrrrrrrrr!!!

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10. David K,

    Gospel Reformation Network.

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11. “Please do not ignore what happens when good works become more than fruit, evidence or the way it is. When they become part of the ground (which even Shepherd denies—not to say that he was entirely consistent with his denial) or the instrument (which he affirms) the gospel is lost. The good news is not that we shall be finally accepted by God if we are sufficiently sanctified. The good news is that we have already been accepted by God (!) for Christ’s sake alone and because that it is so the same Holy Spirit who united us to Christ will also gradually, graciously work sanctity in us. Must we struggle to be sanctified? Yes! Amen! Is it hard? Yes! Amen! Must we take up our cross daily, die to self, and actively seek to grow in sanctity, in conformity to Christ? Yes! Amen! Is the judgment a final exam for believers wherein our standing with God is renegotiated on the basis of how well we did in this life? μὴ γένοιτο. May it never be! The standing with God of all believers has already been adjudicated at the cross and our Savior said: It is finished! That is the Word of God. That is the gospel. If an angels tries to tell you differently little one, you tell him ‘Get behind me Satan.'” – R. Scott Clark

    http://heidelblog.net/2014/05/faith-alone-is-the-instrument-of-justification-and-salvation/

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12. Paul, I wish I could up vote that R. Scott Clark post.

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13. While we’re at it (it’s all about the Heidelblog) here are some related resources addressing some historical claims about what Ames, Witsius, Turretin, et al taught about salvation and works:

    1. Ames on salvation: http://heidelblog.net/2014/10/ames-redemption-is-the-execution-of-the-sentence/

    2. On the necessity and efficacy of good works in salvation: http://heidelblog.net/2014/06/efficacy-necessity-good-works-salvation-1/ (5 parts)

    3. Here’s a 13-part series on the H-cast on the Marrow of Modern Divinity, which some are implying was antinomian – http://heidelblog.net/the-heidelcast/ (start with episode 58).

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14. Who are these people implying the Marrow was antinomian? Maybe I’ll just ask your students who like to inform others of who these people are.

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15. Here’s another source for 17th century Reformed theology on justification:
    http://books.google.com/books?id=Ua9NAAAAcAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

    See chapter 31, pp. 294-303, “Of the Necessity of Good Works to Salvation, or Justification.”

    John Davenant affirms that “some good works are necessary to justification, as concurrent or preliminary conditions; although they are not necessary as efficient or meritorious causes” and that “good works are necessary for retaining and preserving a state of justification, not as causes, which by themselves effect or merit this preservation, but as means or conditions, without which God will not preserve in men the grace of justification.” (299-301)

    I’ve never read Norman Shepherd, so I don’t know what he meant by “necessary.” But the kind of necessity that Davenant affirms is not beyond the bounds of Reformed orthodoxy in the 17th century.

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16. CEV, who here is subscribing John Davenant? Are you?

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17. “The exclusive ground of the justification of the believer in the state of justification is the righteousness of Jesus Christ, but his obedience, which is simply the perseverance of the saints in the way of truth and righteousness, is necessary to his continuing in a state of justification.”

    “The righteousness of Jesus Christ ever remains the exclusive ground of the believer’s justification, but the personal godliness of the believer is also necessary for his justification in the judgment of the last day.”

    These are called contradictions. Personal godliness, good works, etc are the results of Justification.

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18. Yes, works are necessary for a sure title to eternal life, but it won’t be our works that merits that title.

    “Now where shall we find this full conformity to the Law but in Christ? and what will that in Christ avail us if it be not imputed and made over to us? So as to eternal Life, unto which without fulfilling the Law we can have no claim or title: For the old Law-condition or Covenant being yet in force, do and live, (Lev. 18:5; Rom. 10:5; Gal. 3:12; Luke 10:28); unless this Condition be performed we cannot hope for life. True indeed, under the Covenant of Grace God accepts of what is done by the Surety, and he doth not expect of the Sinner in his own person the perfect obeying of the Law as a condition of life, but yet he will have the thing done either by or for the Sinner, either by himself or by his Surety, or else no life: doth not this then evince the necessity of the imputation of Christ’s active Obedience?” – Thomas Jacomb 1672, Eighteen Sermons on Romans 8:1-4.

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19. “some good works are necessary to justification”

    “Some” is such a precise term.

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20. Bob,

    If you google “Marrow of Modern Divinity” and “antinomian” you can find a partial answer. Not many modern folk will come right out and say it but I’ve seen a couple of NAPARCers insinuate it. If you search books.google.com you’ll find examples of this charge from the 18th century and beyond too.

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21. Almost everybody on both sides of the law-grace debate sides with the Marrow position, and both sides formally reject neonomianism.

    Sinclair Ferguson—“The Marrow debate was a doctrinal, gospel matter, the most pastorally significant of all the theological controversies that have taken place in the area of reformed theology”

    http://theaquilareport.com/marrow-controversy-2-0

    mcmark– I disagree, because the nature (extent and justice) of Christ’s expiation/ propitiation was and is the most important debate. The Marrow idea that “Christ is dead for you” is NOT the solution to neonomianism because that idea is neither true nor the gospel…..

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22. According to Mark Jones, the precise distinction between law and gospel cannot be all that useful because in the “not yet” we do not already know how things will turn out. Jones insists that we must agree that circumcision was grace to Ishmael, even if circumcision did not result in Ishmael’s justification before God. That was not God’s fault but Ishmael’s fault, because circumcision was God’s grace and Mark Jones know that.

    The precise distinction between law and grace is not biblical, explains Mark Jones, except when it comes to saying that circumcision was grace and not law. At that point preciseness is useful. And also when it comes to saying that Ishmael sinned against grace and not only against law. Ishmael was blessed with circumcision even if that did not work out so well for Ishmael.

    For Jones.a precise distinction between law and grace is not necessary, except maybe when we are talking about those born outside the covenant. Mark Jones has trouble seeing how those not in the covenant can be commanded to believe the gospel. As he also has trouble understanding how those not in the covenant can be commanded to obey the law. Because obeying the law is ultimately not precisely different from believing the gospel.

    Because if we tell all those who attend the means of grace that they are forgiven, then they are all forgiven. And if we tell those in church that their works are good and acceptable to God, then indeed their works are good and acceptable to God. If nobody was born under grace then we would have to tell everybody that they were born under the law, but in practical real life that precise distinction between under law and under grace does no good….

    And,when you think about it, a theology of the cross cannot be triumphant and precisely know what is faith and what is works or what is not faith. I mean, when you think in terms of the not yet gray in which we all still live, law is grace and grace is law, at least for those in the covenant.

    Galatians 4: 30 But what does the Scripture say? “Cast out the slave woman and her son…

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23. mcmark, so unpack “The Marrow idea that “Christ is dead for you” is NOT the solution to neonomianism because that idea is neither true nor the gospel…..”

    What is The Marrow saying (show that Fisher is saying what you are saying that he is saying…) that you disagree with and why?

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24. McMark, so Jones is the next Leithart?

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25. Jack, I agree that I had a lot packed into that, and I don’t have time today to unpack it all. But without addressing the definitions of the gospel and of “neonomianism”, I will speak to the question of “is Marrow saying what you say it is saying”. Jack, do you deny that Marrow is saying that “Christ is dead for you”?

    After we agree on what Marrow says, I would like to deconstruct the difference between “dead for you to make you an offer” and “dead for you because your sins were imputed to Him”. (As I like to deconstruct the Jesuit difference between acquiring and obtaining….)

    I think that the Marrow view involved a view of predestination that was Amyraldian. The counsel of God with respect to predestination contained a determinative decree and a hypothetical decree. The former belonged to God’s secret will and the latter to God’s revealed will. The Marrow taught that the revealed will of God expressed God’s will as desiring the salvation of all who hear the gospel.

    The Marrow Men claimed that by making this salvation conditioned upon faith, they in fact made the work of salvation particular because only the elect actually came to faith. But salvation was made dependent upon man’s faith, because one had to explain how only some were saved when in fact God desired the salvation of all, earnestly urged all to come to Christ, and provided an atonement which was sufficient for all, intended for all and available to all (as in the current Two Ways to Live tract)

    To say the least, I disagree with Sinclair Ferguson and Donald Macleod about Marrow being essential to the true gospel. But I suspect the question for you my friend Jack is if the ambiguity of Marrow rises to the level of “false gospel”….

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26. Jones is very much like Leithart in saying that this is a catholic space with room with all kinds of diversity, and then turning around to say that views other than his own are “deviant”

    http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/leithart/2014/09/deviant-calvinism

    Leithart—-“appointed, willed, and ordained that the death of his Son should be, and should be esteemed, a ransom of such a kind that it might be offered and applied to all …In Crisp’s summary, “God ordains and intends that the satisfaction of Christ be a means of salvation that is truly sufficient for all but conditional upon faith,” a faith that is given only to the elect.. Crisp argues that this view isn’t excluded by any Reformed confession, even the Westminster Confession, which comes the closest to excluding it. The Canons of Dort, for instance, declare that the “benefits of Christ’s work only to those with faith, whom God has elected,” but Crisp argues that “this is entirely consistent with the claim that the work of Christ is sufficient for the salvation of all humanity in principle,” and that it was in fact intended to be sufficient, while “effectual only for the elect who are given faith” (180).

    Leithart—-Crisp refutes the notion that hypothetical universalism reduces to Arminianism. The fact that the two positions overlap in language and content doesn’t mean they are equivalent, and they aren’t: “Whereas the hypothetical universalists claimed that God effectually applies the work of Christ only to those whom God has eternally elected according to God’s good pleasure and will, the Arminian’s claim that God elects those ‘individuals who through the established means of his prevenient grace come to faith and believe’ and persevere in the faith…. the hypothetical universalist scheme claims that God elects independent of any knowledge God has concerning foreseen faith” (188).

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27. As a Lutheran, I would say that Mark Jones is confused and don’t even know his own Reformed & Presbyterian tradition.

    Be that as it may, justification by faith alone was not a theological formulae in its original setting. Justification by *faith* alone refers to an event. Since faith in its Reformation setting as re-appropriated by Luther was never defined as a mental assent (for that would then mean that there had not been a breakthrough in the first place!) but situated in relation to the proclamation of the gospel in word and sacraments, justification by faith was not defined as faith in theological propositions including imputation.

    Instead of being a theological formulae that was part and parcel of the wider theological system, imputation was a reference to the concrete act of pronouncing the forgiveness of sins as embodied in for example, the absolution. That is to say, imputation simply meant that the word does what it says and says what it does.

    This does NOT mean that doctrine is unimportant Mark Jones seems to be implying. It simply meant that doctrine was grounded or rooted in the concrete and tangible (and tactual) act of the proclamation of the gospel in word and sacraments in a specific context in time and space which is the living present of “I-to-you.” In other words, the Reformation was not about the true meaning of the external word of the gospel refashioned according to doctrine but the other way round.

    Once this is understood then we can proceed to say that the continuity between the Reformation and the medieval and patristic Church was grounded precisely in what the word and sacraments *actually* do to us. And it is precisely this that Rome errs grievously as the very Church of the Antichrist is corrupting the true meaning of the word and sacraments with her false doctrine. That is Rome’s error was precisely because she derived her wrong unbiblical understanding of the proclamation of word and sacraments from her unbiblical theology.

    Thus, if Romanists or Papists are to be saved or can be saved within the Roman/ Romish Church it is precisely because of the underlying or latent layer of the hidden gospel beneath the encrustation in the proclamation of word and sacraments and NOT despite her false doctrine.

    IOW, for example, it is not that a non-confessional Protestant is saved despite of the non-Reformational confession but precisely because of “blood of Jesus Christ” as applied in baptism — one baptism for the remission of sins.

    Faith therefore is in the external word and sacraments — such is the simplicity and down-to-earth nature of the gospel. Faith is not in a theological system, however, complex and consistent.

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28. Jason,

    So are people likewise saved in Mainline churches with crappy theologies because they still do baptisms and celebrate The Lord’s Supper?

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29. Good question, Erik

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30. Erik,

    Yes.

    We are not saved by our belief in doctrinal propositions. So the issue whether one is saved because *or* despite doctrine is irrelevant. We are saved by the external word of the gospel in its oral and sacramental forms.

    In many many churches, Christians are saved by their baptism. Faith is in the preached word and sacramental word. Faith has nothing to do whether one can articulate the formula of justification by faith alone or even the theology of penal substitution. Likewise, faith is not about doctrine being irrelevant to one’s justification. Faith is not in doctrine but in the living voice of the gospel.

    This is why the Reformation can maintain continuity with the pre-Reformation churches. This is why the pre-Reformation Christians are justified even though the theological formulae of justification by faith alone and the corollary of penal substitution were alien to them.

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31. I realize this comes as a shock to the Reformed & Presbyterian but this is what the Reformation was about. This is why Calvin held to a high view of baptism (and not only the Lord’s Supper). This is why the Reformers could claim that there were true believers in the Roman Whore Church. (If I recall correctly, Calvin’s contention against the Lutheran Joachim Westphal was over the Lord’s Supper). This is why the Book of Common Prayer crafted by the Protestant Archbishop Cranmer maintained a realist language of baptism whilst exhibiting ambiguity in relation to the Lord’s Supper.

    Baptismal regeneration is not in conflict with justification by faith alone but is the concrete expression thereof. The issue is whether all baptised are regenerated or not. As a Lutheran who does not subscribe to the Book of Concord word for word, I’d say that the language of baptism which is the language of proclamation is to be held in existential tension with the doctrine of election.

    One particularises the doctrine of election by the use of personal pronouns of “I-to-you” in the concrete setting of proclamation of the gospel. That is instead of being held back by the doctrine of election, proclamation is the doing of the electing of the ungodly itself.

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32. Basically, the elect (where ever they are to be found) are saved not despite a wrong understanding of doctrine but despite a wrong understanding of the proclamation of the gospel in word and sacraments.

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33. Jason – This is why the Reformers could claim that there were true believers in the Roman Whore Church.

    Erik – Wouldn’t all who were baptized have been saved under your scheme? If not, why not?

    Jason – Basically, the elect (where ever they are to be found) are saved not despite a wrong understanding of doctrine but despite a wrong understanding of the proclamation of the gospel in word and sacraments.

    Erik – What if they’re baptized and never darken the door of a church again?

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34. Berkhof —Roman Catholics hold that (water) baptism is absolutely necessary for all unto salvation, and that the sacrament of penance is equally necessary for those who have committed mortal sins after baptism; but that confirmation, the eucharist, and extreme unction are necessary only in the sense that they have been commanded and are eminently helpful. Protestants, on the other hand, teach that the sacraments are not absolutely necessary unto salvation, but are obligatory in view of the divine precept Willful neglect of their use results in spiritual impoverishment and has a destructive tendency, just as all willful and persistent disobedience to God has.

    That they are not absolutely necessary unto salvation, follows: (1) from the free spiritual character of the gospel dispensation, in which God does not bind His grace to the use of certain external forms, John 4:21,23; Luke 18:14; (2) from the fact that Scripture mentions only faith as the instrumental condition of salvation, John 5:24; 6:29; 3:36; Acts 16:31; (3) from the fact that the sacraments do not originate faith but presuppose it, and are administered where faith is assumed, Acts 2:41 [see also 10:42-48]; 16:14,15,30,33; 1 Cor. 11:23-32; and (4) from the fact that many were actually saved without the use of the sacraments. Think of the believers before the time of Abraham and of the penitent thief on the cross. [Systematic Theology, (1941). 618-619.]

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35. Erik,

    “Wouldn’t all who were baptized have been saved under your scheme? If not, why not?”

    No, since election cuts across the church. Not all who are baptised persevere till the very end. Perseverance is attributed to unconditional election – and not synergism.

    “What if they’re baptized and never darken the door of a church again?”

    I’d say it depends. I wouldn’t write all who never enter church again. But, yes, indeed, generally to be incorporated into the body of Christ is to be incorporated into the church.

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36. Jason,

    I’m picking up some kind of synthesis of Lutheranism and Calvinism with you. Am I reading you right?

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37. During my stint on Earth I’ve now spent time in Methodist, Christian Reformed, Southern Baptist, Christian & Missionary Alliance, Southern Baptist who no longer use the name Baptist, Nazarene (very briefly), Evangelical Covenant (very briefly), Evangelical Free, United Reformed, and Lutheran Church Missouri Synod churches so I’m starting to be able to recognize it all.

    My beard is getting grey for a reason.

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38. Of course the Magisterial Reformers failed in many ways. They went back to the local magistrate to keep the “peace” which is maintained by the “order” which is ensured by authorized violence. Protestants have not been very gracious. Don’t just look at Lutheran Germany, look at the guns owned by the Protestants of America, at the crusades of armed democracy. In the name of grace, God’s law has been changed, reformed, modified, cheapened, so that the life and example of Jesus Christ can be ignored.

    We dare not let the politicians and the teachers of virtue turn the story of Jesus into some general truth about everybody having God for their same father so that we all accept each other, no matter what our motives may be. Philippians 3: Beware of evil workers—“we boast in Christ Jesus and have no confidence in the flesh”. Even though Paul knew that this would mean “sharing in his suffering and becoming like Him” (Philippians 3:10), Paul’s great gain was to “be found in Christ, not having a righteousness of our own that comes from the law, but a righteousness that comes through the obedience of Christ.”

    But isn’t it dangerous for God to not count our sins against us? Maybe it’s so, maybe it’s not. Maybe there’s a not yet aspect of our justification in which God’s work in us by the Holy Spirit will be brought in as an additional factor, so that we can now still have various forms of motivations, including the beauty of threats and the loss of assurance, and whatever else that works to get us on the move…But the parasites and the prodigals say to the elder brothers, take it up with the Father, who now gives the party…

    But wouldn’t it be better now, in the present fight against secularism and liberalism, to keep a stoic stiff upper lip and not “rock the boat” about grace, and accept the “tension” between grace motives and other motives? So what if some works are not done from a clean conscience but done in order to keep clean the conscience clean? Why rock the boat just because grace happens to work for you, when being a pastor of a group which is more than a small sect means that we get along with people who operate out of different motives. .

    But those on the shore want to rock our little boat, to turn it over. if you really believe in grace, they tell us, you could get alone with the rest of us, with other doctrines, with other motives. And we say: the earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof, and this little boats is not theirs, though they kill us, though they command us to bring our babies to their big churches, though they cut us off from their “means of grace”. If God has elected those who are predestined to grace, this does not prove that God has predestined them to be the mediators who hand out that grace.

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39. to jason–during these days of Reformation celebration you need to spend less time channeling Forde and more time with Luther and Calvin. Or maybe with Romans and Galatians.

    Forde reduces the gospel to our experience of faith. To Forde, this “hearing” matters way more than what happened at the cross. To Forde, the gospel is not about us coming to understand doctrines that we did not believe before. To Forde, the gospel is NOT about what God did in Christ, in terms of God’s justice or because of God’s nature as holy.

    For Forde, the gospel is not ultimately about the death of Christ. For Forde, the “gospel” becomes a teaching (law) which shows us that WE need to die and be re-created as new persons of faith. Forde thinks preaching will do that for us by killing us and then making us alive. In that we are made conscious of our sin by the death of Jesus, then we die in our experience.

    Forde’s idea of our “inclusion” in Christ’s death is that this means that Christ is NOT a substitute. For Forde, it’s not Christ’s death that ultimately matters because TO HIM IT’S OUR DEATH BROUGHT ABOUT BY PREACHING WHICH MATTERS. Forde’s idea is that God is “satisfied” not by Jesus’ death, but by our own death –which is an experience of passive trust.

    Forde: “When faith is created, when we actually believe God’s unconditional forgiveness; then God can say, “Now I am satisfied!” God’s wrath ends when we believe him, not because of Christ’s death as a gift of God as payment to God “one time. for all time”. For Forde, God never had any wrath. For Forde, human wrath ends when faith begins.

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40. McMark,

    The reason why Luther and Forde rejected penal substitution (PS) are because …

    1. PS makes the cross to be a sacrifice offered to God. As I have shared before, Luther’s doctrine of justification by faith alone is derived from his rediscovery of the biblical meaning of the sacraments (and not the other way round). The Lord’s Supper as gift and not sacrifice reverses the movement of the cross. John 3:16 declares that the cross is a gift to the world. That is, God offered His Son to the world.

    2. PS diminishes the wrath of God since it makes us to be mere spectators of the cross event. We don’t die to the cross — in Him Who died for us. PS becomes a historical fact to be either believed or disbelieved. We do not come under the wrath of God on the cross. The wrath of God under PS becomes a theoretical speculation rather real and actual.

    3. For Luther and Forde, bondage of the will means precisely that not only we are unfree but that we do not have choices to even consider in the first place. We are killed by the law which is the wrath of God and raised up the gospel which is the love of God. The proper distinction between law and gospel are not options before us but the never-ending work of God on this side of the world …

    3. For Luther and Forde, the wrath of God is all around us. It is not limited to religious experience. When we fall under the rigors and harsh demands of this world in relation to our secular calling, that is the wrath of God, the law, the hidden God working on us through the “masks” of creation. When we experience the fear of nature’s power such as tornadoes or floods, that is the wrath of God also. IOW, the wrath of God is not limited to the law only but encompasses the whole of the old creation.

    4. Thus Luther’s and Forde’s bondage of the will is radical — bondage of the will means the old creation that can only be destroyed. Total depravity requires total destruction. And the total destruction of the old creation as totally embodied by the sinner happens on the cross. The sinner dies with, in and under Jesus Christ only to share in His resurrection: the death of the old Adam & Eve and the raising up anew of the new Adam & Eve.

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41. Jason,

    I find it ironic that you accuse Penal Substitution of “diminishing God’s wrath”, when your own view essentially denies God has any wrath in the scriptural sense.

    You equate God’s wrath with the preaching of law, which in your view “kills the old” in order to “raise it up new” by the preaching of gospel. This makes God’s wrath like “birth pain”, i.e. something unpleasant that is necessary to brings out good.

    But such a view of God’s wrath is unscriptural.

    1, The elect do not come under God’s wrath by the preaching of law. The elect, like everyone else, are by nature children of wrath, long before they came under the preaching of law.

    2, God’s wrath is manifested in hardening the hearts of men, not “killing the old” in order to “raise it up new”. Romans 1 describes God punishing sinners by giving them to a yet more sinful mind.

    3, The new birth only happens to an elect person because he is delivered from God’s wrath. The new birth manifests God’s favor, which causes the elect to believe the gospel and repent all false gospels.

    4, The believer has passed from death to life. He is never under God’s wrath again, even if he still hears the preaching of law.

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42. “How shall we distinguish Christ’s active obedience from His passive obedience? Shall we say that He accomplished His active obedience by His life and accomplished His passive obedience by His death? No, that will not do at all. During every moment of His life upon earth Christ was engaged in
    Speaking of Justification, here’s Machen on the Active and passive obedience of Christ.

    His passive obedience. It was all for Him humiliation, was it not? It was all suffering. It was all part of His payment of the penalty of sin. On the other hand, we cannot say that His death was passive obedience and not active obedience. On the contrary, His death was the crown of His active obedience. It was the crown of that obedience to the law of God by which He merited eternal life for those whom He came to save.

    Do you not see, then, what the true state of the case is? Christ’s active obedience and His passive obedience are not two divisions of His work, some of the events of His earthly life being His active obedience and other events of His life being His passive obedience; but every event of His life was both active obedience and passive obedience. Every event of His life was a part of His payment of the penalty of sin, and every event of His life was a part of that glorious keeping of the law of God by which He earned for His people the reward of eternal life. The two aspects of His work, in other words, are inextricably intertwined. Neither was performed apart from the other. Together they constitute the wonderful, full salvation which was wrought for us by Christ our Redeemer.”

    J. Gresham Machen in the book God Transcendent (190-191)

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43. http://www.reformation21.org/blog/2015/11/truly-reformed-tr-reformed-cat.php

    Mark Jones—“I sometimes worry that their zeal for Confessional fidelity. The better versions of hypothetical universalism – which differ from the views of Amyraut or Cameron – are practically indistinguishable from certain versions of particular redemption. John Owen was actually the novel theologian when he wrote The Death of Death.”

    mcmark—Why can’t we all just get along? We are justified by means of SOME doctrine, but since even correct doctrine needs also the efficacy of the Holy Spirit,. maybe some are justified by the Spirit using false doctrine, perhaps even lies and falsehoods.

    Since we all live in the not yet, everything is “gray” in the real world For justification, sure maybe we still need some precision, but who can say how much, or how much lack of sinning you need to go along with your doctrine. it’s not like the old days.. Now we live in a context where covenant children fornicate with other covenant children, and so maybe it’s a good thing to be less than precise about justification of the ungodly.

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44. Bonhoeffer—”There are some who, when they find out that the bus is going the wrong direction, walk toward the other end of the bus.”

    Mark Jones—“As our Father, God accepts less than absolute perfection because God accepted absolute perfection in our place. ….The obedience we offer to God does not have to be sinless obedience or perfect obedience, but it must be sincere obedience… God rewards imperfect works, according to the riches of his grace, because he is our Father. (Even if the devils would perform good works, God would delight in these works, according to Charnock and Witsius.)”

    http://www.reformation21.org/blog/2015/02/god-accepts-imperfection.php

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45. Count on Mark Jones to turn “christian liberty” into a re-run of his claims about the new ability (and therefore duty) of Christians. Yes, we are able, his theology of glory says—

    Mark Jones—“What do we believe about the power of God at work in his people? The SBC view on this matter is a pneumatological error, among other things. This isn’t even so much about alcohol as it is about ….denying the power of the Spirit to enable us to make a good use of God’s gracious gifts (and) to exercise the fruit of the Spirit, with joy and self-control, when drinking God’s good gift of alcohol. I highlight self-control because some Christians, especially in Reformed circles, do flaunt their liberty a little too much and seem to show a lack of self-control in this area. Just as you aren’t a better Christian because you don’t drink, don’t be deceived that you’re somehow more holy because you have a gift for showing others just how free you are in Christ…. – See more at: http://www.reformation21.org/blog/2016/01/legalism-in-the-southern-bapti.php#sthash.AJTRZzlC.dpuf

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46. Nobody can say just how Antinomian you can be and still be justified in the end.

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