Thus says the Lord: "Stand by the roads, and look, and ask for the ancient paths, where the good way is; and walk in it, and find rest for your souls.
But they said, 'We will not walk in it.'" --Jeremiah 6:16

 

25 July, 2007 - by Chad   comments: (0) Sound Doctrine   "Am I Doing Enough To Get God To Forgive Me?" I have a Roman Catholic relative who actually believes that he is maintaining the ten commandments in his own life, and once expressed to me that one of his deep concerns is that, on the occasion that he does break a commandment, what would happen to him if he were to get in a car accident and die before having a chance to do an act of contrition. In this post, Chad VanRens is back with us and is speaking once again on the subject of sanctification; he will demonstrate some of the more subtle protestant versions of that "I must do some 'work' to make myself clean again" thinking. Along the way, Chad is going to give you an excerpt from a very important book that could help you come to a better understanding of how to fight sin biblically. That's something that every true believer takes great interest in. Chad writes: In my previous postings we examined the false teaching that it is necessary for the Christian to return to the cross over and over again for cleansing from sin. Surely if Christ's death has propitiated the wrath of God for all those who believe and that his sacrifice was once forever then such a teaching is in effect nothing less than a denial of the atoning work of Christ. However, the Christian with the sensitive conscience who sees his sinfulness and realizes that God has no fellowship with sin often wonders how he can be accepted by God because he still sees in himself remaining sin. Often the Christian feels as though his remaining sin somehow keeps him from fellowship with God, that God will not accept him unless he can prove his penitence often by some unbiblical and grandiose act of contrition which often serves only to lead the Christian back into bondage. These acts of contrition or repentance are thought to be done in faith but in point of fact the exact opposite is true. The Christian may stray from acting in faith by trying to seek God through means by which he has not commanded, in effect erecting an idol, for that is the very essence of an idol, a means conceived in the heart of man for approaching God. Often this is the result of the Christian's failure to understand and realize his position in Christ and his position in regards to sin. The book of Romans teaches us some fundamental truths which often are not properly applied by believers. Among doctrines like original sin, sovereign election, and perseverance of the saints are the doctrines concerning Christ's death and resurrection and how the believer is baptized into Christ's death and raised in newness of life. How he is dead to sin and alive to God and how sin has no more dominion over him. He is free from the bondage of sin. Freedom from sin is in particular one of the main points in Romans 6. This is an often misunderstood doctrine. A right understanding of this would go far in the life of the Christian who sees more and more his indwelling sin. It would go very far indeed in preventing him falling into various man made systems of contrition and repentance for he is indeed dead to sin and alive to God through Jesus Christ our Lord and nothing can change that. Martyn Lloyd-Jones' exposition of Romans 6 deals with the bible's teaching on the state of the believer as a new creation in great detail and provides the Christian with the bible's teaching of what it means to be baptized into Christ's death, raised with Christ in newness of life and how this applies to the believer and how this ensures our fellowship with God and our final salvation. Some may charge me with teaching antinomianism here but as Lloyd Jones has said in this volume, "the gospel when properly preached always sounds antinomian." But as he begins his exposition of verses one and two he shows that the notion that we can live in unrepentant sin is absolutely ridiculous. That will not be the focus of our discussion here however. Instead I shall give an excerpt from Lloyd-Jones' exposition on verse 11 of Romans 6 and we shall examine the objective truth which must be first grasped before any real biblical repentance or mortification of sin can take place. We must remember that the epistles, particularly the book of Romans, always set forth an objective truth before a call to action. Without understanding these truths our action may be little else than a vain attempt to please God or worse yet, an act of idolatry. Let us first consider Romans 6:10-11: For in that he died, he died unto sin once: but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God. Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord. That's the truth that must first be grasped. Here is what Martyn Lloyd-Jones has to say on the matter from his volume on Romans 6 entitled "The New Man", chapter 10 of his book. Martyn Lloyd-Jones on Romans 6 In referring to this most important and vital verse last time I indicated that this is the first exhortation, actually, in this Epistle. We must therefore pay great attention to it and make certain that we are indeed doing what the Apostle asks us to do. As we do so I must remind you that there are certain general principles which must govern our interpretation. These we derive from what he has been saying in the previous ten verses. The first guiding principle is that we are to reckon as being true of ourselves what the Apostle has been previously telling us is true of the Lord Jesus Christ. The very words 'likewise' and 'also' make this abundantly clear. The second principle is that this is not an experimental statement, not a question of experience. This is so because as I have just been saying, we are to 'reckon' something as being true of ourselves which is already true of Christ. Therefore we must not begin to think in terms of consciousness of sin within us, and how we are going to get rid of it, for there never was any sin in Christ at all, and he never had any consciousness of sin. So it is a non-experimental statement. We are told to realize, and to hold before ourselves and in our consciousness constantly, something that is already true of our position or status. It is not an exhortation to us to do anything with regard to sin, but to realize what has already been done for us with respect to our relationship to sin. It is an exhortation to us to remember what is already true of us; it urges us to realize what has already happened to us as Christians, those of us who are joined to the Lord Jesus Christ. And what is true of us is that we are already in an entirely new position and standing with respect to sin. This is something we believe solely because the word of God teaches it. You do not 'experience' your position, you are told about it and you believe it. That is what justification by faith alone means. We have this Word of God which tells us that this is God's way of salvation; and we have nothing but the word of God. As we have seen, we have all got to do what Abraham did, as the Apostle has already reminded us in chapter 4. We must take the bare Word of God, believe it, submit to it, and act upon it. That is what we have to do with this statement. Should someone come to me and say, 'But how can I say that I am indeed dead to sin when I am conscious of sin within me, and I feel that I am a terrible sinner?' my answer is, that you have got to believe it in spite of those feelings, exactly as Abraham had to believe God's word that Sarah was going to bear a son though he knew that he had reached the age of ninety-nine and Sarah ninety, the thing was a sheer impossibility on the natural level. Naturally, Abraham knew that it could not happen. In spite of this he believed God; and you and I must do the same. Now that is what this statement exhorts us to do. It is not experimental, not a matter of experience, but we just have to take this word, that if we are in Christ, if we are joined to Christ- and this is true of every believer in Him- then we are already 'dead to sin', even as He is dead to sin. This is of course only a brief sampling of the exposition. There is much more to be considered but this may give us a sure ground for mortifying the deeds of the flesh and should help to focus our confession and repentance according to faith and not according to man made ordinances and exhortations, for that is the very essence of what it means for the just to 'live by faith'. We must by faith take the word of God, believe it, act upon it and not innovate or go beyond it. The Word of God is sufficient. Let us therefore hold fast to that form of doctrine into which we were delivered and walk by faith. Posted by: Jim B.   Link: http://www.oldtruth.com/blog.cfm/id.2.pid.742   Be the first to post a comment about this article        Home  |   About  |  Videos   |  Calvinism