it is good for the heart to be strengthened by grace ... knowingly put oneself “un-der the law”...

I s s u e 1 5 1 O c t o b e r 2 0 0 8

… it is good for the heart to be strengthened by grace … Hebrews 13:9

Studies in Galatians—Part Nineteen

John G. Reisinger

We have now reached the heart of Paul’s letter to the Galatians as it concerns the Christian’s relationship to the law. After laying out the doctrine of justifi ca-tion by faith without the deeds of the law in chapters 2 and 3, Paul raised and answered the question, “What then was the purpose of the law?” (3:19). His answer reveals the radical difference between his theology of the law and that of the Judaizers. Paul asserts that, contrary to the Judaizers’ position, God’s primary purpose in giving the law was neither to curb sin nor to motivate holy living. God gave the law to do just the opposite. The law magnifi es and exposes sin, thus revealing humanity’s hopeless condition. Pressing the law on the conscience will cause transgressions to increase (Rom. 4:15 and 5:20). Paul has shown the utter ineffectiveness of the law to deal with sin in both the sinner and the saint.

Paul realizes that his stance on the law raises a logical question. If the Mosaic law does not help us in any way to be either justifi ed or sanctifi ed, and, in the case of sanctifi cation, the law actually can be a real hindrance, then why did God give the law in the fi rst place? Paul answers by explaining two distinct functions of the law. The primary purpose of the Mosaic law for the unbelievers in Israel was to convict them of sin and their inability to earn righteousness by their own efforts. This pushed them to faith in God’s promise given to Abraham of a coming Messiah. The law also functioned as a pedagogue in the conscience of the believing Israelite during the period of his or her minority prior to the coming of the promised seed.

Paul then poses a question of his own to the Galatians: “Do you people know what

Un-SHACK-led Part Two

A Review of William P. Young’s Popular New Book, The ShackReid A. Ferguson

In This IssueStudies in Galatians—Part Nineteen

John G. Reisinger1

Un-SHACK-led Part TwoReid A. Ferguson 1

Studies on the Resurrection of Lazarus—Part Eighteen

Dr. Philip W. McMillan3

Reisinger—Continued on page 2

G RS O U N D O F

A EC

In our previous article, we considered overall theologi-cal objections to the premises underlying the storyline in William P. Young’s popular book, The Shack. In this article, we will examine specifi c selections that are particu-larly problematic. These sections present ideas that are in direct confl ict with biblical truth.

This book would not likely lead others to Christ. On the plus side, some parts of it could offer useful concepts of God. But unregenerate readers who imbibe what Young writes as though it were the entire truth about God and the nature of salvation will not be likely to recognize their own plight, and thus they will remain fi rmly on the path to hell. The content of the book is dangerous because it seems bib-

lical, and therein lies the problem. The most specifi c charge I would bring against this book is that it destroys the need for the cross of Christ. Consider the following:

Papa: “I don’t need to punish people for sin. Sin is its own punishment, devouring you from the inside. It’s not my purpose to punish it; it is my joy to cure it.”1

On the surface, part of this exchange seems to echo Paul’s words in Romans 2, where he repeatedly states that God has given people over to the sinful desires of their hearts. It would seem that sin is indeed its own punish-ment. Yet there is a crucial 1 William Young, The Shack (Los Angeles: Windblown Media, 2007), 120.

Ferguson—Continued on page 5

October 2008 Issue 151

the law really says” (4:21)? The ques-tion implies that the Galatians did not understand what the law actually taught, because if they had under-stood, they would have been insane to want it.

Paul wants the Galatians to see ex-actly what a dangerous position they will put themselves in if they adopt the Mosaic law. If they follow the Ju-daizers and go “under the law,” they will be “alienated from Christ” and will “fall from grace.” Christ, and his atoning work, will “be of no value” to them at all (5:2-4). To add any cer-emony as an essential component of salvation, whether that ceremony is circumcision, baptism, or any other, is to believe far more than just bad theol-ogy; it is to deny completely the gos-pel of God’s sovereign grace. Such an addition is heresy of the deepest dye. The same principle applies if we add law-keeping in any way to the terms of salvation. In such a case, we effec-tively reject the doctrine of the cross and the blood atonement our Savior made. To knowingly put oneself “un-der the law” in the sense the Judaizers were advocating was to deny Christ and to reject his all-suffi cient grace by trusting in personal works to gain justifi cation. Such a course consigns one to hell.

This situation in the Galatian church sounds a warning to believ-ers in any century and in any setting. Even the most dedicated Christians are not immune from the kind of le-galism that the fi rst-century Judaizers were promoting. The church constant-ly faces two problems related to the law. On the one hand, we must guard against the threat of the “black devil” of antinomianism—being against all law—and on the other hand, we must avoid the danger of the “white devil” of legalism—adding law to the gospel. As Spurgeon said, these two enemies are both devils and either one is capa-ble of destroying a church or a Chris-tian’s profession of faith. If you do not

Sound of Grace is a publication of Sover-eign Grace New Covenant Ministries, a tax exempt 501(c)3 corporation. Contributions to Sound of Grace are deductible under section 170 of the Code.

Sound of Grace is published 10 times a year. The subscription price is $10.00 per year. This is a paper unashamedly committed to the truth of God’s sovereign grace and New Covenant Theology. We invite all who love these same truths to pray for us and help us fi nancially.

We do not take any paid advertising. The use of an article by a particular person

is not an endorsement of all that person be-lieves, but it merely means that we thought that a particular article was worthy of printing.

Sound of Grace Board: John G. Reisinger, John Thorhauer, Bob VanWingerden and Ja-cob Moseley.

Editor: John G. Reisinger; Phone: (585)396-3385; e-mail: [email protected].

Webmaster: Maurice Bergeron: [email protected]

General Manager: Jacob Moseley:[email protected]

Send all orders and all subscriptions to: Sound of Grace, 5317 Wye Creek Drive, Fred-erick, MD 21703-6938 – Phone 800-376-4146 or 301-473-8781 Fax 240-206-0373. Visit the bookstore: http://www.newcovenantmedia.com

Address all editorial material and questions to: John G. Reisinger, Sound of Grace, 3302 West Lake Rd, Canandaigua, NY 14424-2441.

Visit the Sound of Grace Web Page at: http://www.soundofgrace.com

Scripture quotations marked (NIV) are taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNA-TIONAL VERSION® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by Permission. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations marked “NKJV” are taken from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by Permission. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations marked (ESV) are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Ver-sion, copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

ContributionsOrders

VISA or MasterCardIf you wish to make a tax-deductible contribu-tion to Sound of Grace, please mail a check to: Sound of Grace, 5317 Wye Creek Drive, Frederick, MD 21703-6938.Please check the mailing label to fi nd the expiration of your subscription. Please send payment if you want your subscription to continue—$10.00 for ten issues. If you are unable to subscribe at this time, please call or drop a note in the mail and we will be glad to continue sending Sound of Grace free of charge.

acknowledge the real danger of these two enemies of the gospel, you know very little about either your own heart or the truth of Scripture. We must remember that the Galatians were the product of the mighty apostle’s ministry. They had been converted and indoctrinated under his personal teaching. If such people could be be-guiled into forsaking a gospel of grace for a mess of pottage that mixed law and grace, then we surely are capable of doing the same thing today. In the book of Galatians, Paul deals with both perversions of law: the black devil, antinomianism (5:14; 6:2), and the white devil, legalism.

Before we dig any deeper into Paul’s questions and answers about the law, we need to say a word about methodology. Question-asking as a method of teaching and argumenta-tion dates back at least to Socrates. Asking and answering penetrating questions is one of Paul’s favorite methods of teaching. In order to inter-pret the questions a person has used to teach, we need to ask some questions of our own. (1) What is being asked in the question we want to interpret? (2) Why was that particular question asked when it was (at that particu-lar point in the argument)? In other words, what prompted or necessitated that specifi c question? (3) Do we un-derstand the answer the biblical author provided to the question? (4) Lastly, how do we apply the question and the answer to our situation?

Lloyd-Jones exemplifi es this in-terpretive methodology. He fi rst de-scribes the problem that the biblical writer faced in his day; he then shows how the writer answers and solves that problem. He next shows how we to-day face the same basic problem that that particular writer faced; and lastly, he shows how to apply the answers to our problem today.

So, before we interpret Paul’s questions and answers, we must ask


Reisinger—Continued from page 1

Issue 151 October 2008

Jesus wept. (John 11:35 NKJV)1

In this lesson we will study what I am sure you know is the shortest verse in the Bible—“Jesus wept.” Nowhere in Scripture is it recorded that our Lord laughed, and I can fi nd no reference which reveals that any of the disciples burst forth in an audible merriment.

As a general rule, when laughter is spoken of in Scripture there is a negative connotation involved. When the children of Israel were rebuilding the temple and the city of Jerusalem, their enemies heard of it and Nehe-miah 2:19 states that they laughed at the workers and despised them. In 2 Chronicles 30, King Hezekia sent runners to Ephraim and Manasseh to bid them to come to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover and to seek the Lord, worship him and fi nd forgive-ness for all their sin. Verse 10 says: “…but they laughed at them and mocked them.”

I am not easy with all the lightness, humor and mirth in religion today. There is nothing funny about sin, con-demnation, the helpless estate of the lost, the death of Christ, or the fi res of hell. James said this in chapter 4:9, 10: “Lament and mourn and weep! Let your laughter be turned to mourn-ing and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord and he will lift you up.” It is those who go “…out weeping, bearing the seed for sowing, shall come home with shouts of joy, bringing his sheaves with him” (Psalm 126:6). Such is the business of this life and the Lord’s work. Clean humor is good for the soul, but mirth is not to be mixed with the gospel.

Three times our Lord left us a record of his weeping. He wept over

1 All Scripture quotations in this article are from the New King James Version.

Jerusalem and his countrymen after the fl esh, seeing their hardness of heart and the great judgment he must bring upon them. The 5th chapter of Hebrews records his strong crying and tears in Gethsemane. His soul was torn over the immensity of sin which required so great suffering on his part. He wept for being made sin for us and because he would know separation from the Father who had never shown anything but fathomless love for him. And I think he wept for his own, who all their lifetime were held in bondage to fear death. He wept “…with vehe-ment cries and tears,” (Hebrews 5:7).

In Hebrews 5:7 it speaks of his weeping as being in “the days of His fl esh.” Here indeed is a man of sor-rows acquainted with grief. I believe we need to pause here and realize his incarnation. Of the Trinity we say they are one God and we must not divide that substance nor confound those persons. And in this man Jesus of Nazareth we have the eternal Son united sinlessly with the fl esh of man whom he created. This God/Man’s nature is indeed divine, and it is also truly human; who can understand it? And it is this indivisible man who is the fullness of the Godhead bodily who is seated at the right hand of God in glory.

And it is this divine man who stood with the company of the sorrow-ing at his own friend’s tomb and wept. Many say he was just a common man like you and me, some even say he had sins of his own. Others say he was only some ethereal manifestation of a god. It is said by some that he came to teach us a way by which we can earn eternal life. Heresies about this man seem limitless. But in this weeping-man we see that “…eternal life which was with the Father and was mani-fested to us” (1 John 1:2).

We are going to see a grave open, a dead man come forth alive, who will again sit at his own table, who will kiss his sisters, talk with friends he knew before he died, and go to the temple to worship and pray to his God.

Yet, we are privileged to see the man with the gift of life in his words alone; stand at the tomb of one he loved with his face wet with his own tears. Do you doubt he is really MAN? Look, see his tears and be-lieve.

This man was born in Bethlehem and lay in a manger. He suckled at his mother’s breast; she changed him as mothers do. He grew, increased in wisdom and stature with God and men. He received commands from his parents and honored them by obedi-ence. He was subject to them. He worked as a carpenter, knew the pain of a sliver in his hand, the weariness of a long day, the rest and comfort of a noon hour, the taste of good food. He had no hole as does a fox, neither a nest as does a bird; he had no home and so he had deep feelings for the poor. He had friends like the one in the tomb and had enemies among the Jews that stood around him. Satan tempted and tried him, but the wonder of all wonders is that he wept. We are born crying, often die with tears of grief on our face and the faces of those around us and here we see he does the same. If we have friends, we will lose some of them and weep and others will stand at our grave and sob and here Jesus stands at his friend’s grave and weeps.

First, I think that he wept because the sentence of death must fall on so dear a friend. Sins’ wages had been collected from the mortal hand of a

McMillan—Continued on page 18

S t u d i e s o n t h e R e s u r r e c t i o n o f L a z a r u s — Pa r t E i g h t e e n

Dr. Philip W. McMillan

October 2008 Issue 151takes an historical account from Gen-esis involving troubles in Abraham’s household and uses it as a spiritual allegory. Writers of Scripture have lib-erty, when moved by the Holy Spirit, that we do not have. Just because Paul assigned an allegorical meaning to a passage in the Old Testament Scrip-tures, we do not have license to do the same thing with other passages.

On this third view, to be under the law is to have the conscience under the burden of keeping the law to earn standing with God. We will see this more clearly when we come to Ga-latians 5:1 where the law is called a “yoke of bondage.” To be under the law in the sense Paul means here is to be under the obligation, upon threat of death, to perfectly obey the law in its entirety or suffer the consequences of eternal death.

One of the diffi culties in defi ning the word law is that the writers of Scripture do not assign one and only one meaning to it. R. L. Dabney lists eight different uses of the words the law.

The word “LAW” (torah and no-mos) is employed in Scripture with a certain latitude of meaning, but always carrying the force of mean ing contained in the general idea of a regula tive principle.

First, it sometimes expresses the whole of Revela tion, as in Psalm l:2.

Second, the whole Old Testament, as in John 10:34.

Third, frequently the Pentateuch, as in Luke 24:44.

Fourth, the perceptive moral law (Proverbs 24:4; Romans 2:14).

Fifth, the ceremonial code, as in Hebrews 10:1. [JGR: Notice the word code]

Sixth, the decalogue, Matt. 22:36-40.

Seventh, a ruling power in our na-ture, as in Romans 7:23.

of the Old Testament did not exist. Such a view is anachronistic, reading later developments back into the text. Then, just a few paragraphs later, he tells the Galatians that Scripture says to cast out the law/bondwoman (4:30). This interpretation makes Paul refer to the Scripture as the basis for casting out the Scripture. It is a logically in-coherent statement. Furthermore, Paul tells the Galatians that the historical women (Sarah and Hagar) represent the Mosaic and the New Covenants.

Another view states that by the word law Paul is referring to the cer-emonial law since Paul would never think of casting out the moral law. This view also is anachronistic. The division of the Mosaic law into three distinct segments is a much later development.1 Furthermore, as we will see in a later article, even if the category were valid, the so-called ceremonial law would not have been a yoke of bondage. This view seems more concerned with protecting a particular theological view of the Ten Commandments than in carefully ex-egeting the biblical texts.

Still others say that Paul means the Old Covenant, since he immediately mentions “the two covenants” (v. 24). This is my view. Paul advances his argument by comparing the two ma-jor covenants to which the Scripture of his day referred, namely, the Old Covenant made with Israel at Sinai and the New Covenant promised and then fulfi lled in and through Christ. It seems to me that Paul, by the words the law, means the law covenant made with Israel at Sinai. Certainly, Paul’s point is not merely to establish the historical fact that Sarah expelled Ish-mael and his mother from Abraham’s household. The expulsion of Hagar and her son are important in Paul’s theology because they illustrate the necessity for a child of God to cast out the law covenant and its fruits. A note of warning is in order here. Paul

1 Generally, historians credit Thomas Aquinas (14th century) with the division.



our questions. What do the words that Paul uses mean? What provoked Paul to ask these specifi c questions? Why did he fi nd it necessary to ask those specifi c questions at that particular time in his argument? It is obvious that Paul has said, or clearly implied, something that he felt needed addi-tional explanation. He must have said something about the law that was con-trary to what his hearers were thinking about it. Paul seems to have assumed that his fi rst question about the law (3:19) would still be in the minds of his hearers when he asked the sec-ond question (4:21). Paul has said something about the law that made them want to say, “If the law was not given for the purpose which we have believed it was, then what was God’s purpose in giving it?”

The fi rst thing we must do is defi ne some terms. (1) What does Paul mean by words the law? How would the Galatians, and especially the Judaizers among them, have understood Paul’s vocabulary? (2) What does it mean to be under the law in a wrong way? (3) What does it mean to hear the law?

What does Paul mean when he uses the word law? Exactly what law is Paul talking about? Whatever law it is, New Covenant believers have never been under it and must never allow themselves to be beguiled into going under it (4:24-28).

Commentators on the book of Ga-latians generally offer three answers to the question of to what law Paul refers in verse 21. One view sees the law as referring to the Old Testament Scriptures, since Paul immediately quotes, in verses 22-31, from Genesis. This section of the Old Testament Scriptures covers a period of time before the Old Covenant was made with Israel. This would mean that Paul thinks the Galatians are wrong to put themselves under the Old Testament Scriptures. This seems highly unlikely on two counts. At this point in the ear-ly church’s development, the concept


difference between Paul’s words and those of Papa. In Paul’s scenario, GOD is punishing sin by letting it run its course inside people. Furthermore, Paul brings out the idea of an ultimate punishment for sin—death. In these three sentences quoted above, Young has eliminated the doctrine of the pe-nal substitutionary death of Christ at Calvary. Isaiah, anticipating the Mes-siah, wrote:

Surely he has borne our griefs

and carried our sorrows;

yet we esteemed him stricken,

smitten by God, and affl icted.

But he was wounded for our trans-gressions;

he was crushed for our iniquities;

upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,

and with his stripes we are healed.

All we like sheep have gone astray;

we have turned—every one—to his own way;

and the LORD has laid on him

the iniquity of us all. (Isaiah 53:4-6, ESV)

If bearing punishment in our place is not part of Messiah’s work, then we have no gospel to preach. If sin itself is not a punishable thing, rooted in rebellion against God, then Jesus died for nothing. Indeed, we wonder how it is that Jesus even could die. Death happens because it is the wages of sin. If Jesus were not bearing sin, he could not have died, unless something other than sin is the ultimate cause of death. If God does not need to punish sin, then God is not righteous. If sin only needs to be cured, and not forgiven, then we are not justifi ed, and we need to throw out much of the Bible. Young has substituted a medical and thera-peutic model of salvation for the bibli-cal one that answers the need for justi-fi cation and cleansing from our sins. Ferguson—Continued on page 7

Young also undermines the con-cept of authority. Again, on the surface, it would seem that he is in accord with biblical teaching. We think of Jesus’ words in the Gospels, warning his disciples about adopting the Gentile model of authority (Matt. 20:25-27; Mark 10:42-44).

Sarayu: “Authority, as you usually think of it, is merely the excuse the strong use to make others conform to what they want.”

Mack: “Isn’t it helpful in keeping people from fi ghting endlessly or get-ting hurt?”

Sarayu: “Sometimes. But in a self-ish world it is also used to infl ict great harm.”

Mack: “But don’t you use it to re-strain evil?”

Sarayu: “We carefully respect your choices, so we work within your systems even while we seek to free you from them.”2

Upon further consideration, how-ever, we are left wondering what room Young’s version of Christian-ity has for any authority at all. From what authority systems are we to be freed? Not secular. Paul writes that Christians are to obey the governing authorities (Rom. 13:1-5). Religious? Paul can write that he is free from the Mosaic law, but he makes it clear that he is not free from God’s law (1 Cor.

2 Ibid., 123.

9:21). Authority is not the problem, contrary to Sarayu’s proclamation. Human misuse of something good that God ordained is the problem. But Young confuses the two and throws away the concept of authority alto-gether.

Consider the implications of the above exchange. Young’s elimination of authority evacuates the word dis-obedience of any real meaning. If we lose the concept of disobedience, we lose the concept of rebellion. If we get rid of rebellion, we defl ty sweep aside the fall of human beings in the Gar-den. Young’s theology begins in the Garden, but from there, he re-writes the entire scheme of the Scriptures. Authority is not a human system: it was God’s system from the beginning. God speaks and things that were not come into being. That is power AND authority. Jesus exercises authority over the elements when he changes water to wine and when he calms the wind and the waves. Jesus has author-ity over all things, both in heaven and on earth, including his followers. Christians are those who are slaves to Christ. Love-slaves to be certain, but beyond all question, directly under his authority. Young’s paradigm shift has no room for the language of passages such as the following:

Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him. (John 3:36, ESV)

“Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and not do what I tell you? Everyone who comes to me and hears my words and does them, I will show you what he is like: he is like a man building a house, who dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock. And when a fl ood arose, the stream broke against that house and could not shake it, because it had been well built. But the one who hears and does not do them is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation. When the stream broke against it, immedi-

Ferguson—Continued from page 1

If Jesus were not bear-ing sin, he could not have

died, unless something other than sin is the ultimate cause

of death. If God does not need to punish sin, then God is not righteous. If sin only needs to

be cured, and not forgiven, then we are not justifi ed, and we need to throw out much of

the Bible.

October 2008 Issue 151so did give both life, and light, and strength against sin, as the Psalmist declares, Ps.19:7-9. In this sense it contained not only the law of pre-cepts, but the promise also and the covenant, which was the means of conveying spiritual life and strength unto the church. In this sense the law is not spoken of in Romans 6:14, nor is it anywhere opposed to grace.

2. [The law is taken] for the cov-enant rule of perfect obedience: “Do this, and live.” In this sense men are said to be “under it,” in opposi-tion unto being “under grace.” They are under its power, rule, conditions, and authority, as a covenant… In this sense the law was never ordained of God to convey grace or spiritual strength unto the souls of men… It is not God’s ordinance for the dethron-ing of sin, nor for the destruction of its dominion… There is, therefore, no help to be expected against the do-minion of sin from the law… Where-fore those who are “under the law” are under the dominion of sin… “The law is holy… just … good” but can do them no good, as unto their deliver-ance from the POWER of sin. God hath not appointed it unto that end. Sin will never be dethroned by it; it will not give place unto law, neither in its TITLE nor its POWER…3

Owen, in this passage, says ex-actly what I do about the law. The Old Testament Scriptures (the thirty-nine books written before Christ came), or the law in the fi rst sense in Owen’s defi nition, clearly revealed and de-clared the one gospel message of grace. The law covenant made with Israel at Sinai, however, had no grace at all in its covenantal terms. It was a killing covenant. God designed it to be a ministration of death (2 Cor. 3 and Rom. 7:1-11). The law covenant served a very gracious purpose in the history of redemption; it killed self-hope and prepared those under it for grace, but its terms were solely legal. The ceremonial feasts and holy

3 John Owen, The Works of John Owen, vol. 7 (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1965), 42, 43, 44.

Eighth, the covenant of works, Ro-mans 6:142

In this discussion, we will be us-ing two defi nitions. The fi rst is the fi rst one in Dabney’s list, the “whole of Revelation” or the Scriptures as special revelation as opposed to natu-ral revelation (as in Psalm 19:7). The second will be the eighth in Dabney’s list, the “covenant of works.” Dab-ney would not defi ne the covenant of works the same way that we would, but we will discuss that later. John Owen saw these two defi nitions as covering the major uses of the law in Scripture. In a sermon on Romans 6:14, Ye are not under the law, but un-der grace, published by his wife fi ve years after his death, Owen elucidates the point under discussion. We agree with and accept Owen’s defi nition of the word law in Romans 6:14, as well as Galatians 3:19 and 4:21, to mean law as a covenant, and we agree with him that it is an either/or proposition. You are either under law or you are under grace, but you cannot be under both at the same time in the sense in which Paul uses those words in these passages. Those two concepts, under the law and under grace, as used in these three passages, are antitheti-cal. You cannot be under the law and under grace as covenants at the same time. The emphasis in the following quotation is mine. Owen says:

First, the law giveth no strength against sin unto them that are under it, but grace does. Sin will neither be cast out nor kept out of its throne, but by a spiritual power and strength in the soul to oppose, conquer, and de-throne it. Where it is not conquered, it will reign; and conquered it will not be without a mighty prevailing power: this the law will not, cannot give.

The law is taken two ways:

1. For the whole revelation of God in the Old Testament. In this sense the law had grace in it, and

2 R. L. Dabney, Systematic Theology, Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth, 1985), 351.

days clearly preached the gospel of a coming Messiah, but even that proc-lamation came at the end of a sword. Scripture clearly presents the Mosaic covenant as a legal covenant of works.

Owen then goes on to his second major heading. “The law not only gives no strength against sin”:

Secondly, the law gives no liberty of any kind; it gendereth unto bond-age, and so cannot free us from any dominion,—not that of sin, for this must be by liberty. But this we have also by the gospel. There is a twofold liberty:—1. Of state and condition; [JGR: referring to justifi cation] 2. Of internal operation; [JGR: refer-ring to sanctifi cation] and we have both by the gospel.4

Owen then shows that we are de-livered from the curse of the law and have internal liberty, which he calls “the freedom of the mind from the powerful inward chains of sin, with an ability to act all of the powers and fac-ulties of the soul in a gracious manner. Hereby is the power of sin in the soul destroyed. And this also is given us in the gospel.”5

Owen goes on to show the inability of the law, used in his second defi ni-tion as a covenant, to help a believer fi ght sin. Actually, the law not only gives no aid in the fi ght with sin, the law does the exact opposite. The law gives strength to sin (1 Cor. 15:56). If you ask the law to help you struggle against sin, the law will side with sin and condemn you for your guilt.

Thirdly, the law doth not supply us with effectual motives and en-couragements to endeavor the ruin of the dominion of sin in a way of duty; which must be done, or in the end it will prevail. It works only by fear and dread… these things weaken, ener-vate, and discourage the soul in its confl ict against sin…6

4 Ibid., 549.5 Ibid., 550.6 Ibid., 550.




ately it fell, and the ruin of that house was great.” (Luke 6:46-49, ESV)

And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.” (Matthew 28:18, ESV)

And they were all amazed, so that they questioned among themselves, saying, “What is this? A new teaching with authority! He commands even the unclean spirits, and they obey him.” (Mark 1:27, ESV)

New Testament writers rely on the concept of authority as they defi ne sin. Consider 1 John 3:4 where the author defi nes sin as lawlessness—the defi -ance of God’s authority. Practically speaking, we all rely on the concept of authority: try disciplining your own children without authority. The notion is not only ridiculous, it is dangerous and unbiblical. Young undermines the very authority God claims for himself.

Young also sidesteps the issue of un-belief.

Mack: “So was there really an actual garden? I mean, Eden and all that?”

Sarayu: “Of course, I told you I have a thing for gardens.”

Mack: “That’s going to bother some people. There are lots of people who think it was only a myth.”

Sarayu: “Well, their mistake isn’t fatal. Rumors of glory are often hid-den inside of what many consider myths and tales.”3

There is a vast difference between dismissing something that contains a fl ash of truth as a myth and rejecting God’s Word. May a person be uncer-tain about exactly what truth some parts of Scripture teach? Undoubt-edly. But in this conversation, Young summarily dismisses the issue of the authority, the veracity of the Word of God, and humanity’s obligation to believe that word as authoritative. Doubt remains intact, unchallenged.

3 Ibid., 134.

are not helpful or healthy...Papa is as submitted to me as I to Him. In fact we are submitted to you in the same way.”5

This is so wrong on so many levels that it is diffi cult to know where to start. First: the Bible clearly estab-lishes that there is a divine order in the Godhead. In fact, Paul sees order in the home as an extension of such or-der in the Godhead. Second: nowhere, in any passage of Scripture, is God the Father described as submitted to the Son. The opposite is expressly taught. Third: God does not submit himself to his creatures. In the incarnation, he submitted himself to creaturely limits, but never does he tells us that in our restored relationship, he has submitted himself to us. Our restored relation-ship allows us to submit ourselves to him. You see, lack of submission to God IS the carnal or fl eshly mindset:

For the mind that is set on the fl esh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it can-not. (Romans 8:7, ESV)

Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will fl ee from you. (James 4:7, ESV)

For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands. (Ephe-sians 5:23-24, ESV)

And he said, “Abba, Father, all things are possible for you. Remove this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will.” (Mark 14:36, ESV)

Then comes the end, when he de-livers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death. For “God has put all things in subjection under his feet.” But when it says, “all things are put in subjection,” it is plain that he is

5 Ibid., 145.Ferguson—Continued on page 14

Faith is believing that what God has said is true. Sometimes, we may not be sure just what he has said, and that is understandable. But some things are clear. Jesus accepted the Old Testament as God’s truthful account; including the creation account (Matt. 19:4-5). But Young will allow us to doubt what Jesus affi rms to be true. If we can safely question Jesus’ judg-ment about Eden, what else that he has said may we call into doubt? It would seem that the assumption that any of it is true is called into ques-tion. If there is no Garden, then there is no sin that occurred there. If there is no sin from which humanity needs to be delivered, the entire gospel is nonsense. Young either does not real-ize or does not care that humanity’s fall resulted from the question “has God said?” We cannot brush such a mistake—not believing God—lightly aside. Some mistakes are indeed fatal. Some eternally.

Young tackles the notion of evil.Sarayu: “Evil is a word we use to

describe the absence of Good, just as we use the word darkness to describe the absence of light or death to de-scribe the absence of Life.”4

Sin as mere negation is an age old error. Again, 1 John 3:4 defi nes sin as “lawlessness.” In the Garden of Eden, it was not the absence of good that was central to humanity’s fall, it was Adam and Eve’s positive rejection of God’s command, and deliberate dis-obedience. Young’s attempt to rid sin of its moral dimension, thus excluding genuine guilt for rebellion, will be re-visited again.

Young commits the fallacy of equating authority with the forceful and unwelcome imposition of God’s will and making love somehow the antithesis of that.

Jesus: “To force my will on you…is exactly what love does not do. Genuine relationships are marked by submission even when your choices

4 Ibid., 136.

Ferguson—Continued from page 5


Fourthly, Christ is not in the law; he is not proposed in it, not communi-cated by it,—we are not made partak-ers of him thereby. This is the work of grace, of the gospel. In it is Christ revealed; by it he is proposed and ex-hibited unto us…7

Can you say, with John Owen, Christ is not in the law? You can if you understand the two-fold meaning of law as Owen has defi ned it.

To follow Owen’s argument, we must see that the fi rst covenant—the Old Covenant given to Israel at Si-nai—rested primarily on the tables of the covenant, or the Decalogue. The Ten Commandments were the basic covenant document or sum-mary of the covenant terms. The Ten Commandments cannot be equated exactly with the Old Covenant, but they also cannot be separated from the Old Covenant. What happens to the Old Covenant happens to the Ten Commandments. If the Old Convent is abolished, or cast out, then the Ten Commandments are also cast out.

The Old Covenant, as a legal covenant, had the primary purpose of conviction of sin and preparation for grace. We must separate a gra-cious purpose—the preparation of sinners for salvation—from grace itself, which, as Owen said, is found only in the gospel. One, sovereign, unchanging purpose of grace, which is biblical, and a theological Covenant of Grace, which is purely theological, are two different things. One is the product of biblical exegesis and the other is the product of logic applied to systematic theology. John Owen is unerring in his two-fold defi nition. When the Scripture refers to the law covenant at Sinai, it refers to a legal covenant with no grace in it terms. Conversely, the Old Testament Scrip-tures, as revelation, are inherently full of grace: it is an act of grace for God to reveal himself to his creatures, es-pecially to those whom he has chosen

7 Ibid., 551.

Reisinger—Continued from page 6 unto salvation. The entire Old Cov-enant, as a part of that revelation, is gracious in that same sense, but not in its covenantal terms as given at Sinai.

In the same vein, there is not an ounce of covenantal law in the gospel of grace. There are clear, objective, moral standards, or laws, given to the New Covenant people of God, but they do not come as law at the end of a sword. They do not come from Mount Sinai. They come from Mount Calvary. However, even though there is no law, as defi ned in Owen’s sec-ond sense, in the gospel, true saving grace will always lead a child of God to seek to fulfi ll every command that God has revealed as his will for him or her today. The biblical gospel of grace will always produce a holy heart that pants after righteousness. The law covenant is powerless to either pro-duce or sustain such an attitude; if the gospel cannot accomplish these goals, then it is just as weak as the law. Grace must reign in righteousness or it is not grace.8

When we try to defi ne the par-ticular law to which Paul refers, we also raise the vexing theological problem of continuity and discontinu-ity. Clearly, Paul saw the Galatians’ observation of days, and months, and times, and years” (4:10) as evidence of their desertion of the truth of the New Covenant and adoption of the Old Covenant. He saw this observa-tion as loyalty to the Mosaic law on the part of the Galatians, but at the same time, and by the same evidence, he saw very little of “Christ being formed” in them. In 4:11 and 20, Paul is so disturbed by this infatuation with the Mosaic law that he questions their salvation.

What does it mean to be under the law in a wrong way? First, we have to know what it means to be under the law in the right way. For that, we must

8 See our book, Grace, available from New Covenant Media, 5317 Wye Creek Drive, Frederick, MD 21703-6938.

know the purpose of the law. Paul’s fi rst question about the law, “What, then, was the purpose of the law” (3:19, NIV) is the place to start this discussion. Paul asks and answers the specifi c question of both the nature of the law and God’s purpose in giving it. The heart of the problem in the the-ology of the Judaizers was their mis-use of the law. They were using the holy, just, and good law for a purpose God never intended. It is tragic but true that good people can unknowing-ly misuse the holy law of God. Paul is quite clear about this fact: “But we know that the law is good if one uses it lawfully” (1 Tim. 1:8, NKJV). If no one ever misused the law, Paul would have never written what he did in verse eight. So what constitutes a misuse of the law? Any attempt to make the law to be the mother of holi-ness in either a sinner or a saint is to misuse it. The law was an executioner without an ounce of mercy. Bunyan showed this clearly in his picture of the man with club (Moses) who was beating poor Faithful nigh unto death. The law’s designated job was to kill every hope a sinner had of saving him or herself and having done that, its ministry was fi nished. If we do not understand the function of the law, we are more likely to misuse it.

The question in 3:19 is quite clear. We could paraphrase the ques-tion this way: “What, in the light of what I have taught about the law, was God’s purpose in giving it?” The word “then” implies that this is the thrust of Paul’s question. Paul has argued that, on the surface, it appears that the covenant God made with Israel at Sinai contradicts the covenant he made with Abraham many years be-fore. Paul admits this appearance of contradiction and shows that in spite of appearances, there is a clear con-sistency to God’s one, sovereign, un-changing purpose of grace. On the one hand, Paul insists that the covenant at Sinai is law-based and the covenant



This book has a two-fold purpose. First, it is a response to a series of challenges to New Covenant Theology that Dr. Richard Barcellos off ered in his book titled In Defense of the Decalogue. The challenges were made to anyone holding to New Covenant Theology in general and to me personally.

Dr. Barcellos’s book is writt en in an irenic spirit and will prove to be very helpful in the present discussion in Reformed circles on the relationship of the Old and New Covenants. I sincerely hope this response is just as irenic and helpful.

The second purpose of this book is to set forth what New Covenant Theology actually does believe in the eight areas where Barcellos states his objections.

The titles of both books tell the whole story. Barcellos is defending the view that the Decalogue, or “words of the covenant,” writt en on the stone tablets of the covenant (Exodus 34:27, 28) are the highest expression of the Law of God ever given. We believe the New Covenant revelation given to us by Christ and His apostles is a higher and more demanding law than anything given through Moses. Simply stated, this book asserts that Jesus is a new and higher Lawgiver who replaces Moses in exactly the same way he replaces Aaron as high priest. Barcellos insists that Christ is the greatest exegete of the Law of God given to Moses but in no sense gives any higher or more demanding law than Moses. We belive Christ is not only a Lawgiver but he is the full and fi nal Lawgiver who supersedes and replaces all others.

This is the eighteenth title in print by John G. Reisinger. He lives in New York with his wife Rosemary.

B O O K O R D E R I N G I N F O R M A T I O N I S S H O W N O N P A G E 1 0

I N D E F E N S E O F J E S U S , T H E N E W L A W G I V E R

S a v i n g t h e S a v i n g G o s p e l

The position of this book is in broad sympathy with the school of thought that sees “faith seeking understanding.” It is the biblical gospel that saves, and biblical and theological truths need to be understood in order for the gospel to be saved from distortion. Apologetic arguments are secondary, and should be derived from the gospel itself. In other words, apologetic arguments must not be detached and isolated from the faith that is being defended. Defending the faith assumes there is a faith that is being defended. The objective faith is logically prior to its own defense.

The fi rst four chapters of this book trace out the fl ow and logic of the gospel. The remaining chapters examine some of the arguments that are currently used by apologists in the defense of the faith. This book only ‘saves’ the gospel to the extent that it accurately articulates the saving gospel of Jesus Christ.

Steve West is the pastor of Madoc Baptist Church in Madoc, Ontario, Canada. He is the editor of Ministry of Grace: Essays in Honor of John G. Reisinger and the author of Philosophical Dialogues on the Christian Faith: Discussions on the Arguments, Evidence, and Truth of Christianity. He has lectured and taught in the USA, Canada, and Africa.


Ship to: _____________________________________Street address: _______________________________City: _________________ State: _______ Zip: ______Country: _________________________________

□ My check (payable to New Covenant Media) is enclosed□ Charge to my: □ VISA □ MasterCard Expires _______/_______Account Number: ______/______/______/______Signature: __________________________________

TITLE LIST SALE QUANTITY COSTAbraham’s Four Seeds—Reisinger $10.95 $8.75The Believer’s Sabbath—Reisinger $3.75 $3.00Biblical Law and Ethics: Absolute and Covenantal—Long $15.75 $9.95But I Say Unto You—Reisinger $10.95 $8.75Chosen in Eternity—Reisinger $5.50 $4.50Christ, Lord and Lawgiver Over the Church—Reisinger $2.50 $2.00Defi nite Atonement —Long $10.95 $8.75The Doctrine of Baptism—Sasser $3.50 $2.80Full Bellies and Empty Hearts—Autio $14.99 $12.00Grace—Reisinger $13.95 $9.75In Defense of Jesus, the New Lawgiver—Reisinger $23.95 $16.75Is John G. Reisinger an Antinomian?—Wells $4.25 $3.40John Bunyan on the Sabbath—Reisinger $3.00 $2.50Jonathan Edwards on Biblical Hermeneutics and the “Covenant of Grace”—Gilliland $3.95 $3.15Limited Atonement—Reisinger $7.00 $5.60Ministry of Grace Essays in Honor of John G. Reisinger—Steve West, Editor $14.85 $9.35The New Birth— Reisinger $5.50 $4.50New Covenant Theology—Wells & Zaspel $19.95 $15.95The Obedience of Christ—Van Court $2.50 $2.00Our Sovereign God— Reisinger $4.45 $3.55Perseverance of the Saints— Reisinger $6.00 $4.80The Priority of Jesus Christ—Wells $11.95 $9.55Prophetic Fulfi llment-Spiritual, Natural, or Double?—George $4.25 $3.20Saving the Saving Gospel—West (NEW) $16.00 $12.79Tablets of Stone— Reisinger $10.95 $8.75The Sovereignty of God and Prayer—Reisinger $5.75 $4.60The Sovereignty of God in Providence— Reisinger $4.45 $3.55Total Depravity— Reisinger $5.00 $4.00What is the Christian Faith?— Reisinger $2.50 $2.00When Should a Christian Leave a Church?—Reisinger $3.75 $3.00

Total PriceSee Rate Chart below Shipping

Canadian orders—Visa or MasterCard only—please. Total Order

Postage & Handling RatesUnited States

Up to $20.00 $3.95$20.01—$50.00 $6.00$50.01 and Up 12%

Postage & Handling RatesCanada—VISA or Master Card

Up to $30.00 $7.50$30.01 and Up 25%

Postage & Handling RatesOverseas—VISA or MasterCard

Please call or e-mail for rates

N E W C O V E N A N T M E D I A P U B L I C A T I O N S


TITLE LIST SALE QTY COSTPhilosophical Dialgoues on the Christian Faith—Steve West $12.00 $9.50What Jesus Demands from the World—John Piper $19.99 $13.25The First London Confession of Faith-1646 Edition—Preface by Gary D. Long

$7.99 $6.50

All Things New—Carl Hoch $19.98 $15.95Context! Evangelical Views on the Millennium Examined--Gary D Long

$25.00 $17.50

The Doctrine of Christ—William Sasser $4.75 $3.75The Doctrine of Salvation—William Sasser $4.75 $3.75The Doctrine of Man—William Sasser $4.75 $3.75The Doctrine of God—William Sasser $4.00 $3.00The Atoning Work of Jesus Christ—William Sasser $5.00 $4.00The New Covenant and the Law of Christ—Chris Scarborough $10.95 $9.50How to Keep Your Kids Drug Free— Robert Morey $4.95 $1.00Battle of the Gods— Robert Morey $10.95 $2.00Here is Your God— Robert Morey $9.95 $2.00The Origins and Teaching of Freemasonry— Robert Morey $7.95 $2.00Introduction to Defending the Faith— Robert Morey $4.95 $1.00Should Christians Fear God Today?—John Korsgaard $6.95 $3.50Justifi cation by Faith—James White $6.95 $2.75Answers to Catholic Claims—James White $9.95 $2.00The Fatal Flaw—James White $11.95 $2.50God’s Sovereign Grace—James White $8.95 $3.50Behind the Watchtower Curtain—David A. Reed $10.95 $2.00How to Share Christ with a Jehovah’s Witness—Patrick J. Campbell $5.95 $2.50The Reformers and Their Stepchildren—Leonard Verduin $9.95 $9.50The Pilgrim’s Progress (The Accurate Revised Text by Barry E. Horner)

$12.00 $9.75

Biblical Eldership—Alexander Strauch $14.99 $9.30Biblical Eldership Study Guide—Alexander Strauch $19.99 $12.50Biblical Eldership Mentor’s Guide—Alexander Strauch $19.99 $12.50

Total PriceSee Rate Chart on Page 10 Shipping

Canadian orders—Visa or MasterCard only—please. Total Order

M o r e R e s o u r c e sM o r e R e s o u r c e s


with Abraham is grace-based, and they therefore are different in their natures. On the other hand, Paul also insists that the same God gave both covenants and both covenants equally serve the one unchanging and ultimate purpose of God in redemption. God did not change horses in the middle of the stream of redemption at Mount Sinai. He saved sinners the same way before and after both Moses and Abra-ham, and continues to do the same today. Mount Sinai may be a legal covenant, but it still serves a vital and essential part in the scheme of grace.

Paul’s answer to the question in 3:19 was radically different from the answer of his opponents. His answer would have both amazed and enraged the Judaizers. The apostle taught that the law was not given to curb sin and to produce holy living. The law does not have the power to do either of these things. The law was given to magnify sin by bringing the sin in a person’s heart to the surface. We covered this before when we looked at 3:19. The law was like a mirror, which, when the sinner looks into it, reveals, what he is really like.

Paul writes in the same vein when he addresses the church at Rome. Look again at Romans 7:1-11 and see Paul’s theology of law worked out there. Paul consistently teaches that God designed the law to provoke sin and bring it to the surface. Paul is as emphatic in Romans as he is in Gala-tians that the law can neither justify a sinner nor sanctify a saint. It can-not deal with sin, period. Paul goes even farther and teaches that the law actually aggravates and hinders sanc-tifi cation. Lloyd-Jones has stated this clearly. Let me quote a key section from his commentary on Romans 7.

The Apostle sees at once that there is a likelihood of two main charges being brought against him. The fi rst was the charge of antinomianism, the charge that he is more or less saying, ‘Live as you like, sin as much as you

Reisinger—Continued from page 8 like. All is well; grace will look after you and cover all your sin.’ 9

Lloyd-Jones then gives a short summary of Romans six, showing how Paul refutes this unjustifi ed charge of antinomianism. It should be noted that Lloyd-Jones has stated in another commentary dealing with Paul’s statement in Romans 6:1 just how bold and different Paul’s view of law was. After stating his view that “where sin abounded, grace did much more abound” (Rom. 5:20), Paul said, “You will probably accuse me of saying, ‘Let’s continue in sin so that grace may abound’” (Rom. 6:1). Lloyd-Jones makes this penetrating statement.

First of all, let me make a com-ment, to me a very important and vital comment. The preaching of the gospel of salvation by grace alone always leads to the possibility of this charge being brought against it. There is no better test as to whether a man is real-ly preaching the New Testament gos-pel of salvation than this, that some people might misunderstand it and misinterpret it to mean that it really amounts to this, that because you are saved by grace alone it does not mat-ter at all what you do; you can go on sinning as much as you like because it will redound all the more to the glory of grace. That is a very good test of the gospel preaching. If my preaching does not expose it to that misunder-standing, then it is not the gospel.10

If Lloyd-Jones is correct, and I believe he is, then many Reformed churches would fail the test of true gospel preaching. If our preaching of the gospel does not expose us to the same criticism that Paul endured, then we are not preaching the same gospel that Paul preached. You could attend some

9 Marytn Lloyd-Jones, Exposition of Romans 7:1-8:4. The Law: Its function and Limits (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1973), 3.10 Marytn Lloyd-Jones, Exposition of Romans 6. The New Man (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1973), 8.

Reformed churches, especially some Reformed Baptist churches, for one-hundred years and never come close to even thinking of charging them with antinomianism. They guard, protect, and qualify the gospel to the place they actually lose its glory and power. Some of them boast they have no false converts, but fail to add that they have no converts, period. They enthrone Moses in the conscience as the greatest lawgiver who ever lived and have our Lord ministering at the altar of Moses.

Some Jews who were professing Christ as the Messiah refused to leave the Old Covenant, or the religion of Judaism, in its entirety, and move into the New Covenant, or Christian religion, completely. This also is a misuse of the law. These profess-ing Christians wanted to trust Christ while hanging on to the law of Moses. From our perspective, such reluctance, while regrettable, is understandable. The Old Covenant had mediated God’s will to them for centuries. Their national identity was tied to it. This same reluctance, when found a century-and-a-half later on the part of people who had never been Jewish is much harder to understand. Puritan theology evinces the same desire to have both Christ and the Mosaic law. On the one hand, the Puritans insisted, correctly, that the Old Testament must be understood in the light of the New Testament.11 However, in fact, they built their system of theology on a theory of continuity that made it im-possible for them to follow their own principle. A footnote on Galatians

11 “…[A] pure theology as will prove the suitable infl uence in transforming individuals, and churches, and nations, must be based on a well-understood Bible, and especially on a well-understood New Testament: for we run into no vicious circle when we say, we must learn to read the Old Testament in the light of the New, in order to our deriving illustration to the New Testament from the Old.” From: John Brown, An Exposition of Galatians (London: William Oliphant, 1853), 6.

Issue 151 October 2008 (Matt. 13:10-17). This is true of the law as well as the gospel. If all you ever heard was, “Thou shalt not steal,” you have not heard the law. All you heard was a commandment. You have not heard the law until you hear it say, “Thou shalt not steal and if you do I will have you stoned to death.” Now you have heard the law. If all you heard was, “Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy,” all you heard was a commandment. If you heard, “Remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy, and if you so much as pick up a few sticks you are a dead man” you heard the law. It is the penalty aspect that gives law its status and authority. You could post a sign saying “50 mile-an-hour speed limit” every hundred yards on every highway in America, but without a fi ne for break-ing that speed limit, police offi cers to arrest speeders, and judges to collect the fi nes, you do not have a law—you only have good advice.

In Galatians, Paul uses the term the law to refer to the Old Covenant in its entirety, including the Ten Command-ments. He states that this law cannot provide help in the fi ght against sin—either in justifi cation or in sanctifi ca-tion. The purpose of the Old Covenant was to expose sin and to drive a sinner to the only viable solution in the battle against sin—the Lord Jesus Christ. To view the Old Covenant in any other way is to misunderstand and misuse it. The ultimate goal of the Old Cov-enant is to do its job and to pass out of existence, as we will see in our next article, when we will look at Paul’s al-legorical use of Sarah and Hagar. This section of Scripture contains some of the most astounding statements Paul ever made concerning the Christian and the law. Ω

I do not have a shred of clear textual evidence in Scripture to prove this, but I believe it because of a ‘conjuga-tion of moral probabilities.’” He then says that this conjugation of moral probabilities, should, on a fair mind, be enough evidence. We do not need an actual text of Scripture to establish the point. He accuses those of us who reject his view of the Sabbath of being “unreasonable” for demanding textual (biblical) evidence. We all understand that if John Brown had had textual evidence, he would have supplied it. By his own admission, there is no such evidence and we are being unfair to ask for it. Brown further accuses people who believe as I do of being motivated by a “dislike of the objects of the institution” [the Sabbath] when we reject the “conjugation of moral probabilities” as being equal to bibli-cal evidence.

The second question that Paul asks as he unfolds his doctrine of law is in 4:21:“Tell me, you that desire to be under the law, do you not hear the law?” This question highlights not only where the Galatians were going wrong on their view of the law but also why their position was so danger-ous.

So what does it mean to hear the law? To “hear” the law is to un-derstand clearly the law’s terms of perfect obedience and to realize you can never satisfy those terms and are therefore without hope of ever seeing, apart from sovereign electing grace, the face of God in peace.

It is tragic that neither the Juda-izers in Paul’s day nor many Chris-tians today understand what it means to hear the law. The Scriptures are replete with statements that a person can “hear” without ever “hearing”

4:10 in John Brown’s commentary on Galatians illustrates this. Immedi-ately after quoting Galatians 4:10, Ye observe days, and months, and times, and years, Brown writes, “Under the Christian dispensation, with the ex-ception of the Lord’s Day, all days are alike.” After the words “Lord’s Day,” in that sentence, Brown inserts the fol-lowing footnote:

That under the Christian dispen-sation, the fi rst day of the week is divinely appropriated for religious purposes, and that this is in reality the form in which the principle embodied in the Sabbath from the beginning is exhibited under that dispensation, are principles capable, I apprehend, of complete proof by a “conjugation of moral probabilities,” which, on a fair mind, is fi tted to produce an effect as powerful as demonstration. The dis-like of the objects of the institution, it is to be feared, in many cases leads people to demand a kind and degree of evidence of which the subject does not admit; and I am afraid harm has been done by persons endeavoring, with the best intentions doubtless, to meet this unreasonable demand.12

That is an amazing statement, especially from a man like John Brown. I treasure every commentary John Brown wrote. He is one of my favorite writers. However, he was a consistent Covenant Theologian and realized that Paul appeared to be laying the Sabbath to rest under the New Covenant. He felt compelled to defend his view of continuity. You can cut that quotation any way you like and it will always mean the same thing. John Brown in effect is saying, “My theology dictates that the Sab-bath must be a moral commandment and therefore still be in effect today.

12 Ibid., 209.

October 2008 Issue 151Ferguson—Continued from page 7 turned to themselves and the ground.

The world, in many ways, would be a much calmer and gentler place if women ruled. There would have been far fewer children sacrifi ced to the gods of greed and power.”6

Practically speaking, abortion sta-tistics challenge Young’s notion of the female as being the kinder and gentler sex. Millions of children, in this cul-ture at least, are sacrifi ced by women on the altars of fear, convenience, and self. Not all women practice abor-tion, we know. But many do. This fact alone challenges the notion of some kind of female “nature” that is softer than a male “nature.” A universal fe-male nature (one that is calm and gen-tle) would result in a uniform female practice (one that is calm and gentle), but that is clearly not the case. Some women may indeed be more calm and gentle than some men, but others may be less calm and gentle than some men. Young’s polemic is sexist and naïve, and couched as though women were not disobedient in the fall them-selves somehow. I am at a complete loss to even guess where his reason-ing on this point comes from. This is simply so strange to biblical patterns of thought, yet Young’s characters as-sert it as though it has been spoken by God.

Sophia: “He [Jesus] chose the way of the cross where mercy triumphs over justice because of love.7

Here is a fundamental fl aw so very basic as to make one gasp. In it, justice and mercy in God are pit-ted against each other. While James

6 Ibid., 149-51.7 Ibid., 164.

excepted who put all things in subjec-tion under him. When all things are subjected to him, then the Son himself will also be subjected to him who put all things in subjection under him, that God may be all in all. (1 Corin-thians 15:24-28, ESV)

In the days of his fl esh, Jesus of-fered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his rever-ence. (Hebrews 5:7, ESV)

Think about this for just a moment. Any parent who would not restrain his or her child from ingesting poison for fear of not being submitted to that child, or of forcing his or her will upon that child, is not fi t to be a par-ent. Young does not describe love, he creates a mythological arrangement where human beings are on the same level as God. My heart aches to think of people trying to put such nonsense into real-life use.

Let’s examine the implications of Young’s premise. If you do not be-lieve that God should violate anyone’s will, then you ought never to pray for the salvation of the lost. They are kept in that very state by their wicked wills. Heaven forbid you should not submit to them; instead you should delight to leave them to their wills. Absurd? Yes. But it is the logical ex-tension of Young’s position.

Young posits two different results from the fall, or what his theology terms “the turning away from the original relationship.”

Jesus: “Women...turned from us to another relationship, while men

2:13 uses this very same language, Young employs it as an axiom, imply-ing (I believe) opposition between the two. James’ idea is that those who are merciful receive mercy, and thus fi nd grace, instead of raw justice. He begins with stating that “judgment is without mercy to the one who has shown no mercy,” thus recapping the parable of Jesus in Matthew 18:21-35. Grace refused is grace removed. When one is shown mercy and it makes no impact on the soul, when it does not in turn produce mercy, judgment still prevails. Mercy does not triumph over justice nakedly in the sense that justice is simply denied its due. Grace wrought in the heart manifests itself in mercy (among other qualities), and proves its possessor to be Christ’s. Justice is not negated, for God must remain BOTH just, and the justifi er of those who “have faith in Jesus” (Rom. 3:26). This is the glory of Christ’s substitutionary atonement.

Young presents a different picture of justice and mercy, one in which justice is bad, and needs to be tri-umphed over. At this place in The Shack, Young cuts out the very heart of the gospel. Can he really not know that God’s justice was completely upheld while in fact mercy was also poured out? That no one’s sin was just set aside, but that the blood of the Lamb of God was required to atone for sin? In Christ, justice and mercy are compatible, in the same way that righteousness and peace kiss each other (Ps. 85:10). In each pairing, the qualities are not opposites, for all are virtues. The opposite of one virtue can never be another virtue. The opposite

SUBSCRIBE TO SOUND OF GRACE $10.00 FOR TEN ISSUESMy check (payable to Sound of Grace) is enclosed. Charge to my: VISA MasterCard Expires ____/____ Account Number: ____/____/____/_____Name: _________________________________________Street address: ___________________________________City: _________________________ _________________State/Province: _____________ Zip/Postal Code: _________

SUBSCRIPTION

ORDER/RENEWAL

FORM


Ferguson—Continued on page 16

of a virtue must be a vice. Justice is not a vice. All virtues complement each other. None is negated at the ex-pense of another.

Time and space preclude me from citing a host of the lesser but nonethe-less serious errors. Sadly, they are le-gion. And I say sadly because Young’s purpose clearly is to help others by sharing what has helped him—this new way of understanding God. Young’s desire marks him as a kind and caring man. But in this case, the cure he offers is much more deadly than the disease he battles. For in this cure, God himself is so mutilated in comparison to the Bible’s representa-tions, and the gospel is so distorted, as to make the chewing of the meat to spit out the bones virtually impos-sible. There are bones in this cure that can stick in the throat and cause one to die.

We will conclude by examining three more quotations from the book.

Jesus: “Mack, I love them. And you wrongly judge many of them. For those who are both in it and of it [the world], we must fi nd ways to love and serve them, don’t you think? Re-member, the people who know me are the ones who are free to live and love without any agenda.”

Mack: “Is that what it means to be a Christian?”

Jesus: “Who said anything about being a Christian? I’m not a Chris-tian.”

Mack: “No, I suppose you aren’t.”

Jesus: “Those who love me come from every system that exists...I have no desire to make them Christian, but I do want to join them in their trans-formation into sons and daughters of my Papa, into brothers and sisters, into my Beloved.”8

At this point, rather than guiding the reader to a biblical understanding of what a Christian is, Young steers men and women away from it alto-gether. This subverts Christ’s mandate 8 Ibid., 181-182.

to make disciples of all nations (Matt. 28:19). The term Christian IS used in Acts 11:26, where it originated as a slur against Christ’s followers. And in Acts 26:28, King Agrippa completely understood that the Apostle Paul’s aim was in fact to make him a Christian! Young does every reader the great-est disservice by rejecting the very words of Scripture to ply his own vi-sion. His vision, if not overtly denying that someone would have to abandon Budhism, Mormonism, or Islam to be Christ’s follower, at the very least im-plies it could be so. This is positively horrifi c.

Please note, we cannot be brothers and sisters in Christ, apart from par-taking of his spirit, which is the prom-ise given to those who believe and obey the gospel. Young’s construct results in a child of Papa without the spirit of Papa. It is a contradiction in terms, and creates a new class of human being—one unknown to the pages of holy writ. It is a lie. One can-not be Christ’s without owning both Christ and his people.

In this next quotation, Mack asks Jesus how he (Mack) becomes part of the church.

Jesus: “It’s simple Mack. It’s all about relationships and simply sharing life. What we are doing right now—just doing this—and being open and available to others around us.”9

Again, a tacit denial of the gos-pel, as we can see from the following chain of verses.

For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the mem-bers of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit. (1 Corinthians 12:12-13, ESV)

You, however, are not in the fl esh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does

9 Ibid., 178.

not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. (Romans 8:9, ESV)

Let me ask you only this: Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law or by hearing with faith? (Galatians 3:2, ESV)

So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ. (Romans 10:17, ESV)

It is imposslbe to ignore the chain here. To be in the body, the church of Christ, we must be baptized into it by his Spirit. And any who do not have his Spirit are not his. They are not in the body. How is that Spirit received? By the hearing of faith. And this is rooted in one thing—the word of Christ, the gospel.

This is basic Christianity. This, Young fails ever to articulate, if in-deed he does not actually deny and undermine it.

The last of our quotations deals with the source of our condemnation.

Papa: “I don’t do humiliation, or guilt, or condemnation.”10

Dear Reader, the very heart of our salvation is rooted in the realization that we already stand guilty before the judgment bar of God, and need to be made righteous. This pronouncement of righteousness comes but one way—through faith in Jesus Christ.

[T]hough I myself have reason for confi dence in the fl esh also. If anyone else thinks he has reason for confi dence in the fl esh, I have more: circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benja-min, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a perse-cutor of the church; as to righteous-ness under the law, blameless. But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the sur-passing worth of knowing Christ Je-sus my Lord. For his sake I have suf-fered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may

10 IBID., 223.

October 2008 Issue 151Ferguson—Continued from page 15

gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith—that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becom-ing like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resur-rection from the dead. (Philippians 3:4-11, ESV, emphasis added):

We ARE guilty already. Before God. Christ was crucifi ed for our sins, and raised again for our justifi cation—our being pronounced RIGHTEOUS. God does do guilt. We produce it, and in the death, burial and resurrection of his Son, God makes a way for our de-liverance from guilt’s bondage.

And God does do condemnation. God alone is the one who can and does judge us as guilty and condemn us for our sin. The very same God who sets forth Jesus Christ as a pro-pitiation, a satisfaction for our sins, to be received by faith. If God has not condemned us, he does not need to be propitiated, and we are left wondering exactly who is propitiated by the death of Christ. (Rom. 3:25)

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to con-demn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him is not con-demned, but whoever does not be-lieve is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God. And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed. (John 3:16-20, ESV, emphasis added)

To deny God’s judgment on sin, and his just condemnation of it, is once more to deny the need for the

cross, and Jesus’ atoning sacrifi ce there. It is to gut the Bible of its very focus and theme. To rob Christ of his glory. To make God a liar. To lead people to follow lies.

We’ve received the warnings:For the time is coming when

people will not endure sound teach-ing, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. (2 Timothy 4:3-4, ESV)

But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed. As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed. (Galatians 1:8-9, ESV)

Join me in praying that Mr. Young has unwittingly preached a false gos-pel. Pray that he will be recovered from such dark and dangerous errors. Pray that those who already have and who will yet read this book will reject its soul-damning falsehoods. Pray that the true gospel might ring out in clar-ity and power.

The popular appeal of this book is great, with over 2,000,000 copies in print, and with glowing endorsements from the likes of Eugene Peterson (Professor Emeritus of Spiritual The-ology, Regent College, Vancouver, B.C.), Gayle E. Erwin of Calvary Chapel notoriety, and musician Mi-chael W. Smith.

I realize this review has been un-usually candid and perhaps confron-tive. It is not my delight to write these things. To be honest, I hate it. I have no rancor toward the author himself. Some readers may regard my tone and my words as caustic, hateful, and deliberately negative. I am sorry for that. But I would be sorrier still should any of you dear readers buy into its teaching.

Some of The Shack’s readers, who by God’s grace already are Christians, may miss seeing the more grievous errors, because they will have read the book against the backdrop of their own gospel presuppositions. Praise be to God! But there are so very many potential readers who are either not acquainted with the true gospel yet, or whose faith is young and ill-informed. For these readers, Young’s book could provide a poor theological base that undermines biblical truth, the results of which could haunt those readers for years to come. And then there are oth-ers who will believe they don’t need to become Christians, because God is not interested in them being so. These especially need our prayers, and our loving and gentle intervention.

What about the good parts? Someone might well ask. It is an ap-propriate question. There are some sections I truly loved and I thought long and hard about including them in this review. In the end, I opted not to. If someone offered me a wonder-ful, healthful, gourmet meal, but he or she had placed that meal in a chamber fi lled with toxic gas, I would feel that the wise action would be to skip the meal than risk the fumes. The good things in this book can be had else-where, more safely, and in concert with the Scriptures. Reading the book for its good parts simply isn’t worth the spiritual risk.

Mr. Young, I love you. I love what you are trying to do in offering help to those who hurt. But I beg you, in God’s name, to carefully and prayer-fully reconsider what it is that you offer the hurting world in the name of Christ. Ultimately, it is another gospel. Ω


(1) True Christianity has always taught the inspiration, suffi ciency, and supremacy of Holy Scripture. It has told men that “God’s written Word” is the only trustworthy rule of faith and practice in religion; that God re-quires nothing to be believed that is not in this Word; and that nothing is right which contradicts it. It has never allowed reason, or the voice of the Church, to be placed above, or on a level with Scripture. It has steadily maintained that, however imperfectly we may understand it, the Old Book is meant to be the only standard of life and doctrine.

(2) True Christianity has always taught fully the sinfulness, guilt and corruption of human nature. It has told men that they are born in sin, deserve God’s wrath and condemnation, and are naturally inclined to do evil. It has never allowed that men and women are only weak and pitiable creatures, who can become good when they please, and make their own peace with God. On the contrary, it has steadily declared man’s danger and vileness, and his pressing need of a Divine for-giveness and atonement for his sins, a new birth or conversion, and an entire change of heart.

(3) True Christianity has always set before men, the Lord Jesus Christ as the chief object of faith and hope in religion—as the Divine Mediator be-tween God and men, the only source of peace of conscience, and the root of all spiritual life. The main things it has ever insisted on about Christ, are—the atonement for sin He made by His death, His sacrifi ce on the cross, the complete redemption from guilt and condemnation by His blood, His vic-tory over the grave by His resurrec-tion, His active life of intercession at God’s right hand, and the absolute necessity of simple faith in Him. In

man does not like to be told that he is a weak, guilty sinner—that he cannot save his own soul, and must trust in the work of another—that he must be converted and have a new heart—that he must live a holy, self-denying life, and come out from the world.

Yet, this is the Christianity which is doing good this day, wherever real good is done. The only religious teaching which can show solid, positive results—is that which gives prominence to the doctrines which I have endeavored to describe. Wher-ever they are rightly taught, Chris-tianity can point to fruits which are an unanswerable proof of its Divine origin. There are myriads of profess-ing Christians who have no life or reality in their religion—and are only nominal members of Christ’s Church. Except for going to church on Sun-days, they give no evidence of true Christianity. If you mark their daily life—they seem neither to think, nor feel, nor care for their souls, or God, or eternity. Men and women who crowd churches on Sundays—and then live worldly selfi sh lives all the week—are the best and most effi cient allies of the devil.

True faith is not a mere “mental assent” to certain theological proposi-tions—but a living, burning, active principle—which works by love, puri-fi es the heart, overcomes the world, and brings forth much fruit of holiness and good works. Let us live as if we really believed every jot and tittle of Scripture—and as if a dying, risen, interceding, and coming Christ, were continually before our eyes!

Courtesy of GraceGems! www.GraceGems.org

short, it has made Christ the Alpha and the Omega in Christian theology.

(4) True Christianity has always honored the Person of God the Holy Spirit, and magnifi ed His work. It has never taught that all professing Christians have the grace of the Spirit in their hearts, as a matter of course—because they are baptized, or because they belong to a Church. It has steadi-ly maintained that the fruits of the Spirit are the only evidence of having the Spirit, and that those fruits must be seen! It has always taught, that we must be born of the Spirit, led by the Spirit, sanctifi ed by the Spirit, and feel the operations of the Spirit—and that a close walk with God in the path of His commandments, a life of holiness, love, self-denial, purity, and zeal to do good—are the only satisfactory marks of the Holy Spirit.

Such is true Christianity. Well would it have been for the world, if there had been more of it during the last nineteen centuries! Too often, and in too many parts of Christendom, there has been so little of it—that Christ’s religion has seemed extinct, and has fallen into utter contempt!

This is the Christianity which, in the days of the Apostles, “turned the world upside down!” It was this which emptied the idol temples of their wor-shipers, routed the Greek and Roman philosophers, and obliged even hea-then writers to confess that the follow-ers of the “new superstition,” as they called it, were people who loved one another, and lived very pure and holy lives!

Let it never be forgotten, that its leading principles are those which are least likely to please the natural man. On the contrary, they are precisely those which are calculated to be un-popular and to give offense. Proud

True Christianity—“What Is Needed?”

J. C. Ryle, 1895

October 2008 Issue 151McMillan—Continued from page 3 to be God’s beloved Son.

But he was on a mission and that mission was to lift up, to glorify, and to manifest the Father’s name far and wide. Romans 8:8 states that: “…those who are in the fl esh can-not please God.” Yet in John 8:29 we read: “And he who sent Me is with Me. The Father has not left Me alone, for I always do those things that please him.” In John 6:38 Christ said: “For I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me.”

Romans 8:7 tells us: “…the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor in-deed can be.” So as the Israel of God, he came and said: “Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Proph-ets, I did not come to destroy, but to fulfi ll. For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle, will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfi lled” (Matthew 5:17, 18). For “…having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us. And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross” (Colos-sians 2:14), and for the Father, he glo-rifi ed him by keeping and magnifying his law.

He glorifi ed his Father in the redemption of a purchased people. In John 17 he prayed once without shame and could make this claim about the twelve apostles: “While I was with them in the world, I kept them in Your name. Those whom You gave Me I have kept; and none of them is lost except the son of perdi-tion, that Scripture might be fulfi lled”

9:16-18. He is not frustrated by cir-cumstances, or fearful of the task, but anxious to seal the prison of the evil one; “But I have a baptism to be bap-tized with, and how distressed I am till it is accomplished” (Luke 12:50). He longed to complete his work.

How can we doubt that as he stood looking at his friend’s tomb, see-ing all the sorrow of his loved ones and knowing that Satan and sin are the cause of it all; I say, how can we doubt that his indignation at the hor-ror of what had once been perfection and now lay in ruins was a natural and holy emotion for him. As we long for him to come and take us into his king-dom bodily, doesn’t he long to have his own beside him? Listen: “Father, I desire that they also whom you gave Me may be with Me, where I am, that they may behold My glory which you have given Me, for You loved Me before the foundation of the world” (John 17:24). It is with the trumpet of God that he will come and he will gather his own to himself (cf. 1 Thes-salonians 4:16). Do we believe this was not in his mind as he stood there and wept? “He troubled himself.” Bone of our bone; fl esh of our fl esh. His are truly holy and sinless, but nonetheless human emotions.

I think too, that our Lord wept because what he was about to do for Lazarus was a foretaste of his great accomplishment on Golgotha in glori-fying his Father.

On the Mount, he had talked to Moses and Elijah and they spoke of his decease which he would accom-plish at Jerusalem, Luke 9:30–34, and a voice from heaven had declared him

friend who welcomed him to his home and to whose home he loved to go.

He wept also for Mary and Martha whose faith was so tried by this sor-rowful event. There were true friends of Lazarus among the Jews there and they wept. Christ’s feelings for his loved ones knew no bounds; they were as Jordan in the fl ood, broad and deep. We are to “rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep with those who weep” (Romans 12:15). In every duty we have, we have his example to show us the way. Sorrow is a holy emotion, but not if we sorrow as those who have no hope. It is never wrong to follow the Master’s leading.

In verse 33 we are told that “He groaned in the spirit and was trou-bled.” In the original it included the meaning, troubled because something made him indignant. Why was he in-dignant and stirring up his own soul? Why did he bring himself to that state of mind, so as to raise up a storm in his emotions?

1 Corinthians 15:25, 26 tell us this: “For he must reign till he has put all enemies under his feet. The last enemy that will be destroyed is death.” He had not gone to Calvary yet and placed the fi nal seal, a bloody seal, upon the one who has the power of death—that is the devil. It was as good as done in the mind of him “…who calls those things which do not exist as though they did;” Romans 4:17. Yet where there is a testament there must also be the death of the tes-tator, for the testament is in force after he dies; therefore it must be dedicated by blood; paraphrase of Hebrews

No words can express how much the world owes to sorrow. Most of the Psalms were born in the wilderness. Most of the Epistles were written in a prison. The greatest thoughts of the

greatest thinkers have all passed through fi re. The greatest poets have “learned in suffering what they taught in song.” In bonds Bunyan lived the allegory that he afterwards wrote, and we may thank Bedford Jail for The Pilgrim’s Progress. Take comfort, affl icted Christian! When God is about to make pre-eminent use of a person, He puts them in the fi re.

George MacDonald

Issue 151 October 2008 done: I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. I will give of the fountain of the water of life freely to him who thirsts. He who overcomes shall inherit all things, and I will be his God and he shall be My Son.”

A perfect creation again, but sur-passing the fi rst—a spiritual, yet very real and greater Eden, the city with foundations whose builder and maker is God. A place where God dwells and walks among his people. There will never be weeping there, no death, sorrow or crying. Nothing painful will exist anymore—those things are passed away. The end of pain and sorrow comes, for he has made an end of sin along with its author. Heirs and joint heirs of God in Christ, sons come home to the Father’s house. These are his promises and ours, for all the promises of God in him “…are Yes and in Him Amen, to the glory of God…” (2 Corinthians 1:20).

Read Hebrews 11 and see that this is the fulfi llment for all who wait there and for us and also for us who have not yet been entombed: “And all these, having obtained a good testi-mony through faith did not receive the promise, God having provided some-thing better for us, that they should not be made perfect apart from us” (Hebrews 11:39, 40).

We wait and eagerly he waits. Stirred in his holy soul—Jesus wept. Ω

verse 12. And in the midst of all the brethren of all the ages in his body, the church, he says this: “Here am I and the children whom God has given Me” (Hebrews 2:1). That is a part of a quote of Isaiah’s prophecy which is glorious: “Here am I and the children whom the Lord has given Me!” Isa-iah 8:18. Speaking of mankind, the Psalmist says: “None of them can by any means redeem his brother, nor give to God a ransom for him—for the redemption of their souls is costly,…” (Psalm 49:7, 8). Ah, but Christ could and can redeem, his precious blood bought back what silver and gold could never buy and so he alone has the right to cry out to God: “Here am I and the children God has given Me.”

This man came down from the eternal glory, from the presence of the Father. He is the Word, was with God and was God, (cf. John 1:1). He is the brightness of God’s glory, the express image of his person, (cf. He-brews 1:3). The glory of God shines forth in his face, (cf. 2 Corinthians 4:6). He is the fullness of the Godhead bodily, (cf. Colossians 2:9). The invis-ible attributes of God, even his eternal power and Godhead are supremely manifested in this man, (cf. Romans 1:20).

“Therefore, God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,

of those in heaven, and those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Philippines 2:9-11).

Speaking of putting down all op-posing authority, 1 Corinthians 15:28 states: “Now when all things are made subject to Him, then the Son Himself will also be subject to Him who put all things under Him, that God may be all in all.”

As he stood at the tomb he saw that day and longed for it and wept.

Finally, as he looked at Lazarus’ tomb I believe he saw the scene in Revelation 21:1-7. “Now I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the fi rst heaven and the fi rst earth had passed away. Also there was no more sea. Then I, John, saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from heaven saying, behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people. God himself will be with them and be their God. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes; there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away. Then he who sat on the throne said, ‘Behold, I make all things new.’ And he said to me, ‘Write, for these words are true and faithful.’ And he said to me, ‘It is

CDs, DVDs, VHS or Audio Cassette TapesMessages by John G. Reisinger and others from John Bunyan and

Seaside Heights Conferences

are available on CDs or DVDs in addition to cassette and VHS tapes.

For a free catalog of the available materials, please call 800-376-4146;

e-mail: [email protected]

write: New Covenant Media

5317 Wye Creek Drive

Frederick, MD 21703-6938.

McMillan—Continued from page 14

SOV

EREI

GN

GR

AC

E N

EW C

OV

ENA

NT

MIN

ISTR

IES

5317

WY

E C

REE

K D

RIV

EFR

EDER

ICK

, MA

RYLA

ND

217

03-6

938

FORW

AR

DIN

G S

ERV

ICE

REQ

UES

TED

Che

ck y

our l

abel

for e

xpira

tion.

This

is Is

sue

151.

Ple

ase

rene

w y

our s

ubsc

riptio

n pr

ompt

ly.

NO

N-P

ROFI

TO

RGA

NIZ

ATI

ON

U.S

. PO

STA

GE

PAID

PER

MIT

NO

. 45

FRED

ERIC

K, M

D 2

1701

Quotable Quotes from the 2008 Bunyan Conference

“The Law in some sense had a historical beginning at Sinai, and a historical end at the Cross.”

“Neither a legalist nor an antinomian can understand the true na-ture and purpose of the Law, and the true nature and purpose of Grace.”

“The heart of legalism is that sanctifi cation is impossible without the Law.”

“Don’t equate the Ten Commandments with the Old Covenant. Don’t fail to recognize the Ten Commandments as a vital part of the Old Cov-enant which is done away.”

“The message of the whole tabernacle system was symbolized by the veil.”

“I have no problem with lists so long as I make the list. If your list is longer than mine, then you are a legalist. If your list is shorter than mine, then you are an antinomian.”

“We must remember that Paul lived before the Westminster Confes-sion was written.”

“You cannot escape a legalistic attitude in your lungs if you keep breathing in the smoke of Mt. Sinai.”

“Law cannot mother holiness in the life of either the believer or the unbeliever.”

“The most dangerous preacher is the one who preaches law and duty without constantly standing you under the cross and pointing you to the power of the Holy Spirit.”

“God never commanded you to do anything that you are able to do.”

“Nothing hinders evangelism more than infant baptism.”

“Co-depravity teaches me that I am no better than anyone else. Election teaches me that no one is better than I am.”

“Your attitude toward yourself determines your attitude toward oth-ers, and your attitude toward God determines your attitude toward yourself.”

“The only right you have is to go to hell humbly, because you de-serve it.”

“The Christian is free from the ego-massaging that controls the world.”

“Both the Holy Spirit and Satan will remind you of sin, but they do it for different reasons.”

“You cannot have a religion of rules without having legalism reign-ing.” (All the above from messages by John G. Reisinger).

“Whenever I hear John Reisinger preach I love Christ more, and un-derstand my Bible better.” (Steve West)

Quotes provided by Jack Jeffery

it is good for the heart to be strengthened by grace ... knowingly put oneself “un-der the law”...

Documents