This is a recording of a moderated debate between Dr. Carl Trueman, representing the historic Christian faith as espoused by Aurelius Augustine, and Chad Trainer, Chairman of the Board of the Bertrand Russell Society, representing the agnostic/atheistic worldview as espoused by Bertrand Russell.
Topic: The Satisfied Life
Saints and Skeptics, Part 1 from Westminster Theological Seminary on Vimeo.
Saints and Skeptis, Part 2 from Westminster Theological Seminary on Vimeo.
Sam Storms is lead pastor for preaching and vision at Bridgeway Church in Oklahoma City, I can’t recall ever hearing anything about a “millennial” kingdom, much less the variety of theories regarding its meaning and relationship to the second coming of Christ. Like many of my generation, my initial exposure to biblical eschatology was in reading Hal Lindsey’s Late Great Planet Earth during the summer of 1970.
Not long thereafter I purchased a Scofield Reference Bible and began to devour its notes and underline them more passionately than I did the biblical text on which they commented. No one, as I recall, ever suggested to me there was a view other than that of the dispensational, pretribulational, premillennialism of Scofield. Anyone who dared call it into question was suspected of not believing in biblical inerrancy.
Questioning Premillennialism
Upon graduating from The University of Oklahoma in 1973, I began my studies at Dallas Theological Seminary. My professors were a Who’s Who of dispensational premillennialism: John Walvoord (then president of DTS), Charles Ryrie (author of Dispensationalism Today and The Ryrie Study Bible), and J. Dwight Pentecost (author of perhaps the most influential text on the subject at that time, Things to Come), just to mention the more well-known. Anything other than the dispensational premillennial perspective as found in Lewis Sperry Chafer’s Systematic Theology and taught in the many DTS classrooms was considered less than evangelical. The only thing I recall hearing about amillennialism, for example, was how dangerous it was given the fact that it was popular among theological liberals who didn’t take the Bible very seriously.
Robert Gundry’s book The Church and the Tribulation was released in 1973, the same year I began my studies at Dallas, and it fell like a theological atom bomb on the campus. Everyone was reading it, and more than a few were being drawn to its post-tribulational perspective on the timing of the rapture. Debates in the classroom, cafeteria, and elsewhere were abundant and quite heated. Someone obtained a copy of Daniel Fuller’s PhD dissertation in which he critiqued the hermeneutics of dispensationalism, and more gasoline was thrown on the fire.
Upon my graduation from Dallas Seminary in 1977 I immediately immersed myself in a study of all aspects and schools of eschatological thought. Over the next few years, the two most influential and persuasive volumes I read were The Presence of the Future: The Eschatology of Biblical Realism by George Eldon Ladd (himself a historic premillennialist), and Anthony Hoekema’s book The Bible and the Future (Hoekema was an amillennialist). It is worth noting here that the distinction between Israel and the church, on which dispensationalism is largely based, could not withstand either Ladd or Hoekema’s relentless assault. Continue reading
Dr. Daniel Wallace three come to mind: (1) If Matthew and Luke swallowed up Q in their writings, why would we expect to find any copies of Q? Or to put this another way, Luke says that he used more than one source, presumably more than one written source. If so, why haven’t we found it/them? The fact that we haven’t surely doesn’t mean that Luke was not shooting straight with us, does it? (2) Even the Gospel of Mark has few copies in the early centuries, yet it was endorsed as an official Gospel by Ireneaus. Yet this is a canonical Gospel, which apparently was regarded in some sense as authoritative before the end of the first century, or at the latest in the first decade or two of the second century, because of its association with Peter. Yet if there are only two copies of Mark in Greek before the fourth century still in existence (at least as far as what has been published to date), what chance do we have of finding a non-canonical gospel-source in the early centuries? And as the centuries roll on, the likelihood that such a document would continue to be copied becomes increasingly remote. (3) Apart from having the text of Q, as it has been reconstructed, what other criteria should scholars demand of such an alleged discovery? Do they expect the document to have a title such as “The Gospel according to Q”? That neologism won’t wash. Perhaps just such manuscripts have been discovered but were mislabeled. The burden of this short essay is to examine that possibility.
Continue reading
Recently someone asked me what I thought of the Alpha Course. For those unfamiliar with Alpha, it is a course that started in a local Church (Holy Trinity Brompton) in the United Kingdom, that under the leadership of Nicky Gumbel, has been used throughtout the world to draw hundreds of thousands of the unchurched to hear presentations about Christianity. There is no doubt that the course has been distributed widely. Actually that is a huge understatement. It has had phenomenal influence in many surprising places. However, for all that may be very praiseworthy about Alpha, the omission of the biblical gospel, renders it, in my opinion, merely an “almost Christian” or “pre-Christian” course.
I am accutely aware that my words here will be considered extremely harsh by some. However, I do not believe anything can be considered “Christian” without the gospel. The gospel is about what Christ achieved for sinners by His life, death, burial and resurrection (1 Cor 15) AND about how exactly the benefits of this are received by unworthy sinners, namely that justification before God is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone. It is this second and all important part of the gospel message that is omiited in the Alpha Course. The omission is glaring and it is the reason why the Roman Catholic Church (who even to this day anathemetizes those who accept sola fide – justification by faith alone) can and does use the course to draw people into their local Roman Catholic Churches throughout the world.
A so called “Christian” presentation without the inclusion of the gospel (sola fide) is like basketball without a ball. Without the ball there can be no game and without the gospel there can be no biblical Christianity. As Martin Luther said, “justification by faith alone is the article upon which the Church stands or falls.”
To be consistent, it is not merely the Alpha Course that I would not consider “Christian” if it does not include the gospel, but any so called “Christian” movies, even if they are very popular. Movies such as “Chariots of Fire” while perhaps wonderful as a pre-Christian message, also makes no mention at all of how it is that a sinner can stand just in the sight of God. It is great for what it is, a movie about firm chacter and Christian morals, but without the gospel, that is all it can ever be. It cannot be considered a “Christian” movie. Someone can watch the entire thing and be inspired to hold Christian morals, even when it might indeed bring unintended and detrimental consequences, but without the Gospel, it is not “Christian” as I understand the term. A Christian is defined as someone who believes the gospel and a Christian message will at the very least, contain the essential Gospel of justification by faith alone.
What follows is a short and very helpful article by Erin Benziger entitled, “The Ecumenical Compromise of the Alpha Course.” Original source here.
What is the meaning of life? This is the question that many seek to answer and that the internationally known Alpha Course allows people to explore. Having attracted 18.5 million guests since 1993, the Alpha Course is advertised as a non-confrontational means of sharing the truths of the Christian faith. The website of Alpha USA states: Continue reading
The indicative informs us of an accomplished fact. For example, “He made peace by the blood of His cross.” On the other hand, the imperative is a command or direction. In Ephesians 4:32, Paul gives us this command: “Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another.”
“The gospel is not an imperative, but an indicative; not a condition to meet, but an announcement of what Christ has accomplished for sinners. However, the Divine summons to believe the gospel is an imperative (Acts 17:30, Matt 17:5, 6, 1 John 3:23) … a command stony hearted men refuse to believe (John 3:19, 20) unless God mercifully turns our heart of stone to a heart of flesh (Exek 36:26).” – John Hendryx
“Upon a life I did not live, another’s death, I stake my whole eternity.” – Horatius Bonar
“The Bible has no comfort whatsoever to give to people who are not Christians – none at all; indeed the exact opposite. The Bible has nothing to say to such people except to warn them to flee from the wrath to come. It tells them that the sufferings of this present hour are not worthy to be compared with the sufferings they are going to endure, that these are but a foretaste of what is coming to them, that the account of the Flood, the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, and all similar calamities are but faint pictures of the suffering that is going to come to those who do not belong to the Lord Jesus Christ. There is no comfort here for an unbeliever – none at all.” – Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones (Romans – The Perseverance Of The Saints)
“When you arrive in heaven, I wonder if Christ might say, ‘Because of you, others are here today. Wanna meet ’em?'” – Max Lucado
“God has clothed His thoughts in words, and there is no way to know Him except by knowing the Scriptures.” – John Stott
The word of God is “God’s powerful, authoritative self-expression… the word is the very presence of God among us, the place where God dwells. So you cannot separate the word of God from God himself.” – John Frame, in Salvation Belongs To The Lord
“All the heresies which have arisen in the Christian Church have had a decided tendency to dishonor God and to flatter man.” – C. H. Spurgeon
“The Gospel hinges on human sinfulness and confusing sin undermines the gospel.” – Dr. Al Mohler
“Natural man’s sin is precisely this: He wants the benefits of God without God Himself.” – R. C. Sproul
“A fanatic is one who can’t change his mind and won’t change the subject.” – Winston Churchill
“A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity;an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.” – Winston Churchill
“The Law makes sinners, but the Gospel takes sinners & declares them to be saints, holy & righteous through faith in Jesus Christ.” – Pless
“There are many preachers who never preach justification by faith at all, because they do not believe it. They regard the New Testament message as no more than an ethical system, and they are always exhorting people to live better lives, and to stop doing this and that. They apply this in a more general sphere, and so are always making protests to Governments and other powers. They talk unceasingly about applying the Christian ethic… we can say without any hesitation that such men are not preaching the Gospel.” Martyn Lloyd-Jones (Romans – The New Man)
“So exceeding great are the matters of eternity, that nothing in this world deserveth once to be named in comparison with them, nor can any earthly thing, though it were life, or crowns and kingdoms, be a reasonable excuse for matters of so high and everlasting consequence. A man can have no reason to cross his ultimate end. Heaven is such a thing, that if you lose it, nothing can supply the want, or make up the loss. And hell is such a thing, that if you suffer it, nothing can remove your misery, or give you ease and comfort. And therefore nothing can be a valuable consideration to excuse you for neglecting your own salvation.” – Richard Baxter
“Oh, my brethren! bold-hearted men are always called mean-spirited by cowards. You and I cannot be useful if we want to be sweet as honey in the mouths of men. God will never bless us if we wish to please men, that they may think well of us. Are you willing to tell them what will break your own heart in the telling and break theirs in the hearing? If not, you are not fit to serve the Lord. You must be willing to go and speak for God, though you will be rejected. Opposers will call your determination obstinacy; but never mind, your firmness is the stuff of which martyrs are made. In a wrong case, a strong will creates incorrigible rebels; but if it be sanctified, it gives great force to character, and steadfastness to faith.” – C. H. Spurgeon
We shall grow in grace, but we shall never be more completely pardoned than when we first believed: we shall one day stand before the glorious presence of God in his own sacred courts, and see the Well-beloved and wear his likeness, but we shall not even then be more perfectly forgiven than we are at this present moment. – C. H. Spurgeon
“The Lord does not shine on us, except when we take his word as our light.” – John Calvin
“Once you know the truth, this means following it, upholding it, and if necessary suffering for it.” – Aida Skripnikova
“I want you to look for a moment. Just listen to this in 2 Corinthians 7:9-10. Listen to what Paul says. “I now rejoice not that you were made sorrowful but that you were made sorrowful to the point of genuine repentance.” Paul says, “I am glad that you saw your sin. I am glad that it created sorrow in you for this reason: It caused you to turn back to God. And then he goes on and says – listen this is very important “For you were made sorrowful” – now listen to this – “according to the will of God.” It was God’s will to make you sorrowful. Literally it can be translated this way: You were made sorrowful according to God. It was God’s doing.
I remember preaching one time, and as I was preaching, at about the middle of the sermon, people started weeping – just all over the congregation. And they just started coming forward, and they’re crying, and the leader of the counselors kept looking at me like “Shouldn’t we come forward and help them?” And I said, “No.” And then I realized they were going to do it anyway, so I went down and I stopped them. And this is what I told them. I said, “Don’t you touch the ark of God. Don’t you try to comfort people that God Himself is wounding.” God must wound you. There must be a crisis. In order to be saved, you must come to grips with who He is and what you are and the heinous nature of sin, the sinfulness of sin. In order for you to come to Christ and see Him as precious. But even after your conversion, there is a sense in which sorrow and mourning should be Biblical and should continue.” – Paul Washer
John Calvin, writing in the preface to Pierre-Robert Olivétan’s 1535 translation of the New Testament:
He [Christ] is Isaac, the beloved Son of the Father who was offered as a sacrifice, but nevertheless did not succumb to the power of death.
He is Jacob the watchful shepherd, who has such great care for the sheep which he guards.
He is the good and compassionate brother Joseph, who in his glory was not ashamed to acknowledge his brothers, however lowly and abject their condition.
He is the great sacrificer and bishop Melchizedek, who has offered an eternal sacrifice once for all.
He is the sovereign lawgiver Moses, writing his law on the tables of our hearts by his Spirit.
He is the faithful captain and guide Joshua, to lead us to the Promised Land.
He is the victorious and noble king David, bringing by his hand all rebellious power to subjection.
He is the magnificent and triumphant king Solomon, governing his kingdom in peace and prosperity.
He is the strong and powerful Samson, who by his death has overwhelmed all his enemies.
This is what we should in short seek in the whole of Scripture: truly to know Jesus Christ, and the infinite riches that are comprised in him and are offered to us by him from God the Father. If one were to sift thoroughly the Law and the Prophets, he would not find a single word which would not draw and bring us to him… Therefore, rightly does Saint Paul say in another passage that he would know nothing except Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
Dane Ortlund recently wrote, “Dear comforters of sufferers: Just because Rom 8:28 comes before Rom 12:15 in the canon doesn’t mean it should in your counsel.”
Joni Eareckson Tada talked about this in a recent interview with Marvin Olasky:
When you were in the hospital room, in despair about becoming a quadriplegic through your diving accident, were some comments people made—with good intentions—hugely irritating?
I had many well-meaning friends my age who said well-meaning things, but they were uninformed because the Bible says weep with those who weep. Many friends would say to me, from Romans 8:28, “Joni, all things fit together to a pattern for good.” Or, from James 1:3, “Welcome this trial as a friend.” Or, from Romans 5, “Rejoice in suffering.” These are good and right and true biblical mandates, but when your heart is being wrung out like a sponge, sometimes the 16 good biblical reasons as to why all this has happened to you sting like salt in the wound. When people are going through great trauma, great grief, they don’t want answers. Because answers don’t reach the problems where it hurts in the gut, in the heart.
What does help?
When I was a little girl, I remember riding my bike down a steep hill. I made a right-hand turn. My wheels skidded out on gravel and I crashed to the ground. My knee was a bloody mess. My dad comes running out. I’m screaming and crying. Although I didn’t ask why, if I had, how cruel it would have been for my father to stand over me and say, “Well, sweetheart, let me answer that question. The next time you’re going down the hill, watch the steepness, be careful about the trajectory of your turn, be observant of gravel.” Those would all have been good answers to the question, “Why did this happen?” But when people are going through great trauma and great grief, they don’t want to know why. They want Daddy to pick them up, press them against his chest, pat them on the back, and say, “There, there, sweetheart, Daddy’s here. It’s OK.” When we are hurting, that’s what we want. We want God to be Daddy: warm, compassionate, real, in the middle of our suffering. We want fatherly assurance that our world is not spinning out of control… Don’t you dare be caught rejoicing with those who weep.
HT: Justin Taylor
Josh is a student at Reformed Theological Seminary, Washington DC and a member of Covenant Reformed Baptist Church, Warrenton, VA. I thought this short article he wrote regarding the Presidential Inauguration Prayer debacle “Not one word?” was excellent:
This past week saw yet another public controversy erupt regarding a Christian pastor and matters pertaining to sexual ethics. Most of you are aware of President Barack Obama’s first choice of Pastor Louie Giglio to give the benediction at the upcoming second inauguration. As the story goes, Giglio was effectively canned because he preached a sermon years ago in which he affirmed biblical teaching that homosexuality is sin. Needless to say, this was too much to bear for an administration devoted to “tolerance” and “diversity” (whatever those terms mean these days). The homosexual activists who supported the President’s re-election got what they wanted and so the pastor will not give the benediction after all.
But the controversy didn’t end there. It only escalated to a rather absurd level. This week, MSNBC host Lawrence O’Donnell gave his take on the matter along with an interesting commentary on using the Bible in the swearing-in ceremony:
This time, as it was last time for the first time in history, the book will be held by a First Lady who is a descendent of slaves. But the holy book she will be holding does not contain one word of God condemning slavery. Not one word. But that same book, which spends hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of pages condemning all sorts of things and couldn’t find one sentence to condemn slavery, does indeed find the space to repeatedly condemn gay people, as the now banished Louie Giglio said it does. And as the First Lady is holding that book for the President, sitting someone near them will be a pastor who the Inauguration Committee will make sure is much more adept at hiding what that book actually says than Louie Giglio was.
First, let’s give credit where credit is due. We need to thank O’Donnell for at least having the honesty to admit that the Bible does indeed teach that homosexual behavior is a sin, although he couches this teaching in emotionally-dripping language of “condemning gay people” (echoing the culture’s attempt to make one’s perverse behavior into a personal identity). It’s a subtle attack on Christian orthodoxy to be sure, but the acknowledgement of what the Scriptures teach on that subject is duly noted and appreciated. Yet the same can’t be said regarding his statements on slavery.
Does the Bible uphold the type of chattel-slavery which existed in Antebellum America to which O’Donnell makes reference? Absolutely not. The Old Testament does indeed uphold and regulate various forms of servitude. We’ll certainly acknowledge that. Indentured servitude, for example, allowed an individual to sell himself into slavery in order to pay off debts. It was a sort of social safety net in the ancient world which prevented individuals and their families from starving to death. That’s the context that’s often missing from these discussions. James White and others have talked about this at length. But it is beyond absurd to assert that this is somehow comparable to plantation slavery in 19th century America.
Yet O’Donnell says, referencing America’s practice of chattel-slavery, that there’s “not one word” condemning it. Really? Is he sure? Let’s take a look at Exodus 21:16 to see if that’s true:
He who kidnaps a man and sells him, or if he is found in his hand, shall surely be put to death.
So we see here that the practice of man-stealing (to use another term) and the subsequent selling of the kidnapped individual into slavery were ruled by God to be capital offenses. In practical terms, this means that the practitioners of the Trans-Atlantic slave trade–both of sellers and the buyers–would have received the death penalty. Just the other night as I led my family through our daily Bible readings, we came across a similar provision in Deuteronomy 24:7. Not one word, Mr. O’Donnell? Hardly.
Given what we see here, there’s one of two possibilities: either O’Donnell is being deliberately dishonest about what the Bible clearly teaches on this subject or he is simply ignorant of what the Scriptures contain. Either way, one can safely assume that his audience won’t know any better. Biblical illiteracy is ubiquitous in modern American society. That’s why so many critics on television can get away with such ridiculous rhetoric. They’re not seriously engaging the text of Scripture, but instead burning bibles they’ve constructed themselves out of straw. Certainly nothing new under the sun.
Josh Dermer
Are you afraid that preaching the gospel will not win souls? Are you despondent as to success in God’s way? Is this why you pine for clever oratory? Is this why you must have music, and architecture, is it by might and power, and not by the Spirit of God? It is even so in the opinion of many.
Brethren beloved, there are many things which I might allow to other worshippers which I have denied myself in conducting the worship of this congregation. I have long worked out before your very eyes the experiment of the unaided attractiveness of the gospel of Jesus. Our service is severely plain. No man ever comes hither to gratify his eye with art, or his ear with music. I have set before you, these many years, nothing but Christ crucified, and the simplicity of the gospel; yet where will you find such a crowd as this gathered together this morning? Where will you find such a multitude as this meeting Sabbath after Sabbath, for five-and-thirty years? I have shown you nothing but the cross, the cross without flowers of oratory, the cross without diamonds of ecclesiastical rank, the cross without the buttress of boastful science. It is abundantly sufficient to attract men first to itself, and afterwards to eternal life!
In this house we have proved successfully, these many years, this great truth, that the gospel plainly preached will gain an audience, convert sinners, and build up and sustain a church. We beseech the people of God to mark that there is no need to try doubtful expedients and questionable methods. God will save by the gospel still: only let it be the gospel in its purity. This grand old sword will cleave a man’s chine [i.e., spine], and split a rock in halves.
How is it that it does so little of its old conquering work? I will tell you. Do you see the scabbard of artistic work, so wonderfully elaborated? Full many keep the sword in this scabbard, and therefore its edge never gets to its work. Pull off that scabbard. Fling that fine sheath to Hades, and then see how, in the Lord’s hands, that glorious two-handed sword will mow down fields of men as mowers level the grass with their scythes.
There is no need to go down to Egypt for help. To invite the devil to help Christ is shameful. Please God, we shall see prosperity yet, when the church of God is resolved never to seek it except in God’s own way.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, 1888, vol. 34, p. 563
Its clear that no one who believes the Bible (a Christian), the Torah (a Jew) or the Quran (a Muslim) can ever participate in the current administration’s Presidential inauguration. Dr. Al Mohler says it very well here.