Word of Salvation – Vol.23 No.21 – February 1977

 

The Doctrine That Seems To Need No Proof..!

 

Sermon by Rev. A. I. de Graaf on Canons of Dort Chapter III 1-6/8-10

Scripture Readings: Psalm 14; Ephes 2:1-10

Psalter Hymnal: Psa.86:11-13; 224; 491; 98:1,2,3,7; 388:2,3; 326:1,2,3; 326:4

 

It is interesting to see how ACTION calls for RE-action.  Malcolm Muggeridge appeared on the Australian scene, to defend and proclaim the Christian faith which he once scorned, but found as the only Way.  And immediately there are those who lash out with bitter criticism of the Church, of Christianity, and especially of ChristenDOM.

When we read his bitter attacks, and those of other critics – like Bertrand Russell – we had better take note.  Because these attacks are like those of so many disappointed children of Christians who have turned away from what they reckon is proud, sham and fraud.  (Are we goodies the only ones who can save the world?  Look at what we did in the process – the broken promises, the power and wealth and ease we brought ourSELVES in the Name of Christ.  Look at Ireland, Southern Africa, Lebanon!  Look at the whole sickening show right from the Crusades onwards…!).

When we read and hear these bitter attacks, which in our day especially focus on SOCIAL JUSTICE – or rather us Christians’ lack of it – we had better listen carefully.  A lot of what I hear in these voices is DISAPPOINTMENT, BITTER DISAPPOINTMENT.  And a disappointed man is a man who had started off EXPECTING something.

Was he wrong in that?

Had we CHRISTIANS promised something we could not keep?  Had we somehow pointed at OURSELVES again, in our presentation of the Good News, instead of at God, the GOD OF ALL GRACE?  It is amazing, how time and again we Christians answer our critics by trying to prove that WE’RE NOT AS BAD AS IT LOOKS.  At a time that people thought that whatever we did and said had to be REASONABLE, and the Christian faith was scorned as being too dumb, too simple, too childlike and illogical, both the Apologists in the first century. and a man like Schleiermacher in the 19th, tried to prove that CHRISTIANS WERE ENLIGHTENED MEN, TOO, with WHOM YOU COULD TALK AND REASON.

Nowadays, the big stumbling block is our lack of SOCIAL CONCERN – the Church’s allowing black slavery, rich exploitation of the poor, lagging behind in feeding the hungry and liberating the oppressed.

Today it is again – especially in the World Council of Churches – that men and women rise up and say: BUT LOOK AT US, NOW!  We will do it better.

WE WILL START A THEOLOGY OF LIBERATION AND WE WILL HELP THE BLACKS.

WE DID NOT SEE THINGS IN THE PAST, BUT NOW, AT LAST, WE ARE CHANGING…

And so you see Christians who join the Marxists, in a belated attempt to even YET bring in the paradise on earth.

But their big handicap is the handicap of the Marxists:
for a paradise you need building blocks
and these building blocks are PEOPLE.

And it would be so helpful if these people would be GOOD PEOPLE, but man alive!  ARE THEY HARD TO FIND…!!!

MARXISM thought that the proletarian would be that ideal man.
But he, too, must be FORCED to work for the common good.  As soon as he cannot make an extra dollar with it, he starts taking things at his work mighty easy, when the boss isn’t looking….!

WE ATTEMPT, WE TRY. . . WE BUILD.

BUT ALWAYS THERE IS THAT HARD FACT OF HUMAN UNWILLINGNESS, HUMAN IMPERFECTION, SO MUCH SO THAT PEOPLE TALK OF “THE HUMAN FACTOR”.

But now the difference between the humanist and the Christian – for all their sameness in being imperfect and for all their sameness in promising more than they deliver – is that the humanist will call this indeed: human – to err is to be human – while God’s Word says: If only they WERE human..!

If only man was again as He was MADE IN THE FIRST PLACE, as he left the Divine workshop, as he was meant to be: perfect, good, the ideal building block of paradise.

The doctrine of human sin needs no proof it seems:
we all see it and are filled with dismay as we see it.

It needs no proof, no, but it does need CONFESSION.  And that’s the hardest thing to do.

When the fathers of Dort wrote this confession, these Canons, it was a different world from ours, outwardly.  But the CENTRAL PROBLEM was there as it is there now: The people against whom these Canons were written, the Arminians, wanted to do two things:

(1)  they wanted to defend the goodness that there is still is (!) in the human heart.  Like so many present-day critics of the Christian faith they thought that it was UNWORTHY and UNFAIR not to see that people – NON-Christian people too – CAN DO GOOD THINGS and make RIGHT decisions.

“Who do these Christians think they are?”

(2)  The Arminians wanted to STREAMLINE THE BIBLE AND THE CHRISTIAN MESSAGE A BIT, so that it would be easier to understand.

Why force people to believe in something he cannot understand?
Is God so sovereign that man cannot do a thing?
Must he wait till God does something to get him out of his spiritual grave?
No, this the Arminians saw as unbiblical too and they rejected it.

But THEN they said – THEN the position must be that man CAN make his own choice, and that there IS inside man that absolutely FREE will, with which he can make the choice between going the right way… or going the wrong way.  A bridge where he stands… all on his own.  But that would mean that man is not totally corrupt.  There is a good core in him.  And Christ died for all men so that this good core might be there and might be used.  If someone then still gets lost, that is the loss of a sheep of Christ, it is a saint who turns away after all, a saint, who was a Christian, but loses his salvation.

Because salvation is not the full and total thing.  It is the POSSIBILITY to make it, and now it depends what YOU make of this.

* * * * *

But against this the Fathers of Dort maintained the doctrines of GRACE.  That’s the best name ever given to these “5 points of Calvinism”…
The Doctrines of GRACE.
“Not that we loved God but that He loved us!”

That is the Biblical theme running through this teaching.  In many ways the critics of the Christians are right.  The Christian knows the Word of God, his strongest critic; he knows that God’s eyes see into the depths of his soul and scan all his deeds.

He knows that God hears all his words and confesses that doctrine that seems to need no proof:
“Lord, there is no good in me apart from Thee.”

Those fathers of Dort – in many ways they, too – were disappointing Christians.  They could be very rough on people with whom they disagreed.  Their mission work was under-developed.  They condoned slavery and did not protest as they should when their government put the making of money in the overseas colonies on a par with – if not above the preaching of the Gospel…!

They had many blind spots in their view of the Word.

Maybe they also had a blind spot for what the Lord was doing in other places – including the Roman Catholic Church – but yet they caught the biblical point and were willing to do battle for it,
THAT WHAT PEOPLE NEED
AND WHAT THE WORLD NEEDS AND WHAT THE CHURCH NEEDS
yes, the church most of all
is the GRACE of a God
who loves in spite of our hatred,
and justifies the sinner for no reason except His sovereign will.

Here the Christian stands right next to his critic, and says: you are right in listing my shortcomings.
I have them.
You have them too.
I need not forgive you, but you and I both need the forgiveness of a holy God.

That is why these doctrines of grace start off with that “T” of *Total depravity (* Total depravity which means: state of feeling depraved: corruption: the doctrine of sin may need no proof in a world like ours, but it does need CONFESSION even in a CHURCH like ours.  That there is only ONE Way: Christ – Who said this about Himself quite clearly – is not because we who must preach Him are so bigoted and know so much better than others, we think…!

(Maybe we are as bad as all that – too), but Christ is the ONLY WAY as He said, because our sin closed all other ways.  Our rebellion made us utterly and totally INCAPABLE of carving out any other route to perfection.  The way of the Law was there to get to Paradise, but by sin we chopped off our own feet and legs and now we cannot walk that road – even if we wanted to.

The church can make no way to God, neither can the Christian.  No man can, …be he ever so pious, so motivated, or so socially or morally concerned.  We are proving total depravity even in the church.  We are no exception.  The only difference is that we have begun to see another truth at work in the world, and that is the utter and totally surprising grace of God.

A grace that does not merely offer, for then we could still reject – and in fact we are so sinful and rebellious we certainly would.

A grace that does not merely open a door, for our misery is so great that we would rather stay outside than say “thank you” to God.

To God of all Persons!

No God’s grace also brings in, also gets us in, and overcomes the rebel by a power that is not his own, but straight from heaven.

Doctrines of grace…!

This grace does not merely start, but also sees through.  So that when the saints go marching in ― the saints as they have persevered, as they have fought and obeyed, and wrestled and held on to God in faith ― the saints sing the song yet of God who does NOT forsake the work of His Hands.

― Total depravity.  .not unto us, not unto us, but to Thy name give glory. .. !

― Unconditional election: GOD said: I want You, before we ever could say: I want God!
God started, His is the Initiative.

― Limited atonement: only for His sheep did Christ die,
but then indeed NONE of His sheep He shall ever allow to be snatched from His Hand!

― Irresistible Grace: if it were up to us we would resist,
we would smother the voice of God even in our last breath.
But God’s grace – and that is the wonder of it – is STRONGER ALWAYS… stronger than our sin.

― Perseverance of the Saints – therefore, is also a doctrine of grace.
It is, yes, the SAINTS who persevere, but because GOD’s work is carried on in them.

And so it is in this context and against this background that CONFESSION OF SIN is made.

We need grace for the very first start.  UNCONDITIONAL election!

We need grace for the whole way of salvation ― the bridge must extend over the whole gap!  We need grace in spite of our fighting against it as fight we do, the critics are right!  And we need grace to the very end.  Even when God says to us: ‘Well done faithful servant,’ it is yet ours to say: Lord only by THY grace do we lift up our head: Not unto us, not unto us, but unto Thy Name the glory.

Only when looking at the Bible ― only when looking at the Christian faith in this way can we listen to our critics and keep going.  We know they are only too right.  But thanks be to God Who GIVES us the victory….That does not mean that therefore we do not try, that therefore we let go and live a sloppy Christian life.  To confess our sinfulness is to HATE that sinfulness and when God who hates it more than any of us could, sends not just His Son but also His Spirit to do something about our condition, we cry for the changing power of that Spirit, that, born again, we shall begin to live to His glory.

And then we will indeed discover that much of what others do around us – who are no Christians at all – is also noble, is also and often in comparison with us… MORE ! helpful to world and mankind.  Whilst Christian marriages often go on the rocks, we meet unbelievers who are happy together…  Whilst Christian statesmen sometimes have a blind spot for social justice (And God LOVES justice!) there are non-Christians who catch the point and carry it out – even Marxists do that and at times put their lives at risk for their fellow men in spite of their theories that can be so inhumane.  Yes, but that COMMON grace is grace, too, says the Bible.  It is GRACE that Total Depravity does not mean that we are, always and in all things, as BAD as we can possibly be.  Even though it DOES mean that in nothing, ever, are we as good, and as God-pleasing, as we SHOULD and COULD be.  Total depravity is often NOT what we see when we look at each other from the sinner’s vantage point, but it is what GOD sees when HE looks down on the children of men from above – as Psalm 14 and Psalm 53 have it.

We can look out from this church and notice a high building next to a very small one.  But as soon as we get into a helicopter and fly over at 1000 feet, the 2 buildings begin to look remarkably alike and both very low and small indeed.  And when we would try to see any difference from a jet cruising at 30,000 feet we would be completely at a loss.  Total depravity is not for us to judge.  It seems a doctrine that needs no proof, but boy! are we clever to conclude that HIS… Hitler’s…? Vorster’s…? .Fraser’s or Whitlam’s…? …yes that my wife’s or my husband’s DEPRAVITY is just a bit more total than mine.  But seen from God’s point of view we can learn to look at Hitler and say: THERE BUT FOR THE GRACE OF GOD GO I.

And when we then learn of a grace so great that it sent Christ to die for such a one as me, then there is the wonder from which a faith is born that can stand the critics:

“Amazing love.  How can it be
 That Thou my God Hast love for me!”

Total depravity…met by total love and grace.

I see the cross… and I ask God, why did you do that?  Why?
Then you will discover the beauty of the Doctrines of Grace.
The beauty of these doctrines about you and me…. and God.

Amen.