Studies in The Baptist Catechism: Section Three – The Decrees of God (Q.10)

October 16, 2016October 16, 2016 / William F. Leonhart III / 1 Comment

Q.10: What are the decrees of God?

A. The decrees of God are His eternal purpose according to the counsel of His will, whereby, for His own glory, He hath foreordained whatsoever comes to pass.¹

¹Ephesians 1:4, 11; Romans 9:22-23; Isaiah 46:10; Lamentations 3:37

Moving along in our discussion of what man ought to believe concerning God, let us pivot a bit from what God is to what God does. Now, these two aspects of God should not be divorced from one another. Obviously, what God is will determine what God does. When we say that God is good, after all, we are claiming that God is the ultimate standard of all that is good. In order to properly define what good is requires that we do so in reference to what God is. It also requires that we do so in reference to what God does.

The first step in examining what God does is to look to His eternal decrees. In the decrees of God, we find the Source and Purpose for all that occurs, whether in the secret counsels of God or in the created order, from eternity to eternity. God Himself is the Source of everything that occurs. He is also the Purpose. The Westminster Assembly put it this way:

“The decrees of God are his eternal purpose according to the counsel of his will, whereby, for his own glory, he hath foreordained whatsoever comes to pass,” (The Westminster Shorter Catechism, Q.7).

William Collins, when penning The Baptist Catechism, changed nothing of substance in this answer. Why? This answer serves as one of the shortest, most succinct summaries of the doctrine of God’s sovereignty ever committed to the page. In it, we find that all that comes to pass is a result of God’s eternal purpose, according to the counsel of His will, and foreordained for the purpose of His own glory.

All that occurs, has occurred, or will occur is determined by the eternal will of God, comes from God, is guided and held together by God, and will ultimately culminate in His receiving all glory, honor, and power. In other words, the Source and Purpose of all things is God, God, God! “For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen” (Rom. 11:36; NASB).

If you really stop to think about it, Romans 11:36, from a worldly perspective, is a somewhat counter-intuitive way to end the discussion Paul began way back in Romans 9. In Romans 9-11, Paul explains how the monergistic gospel he has been describing since chapter 1 is actually good news, since many of his kinsmen are not believing. He begins Romans 9 with these words:

“¹I am telling the truth in Christ, I am not lying, my conscience testifies with me in the Holy Spirit, ²that I have great sorrow and unceasing grief in my heart. ³For I could wish that I myself were accursed, separated from Christ for the sake of my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh, ⁴who are Israelites, to whom belongs the adoption as sons, and the glory and the covenants and the giving of the Law and the temple service and the promises, ⁵whose are the fathers, and from whom is the Christ according to the flesh, who is over all, God blessed forever. Amen.,” (Rom. 9:1-5; NASB).

Many in Israel would not repent. As a result, they were broken off, as branches are broken off from a tree. Paul refers to this breaking off as a partial hardening. “For I do not want you, brethren, to be uninformed of this mystery—so that you will not be wise in your own estimation—that a partial hardening has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in,” (Rom. 11:25; NASB). How were many of Paul’s kinsmen according to the flesh coming to be hardened? They were hardened according to the sovereign will of God, according to Romans 9. God demonstrates His mercy upon whom He wills, and He hardens whom He wills (9:14-18).

Paul knew this was a hard pill for his readers to swallow. It was a hard pill for him to swallow. However, it was the truth, and Christians are those who ultimately must come to the place where they affirm with Paul: “For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen” (Rom. 11:36; NASB).

Notice how, in the answer given in the catechism, God’s purpose is eternal. As we have already mentioned, God is immutable; He does not change. God has never changed His mind on a matter. What He decreed in eternity past remains unchanged to this day. Thus, the apostle Paul writes: “just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him,” (Eph. 1:4a; NASB). If God can change His mind, what would it matter who He chose to be holy and blameless before the foundation of the world? He could just as easily choose differently tomorrow, if indeed He is unstable in His decrees.

However, we know that He is not unstable. Whatsoever He has decreed will surely come to pass. It is on this truth that our hope in an eternal inheritance rests, for Paul also writes: “also we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to His purpose who works all things after the counsel of His will,” (Ephesians 1:11; NASB). But, if God’s will is mutable, might our inheritance be given to another? Why should we hold to it with any surety? On the contrary, Louis Berkhof writes of God:

“He is not deficient in knowledge, veracity, or power. Therefore, He need not change His decree because of a mistake of ignorance, nor because of inability to carry it out. And He will not change it, because He is the immutable God and because He sis faithful and true,” (Berkhof, Systematic Theology. Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., Grand Rapids. 1941, pg. 105).

God’s sovereignty and immutability in His decrees, then, are a great comfort to us. They ensure for us all of the great promises of God. Our comfort is not the ultimate purpose of the doctrine, though. How foolish, arbitrary, overly-romantic, and trite it would be if God had determined to mold His determinative faculties around something as ultimately insignificant as human feelings. No. God’s created order does not revolve around us: our wills, our feelings, our significance, our dignity, and our glory. Rather, it is all for His glory!

It is ultimately God’s glory that hinges on His purposes being established, not ours. It is ultimately His divine, eternal reputation that is at stake. Thus, He is the One whose “good pleasure” is paramount:

“Declaring the end from the beginning,

And from ancient times things which have not been done,

Saying, ‘My purpose will be established,

And I will accomplish all My good pleasure’,” (Isaiah 46:10; NASB).

We object that God’s good pleasure must make sense to us. We must be able to wrap our finite, fickle minds around His sovereign, eternal decrees, or He is a monster! “¹⁹You will say to me then, ‘Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?’ ²⁰On the contrary, who are you, O man, who answers back to God? The thing molded will not say to the molder, ‘Why did you make me like this,’ will it?” (Rom. 9:19-20; NASB). Just as the clay does not have a right to demand to know the secret counsels of the potter, neither do we have the right to demand from God His secret decrees.

We do not get to determine the definition of good, and then demand that God fit into that mold. Rather, we determine what is good by a proper examination of God. Hence the age old problem of questioning authority. In the military, it is a soldier’s duty to disobey unlawful orders, because the law is above command in rank. In theology, we never have right disobey an order of God, because He is the law.

We have no right to question the goodness or the justice of God, because He is the standard of goodness and justice. To lay a charge against Him is to speak out of sheer ignorance. Though one may observe several instances where Lord Tennyson’s often quoted The Charge of the Light Brigade is flawed in relation to subordination in the military, it holds true nonetheless in Christian theology.

“Theirs not to make reply,

Theirs not to reason why,

Theirs but to do and die.”

Studies in The Baptist Catechism: Section Two – Theology Proper

October 9, 2016January 19, 2018 / William F. Leonhart III / 12 Comments

Table of Contents

Part I – Prolegomena

Section One: Authority, Revelation, and Scripture

Part II – What Man Ought to Believe Concerning God

Section Two: Theology Proper
Section Three: God’s Decrees
Section Four: Our First Parents, Sin, and the Fall
Section Five: Christ the Mediator
Section Six: The Work of the Spirit
Section Seven: The Death of the Righteous and the Wicked

Part III – What Duty God Requires of Man

Section Eight: Introduction to the Moral Law
Section Nine: The First Table of the Moral Law (Part One)
Section Ten: The First Table of the Moral Law (Part Two)
Section Eleven: The Second Table of the Moral Law (Part One)
Section Twelve: The Second Table of the Moral Law (Part Two)
Section Thirteen: The Proper Response to Law and Gospel

Part VI – The Communication of God’s Grace

Section Fourteen: The Ordinary Means of Grace
Section Fifteen: Prayer and the Lord’s Prayer

______________

In writing this humble series, I don’t hope to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the great theologians who have already written on these subjects. What I do hope to accomplish is to make The Baptist Catechism a bit more accessible and clear for my generation. You may read Section One of our study here. Having completed the second series of articles on the Catechism, you may now read it in its entirety below or click on the links to read it section by section.

Q.7: What is God?

A. God is a Spirit,¹ infinite,² eternal,³ and unchangeable,⁴ in His being,⁵ wisdom, power,⁶ holiness,⁷goodness,⁸ and truth.⁹

¹John 4:24

²Job 11:7-9;

³Psalm 90:2

⁴James 1:17

⁵Exodus 3:14

⁶Psalm 147:5

⁷Revelation 4:8

⁸Revelation 15:4

⁹Exodus 34:6

It can seem almost improper to ask a question such as What is God? as though we are calling God a thing—an impersonal, inanimate object. Rather, the question seeks to discern two things about the very personal Being we call God. We want to know, generally, what comprises God’s essential nature and, more specifically, what His attributes are.

Answering this question is of prime concern for our study, because heresies are built upon false conceptions of God. There are heresies, like Mormonism, that teach that their god had a body before he became a god and that he still has a body to this day. Mormons also teach that their god is not eternal. He will continue on for eternity, but he came into being at some point. He is everlasting, but he is not from everlasting. Other cults, like Islam, teach that their god does change. He arbitrarily changes from one day to the next, according to his changing desires. The god of Islam is not fixed.

Spirit

Enough about what God’s word does not teach; what does it teach? In order to understand what God is, we must often speak of Him in terms of what He is not. For instance, when we consider the fact that God is Spirit, we are acknowledging the fact that God is incorporeal. That is a fancy way of saying that God does not have a body. “See My hands and My feet, that it is I Myself; touch Me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have,” (Lk. 24:39; NASB). In His essential, eternal being, God does not have a body like ours.

“God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth,’” (John 4:24; NASB).

This is the first of many attributes of God that distinguish Him from ourselves. In His very nature, God is Spirit; He is incorporeal. In our nature, we are body and spirit. A distinction is being made here. We are not as God is, nor will we be in eternity. At the resurrection, we will receive new, glorified bodies, and we will have these bodies for all of eternity.

Infinite, Eternal, and Unchangeable

Here, our Catechism teaches us three more of God’s essential attributes. He is infinite, eternal, and unchangeable. These attributes are meant to be read as qualifiers of the attributes that follow. So, it could actually be broken down like this:

God is infinite in His being, wisdom, power, holiness, goodness, and truth.
God is eternal in His being, wisdom, power, holiness, goodness, and truth.
God is unchangeable in His being, wisdom, power, holiness, goodness, and truth.

These attributes also distinguish God from man. They are what have lately been styled the incommunicable attributes of God. That just means that God does not share these attributes with His creatures. It is in these attributes that we find the Creator / creature distinction of Scripture. God is completely other. Sure, we exist, but we do not have infinite, eternal, or unchangeable being. As Christians, we might grow in wisdom, holiness, goodness, and truth, but we will never possess those traits infinitely, eternally, and unchangeably as God does.

In the entirety of His being, God is all of these attributes. God is essentially and exhaustively infinite.

“Can you discover the depths of God?

Can you discover the limits of the Almighty?

They are high as the heavens, what can you do?

Deeper than Sheol, what can you know?

Its measure is longer than the earth

And broader than the sea,” (Job 11:7-9; NASB).

There has never been a time when God did not exist, and exist in all of His essential attributes.

“Before the mountains were born

Or You gave birth to the earth and the world,

Even from everlasting to everlasting,

You are God,” (Ps. 97:9; NASB).

God is unwaveringly trustworthy in the immutability (unchangeability) of His attributes. All of His promises we can expect He will fulfill, because of His supreme and perfect consistency. Thus, we derive great comfort from this doctrine.

“Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow,” (Jas. 1:17; NASB).

Being, Wisdom, Power, Holiness, Goodness, and Truth

Having observed God’s infinitude, eternality, and immutability, let us examine the attributes of God in which we see these characteristics on display. The following attributes are what might be called the communicable attributes. That is, these are attributes in which the creature might share in a certain measure, albeit in a finite, temporal, and changeable sense. Where we exist and may to a certain measure prove wise, powerful, holy, good, and true, these are things we receive from God, not things that originate in us. God, on the other hand, possesses all of these attributes infinitely, eternally, and unchangeably.

Being. First, let us recognize that God is infinite, eternal, and unchangeable in His being. There was never a time when God began to be. He has always existed. In fact, God’s covenant name in the Hebrew Scriptures (YHWH; Yahweh, or Jehovah) was derivative of this idea. The name Yahweh is believed to have been revealed first to Moses at the burning bush:

“God said to Moses, ‘I AM WHO I AM’; and He said, ‘Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you,’’” (Exod. 3:14; NASB).

God did not claim to have come into being. Rather, He declared, “I AM WHO I AM.” That is to say that God exists. From all of eternity past to all of eternity future, God is. He did not create Himself, nor was He created by another. He simply has always been, still is, and always will be. He is the constant, eternal I AM.

Christ evoked this same moniker of Himself in several sayings in the Gospel of John known as the I AM statements. In a very provocative way, Christ used the construction ἐγώ εἰμι repeatedly in reference to Himself. The term ἐγώ in Greek means I in English. It is often used with action verbs to describe events (e.g. I run, I walk, I sit, etc.). When referring to being or existence, one would not typically use the term ἐγώ, but would rather choose εἰμι, which is translated into English as I am. Never would it be necessary, in the Greek, to put these two terms together, unless the person speaking is trying to make a very specific point.

Interestingly, in Exodus 3:14 in the Greek version of the Hebrew Scriptures (The Septuagint; LXX), God refers to Himself with these two Greek terms. In the English, we read, “I AM WHO I AM.” In the Greek, it reads, “Ἐγώ εἰμι ὁ ὤν.” This was God coming to Moses as the covenant God of Israel and telling him that He never began to be, but simply is from all of eternity. Thus, the Jews of Jesus’ day would have been very careful not to use this construction to refer to anyone but God Himself. Jesus, however, used it of Himself in multiple statements! In all of the following statements, Jesus refers to Himself using the construction ἐγώ εἰμι.

“Then Jesus again spoke to them, saying, ‘I am the Light of the world; he who follows Me will not walk in the darkness, but will have the Light of life,’” (John 8:12; NASB).

““I am He who testifies about Myself, and the Father who sent Me testifies about Me,” (vs. 18; NASB).

“Therefore I said to you that you will die in your sins; for unless you believe that I am He, you will die in your sins,”(vs. 24; NASB; note: The term He is inserted by most English translations. It does not actually appear in the Greek text.).

“So Jesus said, ‘When you lift up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am He, and I do nothing on My own initiative, but I speak these things as the Father taught Me,’” (vs. 28; NASB; note: Again the term He does not appear in the Greek text.).

Jesus’ I AM statements here serve to build a certain tension between Him and the religious leaders with whom He is speaking. He is blatantly claiming to be Yahweh in human flesh. Not only this, but He repeatedly calls their authority into question, even calling them sons of the devil. This interaction culminates with Christ making His claim to deity unmistakable:

“Jesus said to them, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was born, I am,’” (John 8:58; NASB).

Jesus in this statement is not merely claiming to be infinite, eternal, and unchangeable in His being. He is claiming to be such because He is claiming to be Yahweh Himself! In response to this bold claim, the Jews picked up stones to stone Him, so He hid himself and went out of the temple.

Wisdom. As we mentioned when we began this study, God is the source of all true knowledge, understanding, and wisdom. He searches all things, even Himself, and there is nothing hidden from His sight. The Psalmist spoke well of this attribute of God when he declared the following:

“Great is our Lord and abundant in strength;

His understanding is infinite,” (Ps. 147:5; NASB).

In our knowledge, understanding, and wisdom, we are finite, temporal, and changing. God, on the other hand, is the source of all true knowledge, understanding, and wisdom. In all three, He is infinite, eternal, and unchangeable. As we stated in our first study, all proper knowledge of God must have God as its Source. In fact, all proper knowledge, understanding, and wisdom does come down to us from the Lord of Glory.

Power. Psalm 147:5 also speaks to the great power of our God. The psalmist proclaims, “Great is our Lord and abundant in strength.” Surely, our God is omnipotent (all powerful). In fact, His exhaustive power is so prominent an attribute as to be attributed to Him as one of His titles. In Revelation 4:8, we read of the designation given Him by the seraphim who surround His throne:

“And the four living creatures, each one of them having six wings, are full of eyes around and within, and day and night they do not cease to say,

‘Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God, the Almighty, who was and who is and who is to come,’” (Rev. 4:8; NASB).

The Lord’s power also speaks to His authority. Sure, as the Catechism for Boys and Girls teaches us, “God can do all His holy will.” Notice though that in Isaiah 6, the Old Testament parallel to Revelation 4:8, the six-winged seraphim refer to God as the Lord of hosts:

“And one called out to another and said,

‘Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord of hosts,

The whole earth is full of His glory,’” (Isa. 6:3; NASB).

This title of God teaches us that God has all authority to dispatch hosts of heavenly beings to accomplish His will in creation. For this reason, we can have confidence when we pray, “Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven,” (Mt. 6:10b; KJV). At a moment’s notice, were it God’s will, God can exercise His infinite power and execute His divine authority to set all things right on earth, just as it is in the very presence of God. Surely, God has it in His power and in His authority to accomplish His will in all things.

This is a comfort for us as Christians who know that “God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose,” (Rom. 8:28; NASB). God not only promises good things to those who love Him and called, He not only knows of the good things that will come to us, but He actually causes all such things to come to pass. The God who promises to work all things out for the good of His saints actually has all power and authority to ensure that His promises will be kept.

Holiness. God is not only referenced as the Almighty in these refrains. He is also called holy. Not only is He called holy, but He is thrice holy: “‘Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord of hosts,” (Isa. 6:3b). In antiquity, when an author wanted to emphasize a particular word or phrase, he would repeat it. Holiness is the only attribute of God repeated thrice. This repetition is meant to highlight its preeminence. Of the holiness of God, the Westminster divines wrote:

“Q. 2. Is God necessarily holy?

A. Holiness is as necessary to him as his being: he is as necessarily holy as he is necessarily God: ‘Who shall not fear thee, O Lord?—for thou only art holy,’ Rev. xv. 4” (Westminster Assembly, The Assembly’s Shorter Catechism Explained. Oliver and Boyd, Edinburgh. 1765, pg. 31).

All of God’s attributes could be said to be dependent upon this over-arching attribute of holiness. God’s acts are just, because God is holy. God’s love is pure, because God is holy. God’s glory is matchless, because God is holy. God’s transcendence is unattainable, because God is holy. God’s ways are not our ways, because God is holy.

Everything that God does is holy. All of His works, His decrees, His provisions, and His dealings with mankind are absolutely holy. For all the efforts of the anti-theists, there is absolutely no charge that can be laid against God on account of His works.

“The Lord is righteous in all his ways,

And holy in all his works,” (Ps. 145:17; KJV).

God’s covenant promises are also holy: “For He remembered His holy promise, and Abraham His servant,” (Ps. 105:42; NKJV). All that God has determined shall come to pass work toward His ultimate holy ends. We have the security and the assurance of knowing that God has promised good to all His saints, and His promises will surely come to pass.

All that God ordains and all that He designates as His own is to be reckoned as holy. God’s apostles and prophets were deemed holy (Eph. 3:5) insofar as they were His apostles and prophets. God’s elect are holy (Eph. 1:1; Phil. 1:1; Col. 1:2), even the elect of otherwise corrupt churches (1Cor. 1:2; 2Cor. 1:1). Even the day that God has set aside for His worship is to be considered holy by His people:

“If you turn away your foot from the Sabbath,

From doing your pleasure on My holy day,

And call the Sabbath a delight,

The holy day of the LORD honorable,

And shall honor Him, not doing your own ways,

Nor finding your own pleasure,

Nor speaking your own words,” (Isa. 58:13; NKJV).

Above all, let us not forget that God’s holiness is revealed to us so that we might respond in praise, and awe, and wonder.

“Who will not fear, O Lord, and glorify Your name?

For You alone are holy;

For all the nations will come and worship before you,

For Your righteous acts have been revealed,” (Revelation 4:8; NASB).

Goodness and truth. Finally, let us consider the fact that God is infinite, eternal, and unchangeable in His goodness and truth. We often keep our motives and justifications secret from our children in the hopes that they will learn to trust us. We do not explain to them every reason for every command we give them. Rather, we say things like, “…because I told you so.” In these moments, do we mean to be harsh and uncaring? Not necessarily. It can be proper to respond to our kids in this way if our desire is for them to grow in their trust of us.

Yet, for as much as we know what’s best for our children, we do not know as much as God. For as much as we might treat our children with kindness, love, and sympathy, we are not as good as God. God’s goodness and truth are far above our own, and we have the privilege of being called His children. Consider the declaration made to Moses as the Lord passed by him:

“Then the Lord passed by in front of him and proclaimed, ‘The Lord, the Lord God, compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in lovingkindness and truth,” (Exodus 34:6; NASB).

What comfort is there in knowing that, though we do not know all things and though we are mired in sin and misery, God is infinite, eternal, and unchangeable in His goodness and truth. We have the privilege of serving this God. We have the privilege of calling Him Father. What a blessing! What security! What great and glorious assurance!

Q.8: Are there more Gods than one.

A. There is but one only, the living and true God.¹

¹Deuteronomy 6:4; Jeremiah 10:10

Besides monergism, monotheism is the doctrine that most distinguishes Christianity from myriad other world religions. While it could be argued that all religions besides Christianity promote a works-based view of salvation, there are admittedly other religions that hold to monotheism. Judaism and Islam are just two such religions. Other religions, like many pagan religions, teach a view known as polytheism. This view teaches that there are many gods. Mormonism and many Hindu sects teach henotheism, a brand of polytheism in which only one of the many gods is to be worshipped.

Still others, like Buddhism, are ultimately atheistic or agnostic at their root, teaching no particular view of God or the gods. Other religions teach pantheism (all things are god) or even panentheism (god is all things and more). Others, like African Traditional religions, have adopted animism teaching that all things (plant, animal, and mineral) have a soul and are animated by a supernatural force in the world.

Christianity affirms the Shema of the ancient Hebrews: “Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord is one!” (Deuteronomy 6:4; NASB). God is not many. He certainly is not three gods, as Christians are slanderously charged as teaching in the Quran. As has been attested by Christians throughout the history of the church, going all the way back to creation itself, there is only one God.

“The unity of the world shows there is only one Maker. The voice of conscience testifies that there is only one Lord and Master. Reason teaches that there can be but one infinite and absolute Sovereign. This one God is called the living and true God, to distinguish his name from those of the false gods the heathens worship, who are false and dead,” (A.A. Hodge, The System of Theology Contained in the Westminster Shorter Catechism. Wipf and Stock Publishers, Eugene, OR. 2004, pg. 16).

Throughout the Hebrew Scriptures, God is recognized to be only One, though subtle hints to His triunity are peppered here and there throughout. The term most commonly translated God in the Hebrew text is the word אֱלֹהִים (transliteration:Elohim; cf. Deut. 4:35; 39; 7:9; 1Kgs. 8:60; Isa. 45:18), which is notably a plural noun. The term is used 2,570 times in the Hebrew Scriptures the first of which is the first verse of the Bible in which it is the fourth word written. God is also notably designated plural pronouns in several passages of the Hebrew Scriptures (e.g. Gen. 1:26; 3:22; 11:7; Isa. 6:8).

What does all of this mean? Is God one or is He not? God certainly is but one true and living God. Yet, God has also revealed Himself in three infinitely eternally distinct Subsistences: the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. For this reason, Christians honestly confess that we are neither Unitarian monotheists nor Tri-theists. We believe, as Scripture teaches, in the triunity of God. He is one God, and the Father is God, and the Son is God, and the Spirit is God. These three are different Persons, and yet they are one God.

“To apply arithmetical notions to God is as unphilosophical as profane…. He is not One in the way in which created things are severally units; for one, as applied to ourselves, is used in contrast to two or three or a whole series of numbers. But God has not even such a relation to His creatures as to allow, philosophically speaking, of our contrasting Him with them’ (Newman),” (Alexander Whyte, An Exposition of the Shorter Catechism. Christian Focus Publications, Ross-shire, Great Britain. 2004, pg. 29).

God is one, but we dare not assign to him an anthropomorphic (human-like) oneness. God is otherly one. He is one in the sense that only God may be one. Thus, it should not baffle us when cultists like Muslims, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and Oneness Pentecostals mistaken Christian theism with Tri-theism and deny on its face the oneness of the Christian expression of monotheism. They forget that we are not talking about their false gods. We are talking about the God of Scripture. Even in our agreement on the term monotheism, we find no neutral ground on which to stand with Unitarian monotheists.

Decidedly less of a temptation for Christians is to affirm any form of polytheism. Polytheists cannot goad us into engaging the accusation that we do not truly believe in “three.” We do not believe in “three.” At least, we do not believe in a plurality in the way that they would affirm a plurality. There is a plurality of Subsistences in the Godhead, but these Subsistences are not three gods. They are each God, and there is only one God. Again, God is divinely other in His oneness. He is neither like us in His oneness, nor is He like the gods we fabricate in their supposed oneness.

“But the Lord is the true God;

He is the living God and the everlasting King.

At His wrath the earth quakes,

And the nations cannot endure His indignation,” (Jeremiah 10:10; NASB).

God, then, is distinguished in His oneness both from any oneness that may be found in His creatures and from any conception of oneness His creatures may venture to fathom or fabricate. To say that human beings can wrap our minds around such a oneness as is found in the Christian doctrine of the Trinity is to say that we are the judge of all sound reason and revelation. Consider the testimony of our Confession:

“The Lord our God is but one only living and true God; whose subsistence is in and of Himself, infinite in being and perfection; whose essence cannot be comprehended by any but Himself,” (The Baptist Confession, 2.1; emphasis added).

God’s oneness is essential to all that we confess as orthodox Christians. It is a necessary confession for all who would claim to believe in the one true God of the Holy Scriptures. To say that we are monotheists is to distinguish ourselves from all non-monotheistic world religions. However, this affirmation does not serve to link us with Unitarian monotheists. Rather, Christians hold to the Triune monotheism of Scripture, a monotheism that accords with sound reason, but a Triunity that stretches our finite minds beyond the third heaven.

Q.9: How many persons are there in the Godhead.

A. There are three persons in the Godhead, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit; and these three are one God, the same in essence, equal in power and glory.¹

¹1 John 5:7; Matthew 28:19

As we move from the question of how many Gods to the question of how many Persons, we must keep in mind that our subject has not changed. We are still speaking with reference to triune monotheism. We have simply moved from our focus on the monotheism part of the construction to a focus on the triune part.

To put it another way, we are speaking with reference to the fact that God is one God eternally existing in three distinct Persons. In answer to the last question, we focused on the oneness of God. In answer to this question, we shall focus on the tri-unity of the Godhead. The Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God.

“Q.1. Whence is it that this article of our holy religion has been much opposed by adversaries, in every period of the church?

A. The devil and his instruments have warmly opposed it, because they know it is the primary object of our faith and worship; it not being enough for us to know what God is, as to his essential attributes, without knowing who he is, as to his personality, according as he has revealed himself in his word, to be Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, 1 John ii. 23, ‘Whosoever denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father,’” (Westminster Assembly, The Assembly’s Shorter Catechism Explained, pg. 40).

Even to our day, there is no shortage of heretics who deny this essential doctrine of our faith. We need not think long to recall a handful of these groups: Islam, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (Mormonism), The Watchtower Bible and Tract Society (Jehovah’s Witnesses), Oneness Pentecostals, Unitarian Universalists, etc. The mere existence of these heretics demands that we study our faith.

Apologetics (the defense of the faith) ought to be an essential motivation for learning the catechism. As we learn the catechism, we are learning the essential elements of the Christian faith and thus tearing down strongholds erected in our own minds against it.

“⁴For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, ⁵casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ, ⁶and being ready to punish all disobedience when your obedience is fulfilled,” (2Cor. 10:4-6; NKJV).

Catechetical instruction (discipleship) is of utmost importance. The lack of it has led to a tremendous deficiency in the church’s ability to defend the faith. For this reason, Jehovah’s Witnesses are notorious for being able to twist Christians in doctrinal pretzels. Jehovah’s Witnesses hold up to four meetings a week in order to indoctrinate their followers in the teachings of the Watchtower. Conversely, imagine if Christian parents committed themselves four or five nights a week to reading the Bible with, and catechizing, their families. Christians would be as immersed in the truth of God as Jehovah’s Witnesses are immersed in the lies of the devil.

The first article of this faith, the foundational principle of the Christian religion, is the triune God of Holy Scripture. God is one God, and He is three Persons. As the Westminster Assembly cited in the above quotation: “Whoever denies the Son does not have the Father; the one who confesses the Son has the Father also,” (1Jn. 2:23; NASB). To deny the deity of the Son of God is to deny God Himself.

There are several passages that demand our affirmation of the triune nature of God.

“²²Who is the liar but the one who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, the one who denies the Father and the Son. ²³Whoever denies the Son does not have the Father; the one who confesses the Son has the Father also. ²⁴As for you, let that abide in you which you heard from the beginning. If what you heard from the beginning abides in you, you also will abide in the Son and in the Father,” (1Jn.2:22-23; NASB).

“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ. . . with a view to an administration suitable to the fullness of the times, that is, the summing up of all things in Christ, things in the heavens and things on the earth. In Him also we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to His purpose who works all things after the counsel of His will. . . In Him, you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation—having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is given as a pledge of our inheritance, with a view to the redemption of God’s own possession, to the praise of His glory,” (Eph. 1:3, 10-11, 13-14; NASB).

“for through Him we both have our access in one Spirit to the Father,” (Eph. 2:18; NASB).

“¹⁴For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, ¹⁵from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name, ¹⁶that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man, ¹⁷so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you, being rooted and grounded in love,” (Eph. 3:14-17; NASB).

“⁴There is one body and one Spirit, just as also you were called in one hope of your calling; ⁵one Lord, one faith, one baptism, ⁶one God and Father of all who is over all and through all and in all,” (Eph. 4:4-6; NASB).

The above passages from Ephesians demonstrate what has commonly come to be known as the economic Trinity. When we talk about the economic Trinity, we mean God as He acts with respect to redemption. Insofar as God’s Covenant of Redemption is eternal, it could be said that God’s roles in accomplishing redemption are eternal. That is not, however, to say that God’s eternal roles impact His eternal nature. Regarding His nature, the Catechism affirms that He is “the same in essence, equal in power and glory.”

In regard to God’s acts of redemption, there is a subordination of roles. The Father elects us from eternity past and sends His Son, the Son condescends in time, obeys the Father perfectly, and atones for our sins, the Father and the Son send the Holy Spirit, and the Spirit applies to us the redemption accomplished by Christ. The Baptist Confession explains it in this manner:

“…the Father is of none, neither begotten nor proceeding; the Son is eternally begotten of the Father; the Holy Spirit proceeding from the Father and the Son,” (LBC 2.3).

The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are each fully God in all that entails. Whatsoever we affirm of God in is infinitude, eternality, and immutability is true of the Father. The same is true of the Son, and the same is true of the Holy Spirit. As we affirm the Godhead’s unity of essence, glory, and power, we will guard ourselves from moving from a biblical affirmation of triune monotheism into a heretical affirmation of tri-theism.

Again, affirmation of the triune nature of the Godhead is essential to the Christian faith. It is so essential, in fact, that affirmation of it was included in the earliest recorded baptismal formula. “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit,” (Mt. 28:19; NASB). The saints followed in the example of our Lord in their adopting of future baptismal formulas, requiring of baptismal candidates that they affirm the redemptive work of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Let us testify, along with the saints throughout all of church history, the triune nature of the God we serve.

Studies in The Baptist Catechism: Section Two – Theology Proper (Q.9)

October 9, 2016January 19, 2018 / William F. Leonhart III / 2 Comments

Q.9: How many persons are there in the Godhead.

A. There are three persons in the Godhead, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit; and these three are one God, the same in essence, equal in power and glory.¹

¹1 John 5:7; Matthew 28:19

“Q.1. Whence is it that this article of our holy religion has been much opposed by adversaries, in every period of the church?

There are several passages that demand our affirmation of the triune nature of God.

“for through Him we both have our access in one Spirit to the Father,” (Eph. 2:18; NASB).

“…the Father is of none, neither begotten nor proceeding; the Son is eternally begotten of the Father; the Holy Spirit proceeding from the Father and the Son,” (LBC 2.3).

Studies in The Baptist Catechism: Section Two – Theology Proper (Q.8)

September 24, 2016September 24, 2016 / William F. Leonhart III / 5 Comments

Q.8: Are there more Gods than one.

A. There is but one only, the living and true God.¹

¹Deuteronomy 6:4; Jeremiah 10:10

Throughout the Hebrew Scriptures, God is recognized to be only One, though subtle hints to His triunity are peppered here and there throughout. The term most commonly translated God in the Hebrew text is the word אֱלֹהִים (transliteration: Elohim; cf. Deut. 4:35; 39; 7:9; 1Kgs. 8:60; Isa. 45:18), which is notably a plural noun. The term is used 2,570 times in the Hebrew Scriptures the first of which is the first verse of the Bible in which it is the fourth word written. God is also notably designated plural pronouns in several passages of the Hebrew Scriptures (e.g. Gen. 1:26; 3:22; 11:7; Isa. 6:8).

“But the Lord is the true God;

He is the living God and the everlasting King.

At His wrath the earth quakes,

And the nations cannot endure His indignation,” (Jeremiah 10:10; NASB).

Studies in The Baptist Catechism: Section Two – Theology Proper (Q.7)

September 17, 2016September 17, 2016 / William F. Leonhart III / 2 Comments

Q.7: What is God?

A. God is a Spirit,¹ infinite,² eternal,³ and unchangeable,⁴ in His being,⁵ wisdom, power,⁶ holiness,⁷ goodness,⁸ and truth.⁹

¹John 4:24

²Job 11:7-9;

³Psalm 90:2

⁴James 1:17

⁵Exodus 3:14

⁶Psalm 147:5

⁷Revelation 4:8

⁸Revelation 15:4

⁹Exodus 34:6

Spirit

“God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth,’” (John 4:24; NASB).

Infinite, Eternal, and Unchangeable

God is infinite in His being, wisdom, power, holiness, goodness, and truth.

God is eternal in His being, wisdom, power, holiness, goodness, and truth.

God is unchangeable in His being, wisdom, power, holiness, goodness, and truth.

In the entirety of His being, God is all of these attributes. God is essentially and exhaustively infinite.

“Can you discover the depths of God?

Can you discover the limits of the Almighty?

They are high as the heavens, what can you do?

Deeper than Sheol, what can you know?

Its measure is longer than the earth

And broader than the sea,” (Job 11:7-9; NASB).

There has never been a time when God did not exist, and exist in all of His essential attributes.

“Before the mountains were born

Or You gave birth to the earth and the world,

Even from everlasting to everlasting,

You are God,” (Ps. 97:9; NASB).

“Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow,” (Jas. 1:17; NASB).

Being, Wisdom, Power, Holiness, Goodness, and Truth

“God said to Moses, ‘I AM WHO I AM’; and He said, ‘Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you,’’” (Exod. 3:14; NASB).

“Then Jesus again spoke to them, saying, ‘I am the Light of the world; he who follows Me will not walk in the darkness, but will have the Light of life,’” (John 8:12; NASB).

““I am He who testifies about Myself, and the Father who sent Me testifies about Me,” (vs. 18; NASB).

“Therefore I said to you that you will die in your sins; for unless you believe that I am He, you will die in your sins,” (vs. 24; NASB; note: The term He is inserted by most English translations. It does not actually appear in the Greek text.).

“Jesus said to them, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was born, I am,’” (John 8:58; NASB).

“Great is our Lord and abundant in strength;

His understanding is infinite,” (Ps. 147:5; NASB).

“And the four living creatures, each one of them having six wings, are full of eyes around and within, and day and night they do not cease to say,

‘Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God, the Almighty, who was and who is and who is to come,’” (Rev. 4:8; NASB).

“And one called out to another and said,

‘Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord of hosts,

The whole earth is full of His glory,’” (Isa. 6:3; NASB).

“Q. 2. Is God necessarily holy?

“The Lord is righteous in all his ways,

And holy in all his works,” (Ps. 145:17; KJV).

“If you turn away your foot from the Sabbath,

From doing your pleasure on My holy day,

And call the Sabbath a delight,

The holy day of the LORD honorable,

And shall honor Him, not doing your own ways,

Nor finding your own pleasure,

Nor speaking your own words,” (Isa. 58:13; NKJV).

Above all, let us not forget that God’s holiness is revealed to us so that we might respond in praise, and awe, and wonder.

“Who will not fear, O Lord, and glorify Your name?

For You alone are holy;

For all the nations will come and worship before you,

For Your righteous acts have been revealed,” (Revelation 4:8; NASB).

“Then the Lord passed by in front of him and proclaimed, ‘The Lord, the Lord God, compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in lovingkindness and truth,” (Exodus 34:6; NASB).

Studies in The Baptist Catechism: Section One – Authority, Revelation, and Scripture

August 28, 2016January 8, 2017 / William F. Leonhart III / 13 Comments

Table of Contents

Part I – Prolegomena

Section One: Authority, Revelation, and Scripture

Part II – What Man Ought to Believe Concerning God

Section Two: Theology Proper
Section Three: God’s Decrees
Section Four: Our First Parents, Sin, and the Fall
Section Five: Christ the Mediator
Section Six: The Work of the Spirit
Section Seven: The Death of the Righteous and the Wicked

Part III – What Duty God Requires of Man

Section Eight: Introduction to the Moral Law
Section Nine: The First Table of the Moral Law (Part One)
Section Ten: The First Table of the Moral Law (Part Two)
Section Eleven: The Second Table of the Moral Law (Part One)
Section Twelve: The Second Table of the Moral Law (Part Two)
Section Thirteen: The Proper Response to Law and Gospel

Part VI – The Communication of God’s Grace

Section Fourteen: The Ordinary Means of Grace
Section Fifteen: Prayer and the Lord’s Prayer

______________

There have been several commentaries and helps written on the catechisms of other traditions, especially commentaries on The Westminster Shorter Catechism. Here is a list of some of those that I have found particularly helpful:

The Westminster Shorter Catechism for Study Classes by G.I. Williamson
The Assembly’s Shorter Catechism explained by The Westminster Assembly (1753)
The System of Theology Contained in the Westminster Shorter Catechism by A.A. Hodge and J. Aspinwall Hodge
An Exposition on the Shorter Catechism by Alexander Whyte

One scriptural exposition of Collins’ The Baptist Catechism (1693) in question and answer form has been offered, which I have found immensely helpful:

A Scriptural Exposition of the Baptist Catechism by Benjamin Beddome

I don’t hope to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with these men in writing this humble series. What I do hope to accomplish is to make The Baptist Catechism a bit more accessible and clear for my generation. With that in mind, having completed the first series of articles on the Catechism, you may now read it in its entirety below or click on the links to read it question by question.

Q.1: Who is the first and chiefest being?

God is the first and chiefest being.¹

¹Isaiah 44:6; 48:12; Psalm 97:9

In January of 2012, I had the honor of taking a winter course on “The Theology of the Word of Faith Movement” with Justin Peters at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. The class was memorable to me for several reasons. I had been following the career of Mr. Peters for a while with great interest. One night, my wife and I even had the honor of having him into our home and serving him chicken pot pie. I recall sitting in my living room laughing and singing Ray Stevens’ The Mississippi Squirrel Revival together while my wife rolled her eyes.

I also recall one of the first statements he made in front of the class. I recall it because I wrote it down. He said, “Your worship of God will only be as deep as your theology.” Then he said, “Let me rephrase that. Your worship of God will only be as deep as your knowledge of Him.” In making this statement, Mr. Peters was answering one of the most important questions a Christian should ask himself: “Why do I study theology?”

What is theology? Theology, simply put, is the study of God. The word is derived from two Greek terms: ὁ θεὸς (ha theos) and ὁ λόγος (ha logos). ὁ θεὸς means God or the divine, and ὁ λόγος can be translated word, message,knowledge, and many other similar terms. In modern English usage, –ology (derived from ὁ λόγος) has come to mean “the study of. . .” When combined into one word, then, theology means the study of God.

Why do we study God, though? Well, as Mr. Peters so eloquently stated, we study God so that we might deepen our worship of Him. As The Westminster Catechism teaches, “Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy Him forever.” This is why we study theology. This is our end goal in all our study and apprehension of God and the things of God. If a man is to glorify God and enjoy Him, he must first take hold of some knowledge of Him.

A great many people in this world claim a high level of piety, claiming to have reached new heights of spirituality through private contemplation and stimulating conversation. However, if they have not tapped into the actual truth of God as revealed directly from God, all their musings are a mere pooling of spiritual ignorance. They may speak with flowery language and elevated tones, but they have no real knowledge of the One whom they claim to represent. They have speculation. They have imagination. They have fantasies and rhetorical prowess, but they do not have God.

“²⁰Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the disputer of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? ²¹For since, in the wisdom of God, the world through wisdom did not know God, it pleased God through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe. ²²For Jews request a sign, and Greeks seek after wisdom; ²³but we preach Christ crucified, to the Jews a stumbling block and to the Greeks foolishness, ²⁴but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God,”(1Cor. 1:20-24; NKJV).

All proper knowledge of God must have God as its Source. The world will tell us that this is circular reasoning and that we cannot point to God as the authority that establishes His own authority. We must ask in return: “What then stands as the prime authority above God that would be sufficient to establish His authority?” If they answer reason, we must ask what gives reason its authority and, in order to assist them to remain consistent, we must ask that they not use reason to argue for the authority of reason. If they answer evidence, our response is the same. We ask them to prove evidence as a sound authority by which to judge God without the use of evidence.

How is the authority of God different, then, from evidence or reason? While our interpretation of evidence can be flawed and our reason will inevitably fail us, God never fails. Wherever we find God, whether in Scripture, or in nature, or in our own consciences, we find that He always ultimately lines up with what He has spoken about Himself in His word: the Bible. Apart from His word, we are destined to run into error.

“God is the source and fountain of all our knowledge. He possesses an archetypal knowledge of all created things, embracing all the ideas that are expressed in the works of His creation. This knowledge of God is quite different from that of man. While we derive our knowledge from the objects we perceive, He knows them in virtue of the fact that He from eternity determined their being and form,” (Louis Berkhof, Systematic Theology. Eerdman’s Publishing Co, Grand Rapids. 1996, pp. 93-94.).

We have limited knowledge; God has exhaustive knowledge. God knows all things perfectly, fully, and truly. There are many things we know truly. There are many things we know falsely. There are many things that are true that we don’t know. There are many things that are untrue that we don’t know. It is not our place to strive to know all things. “It is totally inconsistent with creatureliness that man should strive for comprehensive knowledge; if it could be attained, it would wipe God out of existence; man would then be God,” (Cornelius Van Til, The Defense of the Faith. P&R Publishing, Phillipsburg, NJ. 2008, pg. 36). Rather than comprehensive knowledge, we ought to strive after the apprehension of true knowledge. We cannot know all things but, by God’s grace, we can know true things.

All that there is to know, including the depths of God Himself, are known by God. “God’s knowledge is primary, and whatever man is to know can only be based upon a reception of what God has originally and ultimately known,” (Greg Bahnsen, Always Ready. Covenant Media Press, Nacogdoches, TX. 2011, pg. 19). Thus, if we are to have any assurance that what we know about God is true, we must receive affirmation of its truthfulness from Him. We must do the impossible and reach into the heavens to pull down truth. Rather, God must condescend to us in order that He might reveal His truth to us.

The Baptist Catechism starts with the question, “Who is the first and chiefest being?” This question is necessary because it starts with the origin of all proper thought about God: God Himself. “God is the first and chiefest being.” This recognition is key. As finite, material creatures, we are incapable of grasping the truth of an infinite, immaterial God (Isa. 55:8-9; Rom. 11:33-36). We are wholly inadequate for these things, unless God graciously enables us. Out of recognition of our human impotence, The Baptist Catechism begins by highlighting our supremely omnipotent God. We are fallen, sinful, finite beings; God is the first and chiefest Being. Thus, we do not start with man, but with God.

In recognizing God as the first and chiefest of beings, we recognize in Him a particular otherness. He is completely unlike all His creatures. Specifically, He is from everlasting to everlasting. He is the only Being without beginning. Thus, He is the only Being who can rightly claim to be both the first and the last, and He does so time and again.

“Thus says the Lord, the King of Israel and his Redeemer, the Lord of hosts:

‘I am the first and I am the last,

And there is no God besides Me,’” (Isa. 44:6; NASB; cf. Isa. 41:4; 48:12; Rev. 1:8; 2:8; 21:6; 22:13).

No creature can lay claim to being first and last over all creation. All of creation has a beginning and, were it God’s design, all creation would have an end. God not only created all things, but He sustains and directs them, too (Col. 1:17). All of creation is God’s creation and, with it, He does as He pleases (Ps. 115:3; 135:6). How shall man stand as a mere spectator of the vast scope of God’s creation and not give Him due honor and praise for all of His mighty works?

God is distinct from all of His creation. However, He is not merely distinct from it in His eternality, His creation, and His providence; He is also distinct from it in His majesty. God is the first Being; He is also the chiefest Being. By this, the catechism means to draw our attention to God’s preeminence over all things.

Our tendency, as fallen creatures, is to worship the creature rather than the Creator (Rom. 1:25). As a Master Artist, God has adorned His creation with His divine signature. We are like art critics who stand in awe of a masterful painting and give credit to the individual brush strokes and arrangements of color rather than to the painter who gave the painting life. Credit for Symphony No. 5 does not go to the individual trumpet blasts, but to Beethoven himself. How much more is the God of creation due His proper exaltation and adoration for the works of His hands?

“For You are the Lord Most High over all the earth;

You are exalted far above all gods,” (Psalm 97:9; NASB).

Let the pagans sing the praises of their false gods, but let our praises of the one true and living God far exceed theirs. Let us exalt Him as the Lord Most High over all the earth! Let us sing with the saints of old:

“Praise God from whom all blessings flow.

Praise Him, all creatures here below.

Praise Him above, ye heavenly hosts.

Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.”

Let our study of theology always stem from a heart of doxology. Let our pursuit of head knowledge always spring from a wealth of heart praise. Let our desire to take in greater truth about God never be to the end of puffing up the student, but that of lifting up the Creator in praise, and adoration, and worthy exaltation. He truly is worthy, for He truly is the first and chiefest of beings. As J.I. Packer writes:

“We need to ask ourselves: What is my ultimate aim and object in occupying my mind with these things? What do I intend to do with my knowledge about God, once I have it? For the fact that we have to face is this: If we pursue theological knowledge for its own sake, it is bound to go bad on us. It will make us proud and conceited. The very greatness of the subject matter will intoxicate us, and we shall come to think of ourselves as a cut above other Christians because of our interest in it and grasp of it; and we shall look down on those whose theological ideas seem to us crude and inadequate and dismiss them as very poor specimens,” (J.I. Packer, Knowing God. IVP Books, Downers Grove, Il. 1993, pg. 21.).

Q.2: Ought everyone to believe there is a God?

A. Everyone ought to believe there is a God;¹ and it is their great sin and folly who do not.²

¹Hebrews 11:6

²Psalm 14:1

The world is full of art critics. Everywhere we go, we see people standing in awe of great art. They study it, they marvel at it, and they even try to duplicate it. What they will not do, however, is recognize the existence of the great Artist who gave it birth. This great art of which I speak is the art of creation, and the great Artist, of course, is the Creator. God is not merely an Artist, though. He wears many hats. Like the great Leonardo di Vinci, God assumes the titles of Artist, Engineer, Innovator, Inventor, and a great many others. However, unlike Leonardo, God is the Chief among all others in these fields. He far surpasses all His creatures, as we noted in the previous section.

One great difference between God and all others is that His art, His engineering, His innovation and inventiveness pervades all of His creation. Painters place their signatures in the corners of their paintings. The signature of the Divine is pervasive throughout the vast scope of creation and notable in every detail of every element and atom. God is at once immensely God and intimately God. He is both the God of the stars and the planets (Job 38:31-33; Ps. 8:3; 136:7-9) and the God of our grief and our joy (Mt. 6:25-34).

This God is unavoidable and, as such, He is undeniable. He consumes and pervades all around us and all within us, though He is completely distinct from us. It is at once our familiarity with Him and the odd otherness of Him that bids us recognize Him. This too is by divine design. The signature in the bottom right corner of a painting is not so recognizable because it so readily melds into the motif of the painting. It stands out as different so that it might be recognized, but it is not so different that it does not complement the general beauty of the painting.

In the economy of God’s created order, the highest good for man is that He know God and, as such, honor Him. God’s artful creation, then, does not exist for art’s sake. Rather, God’s artful creation exists to point man to the Artist Himself. As we recognize the art and, more importantly, the great Artist behind the art, we fulfill our great purpose as the only creatures made in His image.

This was the great purpose for which God created man: that we might glorify Him and enjoy Him. However, it is impossible to glorify and enjoy One we do not believe to exist. “And without faith it is impossible to please Him,” (Heb. 11:6a; NASB). Thus, because God loves His creation, He has made Himself known through His creation. God’s existence is evident to all through two distinct witnesses: the internal witness and the external witness.

God reveals Himself internally through our consciences. Each of us has the works of the law written on our hearts from birth (Rom. 2:14-16). None of us can rightly claim ignorance of God before the God who reveals Himself to us through our consciences. None are without excuse, “because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them,” (Rom. 1:19; NASB). We are programmed to have an innate knowledge of God’s existence. It is inescapable.

Furthermore, we are programmed to receive knowledge of God’s existence from our surroundings. “For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse,” (Rom. 1:20; NASB). The sun, the moon, the stars, the planets, and the world and everything in it all call out to us proclaiming God’s divine artistry.

“¹The heavens are telling of the glory of God;

And their expanse is declaring the work of His hands.

²Day to day pours forth speech,

And night to night reveals knowledge.

³There is no speech, nor are there words;

Their voice is not heard.

⁴Their line has gone out through all the earth,

And their utterances to the end of the world.

In them He has placed a tent for the sun,

⁵Which is as a bridegroom coming out of his chamber;

It rejoices as a strong man to run his course.

⁶Its rising is from one end of the heavens,

And its circuit to the other end of them;

And there is nothing hidden from its heat,” (Ps. 19:1-6; NASB).

If God is so evident in His creation, then, why do men still deny Him? It is not because they are necessarily convinced that He does not exist. Rather, it is out of a willful, sinful, foolish suppression of the truth that men deny Him. “Sin involved every aspect of man’s personality. All of man’s reactions in every relation in which God had set him were ethical and not merely intellectual; the intellectual itself is ethical,” (Van Til, Defense, 70.). Thus, when a man deceives himself by denying God’s existence, he is acting out of a corrupt heart and committing abominable deeds.

“The fool has said in his heart, ‘There is no God.’

They are corrupt, they have committed abominable deeds;

There is no one who does good,” (Psalm 97:9; NASB).

The default belief of man is not the nonexistence of God, but His existence. Out of the corruption of the fallen heart and mind, unregenerate men suppress the truth of God’s existence: “as it is written, ‘The just shall live by faith.’ For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness,” (Rom. 1:17b-18; NKJV). The contrast here is between those of faith and those who suppress the truth. “The just shall live by faith,” but the unrighteous and ungodly “suppress the truth in unrighteousness.” Paul means to say that the active suppression of truth required to disbelieve in God is an act of willful rebellion against Him.

Adam and Eve knew of God’s existence, for He walked among them (Gen. 3:10). Godly men of the earliest ages also know God existed and called upon His name (4:26). Men and women of all nations have always known Him, but they do not glorify Him as God (Rom. 1:21). Belief in God, then, is the default (Benjamin Beddome, A Scriptural Exposition of the Baptist Catechism. Solid Ground Christian Books, Birmingham. 2006, pg. 3). The suppression of this belief then is absolute rebellion. This is no mere intellectual exercise. This is an active, willful sinning against the God who reveals Himself to us in His creation.

One of the duties, then, that Christians owe to one another is to spur one another on to greater faith (Heb. 10:23-25). If unbelief is sin, then we should seek how we might aid one another in avoiding it. If I, as an ember in the fire of the church, rely on the other embers to keep me burning, with what zeal should I blow on my fellow embers until I feel the return of the warm glow of their faith in Christ? In the same way, it benefits all members of the church to encourage others in their faith and purity, for it will only reap returns of greater faith and purity in their own lives.

Q.3: How may we know there is a God?

A. The light of nature in man and the works of God plainly declare there is a God;¹ but His Word and Spirit only do it fully and effectually for the salvation of sinners.²

¹Romans 1:19-20; Psalm 19:1-3; Acts 17:24

²1 Corinthians 2:10; 2 Timothy 3:15-16

I have long taken issue with the use of the terms nature and natural in discussions of God’s divine revelation. To suggest that revelation can be natural is to suggest that it could be something other than divine in origin. Indeed, nothing about divine revelation is natural. What is meant by many theologians when they refer to natural revelation might best be rendered cosmic revelation.

When referring to natural revelation, what is meant is that which God reveals to us about Himself through His created order. However, post-Darwin, the term nature has come to mean something vastly different than what it once meant. Where the pre-moderns may have been referring to the created order when they referenced nature, Charles Darwin and his humanist predecessors have redefined nature as an undirected, impersonal, random order of events and laws in the vast universe. Thus, the Christian sojourning through a modernist society does himself and the Bible a great disservice to persist in the use of the term natural revelation.

The Baptist Catechism uses a similar term to describe one aspect of cosmic revelation (cosmos from ὁ κόσμος, or the created order): “The light of nature in man…” Another way to describe this is the internal witness. The catechism breaks up cosmic revelation into two categories. God’s existence is attested to us by (a) the internal witness of the conscience and (b) the external witness of God’s works of creation and providence.

“because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse,” (Romans 1:19-20; NASB).

Notice how Paul writes that what is known about God is evident within His human creatures. This line of reasoning refers to the internal witness of the conscience. Because men know right and wrong, and have an innate sense of justice, we can know that God must exist. We are confronted with this undeniable fact every time we read a news story about a child being victimized. Our hearts cry out for justice. We are aware, deep within ourselves, that love demands a verdict.

We also know that anyone who would pass such a judgment, loving though He may be, must be absolutely perfect in order to render such a verdict. As a result, we are struck with a dilemma. If God exists and loves that child enough to punish her abuser, He must in His infinite perfection punish me for the crimes I have committed against Him. Such an undeniable truth causes people to make all kinds of irrational claims.

The first is the outright denial of God’s existence. God cannot exist, goes the argument, or else I would have to be punished. The second is the denial of absolute truth in the realm of ethics and morality. We cannot rightly deny the existence of absolute truth in medicine or physics, because that would lead to utter insanity on those fields. Absolute truth cannot exist, goes the argument, or else there would be one universal standard of justice under which I must be punished.

All that is left is to outright deny justice or love, which only leads to nihilism and the pure futility of an unlivable life. These are all the mere suppressions of the internal witness to God’s existence. All that is within us screams to us that God exists, therefore absolute truth exists and, with it, love and justice.

“The heavens are telling the glory of God;

And their expanse is declaring the work of His hands.

Day to day pours forth speech,

And night to night reveals knowledge.

There is no speech, nor are there words;

Their voice is not heard,” (Psalm 19:1-3; NASB).

Alongside the internal witness to God’s existence is the external witness. Yes, we live in a fallen world, but it is still a universe that undeniably declares the glory of God. The mere existence and grand design of the created order attests to His great work of creation. The perpetuity of the cosmos generally and of humanity specifically attests to God’s great work of providence. Yet, for all of the telling, for all of the declaring, for all of the pouring forth of speech, and for all the revelation of knowledge, there is no speech and there are no words, for their voice is not heard. Men, in our sin, suppress the truth of God in unrighteousness.

Paul argued for the existence of this great God in his sermon on Mars Hill. He did not waste time giving an over-abundance of evidence or trying to convince these Roman philosophers of the existence of God. Rather, He recognizes that they must know He exists: “The God who made the world and all things in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands,” (Acts 17:24; NASB). Paul assumes they have the “light of nature,” that internal witness. He assumes they have looked up at the stars and, perhaps, examined their immediate surroundings and have picked up on the undeniability of God.

Paul’s goal was not to try to argue from a neutral position of, “Perhaps you are right and the Christian God of the Bible does not exist,” to a more Christian position. Paul’s goal was to assert the authority and superiority of the Christian position and to defend that non-neutral position with gentleness and reverence (1Pt. 3:15). Paul understood that they had sufficient witness (both internal and external) to God’s existence. His goal was to remind them of what they already knew and stand firm on it.

Sinful men are accountable for their sinful, foolish denials of God. They are without excuse. What then does cosmic, or general, revelation accomplish? It renders men speechless and excuseless before an eternally holy and just God. This is why we do missions. Some say that men are saved from God’s wrath on the basis of what they do with the light they have been given. If they do not hear the gospel, they may be saved by virtue of the fact that they did not reject it. Were this the case, there would be no reason whatever to do missions.

Rather, the reason we do missions, the reason Christ came as the first Missionary, is because men see the glory and goodness of God in the internal and external witness but, apart from the preaching of the gospel, they cannot turn from their sin and receive the cleansing of the new birth with all that it entails.

“How then will they call on Him in whom they have not believed? How will they believe in Him whom they have not heard? And how will they hear without a preacher?” (Rom. 10:14; NASB).

Men must then have not only the internal and external witness in order to be saved; they must also have the witness of the word of God and His Spirit. Where cosmic revelation falls on ears that cannot hear and eyes that cannot see, God’s word and Spirit open the ears and restore the sight. Where general revelation is only sufficient for the condemnation of men, His special revelation is fully sufficient to save him to the uttermost.

“and that from childhood you have known the sacred writings which are able to give you the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness,” (2Tim. 3:15-16; NASB).

However, God’s word alone is not sufficient salvation in the strictest manner of speaking, because God Himself must also attest to it. He does so through His Spirit: “For to us God revealed them through the Spirit; for the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God,” (1 Corinthians 2:10; NASB). The word of God is merely words on page just like any other words on a page apart from the work of the Holy Spirit to illumine him who reads or hears it.

Q.4: What is the Word of God?

A. The Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testament are the Word of God, and the only certain rule of faith and obedience.¹

¹2 Timothy 3:16; Ephesians 2:20

In ages past, God revealed Himself in many ways. He spoke through visions, dreams, a burning bush, and even a donkey. At one point, He spoke through a stuttering, stammering prophet. At other points, He spoke directly to people. This same God “in these last days has spoken to us in His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the world,” (Heb. 1:2; NASB). These words of Christ, by the work of His Spirit, were brought to His apostles’ remembrance and written down in His holy word.

Whether we are referring to the Old Testament or New Testament, all Scripture is the word of God. It is God-breathed, or breathed out by God. This is what Paul meant when he wrote that all Scripture is θεόπνευστος (theo-pneustos, or God-breathed) in 2Tim. 3:16. Most translations render the term inspired. Thus, when the term inspiration of Scripture is used by theologians, they mean to say that Scripture is breathed out by God—the very word of God Himself.

As such, it would be improper to say that Scripture is the word of man, as though God had spoken to man and man, to the best of his ability, conveyed what had been revealed to him. This is the view held by the neo-orthodox school of theologians, like Karl Barth, who argue that the Bible contains the word of God, but is not itself the word of God. As orthodox Christians, Reformed Baptists affirm every word of the Bible, in the original languages, to be the very word of God. However, Barth and his neo-orthodox companions would contend that “the word of God is within the Bible” (Barth,The Word of God and the Word of Man. Wipf & Stock, Eugene, OR. 1957, pg. 43).

This view came to have prominence in some pockets of the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC), in the mid-to-late 20^thcentury. The Baptist Faith & Message of 1963 (BF&M 1963) included language that allowed for such views to be held. This neo-orthodox influence was successfully eradicated from the SBC through an effort spanning more than two decades that would come to be known as the Conservative Resurgence. Compare the first sentence of the BF&M 1963with the first sentence of the BF&M 2000.

“The Holy Bible was written by men divinely inspired and is the record of God’s revelation of Himself to man,” (BF&M of 1963; emphasis added).

“The Holy Bible was written by men divinely inspired and is God’s revelation of Himself to man,” (BF&M of 2000).

Asserting that the Bible is “the record of” God’s revelation of Himself to man leaves open the possibility that the Bible may not be, in its purest form, God’s actual revelation of Himself to man. Neo-orthodox pastors and seminary professors within the SBC had seized upon this language as justification for teaching that the Bible contains the word of God while not, in total, being the word of God. Dockery and Nelson explain in A Theology for the Church:

“With respect to its nature, Barth distinguished the Bible from revelation itself: ‘Therefore, when we have to do with the Bible, we have to do primarily with this means, with these words, with the witness which as such is not itself revelation, but only—and this is the limitation—the witness to it.’ The Word of God is perfectly revealed in Jesus Christ; the Scriptures are witness, however imperfect, to the perfect revelation of the God-man. It is the church’s responsibility to preach the Scriptures; and, Barth contends, as they are preached, the Holy Spirit works such that the Bible becomes the Word of God to the people,” (ed. Daniel Akin, A Theology for the Church. B&H Academic, Nashville. 2007, pp. 138-139).

We, as orthodox Christians, affirm what has come to be known as the verbal-plenary inspiration of Scripture. That is a fancy way of saying that we believe every word of the Scriptures to be inspired of God. Particularly, we look to the 39 books of the Old Testament and the 27 books of the New Testament. As Jesus taught of the Old Testament canon:

“¹⁷‘Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill. ¹⁸For 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 fulfilled. ¹⁹Whoever therefore breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches men so, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven,’” (Mt. 5:17-19; NKJV).

Jesus believed that even the most minor of strokes in the Hebrew text of the Old Testament bore with them the very authority of God. This is because they are the very word of God. Intrinsically linked with the 39 books of the Hebrew Old Testament are the 27 books of the New Testament. Peter affirms this fact when he writes: “¹⁵and regard the patience of our Lord as salvation; just as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given him, wrote to you, ¹⁶as also in all his letters, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which the untaught and unstable distort, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction,” (2Pt. 3:15-16; NASB). For Peter, the writings of Paul were to be included with the “rest of the Scriptures.”

This prestige was not merely meant to be ascribed to the writings of Paul, though, for Paul himself wrote of the church of God: “having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the corner stone,” (Ephesians 2:20; NASB). How was the church of God built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets? Through their writings and teachings. Notice what we are told of the New Covenant church from her earliest days: “And they continued steadfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in prayers,” (Acts 2:42; NKJV). The apostles’ teaching was paramount for the early church.

It was paramount because it, along with the 39 books of the Old Testament, is “the only certain rule of faith and obedience.” It is certain in that it is spoken, through the apostles and prophets, by God Himself. God used the personalities and backgrounds of the authors of Scripture to preserve for us precisely what He desired for us to know about Himself. God, then, is the prime author of Scripture, though He used the instrument of fallen, sinful men to pen it.

God chose Amos and Paul, Moses and Luke, Nehemiah and Peter to write His holy word, precisely because of who they were and the gifts and limitations He had placed in their lives. He used these human instruments to write Scripture much like a teacher or a professor might use different color ink pens to grade a paper. The characteristics of the human authors were as much important for the writing of Scripture as were the words they wrote. Again, there is no undirected molecule in the creative and providential working of God.

Therefore, even though Scripture was written by imperfect human beings, we can trust that its primary Author is perfect and has not spoken a word, through them, in vain. Scripture is the only certain, sufficient, inerrant, infallible rule for all faith in God our Creator and Savior. It is also the only certain, sufficient, inerrant, infallible rule for all obedience to Him.

Q.5: May all men make use of the Holy Scriptures?

A. All men are not only permitted, but commanded and exhorted to read, hear, and understand the Holy Scriptures.¹

¹John 5:38; Revelation 1:3; Acts 8:30

Having conducted a survey into the nature of Scripture itself, we now bring ourselves to the consideration of how men are to make use of it. The question is asked of the catechumen, May all men make use of the Holy Scriptures? What does the catechizer mean by the words “make use”? To make use, according to the answer offered, is to read, hear, and understand the Holy Scriptures. The catechism goes so far as to note that we are not only permitted, but are commanded and exhorted to avail ourselves of the Scriptures in this way.

Before we begin to flesh out this divinely ordained obligation, another question needs answering. In the realm of soteriology (the study of salvation), we often ask what the biblical authors mean when they use the term all men. There are two possible definitions of this term: all men without exception, and all men without distinction. It is not readily apparent which is meant by the catechism, so let us consider the implications of both.

If by all men the catechism means all men without exception, we must give a hardy “Amen!” Every single person everywhere is bid to hear the word of God and repent. “³⁰Therefore having overlooked the times of ignorance, God is now declaring to men that all people everywhere should repent, ³¹because He has fixed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness through a Man whom He has appointed, having furnished proof to all men by raising Him from the dead,” (Acts 17:30-31; NASB). The word of God and, therefore, the general call of salvation is to go out to all people everywhere throughout the earth. And, as it comes to each ear, it comes with a divine obligation to read, hear, and understand.

If by all men the catechism means all men without distinction, we must likewise give a hardy “Amen!” for this divine obligation is binding on all men of all positions in all tribes, tongues, and nations. Let us recall the Great Commission:

“¹⁸And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, ‘All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. ¹⁹Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, ²⁰teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age,’” (Mt. 28:18-20; NKJV).

Notice two things. The Great Commission that is given to the church is to go and make disciples of all nations. This means that all men without exception will now read, hear, and understand God’s holy word. Notice that the church is not merely commissioned to make converts of all nations. Rather, we have been tasked with making disciples of all nations. This means that they will partake of at least two local church ordinances. They will be baptized into church membership, and they will be taught all that Christ commanded in the Holy Scriptures.

Read the Scriptures

We can affirm, then, that if by all men the catechism means all men without distinction (people of all positions in every tribe, tongue, and nation) and all men without exception (every single human being on earth), that includes us. How then ought we expected to read God’s word? First, we must have access to His word. That means translation. In order for men and women of all tribes, tongues, and nations to avail themselves of Scriptures, they must have it in the common language of their people. Note what is affirmed in The Baptist Confession (1689):

“The Old Testament in Hebrew (which was the native language of the people of God of old), and the New Testament in Greek (which at the time of the writing of it was most generally known to the nations), being immediately inspired by God, and by His singular care and providence pure in all ages, are therefore authentic; so as in all controversies of religion, the church is finally to appeal to them. But because these original tongues are not known to all the people of God, who have a right unto, and interest in the Scriptures, and are commanded in the fear of God to read, and search them, therefore they are to be translated into the vulgar language of every nation unto which they come, that the Word of God dwelling plentifully in all, they may worship Him in an acceptable manner, and through patience and comfort of the Scriptures may have hope,” (The Baptist Confession of 1689, 1.8).

Imagine a missionary from England that goes into a foreign land and in order to bring them the gospel of Christ, but who only speaks to them in English with no translation or interpretation. No matter how much he reads to the people or preaches to the people, that man would be speaking only “to himself and to God” (1Cor. 14:28; NKJV). Of course, there are some King James Only movements that would argue for teaching all nations, or at least the most learned among the nations, English so that they can read the King James Version of the Bible.

This mindset is precisely what our Particular Baptists forefathers were hoping to avoid. For centuries the world was shut up in darkness because of this type of thinking. The church had taken a stance that Jerome’s Latin Vulgate was to be the only translation used by the church. As a result, Latin speaking people had the word of God in their language, but the rest of the world had to rely on priests within the church to explain the Bible to them. This period of church history is rightly called the Dark Ages, because the nations were forced to be in darkness as a result of a refusal to translate the Holy Scriptures into their languages. Hence, as Luther and others began to translate the Bible into the common languages of the people, the Reformers coined a new Latin phrase: post tenebras lux, or after darkness, light!

It is important to note, also, that the post-Renaissance education movement was largely started as a biblical literacy movement. Luther is reported to have written to his princes in Saxony demanding that they educate the peasants, because he was finding that none of them could read the Bible he had labored so diligently to translate into their languages. He reportedly told the princes that it was their duty before God to ensure that their people could read His word.

We are not merely exhorted to read the Scriptures in order to have private dealings with God. In reading the Scriptures, we are able to check what is being taught from the pulpit by the very word of God. “¹⁰Then the brethren immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea. When they arrived, they went into the synagogue of the Jews. ¹¹These were more fair-minded than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness, and searched the Scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so,” (Acts 17:10-11; NKJV). It is when people are robbed of their rightful access to the Holy Scriptures that they accumulate false teachers to themselves (2Tim. 4:3).

Hear the Scriptures

We are not only commanded and exhorted to read the Scriptures, as though the whole of the Christian life were one of seclusion and subjective interpretations of God’s word. Rather, we are also commanded and exhorted to hear God’s word. This brings us to the primary way by which God has promised to work in His church: the public reading and preaching of Scripture.

Over and over again, we are told in Scripture to attend to the public reading and preaching of Scripture. In Antioch, nearly the whole city (Gentiles) came together on the Jewish Sabbath to hear the word of God from the apostles, inciting the Jews to jealousy. Many of the Gentiles received the word with gladness, but they apostles were persecuted and driven out by the Jews (Acts 13:44-50).

Paul binds up saving faith in the preaching of the word of Christ: “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ,” (Rom. 10:17; NASB). For this reason, he exhorts his protégé Timothy to “give attention to the public reading of Scripture, to exhortation and teaching,” (1Tim. 4:13; NASB). The author of Hebrews goes further by exhorting even the hearers to attend faithfully to the public worship of God:

“²³Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful. ²⁴And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, ²⁵not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching,”(Heb. 10:23-25; NKJV).

The preaching of the word of God holds a certain primacy in God’s redemptive economy. It is through the proclamation of God’s word, by God’s ordained ministers, that He has promised to unite His people in truth. Paul tells the church at Ephesus:

“¹¹And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers,¹²for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, ¹³till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ,” (Eph. 4:11-13; NKJV).

It is thus through the hearing of God’s word that He has determined, primarily, to work in and through His people. When the church is given either to private interpretations or to untested teaching from the pulpit, the church is opened up to error and to division. This is how cults start. Either men and women come up with doctrines that the church has never believed through private interpretations or they give themselves to the teaching of one man without ever searching the Scriptures for themselves to see if what he is teaching lines up with Scripture.

Understand

Along with reading and hearing God’s word, the readers and hearers are expected to understand it. The Christian life is a life of taking in knowledge, understanding it, and walking it out in wisdom. Paul writes about this correlation between knowledge, understanding, and wisdom in his letter to the Colossians:

“⁹For this reason we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding; ¹⁰that you may walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing Him, being fruitful in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God,” (Col. 1:9-10; NKJV).

The hearers of God’s word are to follow this cycle. We take in knowledge. After obtaining knowledge, we couple it with understanding, which is to say that it affects our character and shapes our dispositions toward God and others after Christ’s. Finally, it is to be coupled with wisdom so that we walk according to the knowledge and understanding we have obtained. The result of this taking in of knowledge, understanding, and wisdom is that we take in more knowledge (vs. 10).

This is an obligation both on the part of he who preaches and on the part of him who hears. It is the job of the pastor to take the cookies down off of the shelf so-to-speak. It’s easy business to confuse people with overly academic language; it takes great work to convey difficult truths with clarity and simplicity. I have heard James White say that the way one truly knows that he knows a doctrine is if he can teach it to children. This is true. The preacher must do all he can to help his hearers understand the meaning of the text of Scripture.

This obligation is not merely a one-sided obligation, though. Hearers have an obligation as well. When any confusion arises over any teaching from the pulpit, it is the hearer’s obligation to ask the preacher afterward for clarification. No godly pastor would ever be upset to be questioned, if he is approached appropriately, about his interpretation of a particular text. In fact, pastors are encouraged by such active listening on the part of the hearers.

Q.6: What things are chiefly contained in the Holy Scriptures?

The Holy Scriptures chiefly contain what man ought to believe concerning God, and what duty God requireth of man.¹

¹2 Timothy 1:13; 3:15-16

Questions one through five provide the foundation for The Baptist Catechism, in much the same way that the teachings of the apostles and prophets as set down in Scripture provide the foundation for our faith (Eph. 2:20). The answer to question six could rightly be labeled the thesis statement of The Baptist Catechism, insofar as it provides the structure for all the questions and answers that follow.

The catechism could appropriately be said to be structured according to two categories: right believe about God (orthodoxy) and right observance of the duties God requires of us (orthopraxy). The catechism is so structured because it is meant to teach us the Bible, and these two themes are the two primary themes of Scripture. We are taught in Scripture to know the things of God (John 17:7-8; Acts 2:36) and to love God (Exod. 20:6; Neh. 1:5; John 14:15; John 15:10; 1Jn. 5:3). These two commands go hand-in-hand.

A husband cannot rightly say that he loves his wife and yet know nothing about her. At the same time, he cannot learn more of her without being provoked toward greater or lesser affections toward her. As the unbeliever learns more of God, apart from the effectual calling of the Spirit, he will grow in his hatred for Him. As we believers learn more of Him, we grow in our kindly affection toward Him. As we commit ourselves to a study of The Baptist Catechism, let us keep these two commandments in mind. Let us endeavor to know the things of God more, through His word, and so to grow in our love for Him.

Studies in The Baptist Catechism: Section One – Authority, Revelation, and Scripture (Q.5 & Q.6)

August 27, 2016 / William F. Leonhart III / 2 Comments

Q.5: May all men make use of the Holy Scriptures?

A. All men are not only permitted, but commanded and exhorted to read, hear, and understand the Holy Scriptures.¹

¹John 5:38; Revelation 1:3; Acts 8:30

Read the Scriptures

Hear the Scriptures

“¹¹And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, ¹²for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, ¹³till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ,” (Eph. 4:11-13; NKJV).

Understand

Q.6: What things are chiefly contained in the Holy Scriptures?

The Holy Scriptures chiefly contain what man ought to believe concerning God, and what duty God requireth of man.¹

¹2 Timothy 1:13; 3:15-16

A Reformed Baptist Perspective on Public Theology: The Pauline Epistles, Part III – Romans 12, 14-16

August 27, 2016August 27, 2016 / William F. Leonhart III / 13 Comments

You can read earlier posts in this series by clicking on the links below:

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As we observed in our last two articles, Paul’s desire to preach the gospel to the church at Rome provided him the necessary motivation to write his letter to the Romans. In fact, Paul’s mention of his desire in Romans 1:15-17 functions as the thesis statement of the letter:

“So, for my part, I am eager to preach the gospel to you also who are in Rome.
For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, ‘But the righteous man shall live by faith,’” (Romans 1:15-17; NASB).

In the first two articles on Romans, we considered four themes found in this thesis statement: the gospel preached to the church, the gospel as the power of God unto salvation, God’s salvation to all without distinction and, in this way, God will save all His chosen people. These four major themes help us to understand why Paul spends the first eight chapters of Romans explaining the gospel of Jesus Christ and the following three chapters describing the relationship between Israel and the church. Since the thesis statement of Romans 1:15-17 sets the framework for all that follows, we are in our present study using it as the lens through which we examine the rest of the book of Romans. In this offering, we will focus on principles found in these verses that help us to understand why Paul teaches what he teaches in chapters 12, and 14-16.

From Faith to Faith

The gospel results in a life lived in the light of a justification that comes by faith. Paul writes that, in the gospel, the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith (1:17). As we learn of God’s righteousness, that He is both just and the Justifier of sinful men (Rom. 3:26), we are freed from the shackles of sin to walk by faith in the justification we have received through Christ. We are saved by faith; we are also called to walk by faith. Paul spends the last five chapters of Romans explaining how it is that we who have been saved by gospel faith might also walk by that very gospel faith.

Some mistakenly believe that, because they have been justified by faith, they do not have a responsibility to live by faith. This false notion is contrary to the teachings of Romans. The late Jerry Bridges wrote of a time in his life when he had adopted this false notion:

“During a certain period in my Christian life, I thought that any effort on my part to live a holy life was ‘of the flesh’ and that ‘the flesh profits nothing.’ I thought God would not bless any effort on my part to live the Christian life, just as He would not bless any effort on my part to become a Christian by good works. Just as I received Christ by faith, so I was to seek a holy life only by faith. Any effort on my part was just getting in God’s way,” (Bridges, The Pursuit of Holiness, pp. 78-79).

Well, Bridges was right about one thing during this time of his life: we can only accomplish what God has called us to do by faith. However, God precepts require that we walk according to faith, that we do according to faith, that we actively work according to faith. So, just as we are justified according to faith, we are called to live the Christian life according to faith. As we will see in this article and the next, this Christian life is one of relationships: relationships within the local church, within the church universal, and between us and governing authorities.

Body Life

In Romans 12, he urges by the mercies of God that the church of Rome be merciful toward one another in the local church. In this way, he first turns the church inward, drawing them to one another for strength and support for the road ahead. First, he tells them not to be conformed to the image of the world, but be transformed by the renewing of their minds (vs. 2). Paul does not tell his readers to remove themselves from the world, but rather to resist being conformed by it. Thus, they will escape two errors: conformity to the world and isolation from it. The task to which we are called requires much more faith and trust than merely seceding from the public square. Having been saved by faith, we are called to resist conformity to the world by faith while we sojourn in it. This imperative is necessary in our day, for one reason, because our conformity to the world can easily sap the strength of our Christian witness.

Notice that Paul’s first exhortation focuses on the mind of the believer. Prior to our initial repentance, we thought according to the precepts of this world, but when the Holy Spirit awakened us, our minds were changed. The mind is central because transformation comes from a renewed mind.

The first step in renewing one’s mind and resisting the influence of the world is that of recognizing the fact that we are each members of the body of Christ. As members, we have each been granted a measure of faith, gifts of the Spirit. Now, there are myriad tests that have been developed to help people try to discern their spiritual gifts. All of these tests are flawed. The true test is found in living out one’s faith in the body of Christ.

Each local body of Christ has its own individual needs. As each Christian lives and serves among the body of Christ, certain needs naturally arise among that body. Not every Christian is meant to bear the full weight of every burden in the body but, as Christians seek to find ways to serve the body of Christ, they will naturally gravitate toward those needs that are most suitable to their unique giftings. It is through this process, not canned tests, that Christians throughout the ages have discerned their unique giftings in the body of Christ.

In chapter 13, Paul addresses the Christian’s unique relationship to the government. Given that this relationship is a paramount point in our discussion, we will devote an entire article to it separate from this discussion.

Christian Liberty

In Romans 14 and 15, Paul expounds on principles of Christian liberty urging concessions for and patience with weaker brothers and a godly practice of liberty in all things done in good faith. This too was meant to break down barriers between Jews and Gentiles. Many Jews, freed from the law, wished to practice their newfound liberty in eating meat. Believing Gentiles, having participated in pagan sacrifices and knowing those meats were likely sacrificed to idols, might not have known such liberty of conscience. Both were called to be mindful of their brothers in the faith for the sake of the gospel.

In our present day, there is an added dimension. Many Dispensationalists and New Covenanters, arguing from a subjective interpretation of the “Law of Love,” have become professional “weaker brothers.” They make much of their abstinence from things, when properly used, God has explicitly blessed in His word. They use passages like Romans 14 and 15 to argue that Christians’ love for one another means they can forbid their brothers from partaking in things God has blessed. This is not the spirit with which Paul is writing.

In Acts 10, Peter had a vision in which he was shown several animals whose consumption was forbidden in the Ceremonial Law of Israel. Peter was told to rise, kill, and eat the animals, and he begged God that he not be made to eat anything unclean. A voice came from heaven saying, “What God has cleansed, no longer consider unholy,” (Acts 10:9-16; NASB). Were Paul in Romans 14 and 15 saying that weaker brothers could simply declare for themselves what is holy and unholy and impose their subjective standards of holy and unholy on their brothers, Peter’s vision would make no sense. Rather, Paul is recognizing that some of the novices in the church still considered certain things unholy that, used properly, were actually holy. Paul is calling for the more mature brethren to bear with these younger believers. He certainly was not giving license to Seminary professors and Seminary presidents to bind the consciences of mature believers on matters of consumption. If a believer partakes of food or drink to the glory of God, it is holy, and no one is to pass judgment.

On the other hand, we must be careful how we use liberty. In the hands of the immature, Christian liberty can be a very dangerous thing. Historically, the church has labored long to mine and consolidate from Scripture its teaching on Christian liberty. Apart from the teaching of the church on this matter throughout church history, one might take it merely to be a license to sin. Such is not the case. Consider the teaching of The Baptist Confession on the matter:

“The liberty which Christ hath purchased for believers under the gospel, consists in their freedom from the guilt of sin, the condemning wrath of God, the rigour and curse of the law, and in their being delivered from this present evil world, bondage to Satan, and dominion of sin, from the evil of afflictions, the fear and sting of death, the victory of the grave, and everlasting damnation: as also in their free access to God, and their yielding obedience unto Him, not out of slavish fear, but a child-like love and willing mind,” (The Baptist Confession, 21.1). Keep reading…

We must understand that we live in a very reactionary culture. For decades, we have been inundated with notions of political correctness, and this inundation has led to an unholy push for political incorrectness. Rather than policing our tongues, many in Western culture have taken to purposefully setting out to offend others. This is a clear violation of the principles Paul is teaching in Romans 14 and 15. To be sure, we do not want to be ruled by the weaker brother. However, neither is the Christian called to purposefully offend him. We are called to bear with him, lovingly, in his immaturity.

If he has not arrived yet at the place where he understands that all things properly used are holy unto God, we must bear with him until he does understand these things. We should not entice him to partake in something he still perceives to be unholy because, at least in his mind, he would be doing it out of rebellion against God. We are to help him to avoid any such rebellious attitudes toward God while he matures in his understanding of Christian liberty.

The Universal Church

Having examined two major points on relationships in the local church, let us now focus in on a matter that is also of vital importance to Christians: the universal church. Paul ends his letter, in Romans 16, by commending brothers and sisters in the faith to the church in Rome. His commendations are not without significance to us today.

If you have been in the church for any amount of time, you may have wondered why it is that churches require letters of transfer from other churches commending new members to their fellowship. This is not a purely modern practice. In Romans and in Colossians, Paul establishes this practice. He encourages local churches to receive and greet specific saints and offers words of commendation on their behalf (Rom. 16:1-24; Col. 4:7-14).

The other side of this coin is where the apostles specifically warn against certain individuals who have caused major problems either for him or for the church as a whole (1Tim. 1:18-20; 2Tim. 2:16-18; 4:10). This information was of vital importance for local churches, and it still is today. One of the roles of elders in a local church is that of shepherd, and shepherds are tasked with the unenviable duty of warding off wolves who come in seeking to devour the flock (Acts 20:17, 29). In this age of consumerism, wolves easily move from church to church sowing division and dissention. Pastors must be careful to examine each new member of the flock and determine their ecclesiastical history in order to guard the sheep from potential wolves.

In our next article in this series, we will continue to examine what it means to live from “faith to faith.” Specifically, we will zero in on the faith needed to live according to Paul’s teachings regarding the relationship between Christians and governing authorities in Romans 13.

Studies in The Baptist Catechism: Section One – Authority, Revelation, and Scripture (Q.4)

August 13, 2016 / William F. Leonhart III / 3 Comments

Q.4: What is the Word of God?

A. The Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testament are the Word of God, and the only certain rule of faith and obedience.¹

¹2 Timothy 3:16; Ephesians 2:20

As such, it would be improper to say that Scripture is the word of man, as though God had spoken to man and man, to the best of his ability, conveyed what had been revealed to him. This is the view held by the neo-orthodox school of theologians, like Karl Barth, who argue that the Bible contains the word of God, but is not itself the word of God. As orthodox Christians, Reformed Baptists affirm every word of the Bible, in the original languages, to be the very word of God. However, Barth and his neo-orthodox companions would contend that “the word of God is within the Bible” (Barth, The Word of God and the Word of Man. Wipf & Stock, Eugene, OR. 1957, pg. 43).

This view came to have prominence in some pockets of the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC), in the mid-to-late 20^th century. The Baptist Faith & Message of 1963 (BF&M 1963) included language that allowed for such views to be held. This neo-orthodox influence was successfully eradicated from the SBC through an effort spanning more than two decades that would come to be known as the Conservative Resurgence. Compare the first sentence of the BF&M 1963 with the first sentence of the BF&M 2000.

“The Holy Bible was written by men divinely inspired and is the record of God’s revelation of Himself to man,” (BF&M of 1963; emphasis added).

“The Holy Bible was written by men divinely inspired and is God’s revelation of Himself to man,” (BF&M of 2000).

Studies in The Baptist Catechism: Section One – Authority, Revelation, and Scripture (Q.3)

August 6, 2016August 13, 2016 / William F. Leonhart III / 2 Comments

Q.3: How may we know there is a God?

A. The light of nature in man and the works of God plainly declare there is a God;¹ but His Word and Spirit only do it fully and effectually for the salvation of sinners.²

¹Romans 1:19-20; Psalm 19:1-3; Acts 17:24

²1 Corinthians 2:10; 2 Timothy 3:15-16

“The heavens are telling the glory of God;

And their expanse is declaring the work of His hands.

Day to day pours forth speech,

And night to night reveals knowledge.

There is no speech, nor are there words;

Their voice is not heard,” (Psalm 19:1-3; NASB).

“How then will they call on Him in whom they have not believed? How will they believe in Him whom they have not heard? And how will they hear without a preacher?” (Rom. 10:14; NASB).

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