Covenant Protestant Reformed Church
Ballymena
Rev. Angus Stewart
Lord’s Day, 18 January, 2009
“Happy is he that hath the God of Jacob for his help,
whose hope is in the Lord his God” (Ps. 146:5)
Morning Service – 11:00 AM Sermon by Rev. R. Hanko
Called by Name by Jesus
John 10:3
I. Who Called?
II. How Called?
III. To What Called?
Psalms: 82:1-8; 10:13-18; 40:1-5; 23:1-6
Evening Service – 6:00 PM Sermon by Rev. S. Houck
Patience in Tribulation
Romans 12:12
I. The Afflictions of This Time
II. Our Calling to be Patient
III. The Blessing of Faithfulness to This Calling
Psalms: 103:1-2, 8-12; 11:1-7; 77:1-6; 119:65-72
For CDs of the sermons and DVDs of the worship services, contact Stephen Murray
If you desire a pastoral visit, please contact Rev. Stewart or the elders
CPRC Website: www.cprc.co.uk • Live Webcast: https://cprc.co.uk/live-streaming/
CPRC YouTube: www.youtube.com/cprcni
CPRC Facebook: www.facebook.com/CovenantPRC
Quote to Consider:
Herman Hoeksema: “Patience is the power of faith to walk in the way of the Lord, no matter what that way may bring. Patience is this. Here is the way of God. I know it. Here is my calling to walk in this way of God. I know it. As I walk straight on, I see tribulation on this way. If I do not take a side way, reproach will be on the way I must travel. I see it. People will laugh at me if I keep on the way. They will pour scorn upon me if I continue on the way. I will lose my job, my position, my freedom. There, on the way, is the scaffold, the stake, death. There are other ways for me, ways that lead off from that straight way of God’s precepts. I see them, too. They are ways in which I can keep my name, my honor, my position, my freedom. Patience is that, although there are byways, I go straight ahead, straight through shame, reproach, and suffering—without murmuring. That we find here an admonition to be patient is because the flesh will never choose suffering. And there is oh so much flesh to us! When we come before the choice of the straight way of obedience with suffering, and of the byways by which we can escape suffering, we have a hundred excuses to take the byways” (Righteous By Faith Alone, pp. 601-602).
Announcements (subject to God’s will):
Because of Rev. Stewart’s flu, Brian Crossett will read a sermon this morning and Philip Rainey will read one this evening.
New Protestant Reformed Theological Journals are available on the back table.
Catechism: Tuesday, 10:15 AM – Beginners OT Class at the Murrays Tuesday, 4:30 PM – Jacob Buchanan Tuesday, 5:30 PM – Jamie & Debbie Murray Tuesday, 7:00 PM – Campbells at the manse
Ladies’ Bible Study meets this Tuesday, 10:15 AM, at the Murrays.
Midweek Bible Study meets on Wednesday, 7:45 PM at the manse. We will look at “passing the time of your sojourn in fear” (I Peter 1:17-21).
The Reformed Witness Hour next Lord’s Day (8:30-9:00 AM, on Gospel 846MW), is “Strive to Enter in at the Strait Gate” (Luke 13:24) by Rev. Rodney Kleyn.
Upcoming Lectures: Portadown, Fri., 20 Feb., 8 PM – John Calvin’s Battle for the Reformation Limerick, Fri., 6 March, 7:30 PM – John Calvin’s Battle for the Reformation S. Wales, Fri., 20 March, 7:15 PM – John Calvin’s Battle for the Reformation
Website Additions: 6 Tagalog (6 PR catechism books), 1 Portuguese, 1 Slovenian (Homer C. Hoeksema’s pamphlet, “God So Loved the World …“) and 4 Italian translations were added.
PRC News: Rev. Van Overloop left this past Thursday to work for three weeks in the Philippines. Rev. Smit (Lacombe, Canada) is considering the call to the Philippines. Rev. Eriks (Hudsonville, MI) is considering the call from Calvary PRC.
This is the 29th e-mail by Prof. Engelsma on justification
Dear European Forum,
As I have demonstrated from Scripture and the confessions, the cross of Christ is the basis, or ground, of our justification. The cross is the ground inasmuch as the suffering and death of Jesus Christ were the satisfaction of the justice of God the judge in the stead of all the elect church. In His human nature, body and soul, Christ willingly suffered the punishment of our sin. He paid the penalty due to sin demanded by the righteousness of God.
This basis of justification is and must be proclaimed as an integral, essential part of the good tidings of the forgiveness of sins and the legal standing of righteousness with God.
It is this basis of justification, rightly understood, that refutes the charge especially by the Roman Catholic Church against the Protestant doctrine of justification by faith only, that it is nothing but a “legal fiction.”
As I explained in the previous instalment, the charge “legal fiction” intends to expose our doctrine of justification as unreal, as fraudulent. According to Rome, justification by faith alone has God pronouncing a man righteous when, in fact, he is not righteous at all. It is comparable to the decision of an earthly judge, whether by ignorance or injustice, declaring a man innocent and setting him free from the deserved consequences of murder, when in fact the man is guilty of the murder, and remains guilty of the murder, as he exits the courthouse.
In support of its charge, which, if true, would be devastating to the doctrine of justification by faith alone, Rome points triumphantly to the language Reformed Christians themselves use in describing their doctrine of justification: “as if.” In justification it is “as if” the justified sinner had never committed any sin and “as if” he had perfectly obeyed the law of God.
In the previous instalment, I quoted from the Reformed Form for the Administration of the Lord’s Supper, which uses the “as if” language in describing justification.
I could also refer to Lord’s Day 23 of the Heidelberg Catechism. In its main article on justification by faith alone, indeed answering the question, “How are you righteous before God?” the Catechism reads as follows: “Only by a true faith in Jesus Christ … as if I never had had nor committed any sin: yea, as if I had fully accomplished all that obedience which Christ has accomplished for me.”
“Don’t you see,” says the Roman Catholic theologian, “according to your doctrine of justification it is only as if the sinner is righteous; in reality, he is not righteous at all. Your doctrine has God pronouncing him righteous legally, but the result is a ‘legal fiction.’”
Rome is mistaken.
In the divine act of justification, one who is in himself guilty becomes righteous, not fictitiously, but really. The biblical and Protestant doctrine of justification does not amount to a “legal fiction,” but, gloriously, to a legal reality. The sinner is no longer guilty, that is, there are no sins or sinfulness of his that even God can find to charge to his account. The just and truthful God, who can neither weaken His righteous demands of the human creature nor lie, declares concerning the sinner, guilty in himself, that he has perfectly met every demand of God’s law, including paying for his sin.
This is real righteousness! This is truth and reality!
To have no sin according to the judgment of God and to possess perfect obedience to the law of God is not a fictional state of righteousness, but the real thing.
In passing, I note that by its charge, “legal fiction,” Rome in fact exposes itself. It intends to expose the Reformed faith; in fact, it exposes itself. It exposes itself as self-righteous. It exposes itself as despising the righteousness of God and going about to establish its own righteousness, as Paul describes the error in Romans 10:3. For what underlies Rome’s charge, of course, is that the Protestant doctrine of justification is not based upon, nor does it consist of, the inherent righteousness of the good works of the sinner himself. Rome refuses to recognize a righteousness that does not consist of the sinner’s own goodness. If the righteousness of a sinner before God is not at all the sinner’s own good works, if his righteousness is nothing whatever of himself, if his righteousness is not some love he has for God, if his righteousness is exclusively the obedience of Christ outside the sinner—the obedience of Christ for the sinner and on behalf of the sinner—”well then,” says Rome, “the whole business is nothing but a ‘legal fiction.’”
But this is Rome’s great sin, far outstripping all its other sins, including that of the papacy, namely, the teaching that the righteousness of sinners before God is in part what they actually are and what they themselves do, albeit with the help of divine grace. And the dreadful truth for Rome and for every deluded soul that presents himself for justification before God as inherently righteous, according to Rome’s instruction, is that that justification is a “fiction.” “For by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified” (Gal. 2:16). That person who appears without the “wedding garment” of the obedience of Christ, received by (legal) imputation through faith alone, is cast away by God into the outer darkness (Matt. 22:11-14).
Righteousness before God consisting of one’s own works and goodness is no reality. In fact, it is spurious, because even our best works are defiled with sin and, therefore, not the righteousness that can stand with God the judge. It is not the reality of righteousness, because God, who determines reality, has revealed that only the perfect work of His incarnate Son for sinners and in the stead of sinners, will be recognized by Him as the righteousness of men and women, who are guilty in themselves.
“Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past … to declare, I say, at this time his righteousness” (Rom. 3:25- 26).
“… the righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth” (Rom. 10:3-4).
In justification by faith, the believing sinner becomes righteous, truly and really righteous. He becomes righteous by imputation. The perfect obedience of Christ is made over to the sinner. It is made over to the sinner, legally, so that it now is his own—truly and really his own. It is his own as much as it is Christ’s.
“As if” in the Reformed explanation of justification does not at all suggest unreality, as though the sinner is merely said to be righteous, when in fact he is not righteous. Rather, “as if” intends to emphasize the reality of the justified sinner’s righteousness. I see two aspects to the meaning of the “as if.” First, the phrase affirms the completeness, the absolute perfection, of the justified sinner’s righteousness. He is so righteous as if he never had done one sin and as if he had perfectly fulfilled all the demands of the law. Is this not some (real) righteousness?
Second, “as if” insists that the justified sinner is himself personally righteous by imputation. Imputation does not leave righteousness hanging somewhere in the air over the sinner’s head, but makes righteousness the sinner’s own personally. He himself is righteous with the righteousness imputed to him by God through faith on the basis of the cross of Christ. So much is this the case, that it is as if he himself never sinned, as if he himself perfectly obeyed the law, as if he himself hung on the cross to atone for his sins. Righteousness could not be his own more personally if in fact he himself did live a sinless life, did obey the law without one flaw, and did in fact hang on the wood at Golgotha for six hours of eternal suffering.
“As if” does not cleverly or foolishly disguise a sad “not really.”
But “as if” celebrates an amazing, a triumphant “in reality.”
And this is because of what the lifelong obedience, the lifelong suffering, and especially the death of Christ were, and because of who He was, and is, who obeyed and died.
This will be the subject of the next instalment.
Cordially in Christ,
Prof. Engelsma
