We live in a strange time...
Well at least those of us inhabiting the realm
of what is often called Reformed or Orthodox Christianity do...
It seems that many of us are
surrounded by a strange mix of freewill advocates and what many are coming to
call hyper-gracers. The Freewill advocates fall completely outside of the camp
of Reformed or Calvinistic Theology. Therefore it should come as no shock that
they take great umbrage with most of what we believe. Often times even going so
far as to claim we may not even be genuine Christians because in their eyes we
follow systems of men and not God. Where the surprise, or dare I even say the
shock, is coming in, is from how some of us are now being labeled heretical
from those within our own camp.
One thing that has united the
Reformed or Calvinistic camp for centuries is the reality of our embracing of
Monergistic Salvation or completely Sovereign Grace. It has been this unity
that has driven us to be very clear and concise when battling against the error
of Synergism in the Freewill camp. It is a banner to be gladly waved to the
battle cry of “Soli Deo Gloria!” as the Freewill camp waves their banner to the
cry of William Wallace's “Freedom!”
While I am certain that this
newest upheaval is not really all that new in the grand scheme of theological
and doctrinal discord, it seems to be taking on a new spin that could only be
made possible by the advent of the internet and(anti) social media. What has
happened is that many of us are so appalled by Synergism or the idea that man
can in anyway cooperate with God in the process of salvation, and rightly so, that
we recoil in horror and fear when the word synergy is ever mentioned. The panic
that ensues is tantamount to the run on the banks during the stock market crash
that predated the Great Depression. This has gotten so bad that if someone
speaks of cooperating with God in any way pitchforks and torches start to
appear and the villagers gather en masse ready to hunt down the monster that is
threatening their idyllic lives. Using the words cooperate or synergy has
become the theological version of walking into a crowded theater and shouting
fire. You may have the freedom to do it, but you may be held culpable for any
injury or death that ensues.
I don’t deny that much of what I
have already said and much of what I will say from this point on stems from a
recent issue. Recently there has been a falling out between Tullian Tchividjian
and The Gospel Coalition. I am not going to be elaborating on what I view as
The Gospel Coalition’s tragic mishandling of the Sovereign Grace Ministry sex
abuse scandal cover up. I will also not be speaking to accusations against
Tullian claiming he is Antinomian or even a New Antinomian. I will also not be
addressing the accusations against critics of Tullian claiming that they are
legalists or proponents of works righteousness. These accusations have been made by many I
consider godly believers who have gone after godly men such as Mark Jones,
Steve Lawson, Carl Truman or Jerry Wragg. I will be speaking to the divide and
what I perceive to be a grievous error on the part of those passionately
battling against synergistic salvation.
When I was truly born again back in February of 2004 I was adrift in a sea of confusion. For all intents and purposes I had been raised a confessional Lutheran that had been baptized as an infant and had done the proper evangelical thing of “asking Jesus into my heart” at the age of 5. I then jumped through all of the proper religious hoops. I went to VBS and Sunday school. I took catechism classes while in the 2nd and 3rd grades. I was confirmed and took my first communion. Then I went on to live like hell and in total rebellion to God until I came home from the military and my parents introduced me to the Baptist tradition.
Having no desire to look as if I
was not a believer despite my insipid practice of my “faith”; I adopted the
principles of Independent Fundamentalism. I eliminated movies, secular music
and alcohol from my life. I was at every church related function I could get to
and I even made a big deal of insisting that I have Sundays off from my job.
When the time came for me to switch jobs I agreed to work every weekend but I
would not come in on Sundays until I had attended church services. When I got
off work I would rush home and be there for evening services. I even made
efforts to be at every midweek function possible. In short, on the outside I
was a faithful Christian. On the inside I was as wicked as one could get,
because I was still unconverted. I lived legalism. I breathed it.
Then I got saved. The
transformation was amazing even to me. I stopped doing all those things I had
been doing out of some sense of wanting to prove to others how spiritual I was.
I no longer felt like I was earning my place in heaven by how close I came to
maintaining a list of man-made expectations. I stopped measuring my performance
based on how other people were performing. Yet something strangely profound
began to occur in my life. I began to desire to do those things which were
pleasing to God. I began to want to do the things that I saw contained in
Scripture. I began to want to bear fruit. The more I read, the more I learned.
The more I learned the more I wanted to obey. At first obeying was difficult.
It seemed so burdensome to me. Yet the more I obeyed, the more joy I found in
it.
This became such an integral part
of my walk with Christ I began to talk about it with the pastor of the
congregation I was in. The more I spoke about obeying God and the joy that it
brought me, the more he pushed back on me. I began to question myself. I began
to struggle with these internal desires to do those things that I saw contained
in Scripture. I wanted to love God and I wanted to keep His commandments. I
wanted to see the fruits of salvation and of the Spirit in my life. I wanted to
bear fruit in keeping with repentance. Yet I didn’t want to do these things
because it was required of me; not if it meant people were going to think I was
trying to please God and earn His favor.
Soon I began to ask why it was a
bad thing to teach people to obey God if they were truly saved. I began to ask
if obedience was required of us after salvation. Then I really began to hear
phrases that scared me. Phrases like “you sound like you believe in Lordship
Salvation”. What was that? What did it mean? The answer I was given over and
over again was that it was works righteousness and it taught people could not
be saved without doing good works.
This terrified me. I didn’t want
to be that person. The irony of this was that the people telling me I was
believing in some form of works righteousness were the quickest to make lists
of the dos and the don’ts they found in the bible. So on one hand I was hearing
that it was wrong to teach people that they should be obedient and follow the
commands of God contained in the Scriptures or they may not be saved while at
the same time being pointed to a list of rules by which one marks their
spiritual growth. This was terribly perplexing for me. I did not know how to
deal with it.
This brings me to the current
controversy that has begun to spread like wild fire in the confines of the
“Reformed Community”. Is sanctification progressive or is it a once and done
deal like justification? Should believers be taught to strive after holiness;
labor to be set apart, or has this already been done to them and for them?
Should believers be taught to obey the laws of God or the Law of Christ? Do the
Ten Commandments have a role in the life of the believer? Should we adhere to
them?
What I promise is that I am not
interested in building up straw-men only to burn them down. I will not engage in
red herrings or ad hominems. Yet I am going to say some hard things and I am
going to draw an incredibly painful analogy.
If you are in the group of people
within Reformed Theology that does not believe in progressive sanctification or
that any believer should be taught to keep the laws of God or the Law of Christ
out of a sense of duty or commitment, you are probably not going to like me
much when this is done because I adamantly disagree with you. I do not for a
minute believe that our sanctification is completely done at the moment of our
salvation. Yes there is a sense in which we are made holy in and through Christ’s
finished work on our behalf, no arguments from me on that front. Yet one cannot
get around the reality that the New Testament is full of admonishments to the
believer to work out their salvation in fear and trembling. We are to make our
calling and election sure. We are to press on toward the high calling of God.
We are to present ourselves as living sacrifices to God holy and blameless. We
are to run the race set before us. James tells us that we demonstrate our faith
by our works. In short, there is a very real sense in which, after our
salvation, a completely Monergistic work, we enter into a synergistic
relationship with God through, and empowered by, the Holy Spirit; whereby we
grow in holiness and Christ likeness everyday as we actively pursue Him.
This is not a concept foreign to
Scripture. Paul writing to the Church in Thessalonica commends Timothy to them
and calls him a co-laborer with God. The word translated co-laborer in that
passage is sunergos. It is the Greek word that synergy derives from. Timothy is
laboring along side of God in the advancement of the Gospel in the world and in
ministering to the Church. He is not doing it under his own power. No one who embraces
this synergistic nature of the works we do as believers actually believes that
a believer is capable of doing these things on his or her own. Not one of us is
claiming that we are capable of doing anything morally good or pleasing to God
in our own strength. But you have to let go of your fear that believing we work
with God after salvation leads to pride and boasting. Nothing could be further
from the truth. When I came across this reality in Scripture it rocked me, and
oddly enough it delivered me to sense of freedom that I had not yet really
discovered. I was free to pursue Him and His imperatives to pursue His holiness
by trusting in the strength of the Holy Spirit.
I do not strive because I have
the power to do it on my own. I do not pursue holiness because I think I can do
it alone. I pursue these things because He has enabled me and then told me to
do them, and He expects me to. How am I to demonstrate my love to God and my
appreciation for what Christ has done on my behalf if I am not working to keep
His commandments? Why is this concept so terribly offensive to you? Why is the
concept of duty so dangerous to you?
In Ephesians 2:10 we are taught
that God has prepared good works for us from before the foundation of the
earth. What does this mean? Is this only encouragement for us to sit back and
wait to have these good works happen to us without pursuing them? Do we sit
like rag dolls unable to compel ourselves to get up and pursue? Of course not;
the Holy Spirit within in us compels us to search out those good works; just as
the Holy Spirit compels us to obey God. But obey what? What is it that God has
given us to mark obedience by? It certainly isn’t some esoteric ethereal idea.
Our obedience is tangible; it has standards and guidelines. Yet it does not
curry us any sense of salvific work or special favor from our heavenly Father.
We cannot be more loved than we already are through Christ. Yet we can grieve
the Father and we can grieve the Son and we can grieve the Holy Spirit;
precisely because He loves us and expects us to obey Him; and our disobedience
towards Him saddens Him. Our disobedience garners us the just chastisement of
the Father. It must; because any father who loves his children teaches them to
obey, and chastises them when they don’t. But as we are taught in Romans 8
there is no condemnation for those of us in Christ.
This concept is deeply embedded in
Scripture. Take a look at Hebrews 12:3-17:
“Consider him who
endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow
weary or fainthearted. In your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted
to the point of shedding your blood. And have you forgotten the exhortation
that addresses you as sons? My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the
Lord, Nor be weary when reproved by Him. For the Lord disciplines the one He
loves, and chastises every son He receives.
It is for discipline
that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there
whom his father does not discipline? If you are left without
discipline, in which all have participated, then you are illegitimate children
and not sons. Besides this, we have had earthly fathers who disciplined us and
we respected them. Shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits
and live? 1For they disciplined us for a short time as it seemed
best to them, but he disciplines us for our good, that we may share his
holiness. For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but
later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been
trained by it.
Therefore lift your
drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees, and make straight paths for your
feet, so that what is lame may not be put out of joint but rather be healed. Strive
for peace with everyone, and for the holiness without which no one will see the
Lord. See to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God;
that no “root of bitterness” springs up and causes trouble, and by it many
become defiled; that no one is sexually immoral or unholy like Esau, who sold
his birthright for a single meal.For you know that
afterward, when he desired to inherit the blessing, he was rejected, for he
found no chance to repent, though he sought it with tears."
This entire passage is about how
God loves and disciplines all of those He has received and have fallen into
disobedience. There is even a brief description of what that disobedience looks
like when Esau is brought up and mentioned for his sexual immorality and
unholiness. What is sexual immorality if it is not a violation of God’s
commandments? What is unholiness if it is not a violation of God’s law and the
marring of His visage upon us? He chastises us in His love for us. He expects
us to obey Him because we are His children and it is right and proper for us to
obey Him. And while I would never argue that the law in and of itself produces
the obedience it requires from the lost, or in the found, it does grant the
found a guideline by which we can walk. It provides a guardrail that can work
to keep us upon the path of pursuing the holiness without which we will never
see the Lord. The more we pursue Christ and sanctification the more utterly dependent we realize we are upon Him for the strength to walk with Him. But
this reality does not negate the requirement to put effort into the pursuit.
As many of us know, and as many more do not realize, the days of the early church were a time of prolific slavery. This was also a reality that the Hebrew people were all too familiar with. Some of this slavery was indebtedness based. It was akin to the indentured servants that came to the US from Europe after having agreed to work for nothing more than food and shelter simply to get to the New World. This puts us in mind of what Jacob did to earn Rachel’s hand in marriage from his uncle Laban. Then there was the conquered slave culture where a people were defeated in war and carried away to be the victors’ slaves. Some of these were kept as personal slaves but many were sold at markets. These conquered people were powerless to do anything about their condition. There was no escape, and any who tried were put to death, or beaten so badly so as to never want to try again. Their only hope was to be purchased by a benevolent master. This culture extended all the way into the early years of the US and up until the civil war. In many cases it is still active in the world today.
This was the culture that Paul wrote in and it was the culture that God chose to have the perspective of Scripture penned in. The word doulos, or slave, is replete within the bible. And it carries massive implications for the believer today. Why is that? Because chose to use that word in Holy Writ to describe an aspect of our relationship to Him. He sent His Son to redeem, or buy back, His elect from the curse of the law. He delivered, or made us free, from slavery to sin; to set us free to be slaves of Christ; slaves of righteousness. What does Paul say about this reality in Romans 6:15-23:
“What then? Are we to
sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means! Do you not know
that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are
slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of
obedience, which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God, that you who
were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of
teaching to which you were committed, and, having been set free from sin, have
become slaves of righteousness. I am speaking in human terms, because of your
natural limitations. For just as you once presented your members as slaves to
impurity and to lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your
members as slaves to righteousness leading to sanctification.
For when you were
slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. But what fruit were
you getting at that time from the things of which you are now ashamed? For the
end of those things is death. But now that you have been set free from sin and
have become slaves of God, the fruit you get leads to sanctification and its
end, eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is
eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
The genuine believer is a slave
of righteousness under the authority of Christ. This should comfort us and
bring us peace. More than that we should look at Christ as a benevolent slave
master and not as if He is some despotic tyrant who does not lead well. Those
type of slaves masters existed all too often in the history of the US. These
were the men who bought slaves right from the ships as they came into port and
beat those slaves until they learned how work the fields or died in the
process. That is not the type of Master our savior and Lord is. Then there were
those who despite taking part in a blasphemous cultural sin treated their
slaves well.
These men would pay richly for
their slaves and they take them to their homes and feed them and cloth them and
shelter them. They provided medical care and when the time came to see these
slaves enter the fields to work they went and worked with them. These masters
did not pick the slaves up and carry them to the fields. They did not walk
behind the slaves and then grab their hands as the slaves waited to be pushed
in the right direction. The master did not open and close the hands of the
slaves to pick the crops or to plant them. The masters would lead the slaves to
the field. He would walk a row alongside and just ahead of the slave
demonstrating the right way for the work to be done. For a time this would be
slow going and toilsome. Yet as time went on the master could see the slaves
gaining more expertise and soon the slaves could look up and see the master
standing at the edge of the field. They would see him watching as the work he
had done in training his slaves paid off and they became more and more
proficient in the work they were doing. All because he had gone with them and
walked along side them showing them how to do what he wanted done. These slaves
all throughout the history of slavery were often fond of their masters and grew
to love them. They went from working out of fear and obligation to working out
of love. They were not trying to pay back their master; they knew they were
slaves for life. They worked according to the standards that their masters set
for them because they knew those standards were right and they wanted to please
their master. And often, when presented with the opportunity to be free; those
slaves chose to stay in slavery to the one they loved.
This is the Master that Christ
is. This is the type of Master we serve in God. He purchased us at great
personal expense. He chose us when we had nothing to offer and He gave us life
and nursed us to health after the degradation of the slave market of sin had
made us broken and sickly. He has provided all that we need and Christ has gone
on before us showing us the way in which we are to walk. He has established the
parameters of the way we are to conduct ourselves. He has taught us and He has
left us lessons to follow; not to earn our salvation or our freedom, but to
guide us. These things are good for us. Early in our walk we may desire to do
them because we feel we owe it to Him. And don’t we owe Him our obedience? Is
that so wrong? Yet, more than that; He has left these things for us so we can
be conformed to His image just as He has planned. The Law of Christ is meant to
be obeyed. The more we obey it, through the strength of the Holy Spirit, the
more like Him we become. There is personal effort in this, and our Master
expects us to put forth that effort. And we will know when we are not obeying
the command to love God with all that we are and when we fail to love our
neighbors as ourselves. He will chastise us as He should. As any earthly father
would chastise his children; our heavenly Father will chastise us for failing
to obey. There are times when this should cause us to tremble and there are
times that this should cause us to rejoice. None-the-less these things work to
conform us to the image of God.
We should not be so quick to run
from teaching believers to obey the law of God, even if they start out doing it
from duty or obligation. We should embrace obedience as something we owe to the
One who set aside so much for us. Of course we will never be able to repay what
it is that He did in paying for us. But if the effort compels us to love and
sanctification is it wrong? If the effort works to conform us daily to His
image is it wrong? He gave us His law for a good use in our lives and we do
others a disservice when we tell them it is not obligatory to obey their
Master. I cannot say this enough; we recognize that the power to obey does not
come from the law or from within ourselves; but we are still to actively pursue
that obedience. I love my Master. I love my Savior! I love my Lord! And I
gladly obey because he expects it of me…
Soli Deo Gloria!
-Todd
