April 2017 3 Protestant Reformed Theological Journal Cance
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
Editor’s Notes This is the second and last issue of the fiftieth volume of the Prot- estant Reformed Theological Journal. We welcome our readers to its pages. Included are several articles. The Rev. Thomas Reid favors us with the transcript of the second of two speeches that he gave last spring before the faculty, student body, and area Protestant Reformed ministers. The article highlights the labors and contributions of a recent French Reformed theologian, Auguste Lecerf. PRCA pastor, Rev. Thomas C. Miersma, contributes an article on the special offices and gifts in the New Testament church. He asks whether these gifts and offices continue in the church today, and if not, why not? The undersigned has two contributions to the issue. The first is the second part of my examination of the teaching of common grace in light of the five solas of the Reformation. The contention of the series is that the doctrine of common grace vitiates the five solas that constitute the Reformation’s enduring contribution to the New Testament church. The second contribution is another installment of the “John Calvin Research Bibliography.” A number of our readers have expressed appreciation for the bibliography as a useful tool for doing research into all the main areas of Calvin’s theology. The bibliography arose out of my work in crafting a special interim course on the theology of John Calvin. The course is scheduled to be taught once again as the winter interim between the two semesters of the 2017-18 school year. Included in this issue is what we hope will be a regular feature from the seminary’s librarian, Mr. Charles Terpstra. Mr. Terpstra highlights the significant recent additions to the seminary library. We include this not merely for the information of our readers. But we invite our readers to make use of our library for study and research. We are even open to loaning our books to our constituency and friends. And, of course, we have our section of book reviews—a goodly number of reviews in this issue. We want to do what we can to inform our readers of new books of special interest that are being published. Read and enjoy! Soli Deo Gloria! —RLC Protestant Reformed Theological Journal 2 Vol. 50, No. 2 Reformation, Common Grace, and Growing Apostasy (2) The Reformation, Common Grace, and the Growing Apostasy of the Church (2) by Ronald Cammenga This year Reformed churches worldwide are celebrating the 500th anniversary of the Reformation of the sixteenth century. A number of conferences have been held and many more are planned as those who are the heirs of the Reformation commemorate the great event that changed everything. Everything! Absolutely everything was affected by the Reformation—and everyone. Although the Reformation pri- marily impacted the church, there were also political, social, economic and educational effects that resulted from the movement. From the lowliest member of the church to the bishops, cardinals, and the pope in Rome, the Reformation was a movement that had to be reckoned with. Kings and princes, but also peasants, day laborers, and artisans were affected by the Reformation. It was a movement that concerned them all, for the church at that time was at the center of all of life. Everything on the planet revolved around the church. And the result of the Reformation was that it stirred up winds of change that blew with gale force across Europe and beyond. After the Reformation, Europe’s landscape was permanently altered. Our concern in this series of articles is to identify one serious threat to the accomplishments of the Reformation. It was a threat that arose in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries within the Reformed churches themselves. It has proved to be a menacing threat and a burgeoning threat. It is a serious threat, and a threat that must be taken seriously by all who are concerned to preserve what the Reformation restored to the church. That ought to belong to the proper motive of those celebrating the Reformation’s 500th anniversary. The motive for celebrating ought not to be purely historical, paying tribute to an event that took place long ago that has enduring signifi- April 2017 3 Protestant Reformed Theological Journal cance. It ought not to be a celebration aimed at promoting ethnic pride among those whose ancestors had a hand in the Reformation. But our celebration ought to be motivated by thankfulness and ought to include a firm resolution to preserve for future generations—children and grandchildren—all the good, spiritual fruit that the Reformation produced. In dependence upon God and by His grace, here we shall also stand! The threat that this series of articles is concerned to identify is the teaching of common grace. As we have shown and intend further to demonstrate, the error of common grace, both from a doctrinal and from a practical (walk of life) point of view, is not merely a threat to the Reformation. The teaching is in fact the undoing of all the major positive contributions of the Reformation. Where the teaching of common grace has become accepted, there the cardinal truths that were the hallmark of the Reformation have been seriously compromised and, in a number of instances, rejected outright. In the previous in- stallment in this series, we demonstrated the truth of that assertion in connection with the first sola of the sixteenth-century Reformation, sola scriptura, the sole authority of Scripture. If you have not yet read that introductory article, I would encourage you to do so. It documents the common grace assault on the sole authority of Scripture, and its return to the Roman Catholic practice of exalting other authorities alongside of and above the authority of sacred Scripture. In the article, we highlighted one specific error the acceptance of which has resulted in denial of the sole authority of Scripture. With appeal to common grace, the teaching of theistic evolution has become widely accepted in Reformed and Presbyterian churches today. But this teaching has become widely accepted at the expense of compromise and denial of the sole authority of the Word of God. In this article we proceed to consider the second sola of the Reformation, sola fide, faith alone. The Reformation taught that we are justified by faith alone. A church’s acceptance of the teaching of common grace, as history bears out, invariably impacts in a negative way its confession of the great gospel truth of justification by faith alone. Wherever common grace has been embraced and is being promoted, there the witness to sola fide has become garbled, and in some cases altogether muted. 4 Vol. 50, No. 2 Reformation, Common Grace, and Growing Apostasy (2) Justification by Faith Alone The formal principle of the Reformation was the sole authority of the Bible. The material principle of the Reformation was the doctrine of justification by faith alone. Along with sola scriptura, one of the watchwords of the Reformation was sola fide, faith alone. The doctrine of justification by faith alone was the great doctrine recovered by Martin Luther as a result of his own spiritual struggles, particularly the struggle for his own personal assurance of salvation. Luther’s struggle is really the struggle of every child of God. It is the struggle to possess the assurance, the undoubted assurance, assurance in life and in death that you are a child of God. It is the struggle to possess the assurance that God is your God and that you may call upon Him as your God. It is the struggle to possess the assurance that God loves you with an undying love. It is the struggle to know God, not only as the sovereign Lord over and Judge of all men, but as your loving and benevolent Heavenly Father. It is the assurance that Christ, the Son of God, has died for you and paid for all your sins. It is the assurance that He hung on Calvary’s cross for you, in your place, as your substitute. It is the assurance of faith and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Christ and of God. It is the assurance, in the words of the Heidelberg Catechism, Q&A 54 that “I am and forever shall remain, a living member” of Christ’s church.1 It is the assurance of everlasting life, heaven, and glory after this life. It is the assurance of membership in the covenant and kingdom of Jesus Christ. It is such an assurance as gives joy and peace, and produces patience and hope. The church of Luther’s day answered his soul-searching question, “How can I have the assurance of my salvation, the assurance that God is my God and that Jesus Christ is my Savior?” by instructing him to work. Salvation and the assurance of salvation are merited; they must be earned, at least in part. For this reason, Luther entered the monastery at Wittenberg and became a monk. For this reason, as a monk Luther lived the most austere life of self-denial and deprivation. He prayed and he fasted; he denied himself and worked himself to a 1 The Confessions and the Church Order of the Protestant Reformed Churches (Grandville: Protestant Reformed Churches in America, 2005), 104. April 2017 5 Protestant Reformed Theological Journal frazzle. He even beat himself until his body was bruised and bleeding. Cheerfully he performed the most menial of tasks around the mon- astery. He ate very little food until he wasted away and looked like a walking skeleton. In his room, called a “cell,” even in the middle of the winter he had no heat and slept with no covers on a mat on the cold floor.