God Loves… Himself

Paul now proceeds to put on record that he is speaking of every man, and of the best and most excellent men most of all. These are his words: ‘that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world become guilty before God; for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified in His sight’ (Rom 3:19-20). How, pray, are all mouths stopped, if a power that gives us a degree of ability is left to us? One could then say to God; it is not the case that there is nothing at all here; here is something which You cannot condemn, seeing that you have given it a degree of ability. Its mouth at least will not be silenced, nor will it be subject to Your wrath. For if the power of ‘free-will’ is unimpaired and capable of effective action, it is false to say the whole world is guilty and answerable before God. This power is no small thing in a small corner of the world, but is the most excellent thing and the most universal; and its mouth must not be stopped! (Luther, Bondage of the Will)

We have to think just a little in order to follow Luther at this point. While Luther appeared to be something like a volcano at times and erupt into words, this book is not one of those times. He shows that he is a man capable of precise reasoning in places. In places like the section above, we see a man who looks past just the appearance of words and looks to what they mean and what must be true since they are true. What must be true since it is true “that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world become guilty before God”? What is true, Luther tells us, is that for the mouth to be stopped in truth and reality then there must be no ability of the will left to do good.

There is an undercurrent going on here that may not be obvious to the one that reads Scripture or Luther quickly. Is there nothing in the world that is good? God created the world and all things in it and then declared it good. After the fall, however, is there anything good left? Is there an island in the will of human beings that is not fallen and therefore is free to do good as it pleases? Is there an island left in the will of human beings that has enough good to choose good and do good as it pleases? Romans 3:12 has already dealt with that: “ALL HAVE TURNED ASIDE, TOGETHER THEY HAVE BECOME USELESS; THERE IS NONE WHO DOES GOOD, THERE IS NOT EVEN ONE.” The Scripture speaks and tells us that there is none (no one) who does good, not even one. One would think that the case would be closed at this point. If no one does good, then can we say that all human beings are free to do good but that they just don’t want to? The Divine declaration is that no one does good. In other words, what God calls good as opposed to man no man does it because no man can do it.

Luther goes on to point out that not all mouths would indeed be stopped if man can do good of his own will in which there is some little island of good left. If some little degree of ability to do good is left in man, then it is not the case that the mouth of men are closed. Men could simply step out and start doing good and show God that they are good and can do good and so show that they have ability to do so. They could then run their mouths about that rather than close them. They could run their mouths and say that they do have good in them and that they are not totally reliant upon Christ and upon the Gospel to be saved. They could run their mouths and say that they have good in them and that they can do righteous things and not depend utterly on Christ for righteousness. They could run their mouths and say that they don’t need grace alone to bring them to Christ and they don’t need Christ alone as a sacrifice for all that they have done (just some) and they don’t need the imputed righteousness of Christ alone (they have some good works that come from that ability in their will) to be declared righteous.

Luther helps us dive to a deeper depth of the words in Romans 3 and see that for those words to be true there can be no ability of the human will to do good. Can any human being be justified in His sight at any point and time? Can any human being be justified in His sight for any one good thing done? Can any human being be partially (even a very little) justified in His sight because that human being can do good from that little island of goodness left in the will so it has the ability to do good? As with Sodom and Gomorrah, God was willing not to destroy the place for the few righteous in it. If there is any good left in a will so that it is free to do good, then it is not true that God can declare the whole human as having no good and no ability to do good. The assertion of ‘free-will’ stands opposed to Scripture, the teaching of total depravity, and the Gospel of grace alone and Christ alone. It is like yeast which will permeate all things that it is around and eventually take over the Gospel. That is precisely what it has done in the United States. It has permeated every aspect of biblical truth and so many are willing to think of it (‘free-will’) as part of orthodoxy now. But in reality what it does is strike at the very roots of historic and biblical Christianity.

This entry was posted on April 2, 2011 at 9:22 am and is filed under The Gospel and the Enslaved Will. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.