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)
The focus of this section will be on one sentence of Luther: “How, pray, are all mouths stopped, if a power that gives us a degree of ability is left to us?” In the modern day we are more afraid of offending men than God. We walk around quietly and with great care in order not to “offend” anyone that we are trying to “win for Christ.” So instead of telling these people the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help us God, we water things down in order to make it more palatable for their sinful and self-centered hearts. If the point of the Law, according to Paul, is to shut the mouths of men and that the whole world would be guilty before God, then who are we not to apply the Law in its real application to the souls of men so that their mouths would be shut when they see just how guilty and helpless they are before God? They will not see the depths of their guilt until they see their helplessness.
Samuel Walker (born 1714) was a man greatly used of God during his life. He was a minister from 1738-1746 in churches and then in 1746 he became pastor of a church in Truro. He had been a pastor in Truro for about a year (which means he was a pastor for 8-9 years) before he was converted. He tells us that he had historical notions of the doctrines of the gospel, and he knew that a person needed the work of the Spirit. He said that he knew these things “notionally,” but he did not know or teach them practically. He came under increasing conviction of sin and was led to finally know the truth. After so many years of being deceived by his own heart, he then began to search the hearts of those around him and proclaim the true Gospel. This brought intense persecution.
What we want to note at this point is that as long as we leave souls with even a little wiggle room they will take it. As long as we leave them the slightest bit of ability they will use it to deceive their own hearts and deceive themselves about their own work, ability, and salvation. Samuel Walker taught people the necessity of coming to a point of recognizing and coming under the weight of their own sin and original sin. He describes it thus: “That it is a state of impotence as to all conversion towards God, both because God being unknown, there can be no motive to turn unto Him, and also because under the bias of corrupt nature the will does freely and continually choose only the things contrary to Him” (Practical Christianity Illustrated, International Outreach).
As long as the soul thinks it has a little power to choose or a little ability to come to Christ, it will continue to trust in that little ability and remain unbroken and unhumbled. A soul that has that little power to choose or that little ability to come to Christ will not and cannot trust in Christ alone and grace alone. This is the dirty little secret that people don’t want to let out of the closet in the modern day. We think that if people are preaching the truth about Christ and are holding out Christ as the way of salvation that they are orthodox. But they are not. It matters not how much one preaches Christ and the depths of orthodoxy in terms of doctrine if one does not set out to teach people (experimentally) that they are truly dead in sin and have no power or ability in themselves. One can be quite Reformed in all doctrines and yet miss it all by missing this one vital link. So many Reformed people today are friendly with Pelagians and Arminians and link arms to work with them in the Gospel, but in doing so they miss this vital point. Men must be brought to an utter end of all hope in self and all hope in their own ability before their mouths will be shut. Until that happens they will not be at a place where they truly can look to Christ alone by grace alone. They will still look to themselves and when you try to mix grace with one little work you end up with no grace at all. Either the whole world is totally guilty or it is not. Either the whole world has its mouth shut totally or it does not. In order to preach the grace of the Gospel and the Christ of the Gospel we must preach in order to drive men from themselves totally. Until men’s mouths are totally shut they cannot rest totally in Christ.
God Loves... Himself 
April 14, 2011 at 10:42 am |
wow, that is simply perfect. We know that Moses did not tell the snake bitten Israelites to do anything other than look to the pole! Look I say for Life! Life must be gotten from God apart from any notion of efforts to receive it. It is Gone in America. Drive it home Richard, drive it home. Say it and keep saying it. You will be despised, but keep on saying it! God must grant repentance, man generated repentance with a deceitful heart is worthless, no matter how much people despise of us for saying it!