God Loves… Himself

1689 Baptist Confession of Faith, Chapter 11

1._____ Those whom God effectually calleth, he also freely justifieth, not by infusing righteousness into them, but by pardoning their sins, and by accounting and accepting their persons as righteous; not for anything wrought in them, or done by them, but for Christ’s sake alone; not by imputing faith itself, the act of believing, or any other evangelical obedience to them, as their righteousness; but by imputing Christ’s active obedience unto the whole law, and passive obedience in his death for their whole and sole righteousness by faith, which faith they have not of themselves; it is the gift of God.

Justification by faith alone is the article upon which the Church stands or falls. Martin Luther

Romans 9:13 Just as it is written, “JACOB I LOVED, BUT ESAU I HATED.” 14 What shall we say then? There is no injustice with God, is there? May it never be!15 For He says to Moses, “I WILL HAVE MERCY ON WHOM I HAVE MERCY, AND I WILL HAVE COMPASSION ON WHOM I HAVE COMPASSION.” 16 So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy. 17 For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “FOR THIS VERY PURPOSE I RAISED YOU UP, TO DEMONSTRATE MY POWER IN YOU, AND THAT MY NAME MIGHT BE PROCLAIMED THROUGHOUT THE WHOLE EARTH.” 18 So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires. 19 You will say to me then, “Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?”

In a very recent “sermon” the “preacher” was calling on people to make a choice to serve God. The sermon was empty of Christ, empty of the nature of sin, empty of the glory of God, and had nothing about the Gospel. At the end, he still called on people to make a decision to be saved or to join the church. It was striking that there was nothing about God in the sermon other than that He loves you and wants the best for you, though even that was not set out at all. In looking at the 1698 Baptist Confession of Faith and the passage from Romans 9, one cannot find a work about what the “preacher” was talking about.

Again, this may be repetitive, but the Gospel is not about the decisions men make and it is not about how much they keep the commitments they make. The issue is what God does. If I am even remotely close to being correct, in modern America God has been left out of the Gospel in the books and “preaching” that men do. I am constantly astounded (slow to catch on) how much God is forgotten on Sunday mornings and that is a bad sign for the rest of the week as well. The Gospel is about the God who effectually calls, not about how men make decisions. The Gospel is about how God justifies sinners, not about how much sinners accept Christ and pray a prayer.

It is simply impossible for a person to read Romans and Ephesians (and the rest of the New Testament) with any degree of understanding and come to any conclusion other than that God saves sinners according to His good pleasure and according to the glory of His grace. The Bible teaches us that God created all things for His own glory and that includes men. The Fall was a fall into sin and now men fall short of His glory. The Gospel cannot be anything but a way for God to be glorified in saving men and also returning man to a place where men now live to the glory of God.

If the above statement is true, then it is a different Gospel that focuses on men rather than on God. If God created all things for His glory and as a thrice holy God He cannot do anything with an inferior motive other than Himself and His own glory, then the Gospel is all about Him and His glory. It is simply not possible for it to be any other way. The Gospel is the Gospel of God, the Gospel of the glory of God, the Gospel of the glory of Christ, and so on. It is not the Gospel of man in any way and at any time. The Gospel is always about God and His glory in the face of Christ. The comfort that men have cannot be in themselves and their own decisions; it must be about what God has done in Christ. The Scriptures are so clear and the Confession reflects it that God saves for the sake of His own name and not for the sake of sinful human beings and their choices. God has no need of us and He has no need of anything we can do. We should bow low before Him and His glory and ask Him to humble us and bring us to die to self and pride and for Him to turn us to love His glory rather than our love for self.

1689 Baptist Confession of Faith, Chapter 11

1._____ Those whom God effectually calleth, he also freely justifieth, not by infusing righteousness into them, but by pardoning their sins, and by accounting and accepting their persons as righteous; not for anything wrought in them, or done by them, but for Christ’s sake alone; not by imputing faith itself, the act of believing, or any other evangelical obedience to them, as their righteousness; but by imputing Christ’s active obedience unto the whole law, and passive obedience in his death for their whole and sole righteousness by faith, which faith they have not of themselves; it is the gift of God.

Justification by faith alone is the article upon which the Church stands or falls. Martin Luther

Romans 9:13 Just as it is written, “JACOB I LOVED, BUT ESAU I HATED.” 14 What shall we say then? There is no injustice with God, is there? May it never be!15 For He says to Moses, “I WILL HAVE MERCY ON WHOM I HAVE MERCY, AND I WILL HAVE COMPASSION ON WHOM I HAVE COMPASSION.” 16 So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy. 17 For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “FOR THIS VERY PURPOSE I RAISED YOU UP, TO DEMONSTRATE MY POWER IN YOU, AND THAT MY NAME MIGHT BE PROCLAIMED THROUGHOUT THE WHOLE EARTH.” 18 So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires. 19 You will say to me then, “Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?”

Luther was ready to die on the issue of justification. As quoted (more or less) above, the Church stands of falls on this doctrine. That means each local church stands or falls on this doctrine and each person stands or falls on this doctrine. If Luther was correct and is correct on this matter, then we need to have the same view of faith that he did. Again, it is not because Luther believed this was true, but if he was correct according to Scripture then we must have the same view of faith if we are going to believe the same Gospel. We also need to think about how God sent a great revival during the time of the Reformation and how God used the Gospel preached by Luther and the Reformers in many lands.

Luther was quite clear that a man was not ready to be saved until that man was humbled and broken before God. He even went so far (in The Bondage of the Will) as to say until a man was broken and humbled enough to give up his free-will he was not ready to be saved. For Luther the idea that a person could be saved by an act of his own faith was simply preposterous. Souls are saved by Christ alone, which is to say that souls are saved for the sake of Christ alone and by His works alone. The reason that souls are justified through faith (according to Luther) is so that the sovereign grace of God would be exalted. It is not that our teaching of faith should detract from grace and so detract from the sovereignty of God and His grace, but instead it was intended to protect it.

The teaching of the modern day has detracted from the nature of true faith and as such it no longer stands in the defense of God’s sovereign grace. At any point and at any time when any person teaches a view of faith (regardless of that person’s theological position or claim to that position) that detracts from the sovereign grace of God, that person has a false view of faith. This must be stressed, emphasized, and defended with all of our hearts if we are going to defend and preach the Gospel of grace alone. There is no defending and preaching of the Gospel of grace alone if we are not willing to defend the sovereignty of the grace of God and the fact that faith is by His grace rather than by human choice and free-will.

Romans 3:24 being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus;

As long as Romans 3:24 stands the Gospel is by a grace that is not moved by anything in the human soul and that includes faith. God gives faith as a gift by His grace rather than waiting to give grace to those with faith. “It is by faith in order that it may be by grace” (Rom 4:16). We must (MUST) defend this and preach this fearlessly and with all the intensity that God will give us. The Gospel is all by Christ and is all of grace and we must not denigrate that in the slightest way. In order to preach the freeness of God in the Gospel rather than the freeness of man we must preach that the Gospel of grace alone is quite apart from anything that man can do or anything in man. The freeness of God in the Gospel demands that He is free to give faith to whom He is pleased to give it and He is pleased to harden those whom He pleases in non-faith (unbelief). Oh how the glory of free-grace is set forth when the freedom of God to show grace to whom He pleases and when He pleases is set forth. However, when anything contrary to the freedom of God is preached and that includes His freedom to give faith as He pleases, then the Gospel of grace alone is not preached. Free-grace is necessary to a free justification of sinners!

1689 Baptist Confession of Faith, Chapter 11

1._____ Those whom God effectually calleth, he also freely justifieth, not by infusing righteousness into them, but by pardoning their sins, and by accounting and accepting their persons as righteous; not for anything wrought in them, or done by them, but for Christ’s sake alone; not by imputing faith itself, the act of believing, or any other evangelical obedience to them, as their righteousness; but by imputing Christ’s active obedience unto the whole law, and passive obedience in his death for their whole and sole righteousness by faith, which faith they have not of themselves; it is the gift of God.

Justification by faith alone is the article upon which the Church stands or falls. Martin Luther

Romans 9:13 Just as it is written, “JACOB I LOVED, BUT ESAU I HATED.” 14 What shall we say then? There is no injustice with God, is there? May it never be!15 For He says to Moses, “I WILL HAVE MERCY ON WHOM I HAVE MERCY, AND I WILL HAVE COMPASSION ON WHOM I HAVE COMPASSION.” 16 So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy. 17 For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “FOR THIS VERY PURPOSE I RAISED YOU UP, TO DEMONSTRATE MY POWER IN YOU, AND THAT MY NAME MIGHT BE PROCLAIMED THROUGHOUT THE WHOLE EARTH.” 18 So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires. 19 You will say to me then, “Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?”

The difference between a faith given by God and a faith that man works up is enormous, even very enormous. The passage just above in Romans is so clear as to this point. It is God who will have mercy on whom He will have mercy, not men who will have mercy on themselves. It is God who will have compassion on whom He will have compassion, not men who will have compassion on themselves. It is in the hands of God to love or hate as He pleases. It does not depend on men to will or run, but instead it depends on God to have mercy. God has mercy on whom He pleases and He hardens as He pleases as well. The Gospel of grace alone comes to the sinner through faith. The only way we can harmonize Romans 9 with justification by faith alone is if God gives to those whom He pleases this faith.

Paul teaches us in Romans 11:6 that “if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works, otherwise grace is no longer grace.” One thing that this text teaches us is that one work makes grace no longer to be grace. If grace is to be 100% pure grace in order to be grace at all, it cannot be diluted with even one work of man. This should teach us that faith is not a work of man but faith is the gift of God and the work of God (John 6:29). We must never, ever back off from this in the slightest. We must always hold to a free-grace and a sovereign grace and that means we must always hold to grace as 100% pure. The glory of this Gospel of grace alone is God Himself and His glory on display. It is to the degree that we denigrate the Gospel of grace alone that we attack the entire character of God.

It is true that the New Testament puts a lot of stress on faith, but why does it do that? Is it so that men can know that faith is in their own power and that they must work it up? Is faith nothing more than a decision or prayer of men who decide that they want to go to heaven? What a horrible denigration people have done to the whole biblical teaching on faith. Jesus Christ is the author and finisher of our faith, so man cannot be the author or finisher of his own faith. It is God who by His great mercy and grace who gives faith and as such man cannot give it to himself. Faith is the work of God in raising sinners from the dead and giving them spiritual life, so we know that faith cannot be the work of dead sinners themselves. It is God who upholds faith each moment as He indeed upholds our very physical breath at His mere pleasure as well.

In a very real sense the whole Gospel hangs on our views of faith. If faith is the work of man, then man is in charge of his own salvation. However, if faith is the work of God, then the whole of salvation is by grace and grace alone. If true faith can be the work of man, then we need to point men to themselves to believe as they please. Since true faith is the resurrection power of God in the souls of men, we must point men to Christ. We must preach Christ to them as the true object of faith and yet the author of faith. We must preach free-grace to men so that they will look to Christ for faith which only comes by grace. We must preach to true Christians that if they are lacking in faith, they will not find it in themselves but they should seek it from Christ. Faith, whether justifying faith or a faith that grows, can only come from Christ by free-grace. Let us look to the true author of faith for the grace of faith.

1689 Baptist Confession of Faith, Chapter 11

1._____ Those whom God effectually calleth, he also freely justifieth, not by infusing righteousness into them, but by pardoning their sins, and by accounting and accepting their persons as righteous; not for anything wrought in them, or done by them, but for Christ’s sake alone; not by imputing faith itself, the act of believing, or any other evangelical obedience to them, as their righteousness; but by imputing Christ’s active obedience unto the whole law, and passive obedience in his death for their whole and sole righteousness by faith, which faith they have not of themselves; it is the gift of God.

Justification by faith alone is the article upon which the Church stands or falls. Martin Luther

Romans 9:13 Just as it is written, “JACOB I LOVED, BUT ESAU I HATED.” 14 What shall we say then? There is no injustice with God, is there? May it never be!15 For He says to Moses, “I WILL HAVE MERCY ON WHOM I HAVE MERCY, AND I WILL HAVE COMPASSION ON WHOM I HAVE COMPASSION.” 16 So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy. 17 For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “FOR THIS VERY PURPOSE I RAISED YOU UP, TO DEMONSTRATE MY POWER IN YOU, AND THAT MY NAME MIGHT BE PROCLAIMED THROUGHOUT THE WHOLE EARTH.” 18 So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires. 19 You will say to me then, “Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?”

This is a vital subject and as such needs to be dealt with over and over. Faith is not a work of the fallen human soul by which a person is able to work it up and God responds to it with salvation. Faith is not an easy replacement for keeping the law. Faith is the work of God in the human soul and unites the human soul to Christ. The difference between these two views is enormous and is the difference between a works salvation versus one by grace alone. For the Gospel of grace alone to be truly by grace alone faith must be a gift from God. For the Gospel of Christ alone to be truly by Christ alone then faith must have been purchased by Christ and worked in the soul by the Holy Spirit. This is why we must always be vigilante to know what people preach and teach about faith.

We must be careful to understand that sinners are dead in sins and trespasses (Eph 2:1-3) and by nature are children of wrath. When it is said that a person is dead in sin, this means that the person is in bondage to sin and is dead to spiritual things. However, that person is not necessarily dead to spiritual things. That very nature must be changed in order to become a spiritual person and as such one who can exercise spiritual faith. Those who are dead in sins can have a physical faith, but never a spiritual faith. A spiritual faith is one that comes from a new heart and the person is united to Christ and as such has a proper object of faith and is constantly receiving from Christ Himself. A physical faith is one where the person is (in one sense) fixed on self for faith and looks to his faith to earn things from God. A physical faith is one that is quite in accordance with a dead and sinful nature and is also one that can be very, very religious.

A religious and physical faith may know a lot of truth and be quite solid in conservative and biblical doctrine, but it will never be taught the inward realities of those truths by the Spirit of God unless God draws that sinner and regenerates him or her. A religious and physical faith can be very external and very logical from a this world sense, but it is not united to Christ and as such does not have Christ and His spiritual blessings and gifts. The Pharisees can be said in many ways to have had a lot of faith, but it was not a true faith which always comes from Christ. The Pharisees had a lot of religion and believed fervently that they were the elect of God, but they did not have true faith but instead had faith in themselves and worked hard from that faith.

A religious and physical faith, since it is not united to Christ, will never have the love of God flowing through it to God and to others. Religious faith is from the selfish heart and is always about the selfish heart. Religious faith still flows from a fallen heart and does not need the life of Christ in that soul to be very religious and very moral in the externals. A true faith receives all from Christ and looks to grace alone for all it receives. A true faith knows that for it to do one good thing it must receive it from Christ first. A religious faith may in fact know that as true and say that it is true, but the religious faith can only know that in the head. The true faith which is united to Christ lives in utter dependence upon Christ for all things. The true faith, since it is united to Christ, will love as the fruit of the Spirit and will love God from love received. After all, only those who are born of God and know God can have true love (I John 4:7-8). This is true because only those that receive from God can love since God is the only source and origin of true love in the universe. True faith, then, must be a Divine work and given only to the children of God. It is the work of God, not the work of men. Let us point men to Christ for faith rather than point men to faith to have Christ.

1689 Baptist Confession of Faith, Chapter 11

1._____ Those whom God effectually calleth, he also freely justifieth, not by infusing righteousness into them, but by pardoning their sins, and by accounting and accepting their persons as righteous; not for anything wrought in them, or done by them, but for Christ’s sake alone; not by imputing faith itself, the act of believing, or any other evangelical obedience to them, as their righteousness; but by imputing Christ’s active obedience unto the whole law, and passive obedience in his death for their whole and sole righteousness by faith, which faith they have not of themselves; it is the gift of God.

Justification by faith alone is the article upon which the Church stands or falls. Martin Luther

Romans 9:13 Just as it is written, “JACOB I LOVED, BUT ESAU I HATED.” 14 What shall we say then? There is no injustice with God, is there? May it never be!15 For He says to Moses, “I WILL HAVE MERCY ON WHOM I HAVE MERCY, AND I WILL HAVE COMPASSION ON WHOM I HAVE COMPASSION.” 16 So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy. 17 For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “FOR THIS VERY PURPOSE I RAISED YOU UP, TO DEMONSTRATE MY POWER IN YOU, AND THAT MY NAME MIGHT BE PROCLAIMED THROUGHOUT THE WHOLE EARTH.” 18 So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires. 19 You will say to me then, “Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?”

The good news of this glory of a free-justification by free-grace just continues on. Why this subject matter is not a continually addressed in the churches is beyond me. In this we have the salvation of sinners and in this we behold the glory of God ever so brightly. The great God effectually calls some and then justifies them by free-grace. In justification He does not infuse or work righteousness in them in order to make them righteous, but instead He pardons their sins and for the sake of Christ He accounts and accepts their persons as righteous. This is not a legal fiction as some have called it, but He unites them to Christ and as such they are one person with Christ and as such their sins become His legal debt and His righteousness becomes theirs.

It is utterly vital to note and for the soul to have confidence in the fact that God declares sinners just on the basis of Christ alone. It is only this that gives sinners assurance in the presence of God, but it does not come by strength of intellect but only comes by the work of the Spirit in the soul. This growing to rest in Christ alone can only happen when the soul is broken from faith in self and love for self. God will discipline (train) His children and He will strip them of faith and hope in self that they may have faith and hope in Christ. The great hope of the believer is not in what God has worked in him or her, but what God has done in Christ Jesus. There is nothing that God has worked in a person and there is nothing that a person can do that will make them acceptable to God, but it is Christ alone who is acceptable to God.

The soul will usually have many trials of faith until it learns that it cannot trust in the works that it does. The soul will have many crises before it learns that the Law can never give it hope and assurance before God. The soul must learn that no obedience it can perform to the Law is the righteousness that pleases God. The person of the sinner is only acceptable to God on the basis of Christ alone. Some of the older Baptists and some of the Puritans taught that sinners must be broken and humbled by the work of God. Some have misunderstood that as meaning that in some way these things earned favor before God. Not in any way are those things acceptable to God. What we must see, however, is that the soul must be broken from self-love in order to love God. The soul must be broken from its self-righteousness in order to rest in the righteousness of Christ. The soul must be humbled from its great pride in order to receive grace. However, these things are the works of God in the soul and there is nothing in them that can please God as they are still imperfect. The soul must have Christ in order for God to be pleased.

The freedom that a true Christian has is beyond words. That Christians has Christ and as such his or her person is just before God because of Christ. The true believer has no works left to work in order to be justified, though the believer by grace has works of love to do. The true Christian is now free from the Law as a way of justification and by grace alone can love others for His glory. The true Christian has Christ and as such hell has been suffered in his or her place and heaven has been earned by Christ in his or her place and there is nothing left to be earned in order to enter into the eternal glories of God. It is being in Christ and Christ alone that enables the soul to be declared just in the sight of God. The living God does this by free-grace and there is nothing we can add to that free-grace. We can now see the beauty of God shining forth in the Law, but it does not condemn any longer and it should now be seen as the character of God on display. The glory of justification is the glory of God in Christ. It is perfect and cannot be added to, but instead it is to be received as grace alone and a grace that sinners can rest completely on.

1689 Baptist Confession of Faith, Chapter 11

1._____ Those whom God effectually calleth, he also freely justifieth, not by infusing righteousness into them, but by pardoning their sins, and by accounting and accepting their persons as righteous; not for anything wrought in them, or done by them, but for Christ’s sake alone; not by imputing faith itself, the act of believing, or any other evangelical obedience to them, as their righteousness; but by imputing Christ’s active obedience unto the whole law, and passive obedience in his death for their whole and sole righteousness by faith, which faith they have not of themselves; it is the gift of God.

Justification by faith alone is the article upon which the Church stands or falls. Martin Luther

Romans 9:13 Just as it is written, “JACOB I LOVED, BUT ESAU I HATED.” 14 What shall we say then? There is no injustice with God, is there? May it never be!15 For He says to Moses, “I WILL HAVE MERCY ON WHOM I HAVE MERCY, AND I WILL HAVE COMPASSION ON WHOM I HAVE COMPASSION.” 16 So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy. 17 For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “FOR THIS VERY PURPOSE I RAISED YOU UP, TO DEMONSTRATE MY POWER IN YOU, AND THAT MY NAME MIGHT BE PROCLAIMED THROUGHOUT THE WHOLE EARTH.” 18 So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires. 19 You will say to me then, “Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?”

The topic of a free justification that flows from the free-grace of God coming to sinners quite apart from their striving and their so-called good works simply sets out the beauty and self-sufficiency of God and His glory in way that those with new hearts simply cannot resist. The wickedness of men who think that all people only serve God and pretend to like Him in order to escape hell is simply wicked and detestable. The living God is beautiful in all He is and in all His ways. The living God has put Himself on display in Christ and has shone forth in Christ more of His beauties and glories than we can contain. Oh the glory of the Gospel of the glory of God in the face of Christ if we would take the time to study it and pray over it.

The Westminster and the 1689 Baptist Confession set out the teaching of Scripture on justification quite succinctly, but beautifully. The words “Those whom God effectually calleth, he also freely justifieth” is beautiful music to the ears when there is some understanding. Here is hope for poor sinners. It is not how much they will and how hard or how far they run, it is all of the grace of God. Here is hope for the unregenerate and the regenerate who are under attack. God is able to effectually draw sinners to Himself without their help and aide. God is able to justify sinners apart from anything the sinner can do. He does it all by Himself and for His own glory. There are perhaps many poor sinners who struggle with their hearts and lives not knowing the wonders of free-grace.

Struggling sinners need to hear of this free-justification. Yes it sounds too good to be true, and from a human perspective it is too good to be true. However, this is a Divine work and it is not too good to be true for Him. How does God declare sinners just who are not just in and of themselves? Note what the 1689 says in how He does not do it. He does not declare them just by infusing righteousness in them. This is simply great news. In other words, we do not have a level of righteousness we must obtain before we are declared just. God does not help us some here and there and then declare us just, but He has accomplished a perfect righteousness in Christ and it is given by a free gift by free-grace. The glories of this free-grace should deliver our hearts from self-righteousness. God declares sinners just and it is not based on what they have done, are doing, or will do. God declares sinners just and it is not based on what He will do in them, but instead of what Christ has done.

This is great news for sinners that God has opened their eyes to their hearts and they now see their sin. This is news beyond what our hearts can contain. God takes vile and wretched sinners and quite apart from any righteousness in them and yet while they are still in their sins, God takes those sinners and draws them to Himself and without anything in them to attract Him He declares them just. This is the great hope of sinners who have yet to find Christ. They should seek Him praying and reading the Scriptures that they may know more of this great and free-grace. This is the great hope of those who already have Christ as they continually fall short of His glory. If they had to wait until He infused enough righteousness in them, they would have to wait thousands and millions of lifetimes, though even then it would still be impossible. Yes we struggle with sinful hearts and yes we have doubts and at times are overwhelmed. But Christ is sufficient and Christ alone. He does not need out help and does not want our help in the slightest. Blessed are the impoverished of spirit.