All Passages Work Together for Good

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Before Green Baggins goes on to my next chapter, he had some follow-up questions to my last response.

First, law and gospel. As I said, I affirm the three uses of the law. My position is this: when the law reveals to me my need for a savior, and prepares me for the gospel proper, that is part of the story of how God undertook to save me. The law that condemns, indeed, the very passage that pierced me to the heart, is now understood by me in a framework of grace.

I don’t deny that Scripture contains many imperatives, and I acknowledge that such imperatives condemn those who are in rebellion, and remain obligatory for those who have been forgiven. But if I am elect, regenerate, and forgiven, all things work together for good. If all things work together for good, then this means that all passages work together for good for those who love God and are the called according to his purpose.

Flip it around. What could be more gracious than John 3:16? And yet, for those who are perishing, this grace is to them the stench of death. I therefore conclude that the law and gospel application is not a matter of different kinds of texts as it is a matter of different kinds of human hearts — law hearts and grace hearts. In order to be transformed into a grace heart, a law heart must be convicted. But that conviction can come from “law texts” or “grace texts.” And once the person is converted, the “law texts” that terrified take on a completely different appearance.

In the comments, Chris Hutchinson asked when I was going to call Steve Schlissel and Rich Lusk on the carpet for their explicit rejection of the law/gospel distinction. First, the fact that they have been accused of doing this in this controversy is not even slightly compelling to me. As I pointed out recently, in their report the PCA study committee quoted me as arguing for something that I was actually arguing against. I have corrected this mother of citation errors, and I will be very interested to see if that egregious error still shows up in the copy that will be distributed to all the delegates attending the PCA’s General Assembly. In this controversy, multiple accusations have been entirely unreliable. I know this to be the case with regard to many aspects of my own teaching. Why should I drop everything and condemn my friends simply because they have been accused by the same unreliable people? And secondly, my formulation of the law/gospel distinction seems to be a little strange to you, but it is kind of okay, you guess. And I guess I don’t believe that Steve or Rich would have any problem with what I have argued for here.

With regard to the Larger Catechism 55, I have no problem affirming it if the language is taken in a straightforward, ordinary way. I am justified by Christ’s good work, and not in any way by my good works. But if someone said that this question requires that merit be understood in its technical, theological, covenant of works sense, then I would want to take an exception there.

Lane says, “One must also deny the errors that attack such truth. This is an equally binding and equally important aspect of orthodoxy.” I do believe this is true. But is it possible to deny Nestorianism (which I do) while doubting if Nestorius was one? And it sometimes seems to me that Barth is not the best representative of Barthianism, not that I agree with either. If you want me to deny as a soul-destroying error the doctrine that sinful men can in any way contribute to their own salvation, I am happy to do so. If you want me to condemn Wilkins or Lusk for teaching that, you will have to first convince me of two things — that you got your facts right, and that you are above petty politics. I am currently settled in the conviction that with certain notable exceptions (you, Lane, being one of them) the response to both of these criteria of mine is negative. Your GA delegates are going to be rolling into a vote on this inaccurate report of your study committee without having been given time even to read, let alone digest, the report. This is why we have cliches like “the smell test.”

For Lane’s last question, I believe that there is a practical distinction between faith and virtue, not only an abstract distinction. I am saying we can distinguish, but never separate. What is easier to distinguish than height and breadth? But if I remove the height of an object, I am simultaneously removing the breadth. I cannot separate them. To use the example offered by St. James, it is like the body and spirit, which are two entirely different things. But if we separate them, that is the condition that we call death.

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