The Warrant of Faith - C.H.Spurgeon sermon 531 pt.5
I shall deal with that matter first of all, negatively, and then, positively.1. First, NEGATIVELY; and here my first observation is that any other way of preaching the gospel-warrant is absurd. If I am to preach faith in Christ to a man who is regenerated, then the man, being regenerated, is saved already, and it is an unnecessary and ridiculous thing for me to preach Christ to him, and bid him to believe in order to be saved when he is saved already, being regenerate. But you will tell me that I ought to preach it only to those who repent of their sins. Very well; but since true repentance of sin is the work of the Spirit, any man who has repentance is most certainly saved, because evangelical repentance never can exist in an unrenewed soul. Where there is repentance there is faith already, for they never can be separated. So, then, I am only to preach faith to those who have it. Absurd, indeed! Is not this waiting till the man is cured and then bringing him the medicine? This is preaching Christ to the righteous and not to sinners. "Nay," saith one, "but we mean that a man must have some good desires towards Christ before he has any warrant to believe in Jesus." Friend, do you not know what all good desires have some degree of holiness in them? But if a sinner hath any degree of true holiness in him it must be the work of the Spirit, for true holiness never exists in the carnal mind, therefore, that man is already renewed, and therefore saved. Are we to go running up and down the world, proclaiming life to the living, casting bread to those who are fed already, and holding up Christ on the pole of the gospel to those who are already healed? My brethren, where is our inducement to labour where our efforts are so little needed? If I am to preach Christ to those who have no goodness, who have nothing in them that qualifies them for mercy, then I feel I have a gospel so divine that I would proclaim it with my last breath, crying aloud, that "Jesus came into the world to save sinners"—sinners as sinners, not as penitent sinners or as awakened sinners, but sinners as sinners, sinners "of whom I am chief.
posted by mark pierson at 7:58 AM
7 Comments:
"Very well; but since true repentance of sin is the work of the Spirit, any man who has repentance is most certainly saved, because evangelical repentance never can exist in an unrenewed soul. Where there is repentance there is faith already, for they never can be separated. So, then, I am only to preach faith to those who have it. Absurd, indeed! Is not this waiting till the man is cured and then bringing him the medicine? This is preaching Christ to the righteous and not to sinners. "Nay," saith one, "but we mean that a man must have some good desires towards Christ before he has any warrant to believe in Jesus." Friend, do you not know what all good desires have some degree of holiness in them? But if a sinner hath any degree of true holiness in him it must be the work of the Spirit, for true holiness never exists in the carnal mind, therefore, that man is already renewed, and therefore saved."
November 10, 2006 8:05 AM
It is obvious that Spurgeon here is speaking against the Hyper Calvinists and their desire to only preach salvation to "sensible" sinners. No way would this be applied to MacArthur.
November 10, 2006 8:10 AM
I am going to leave you alone Mark, but in closing will you consider that Spurgeon was preaching to anyone that would *hear* this message?
November 10, 2006 8:39 PM
Brian, if you are going to quote Spurgeon to me, please try to do so in context. Also, try to familiarize yourself with my doctrinal positions BEFORE you try to refute me. That would save us both so much time and energy.
November 11, 2006 9:15 AM
I believe Spurgeon correctly believes he is giving the external call to all sinners and that the effectual call is a work of the Holy Spirit upon the hearts of the sinners that God brings to repentance and faith.
This grace (listen up Brian) causes a sinner to be convicted of sin and respond in faith AND repentance. Hebrews chapter 11 gives a summary of what faith has looked like from God's people. It paints a picture of a faith that responds with action. There are no examples of a Zane Hodges 'carnal Christian' listed in Hebrews 11. A so-called carnal Christian is not a Christian at all. He is a false professor. Brian, sinners come as they are but they do not remain as they are because of the work of the H.S.
What an insult to the grace of God to believe in a Zane Hodges salvation.....
W.H.
November 11, 2006 10:40 AM
Dear Brother,
I understand your passion brother and don't mean to imply that your motives are wrong; I was just pointing out a temptation trap we can fall in and notice that many in the Lordship camp seem to have a respecter of persons weakness and that is just an observation.
Quite frankly I tend to want to laugh at the sarcasm myself as well as statements like Jazzy said when saying Nate put the ream and steam and dry clean on Lou. When I read that I got to laughing out loud. Guys all I can say is that I was in the Marines and I have lived under the toughest bullying and verbal courseness and have been guilty of it myself...but men in their passions still have a deep need of God and we need to be careful not to confuse our male instinctiveness with the will of God. Peter needed to learn this. Remember that God created a man and a woman and in this union we learn of his heart. Grace is seen in the women visiting the tomb and mans futile strength is seen cowering in darkness at the end of the day.
It is for this reason that I am dropping all Lordship links because I am just concerned that they are just not getting it and perhaps at one time they did...but flesh and law always comes back to constrain us and mislead us and quite frankly it is misleading some of you.
I will admit this own weakness in my own life in the past and my desperate need to see the radical nature of grace and how alien it is to what we think and that man constantly feeds a desire to confuse the two but MacArthurs group is unwilling to admit this.
Please know that I love you guys even though it may not seem like it right now.
I have lived under some of the toughest verbal onslaughts and have been guilty of them as well. That is not to say that we are not to be tough at times, but that we are to learn the proper time and that instead we are to be constantly seasoned with grace and lead by the Holy Spirit. I am still learning and am finding that I need to move away from the Lordship crowd as what appears at times to them to be strength is in reality weakness and I believe that it is clear in Spurgeons life as well as in his own messages he reveals that he wrestled with this. Nevertheless in his appropriation of seperation and practice of it...I firmly believe he was right as I also believe he did indeed grasp the radical nature of grace and he did not find it in the teachings of the Puritans which the Lordship crowd constantly gravitates toward and that Spurgeon had a hard time breaking away from. We are to desire the sincere milk of the word...not books and books that are leavened with human reasoning despite some truths they understood.
Take care brethren and I encourage you to desire the sincere milk of the word and I wish to endeavor to do the same with you.
November 11, 2006 10:51 AM
Let's see now...I read MacArthur, Zaspel, Reisinger, Spurgeon, Grudem, Boice, Unger, Halley, I even have a Scofield Reference Bible; Classic Dispy, Progressive Dispensational, New Covenant Theology, Covenant Theology; Cessationists, continuationist; Dispensational Pre-mill, Historic Pre-mill, Post-Mill and A-Mill.
Hmmm. Which one to put on the pedestal here...
November 11, 2006 10:12 PM
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