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The Question of the Necessity of Good Works (7): Losing the Sense of God’s Favor

The Question of the Necessity of Good Works (7): Losing the Sense of God’s Favor

The Canons of Dordt, doing their part to exhort on the believer the necessity of good works, warn the believer sharply in 5.5: By such enormous sins…they [true believers] very highly offend God, incur a deadly guilt, grieve the Holy Spirit, interrupt the exercise of faith, very grievously wound their consciences, and sometimes lose the sense of God’s favor for a time, until, on their returning into the right way of serious repentance, the light of God’s fatherly countenance again shines...

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The Question of the Necessity of Good Works (4): The Renewal of the Sinner

The Question of the Necessity of Good Works (4): The Renewal of the Sinner

At the same time the Reformed faith insists that the sinner is saved by God’s grace wholly without his own works—including especially the doctrine of justification by faith alone in which the believing sinner is justified before God in his conscience and experience by faith alone and not at all by works—it also insists that good works are necessary. It is slander to charge the defense of this position with a denial of the necessity of good works. Those who do...

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The Question of the Necessity of Good Works (3): A Real Necessity

The Question of the Necessity of Good Works (3): A Real Necessity

It must be held firmly by every believer that his works, works of faith and done by grace, do not obtain any aspect of salvation. They do not obtain because they do not obtain the Spirit. Works are not an instrument, or a means, of salvation. Instrument and means are the same thing. Since the covenant is salvation, works are not an instrument to obtain the covenant. Since the covenant is fellowship with God, works are not the instrument to obtain,...

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The Question of the Necessity of Good Works (2): Justification by Faith Alone

The Question of the Necessity of Good Works (2): Justification by Faith Alone

No sane person would ever think to ask of any proponent of the false doctrines of Roman Catholicism, Arminianism, or the federal vision why works are necessary. It is patently obvious why works are necessary in Roman Catholicism, in Arminianism, and in federal vision theology. Works are necessary as instruments, or means, in connection with faith to obtain salvation, the enjoyment of salvation, and the fellowship of God’s covenant of grace now and in eternity. Salvation, especially considered as the sinner’s...

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The Question of the Necessity of Good Works (1): A Proper Starting Point

The Question of the Necessity of Good Works (1): A Proper Starting Point

The question of the necessity of good works is now bedeviling the Protestant Reformed Churches. Specifically, the issue is the question of the necessity of good works in relation to the believer’s experience of salvation. Consistories, several classes, and two synods of these churches have had to speak to this question as the result of numerous appeals and protests from various members of the churches. In all of those decisions the connection of this question with the truth and confession of...

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Thankful for a Blessed Victory

But thanks be to God, who giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. —1 Cor. 15:57 By God's grace we will, not merely on Thanksgiving Day, thank him for that blessed salvation, which Christ earned for us. By all means we must do that on Thanksgiving Day. But our calling is to do so every day. Every day we must fight the sinfulness of our flesh, and the boasting of what we are and did. That victory for which we...

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Islam (15)

In our last blog post on April 21 (blog post: Islam 14), we compared the soteriology of Islam with Christianity, that is, we looked at Islam’s doctrine of salvation. Like all religions, Islam offers its adherents salvation from this world of sin and misery. Some religions offer a “better place,” while others offer a higher form of consciousness. Buddhism, for example, offers the idea of nirvana, which is release from the endless cycles of reincarnation through which believers must pass on...

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