John MacArthur

It has now been 15 years since The Gospel According to Jesus was first published and the lordship of Christ became a matter of intense debate among evangelicals. That book stood for the simple proposition that the gospel is a call to surrender to the lordship of Christ in humble, repentant faith.

My publisher originally assigned The Gospel According to Jesus to their academic division. They had high expectations for the book from the start and initially thought it might sell as many as 30,000 copies–an unusually high number for an academic book of that sort. But it surpassed 100,000 in sales in a few months, and within a couple of years it had reached the quarter-million mark. There are now about half a million copies in circulation, and the book is still in print. That is almost unprecedented for a polemic book dealing with a theological issue.

When I wrote the book, I expected it to be somewhat controversial, of course, because I was defending a view that a handful of respected Christian leaders, (including Charles Ryrie, John Walvoord, and Zane Hodges) had already denounced as “lordship salvation.” But I confess that I did not anticipate the firestorm of intense debate that arose. The controversy seemed to dominate the evangelical world for several years after the book was published.

Most of my theological opponents in the lordship debate were fellow conservative evangelicals who had been my friends and allies in earlier controversies regarding the charismatic movement and the inerrancy of the Scriptures. They were men whom I deeply respected (and still esteem highly for much of the work they have done).

But they were promoting a view of the gospel that, from a biblical perspective, seemed seriously flawed. They insisted there is no place in the gospel for the proclamation of Jesus’ lordship. They said those who call unbelievers to surrender to Christ’s authority are preaching a gospel of works. They taught that repentance is a false addition to the gospel message. They objected to any kind of evangelism that employed the language of denying oneself, taking up a cross, and following Christ (cf. Matthew 16:24; Mark 8:34; Luke 9:23). They declared that devotion to Christ, love for Him, and obedience to His commands are all matters that pertain to discipleship rather than saving faith. Faith, they said, is merely the acceptance of salvation as a free and unconditional gift–and they portrayed discipleship as a second-level commitment. Therefore, according to their view, the gospel presents Jesus as Savior only, not as Lord.

Nearly all the leading advocates of the no-lordship gospel were associated with Dallas Theological Seminary. In fact, Dr. James M. Boice, who wrote powerfully in defense of “lordship salvation” long before I entered the fray, referred to their view as “the Dallas Doctrine.”

The pedigree of no-lordship doctrine at Dallas Seminary is traceable back to founder Lewis Sperry Chafer. The doctrine apparently stemmed from Chafer’s misguided attempts to develop a uniquely dispensationalist soteriology. Chafer (together with other early dispensationalists, including C. I. Scofield) was so zealous to eliminate every vestige of law from the dispensation of grace that he embraced a kind of antinomianism. That was the seed from which the no-lordship gospel sprouted.

Apparently, no-lordship doctrine no longer dominates Dallas Seminary the way it once did, but controversy over the issue is by no means dead. The past year or so has seen publication of a few new books touting the no-lordship view, attempting to revive the debate yet again. At least one organization, the Grace Evangelical Society, was founded in the heat of the controversy a decade and a half ago and regularly publishes a journal and a newsletter devoted to defending no-lordship theology. The question evidently remains unsettled for many.

My own views on “lordship salvation” have not changed, and if anything I now see the issue as larger and more far-reaching than I did when I first wrote The Gospel According to Jesus. Much more is at stake than just the question of how we proclaim the gospel. The lordship issue has serious ramifications for a number of crucial points of theology.

Grace

The doctrine of grace, for example, is profoundly affected by no-lordship teaching. Defenders of the no-lordship gospel often refer to their unique teachings as “Grace Theology” and their movement as “the Grace Movement.” They are convinced that only their system preserves the gospel’s message of grace. That is precisely why they insist every opposing opinion is a kind of works-salvation.

But they are working with an unbiblical notion of “grace.” Grace is not a liberal clemency or a passive indulgence that simply tolerates and coexists with sin. Divine grace doesn’t guarantee heaven in the afterlife while merely overlooking the evils of this life. Authentic grace is the undeserved favor of God toward sinners, delivering them from the power as well as the penalty of sin (Romans 6:14). Grace is dynamic, “teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age” (Titus 2:12).

Furthermore, grace is not merely God’s response to the sinner’s initiative. Quite the opposite. Because He is gracious, God takes the initiative, drawing the sinner (John 6:44, 65), granting repentance (Acts 3:26; 5:31; 11:18), and awakening the heart to faith (Acts 13:48; 16:14). Every aspect of the believer’s response–conviction, repentance, and faith–is the result of God’s gracious work in the heart. “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8).

God’s grace is rooted in Christ’s atonement for sin, which was infinitely costly. In fact, Christ’s death on behalf of sinners is the supreme expression of divine grace. It is unthinkable that God would sacrifice His Son to purchase heaven for sinners but leave them to fend for themselves against the power of sin in this life (cf. Romans 8:32).

Sanctification

That’s why sanctification is another major doctrine whose biblical foundations are undermined by no-lordship doctrine. The whole gist of the no-lordship message is that while justification is a free gift of God’s grace, sanctification is primarily the believer’s own work–and therefore more or less optional.

But Scripture teaches that sanctification begins at conversion. The process of practical sanctification is launched by God’s regenerating work, when He graciously gives the sinner a new heart and a new spirit of obedience (Ezekiel 11:19-20; 36:26-27; 2 Corinthians 5:17). Just as regeneration marks the beginning of sanctification, glorification marks its end. Sanctification culminates in that moment when we see Christ and are instantly conformed perfectly to His image (1 John 3:2; 1 Corinthians 13:12). Meanwhile, all genuine believers are being sanctified–conformed gradually to the image of Christ (1 Corinthians 1:30; 2 Corinthians 3:18; Romans 8:29). Those who remain unchanged and in unbroken bondage to sin have no true knowledge of Christ (1 John 3:6).

Sanctification is as much a work of divine grace as justification. By portraying sanctification as an optional human work, advocates of no-lordship doctrine actually fall into the very error of works-salvation they profess to deplore. They have made at least this aspect of salvation into a human work.

Justification by Faith

The pivotal doctrine in the lordship debate is justification by grace through faith alone (sola fide). No-lordship doctrine is a corruption of sola fide. The leading proponents of the no-lordship view err because they tend to make justification practically the only work God does in salvation, and they omit or downplay the doctrines of regeneration and sanctification.

Justification is a forensic decree–God’s legal verdict that the sinner has been fully forgiven and credited with the full merit of a perfect righteousness. Justification must be distinguished from regeneration and sanctification, but it can never be divorced from them. There is no such thing as a justified sinner who is still unregenerate or utterly unsanctified.

That is not to suggest that we are justified because of our sanctification. We are not even justified “because” of our faith. Faith is the instrument of our justification, not the ground of it.

The righteousness of Christ–not any work done by the believer or wrought by God in the sinner–is the true ground of our justification. In other words, God gives us a righteous standing only because of the perfect righteousness He imputes to us. We’re not justified because of any righteousness we attain in our sanctification. We’re not justified because of the quality of our faith or the depth of our repentance. God accepts us only for Christ’s sake. Because of our union with Christ, he receives us as righteous in Christ. Thus we are justified because of what Christ has done on our behalf; not because of anything we do, period.

And it is by faith alone that we lay hold of the promise of justification. That’s what Scripture means when it speaks of being “justified by faith” (Romans 3:8; 5:1; Galatians 2:16; 3:24).

But, as the Reformers said, while faith alone justifies, the faith that justifies is never alone. Genuine faith inevitably produces good works. The works are the fruit, not the root, of faith. And justification is therefore complete at the very inception of faith, before faith ever produces a single work. It is not a process like sanctification.

Most who have defended the lordship of Christ for the past decade and a half have labored diligently to make these things clear and to defend the principle of sola fide. This will become more and more important if the debate is rekindled, because there are a number of theological trends on the horizon that tend to undermine the principle of sola fide. These include the so-called “New Perspective on Paul,” several recent attacks on the doctrine of imputation, ECT-style ecumenism, and a revival of Anabaptist opposition to the doctrine of justification by faith alone. Some who have helped popularize these trends claim that they too are simply battling the shallow “faith” and cheap “grace” of modern evangelicalism, but they actually overthrow the heart of the gospel when they abandon the doctrine of justification by faith.

The errors of no-lordship theology do not find their origin in the principle of sola fide; they stem from an incomplete, man-centered soteriology that refuses to see anything beyond justification. In defending the gospel from no-lordship doctrine, we must take care not to commit the opposite error by downplaying or abandoning the doctrine of justification by faith alone.

The Sovereignty of God

Another doctrine under attack in the lordship debate is the doctrine of God’s sovereignty. No-lordship theology cannot coexist with biblical views of election, predestination, and divine foreknowledge. Simply put, you won’t find a Calvinist who believes in no-lordship doctrine.

If salvation is really all God’s work, how could it be utterly lacking the grace of sanctification? Is surrender to Christ really a human work, or is regeneration with all its effects a sovereign work of God? How can a believer whose heart has been renewed by divine grace fail to bow to Christ’s lordship? As I wrote in chapter 1 of The Gospel According to Jesus:

We must remember above all that salvation is a sovereign work of God. Biblically it is defined by what it produces, not by what one does to get it. Works are not necessary to earn salvation. But true salvation wrought by God will not fail to produce the good works that are its fruit (cf. Matthew 7:17). No aspect of salvation is merited by human works, but it is all the work of God (Titus 3:5-7). Thus salvation cannot be defective in any dimension. “We are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them” (Ephesians 2:10). As a part of His saving work, God will produce repentance, faith, sanctification, yieldedness, obedience, and ultimately glorification. Since He is not dependent on human effort in producing those elements, an experience that lacks any of them cannot be the saving work of God.

I once listened to a message by S. Lewis Johnson critiquing a book by Zane Hodges in which Dr. Johnson concluded that the central error underlying no-lordship doctrine is nothing but the ancient heresy of semi-pelagianism–the belief that saving grace cannot be efficacious without the prior cooperation of human free will.

Dr. Johnson’s analysis was accurate. Scripture teaches that God’s saving grace is inherently efficacious. All whom the Father has chosen shall come to Christ (John 6:37). Each one of them will be effectually called, justified, glorified, and perfectly conformed to the image of Christ (Romans 8:29-30). No aspect of salvation can fail, because none of it hinges on the fickle human will. All of it is the efficacious work of a sovereign God. Accept those truths and you cannot embrace no-lordship doctrine.

Other Important Points of Doctrine

Where you land on the lordship question will also have far-reaching implications for your views on assurance, faith, repentance, eternal rewards, human depravity, the role of the moral law, and a host of other crucial doctrines. Almost no aspect of soteriology is left untainted by the errors of no-lordship doctrine.

I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom:  preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching.  For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions,  and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths.  As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry. [2 Timothy 4:1-5, ESV]

What does it mean to “do the work of an evangelist”? Evangelist derives from the Greek verb ευαγγελίζω. Both ευαγγελίζω and its cognate noun ευαγγελίον derive from a compound of ευ- (good) and άγγελoς (messenger). It is often translated as “good news” and in the New Testament it is applied exclusively to the unique message of the life and works of Jesus.

The nature of the gospel, no matter what age or language we are speaking in, is the life and works of Jesus [1 Corinthians 15:1-11]. It is not about world views or comparative religion. It is not a catechism or bullet point list of things we must give our consent to. It is not even about the conversion of unbelievers. It is the presentation of Jesus Christ to those who need to meet him – period.

In Galatians, the Apostle Paul makes it plain that the true gospel is distinguished from other (έτερος or “different”) gospels because the true gospel is ουκ κατά άνθρωπον – not after/by man. The gospel is not defined by men but by He who Is the Gospel – Jesus Christ. So, in Biblical evangelism we must first recognize that the gospel is not some system devised by man – whether that system is Jewish legalism or the Golden Keys of Soul-winning or the Finney-esque altar call – but the person of Jesus Christ.

Thanks to Erik at re:Fundamentals

“I am not at a loss to tell you that it could not be for any good thing in Jacob, that God loved him, because I am told that “the children being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God, according to election might stand, not of works but of him that calleth.” I can tell you the reason why God loved Jacob; It is sovereign grace. There was nothing in Jacob that could make God love him; there was everything about him, that might have made God hate him, as much as he did Esau, and a great deal more. But it was because God was infinitely gracious, that he loved Jacob, and because he was sovereign in his dispensation of this grace, that he chose Jacob as the object of that love. Now, I am not going to deal with Esau, until I have answered the question on the side of Jacob. I want just to notice this, that Jacob was loved of God, simply on the footing of free grace.”

C. H. Spugeon’s sermon, preached on Sunday, January 16th, 1859

So I’m slowly making my way through Hebrews and come to a complete halt at 11:24-26.  A familiar passage to us:

“ By faith, when he grew up, Moses refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter, choosing rather to be ill-treated with the people of God than to enjoy sin’s fleeting pleasure. He regarded abuse suffered for Christ to be greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, for his eyes were fixed on the reward. ”

(Hebrews 11:24–26, NET)

Moses makes a costly demonstration of his God-imparted faith by throwing his lot in with despised and enslaved Hebrew people.  Why would he prefer the poor treatment of a slave over the regal lifestyle of royalty?  The answer is stunning!  Moses considered the abuse he suffered, at the hands of the Egyptians, as having done so for Christ.  And what more, he considered this abuse as wealth!  Abuse as wealth?  Yep.  Why did he view abuse as greater than the gold of Egypt?  Moses was a Christian Hedonist. Sorry, I slipped into Piper-land for a moment. But in all seriousness, Moses has his eyes set on something that supernaturally alters that which is Ugly–>Beautiful and Beautiful–>Ugly.

I’m looking for my readers (all 3 of yal) to chime in with some thoughts.  It’s not a matter of whether the passage is intellectually understandable.  Sure I get it, in my head.  But have I experienced it.  Or a bigger and tougher question.  Would I gladly welcome this kind of affliction if it were the only way for me to treasure Christ properly?

What Say You?

Solomon has just completed building the temple of the Lord, dedicating it with joy and prayer (chp. 7). He begins a period of wider building once the temple and his house are build. He takes cities from rival people, builds walls and gates, establishes fortified supply cities throughout, and places the men of Israel in key leadership positions (8:1-10). He offers burnt offerings, observes the special feasts commanded in the Law, and organizes temple worship in keeping with David’s commands, finishing all the work before him (8:12-18).

But in the middle of all this accomplishment, verse 11 sticks out like a giant aching thumb. The king has an Egyptian wife; he has married outside of Israel. Apparently, he recognizes something of the inconsistency. He decides that an unholy wife shouldn’t live in the places made holy by the ark’s presence.

(House of Pharaoh's Daughter - King Solomon's wife or Queen - King Solomon's Citadel)

But is this repentance? Is this turning from the act of disobedience? Of a sort, perhaps? But it’s hardly warfare against sin. It would seem to be the mandatory motions of religious sensibility, which demand a certain decorum but neglects deeper realities.

We don’t wish to beat up on Solomon as though inconsistency belongs to him alone. How often are we tempted to coddle our sins in more secret places, out of sight of the Most Holy, rather than repent of it altogether and casting it out of our lives completely? How tempting it is to keep our sins safely tucked away for future use rather than hating and killing our sin. We’re not too unlike Solomon whenever we make political alliances with our sins instead of abandoning ourselves more completely to God.

Even if all around us is success, we may then be laying the grounds for our own defeat. Visible success is no measure of genuine godliness. Outward results may simply mask inward failure. And the seed of our failure is planted in the secret, safe grounds of far away houses that the godly among us cannot observe. We all have places in us where we may hide and store things, places no one has access to unless we open it to them. Those are the most dangerous places of all. Those are the places most needing light. the things we place there are the things most needing discovery and death because they’re ultimately the most dangerous and damning.

Oh, Lord, keep me from delighting in secret sin. Keep me from building private residences for disobedience. Make me ruthless with all that opposes your holy word and your glorious Name. Do this with all you people, O Lord, our Sovereign King and Redeemer.

Thanks to Thabiti Anyabwile

The brethren immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea, and when they arrived, they went into the synagogue of the Jews.  Now these were more noble-minded than those in Thessalonica, for they received the word with great eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see whether these things were so.
Acts 17:10-11

1. Faith comes by hearing (Rom. 10:14-15). We cannot call on Jesus unless we believe in him and we cannot believe in him unless we hear of him from the lips of a herald. Faith begins with words.
2. God has chosen word-gifts and word-offices to build up the church (Eph. 4:11-12).
3. God creates through his word (cf. Gen. 1; Col. 1:16). God’s work of creation is always a speech act.
4. God regenerates through his word. We are born again through the living and abiding word of God (1 Peter 1:23). And “word” here is not merely Jesus Christ, but the preaching Peter’s audience had received (v. 25).
5. God’s people are called to follow his commands and keep the laws. Jesus exhorted “if you love me, you will keep my commandments (John 14:15; cf. Deut. 11:1). We cannot love unless we are obedient and we cannot obey unless we are instructed in the law of the Lord. That is why the Psalmist not only rejoices in the person of God, but delights in his decrees and statutes (Psalm 119:16, 24).
6. Throughout the Bible, there is an unmistakable priority of hearing over sight. In distinction to the popular religions around them, God insisted that he was a God who would be unseen (cf. Exodus 20:3-4). When Moses asked to see God, the Lord refused, saying, “You cannot see my face, for no one can see me and live” (33:20). Instead, God caused his goodness to pass in front of Moses by proclaiming his name–“Yahweh”–and declaring his character–“I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion” (33:19). Biblical faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see (Heb. 11:1; cf. 1 Peter 1:8).

1. All the corporate worship we know of in the early church is saturated with words. While there are many things we don’t know about the worship of the early church in the Bible, we do know that they devoted themselves to the apostle’s teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer (Acts 2:42). We know they were devoted to the public reading of Scripture (1 Tim. 4:13). We know they brought hymns, words of instruction, revelations, tongues and interpretations (1 Cor. 14:26). In other words, while we can make inferences and prudential judgments about the role of visual arts in worship, we know for certain that their gatherings were infused with words.
2. Jesus Christ is the preexistent, incarnate, eternal, Word of God (John 1:1). It is sometimes objected that our focus in worship is to be on the Word (Jesus) not the word (the Bible). This is surely true. We worship Christ not the Scriptures. But the argument goes too far if it places a wedge between the incarnate Word of God (Jesus) and the word of God (Scripture). We don’t believe the Bible is Jesus Christ, but let us not miss the connection between the Word and the word. God created by means of the eternal Logos–his wisdom, his speech, his voice, his word. At the same time, we know that God created by and in Jesus Christ. Both truths demonstrate that the Logos is the mediating agent in all of creation and revelation, whether by means of the Divine Voice or incarnated in the person of Jesus Christ. In other words, the Word we see revealed and embodied in Jesus, is the same Word we meet in God’s self-disclosure in the pages of Scripture.
3. Paul places a high value on maximum intelligibility in corporate worship (1 Cor. 14:1-25). There are times and places for ambiguity and subtlety. Corporate worship, however, is for proclamation. And words are the least ambiguous (though not always crystal-clear themselves) means by which the truth can be proclaimed. Dance can honor God, painting can praise our Maker, and music can please the Lord, but no other art form can proclaim the truth with as much shared intelligibility as words. Even the parables, which are often cited as encouragement for using stories and drama, were too ambiguous. That’s why Jesus told parables: to be unclear. “The secret of the kingdom of God has been given to you,” Jesus told his disciples. “But to those on the outside everything is said in parables so that they may be ever seeing but never perceiving, and ever hearing but never understanding; otherwise they might turn and be forgiven” (Mark 4:11-12).
4. Jesus was a preacher. “But he said, ‘I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns also, because that is why I was sent’” (Luke 4:43).
5. The church was founded on the teaching of the apostles and prophets (Eph. 2:20; cf. John 16:13).
6. Teaching-preaching was a normative part of early Christian worship. The first Christians inherited from the Jews a strong tradition of teaching and preaching (cf. Acts 13:14-16; 15:21). From at least the time of Ezra, for example, we know that the Levites “helped the people understand the law.” They “read from the book, from the law of God, clearly; and they gave the sense, so that the people understood the reading” (Nehemiah 6:7-8; cf. 2 Chronicles 15:3). We see this same emphasis in the New Testament church. Paul was preeminently a preacher (Ephesians 3:7-9). He commanded Timothy mainly to preach and teach (1 Tim. 4:13) and to instruct others in the same (2 Tim. 4:2). Titus’ primary instructions are concerned with teaching what is in accord with sound doctrine (Titus 2:1). One of the main roles of the elder was to teach (1 Tim. 3:2; cf. Acts 6:2), so much so that “the elders who direct the affairs of the church well are worthy of double honor, especially those whose work is preaching and teaching” (1 Tim. 5:17). Clearly, the authoritative teaching and preaching of Scripture was a normative part of the early Christian gatherings, if not the central event of their meeting together.
7. We live by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord (Deut. 8:3; Matt. 4:4).
8. The gospel is first of all news (Rom 10:15). Words must be central in corporate worship because the gospel is first and foremost a message–not an experience or an expression or even a command, but a declaration of good news.
9. Powerful emotional experiences come through Holy Spirit anointed preaching. Giving priority to the word, does not mean short-circuiting our affections. Our aim is not wise and persuasive words, but a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words (1 Cor. 2:4, 13). True preaching does not simply fill our heads with knowledge, but removes the veil from our eyes (2 Cor. 4:3) and clearly portrays Christ crucified (Gal. 3:1).
10. The word of God is no dead letter. It is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, dividing soul and spirit, joint and marrow, and judging the thoughts and intentions of the heart (Hebrews 4:12; cf. Acts 2:37).
11. Transformation into Christ-likeness is not less than a mental-cognitive activity. We need words and truths in order that we might be transformed by the renewing of our minds and reach maturity in the knowledge of the Son of God (Romans 12:1-2; Eph. 4:13).
12. Jesus abides in us through his words. There is no rigid distinction between the person of the Jesus and the words of Jesus. We know Jesus through his words. “If you abide in me and my words abide in you,” Jesus tells his disciples, “ask whatever you wish and it will be given you” (John 15:7). For Jesus the two are interchangeable: remaining in him and his words remaining in us. When his words abide in us, we abide in him.
13. The promises of God sustain us in hard times. For example, the Psalmist says, “My comfort in suffering is this: Your promise preserves my life” (Psalm 119:49). And, “If your law had not been my delight, I would have perished in my affliction” (119:92). And “I rise before dawn and cry for help; I have put my hope in your word” (119:147). Only the word of God has the power to keep us going when life grinds us down.
14. God has exalted above all things his name and his word (Psalm 138:2).
15. When all else passes away, the word of God will remain (Isa 40:7-8; 1 Peter 1:24-25).
16. Our only weapon in spiritual warfare is the sword of the Spirit which is the word of God (Eph. 6:10-18; Matt. 4:1-11). We fight the devil’s temptations to disobedience and despair by claiming the promises of God and knowing who God declares us to be; that is, we resist the devil with words and by belief in God’s words to us.
17. All of Scripture is God-breathed and profitable for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness (2 Tim. 3:16).
18. Through God’s great and precious promises, we are able to participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires (2 Peter 1:4).
19. The Scriptures cannot be broken (John 10:35). There is much flexibility when it comes to corporate worship, but since we know that the Scriptures are inviolable, and that we are sanctified by the truth, and that the word is truth (John 17:17), we would be foolish if we did not make a priority that which we know has the power to save, transform, and endure.

Thanks to Kevin DeYoung