THEO talk

Ever since Adam ate of the fruit, a condition was given to him and all his descendents which theologically is called original sin. Original sin is the sinful inclination of the human heart to wickedness and rebellion against God that infects every descendant of Adam, hence all of mankind is born with original sin.  The implications of original sin is a heart with the proclivity for lawlessness and a will that is in indefinite bondage to sin and folly.  The will represents the affections, both positive and negative, that dictate who/what we value and treasure. Hence, if our will is in bondage to sin and folly, then we will only ever treasure (worship) sin, folly, and all the depravity that comes with it. Theologically, this bondage of the will to sin is called total depravity and is fully responsible for the chaos that consumes our world.  The following definition of total depravity is imperative for the Christian to know and understand:

• Total Depravity: the natural man’s inability and unwillingness to come to God on His terms, the Gospel of Jesus Christ. (Solus Christus)
• Jesus captures both aspects of TD (inability & unwillingness) powerfully in John 5:40 and 3:19-21 and then in 8:36 gives the remedy to man’s depraved state: “If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.” In other words, one of the most pertinent fruits of salvation in Christ is redemption from sin and its dominion over the sinner. See Romans 6:1-14; Eph 1:4-13; Col 1:13-14; Gal 5:16-26.

The Bible teaches the following implications of total depravity: 

• Born dead in trespasses & sins: Ephesians 2:1; Col 2:13; Titus 3:3-4
• Naturally children of wrath/Satan: Ephesians 2:3; John 8:43-47
• Spiritually dead & unreceptive to biblical truth: 1 Corinthians 2:14; Colossians 2:13;
• Enslaved to sin: John 8:34-36; Jeremiah 13:23
• Mind set on the flesh: Romans 8:6-7; Gal 5:16-21
• Unable to submit to God’s law/standard of righteousness: John 5:40; Rom 10:2-3; 1 Cor 1:18; 2:14
• Heart/will predisposed to evil: Genesis 6:5; 8:21; Jeremiah 17:9
• Naturally hostile to God: Romans 8:7; Colossians 1:21
• Naturally alienated from God: Ephesians 4:18; Col 1:21
• Naturally cannot do good or please God: Rom 3:12; 8:8
• Naturally prone to idolatry & works righteousness: Rom 1:22-25; 10:2-3; Galatians 3:10

The doctrine of total depravity is one of the most neglected doctrines in American Evangelicalism (which shouldn’t surprise anyone given the American obsession with self-esteem and self-reliance). The idea that we are inherently evil, broken, dead, and incurably sick just doesn’t seem to catch on these days.  Shockingly, recent Gallup polls indicate that an overwhelming 77% of professing American Evangelicals believe that people are “basically good” (I say this is shocking not because these are Americans, but rather because they claim to be followers of Jesus and yet apparently are completely ignorant of the Bible’s view of mankind since the Fall.)  Historically, there are have been 3 general positions on man from a salvific perspective–that is, man’s condition as it applies to salvation and redemption in Christ. I will highlight each three and then draw the implicational conclusions of subscribing to each:

1. Pelagianism: named after the 4th century British monk, Pelagius held the view that man was good to his core.  Pelagius and his followers denied original sin (sin is an universal human condition, but simply a choice that each individual makes) and subsequently, denied the bondage of the will, while affirming that man, by his own free-will, could choose either to follow Adam’s bad example or Christ’s good example.  Grace, in Pelagius’ mind, was a bonus, not a necessity for salvation, as man inherently as it within himself to obey God perfectly, thus extirpating man’s need for salvation through Christ. Although it has been condemned by more church councils than any other heresy, Pelagianism has always been a perennial threat, because as theologian Michael Horton says, “It is our most natural theology.” (The idea that you can “pull yourself up by your own bootstraps” is the theology of most people, particularly in America where the self is exalted and narcissism is the largest therapeutic religion). Implication: man saves himself, apart from any work or help from God or Christ.
2. Semi-Pelagianism: seen as a halfway point b/w Pelagianism and Augustinianism, Semi-Pelagianism acknowledged the fall and original sin and its effects on man’s nature, SP nevertheless acknowledged that man still has the ability to accept or reject the salvific grace of God when offered to him.  The will is weakened but is not enslaved. Man is dying but not dead. He is drowning but not below the proverbial water of his sin. God will toss you the life-preserver but you still have to grab hold of it or as Billy Graham has put it, “God does 99% of it but you still must do that last 1%.”  Fact: It’s important to note that the Second Council of Orange in 529 A.D. condemned Semi-Pelagianism as heresy and even went so far as to condemn those who thought that salvation could be conferred by the saying of a prayer (sound like any modern-day evangelical revivalism or existential Christianity???), affirming instead–with ABUNDANT biblical references, that God must awaken the sinner and grant the gift of faith before a person can even seek God. Implication: man works along with God to save himself.
   
3. Augustinianism: named after the 4th century church-father, Augustine, along with Martin Luther and John Calvin, is held to be the most influential theologian & philosopher outside of the Bible.  Augustine taught that human beings, because they are born in original sin, are incapable of saving themselves. Apart from God’s grace, it is impossible for a person to obey or even to seek God.  Representing the entire race, Adam sinned against God and in doing so, plunged all of his descendents with him into total corruption.  The results are so devastating, that our very wills are in bondage to sin & idolatry, which makes it impossible for people to save themselves since they are in bondage to the very corruption they wish to be free of. Implication: man cannot save himself and is at the complete mercy of God for his salvation and redemption.

In our day, most evangelicals do not use the above terms but do recognize and use the two below which are modern forms of the teachings of Pelagius and Augustine:

• Arminianism: named after the late 16th century Dutch theologian Jacob Arminius, Arminianism is a modern form of Semi-Pelagianism that the majority of American Evangelicals subscribe to–though I would argue that most are much closer to holding Pelagius’ view of man in their affirming man’s basic goodness.  Arminianism was a response to the teachings of John Calvin and the Reformers who held unshakably to the biblical view of total depravity and man’s inability to come to God on his own, much less save himself.  Interestingly enough, it was the rise of Arminianism and its emphasis on self-determination in colonial New England in the 18th century that planted the seeds for various unorthodox and outright heretical views of God including Unitarianism, Universalism, Arianism (Jehovah’s Witnesses), and in the 19th century it was revivalism & frontier individualism–both which derived from Arminian theology–that led to an explosion of cults and sects.  Self-proclaimed “prophets” drew many people away from traditional Protestant churches and established their own churches: the Church of Christ, Disciples of Christ, Pentecostal groups, Mormonism, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Seventh-Day Adventists, and a slew of others. Fact: be very vary of any church or group that originates from a self-proclaimed prophet/prophetess. The Apostle Paul adamantly warns against any prophet or angel that would proclaim any gospel other than Jesus Christ and Him crucified–Gal 1:7-9. The true Church of Jesus Christ is built on 2 things: “where the Word is rightly preached and the sacraments are rightly administered.”  What this means is the person & work of Jesus is the central focus of the preaching of the Word and the sacraments(sacred ordinances) of baptism & the Lord’s Supper are rightly administered to those of the covenant community. The most essential & important question to ask yourself is this: Is this a place where God and His revelation in Christ’s person and work is clearly proclaimed, and are people serious about growing in Christ through the Word, sacraments, prayer, evangelism, and missions?

• Calvinism: named after the 16th century Bible expositor & Reformer, John Calvin held to an Augustinian view of man after intense study of Scripture.  Indeed Calvin’s Institutes quotes Augustine more than any other church father or theologian outside of the Bible.  The notable 5 Points of Calvinism: Total Depravity, Unconditional Election, Limited Atonement, Irresistible Grace, Perseverance of the Saints–are generally associated with Calvin, though they were actually postulated nearly a century after Calvin in response to Arminius and his followers rejecting Reformed Soteriology.  Historically, those who embrace the soteriology of Calvinism have been some of the biggest names in church history: Augustine, Tyndale, Wycliffe, Knox, Luther, Calvin, Zwingli, Owen, Bunyan, Whitefield, Edwards, Spurgeon, Warfield, among others.  Though since the Second Great Awakening it has been vehemently rejected by most in evangelicalism, Reformation theology, particularly the soteriology of Calvinism, has been resurging among the younger generations as historically Reformed Theology as held a high view of Scripture and the Gospel.  As part of that young generation that has embraced Reformed Theology, I still stand amazed at the direct correlation between one’s view of Scripture and one’s view of salvation.  In other words, generally speaking, those who have a high and mighty view of Scripture, God, and the Gospel, are usually those who embraced Reformation Theology because of its emphasis on God’s glory and the centrality of Jesus in preaching & teaching.

In order to understand the doctrines of original sin and total depravity better, I think it’s important to examine the metaphysics behind the nature of man and his freedom in light of his proclivity to sin and wickedness.  Augustine postulated four stages of redemptive anthropology, namely four distinct periods of man’s relationship to sin:

1. Posse Peccare/Posse Non Peccare: (freedom of Adam) this refers to Adam’s pre-fall state where he possessed both the ability to sin and the ability not to sin.  Yet Adam chose to sin and in doing so lost the ability not to sin.  In other words, he and all of his progeny after him fell into the second state:
   
2. Non Posse Non Peccare: (freedom of the sinner) this is the condition that characterizes the overwhelming majority of mankind which is the inability to not, not sin. In other words, the condition of fallen man is that he not able to not sin. ALL he does is sins and ALL he wants to do is sin (live autonomously apart from God and any sort of accountability).  Jonathan Edwards, in his classic The Freedom of the Will, was quick to defend the Calvinistic/Augustinian view of man’s fallenness by making the astute observation that man’s will is inextricably connected to his unregenerate & depraved heart and therefore all the desires and affections he gets, pumps from that depraved and spiritually dead heart.  Therefore, Edwards says, the unregenerate only find themselves with sin-inclined, deceitful, pernicious hearts, which give birth to depraved inclinations and enslavement.  Subsequently, he says, “the unregenerate do not want to do God’s will or submit to His law.”  This is exactly why Jesus taught the necessity of the new birth (regeneration) in John 3 and went so far as to say that people cannot see or enter the Kingdom of God.
   
3. Posse Non Peccare: (freedom of the regenerate) this is the freedom granted to fallen sinners by the power & grace of the Holy Spirit to change the disposition (nature) of the born again believer in Jesus Christ.  With regeneration, man recaptures what was lost in the fall, namely the ability to not sin.  But not only does he regain what was lost in the fall, God actually changes his disposition so that he actually desires to obey God, worship, and delight in Him above all things. This is one of the clearest indicators of true conversion: redemption from sin and the sensus suavitatis–taste & longing for God and His holiness.
   
4. Non Posse Peccare: (freedom of the glorified) there will come a day for the redeemed where they will experience the complete liberation and redemption from sin, namely salvation from the presence of sin. When the Redeemed of God are finally all gathered into His presence, they will lack the complete ability to sin.  Not only that, but they will lack any desire to sin any longer. Why? Because that which they have hungered and thirsted after has finally been revealed to them and they will be fully known by God.  It’s important to note that the Holy Spirit is the guarantee or down payment of this future glory.  In other words, if you have experienced regeneration and redemption from the dominion and bondage to sin in this life, you can know for certain of the glory that will be revealed to you in the next!

Crucial to understanding biblical anthropology is the biblical doctrine of covenant. Covenants in Scripture are either unilateral or bilateral depending on whether or not they are law-based or gospel-based.  The concept of covenant in the Bible is juxtaposed with the concept of contract that many evangelicals hold to in America today.  Contract implies bilateral terms that both parties agree to and if one fails to keep the terms, the contract can just be either amended or extirpated altogether.  Such a view of salvation is inherently shallow and completely foreign to the character of salvation in Scripture and how it is presented to us in terms of covenant that God enters into with us, not vice versa.  Understanding your salvation in terms of covenant deepens one’s appreciation, adoration, wonder, and worship of the God who would go to such links to include us in His Story of Redemption.  The Psalmist said it well in Ps 8:3-4, “When I look at Your heavens…which You have set in place, what is man that You are mindful of him…care for him???”

Biblical covenants may be characterized under the titles of works & grace. In other words, the covenants that God established with Adam, Noah, Abraham, the Israelites at Sinai, David, and Christians (the Christian’s covenant is the New Covenant as prophesied in Jeremiah 31:31-34 and 32:40) fall under the headings of “Covenant of Creation” or “Covenant of Grace”. Theologically, these, along with the “Covenant of Redemption”, form the soteriology (doctrine of salvation) of Reformed Covenant Theology. I will briefly introduce each since I will be writing an entire post over Covenant Theology.

1. Covenant of Creation: this is the covenant God made with Adam when He made Adam from the dust of the earth and set him in the Garden of Eden to tend to the garden & animals, lead his wife in fulfilling their creation mandate to be fruitful & multiply and fill the earth, and to worship the LORD only by obeying His command not to each from the Tree of Knowledge of Good & Evil.  Yet Adam chose to disobey God by seeking His own goodness & well-being apart from God (idolatry) and therefore, the consequences of breaking the covenant were enforced on the man and all his seed after him. Implication: every single person is born under the curse of the COC and therefore is in need of the covenant of grace.
   
2. Covenant of Grace: God’s promise to the woman in Gen 3:15 was that from her Seed would come on that would crush the serpent’s head and accomplish redemption for mankind.  This is the central theme & focus of the book of Genesis.  Genesis means “origins” or “beginning” which is in reference to the origin/beginning of redemption and gives the promises of how God would accomplish redemption for all who will receive it.  The covenant of grace is most clearly seen in the Abrahamic Covenant that is stipulated from Gen 12 to the end of the book as it is reestablished with Abraham’s seed: Isaac, Jacob…and ultimately, with Jesus Christ.  All who hold fast to Jesus Christ by faith alone are included in the blessing of the Abrahamic Covenant as Paul argues in the book of Galatians.  Therefore, the Covenant of Grace is one of the central themes in Scripture, and all sound & faithful hermeneutics (interpretation disciplines) should start with the COG as that which all other Scripture should be deduced from since it is ultimately the Gospel of Jesus that comes from the covenant of grace.
   
3. Covenant of Redemption: this is the unfolding plan of redemption that the Trinity seeks to accomplish from Genesis 3 to Revelation 22.  The main idea is that the Scripture teaches that before the foundation of the world, the Father chose those for whom the Son would die for and pay their ransom and it is these elect that the Spirit comes and calls to faith in the Son to the glory of the Father.  Hence, the entire Godhead is involved in the salvation of sinners and greatly desires to rescue their elect from their sins.  The Christian’s response to such a revelation is awe-struck worship and adoration, with the deep desire to get lost in the majesty of the saving, gracious, and loving God of the Bible. See Eph 1:3-14; 2 Tim 1:9; 1 Peter 1:18-20; Rev 13:8; John 1:1-18; Rom 8:29-30.

It should go without saying, that theology matters. That doctrine matters. That what the Bible says about God, about mankind, and the world greatly matters because it revelation from God about the way things really are.  The American Evangelical church would do well to heed God’s warning to those who thought themselves to be His people merely because they are born “Christian” or surround themselves with Christians by attending church:

“My people perish for a lack of knowledge; because you have rejected knowledge, I reject you from being a priest to me.  And since you have forgotten the law of your God, I also will forget your children.”-Hosea 4:6

One of the most important marks of a true church is the view it has on man and the place sin has in either man’s goodness or man’s wickedness.  The Bible is crystal clear that man has a terminal problem called sin and that those who ignore it or openingly do not preach/teach on it should be avoided at all costs because without addressing the problem of sin, the solution of the Gospel makes no sense and there will be no desire to receive it as the treasure that it is.

After recently visiting one of the most religious sites by man’s standards, the Vatican in Rome, I am more zealous than ever to continue my series on what marks a true church of Jesus Christ. After visiting Europe and numerous ancient church sites, I was once again reminded of the fact that most people are misinformed about what constitutes a true church and what doesn’t. One of those distinguishing marks is the biblical doctrine of conversion.

The doctrine of conversion is inextricably connected to the doctrine of repentance and is one of the most indicative marks of regeneration and true conversion. Conversion is the theological term for the sinner’s salvific response to the Gospel in repenting of their sin and believing in the Gospel. It is the literal act of forsaking everything and following Jesus as He calls His disciples to do in Mark 8:36-38 and Luke 9:23-25, 57-62. This forsaking is what the Bible calls repentance.

Repentance is the salvific response to the Gospel in feeling the conviction and weightiness of one’s sins, mourning over those sins, confessing them to the Father, asking for His forgiveness based on the atoning death of Jesus, and turning away(forsaking) from sin by the grace and help of the Holy Spirit. Now the Spirit uses a plethora of conduits to bring about repentance, but the point is that only He can grant one the ability to repent–see 2 Timothy 2:25-26. Repentance plays a major role in Biblical Theology because it is one of the chief signs of the New Covenant as prophesied by the prophet Ezekiel:

• “You will remember your evil ways, and your deeds that were not good, and you will loathe yourselves for your iniquities and your abominations.”-Ezekiel 36:31
• “But this is the (new)covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the LORD: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people.”-Jeremiah 31:34

The New Covenant at its core is about receiving a new heart and the Holy Spirit that radically transforms the sinner from an idolater to a worshiper of the true & living God and His Son Jesus Christ:

• “I will give them one heart, and a new spirit I will put within them. I will remove the heart of stone from their flesh and give them a heart of flesh, that they may walk in my statutes and keep my rules and obey them. And they shall be my people, and I will be their God.”-Ezekiel 11:19-20

This is exactly what Jesus promised would happen in John 6 (“They shall be taught of God”)  & 7 (“Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water”)  where He quotes the OT salvific prophecies concerning Himself and the New Covenant He would establish with His people. The clear implication of Ezekiel 11 & 36, Jeremiah 31 & 32:40 is that the New Covenant would entail a radical conversion from rebellion against God to obedience to His Word and would bring about change & transformation in all who God the Spirit would call out of the world into His Kingdom. In other words, those who profess faith in Christ and call themselves Christians yet have never repented, have never received the new heart & Holy Spirit that comes with the New Covenant, and are not walking in the statutes/ways of the Lord, ought to heed Jesus’ sober warning in John 3:36,

• “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.”

This brings me the most important part of this post in addressing true signs of the Spirit’s work in conversion juxtaposed with false signs concerning false conversion and self-deception. What are the true signs of the Spirit’s work in conversion? In other words how do you know genuine conversion from spurious conversion???

True Signs:

1. Biblical Christology: this is raising one’s esteem & affections for Jesus Christ and seeing Him as the Bible sees Him which is as the Son of God–God come in the flesh–as the only Savior of mankind and Lord of His people. This also entails believing & treasuring the biblical Gospel of Christ crucified, risen, & reigning today as the Lord of all the earth.
   
2. Sensitivity to Sin: this is the awakening of the conscience or conviction of sin in the heart of the believer. One of the telling signs that one is truly borne of the Spirit is that they become increasingly aware of their depravity and their dire need for the Gospel(every single day) and the blood of Jesus that cleanses them from every sin. Those who profess faith in Christ who can consciously sin that grace may abound should heed Paul’s teaching in Romans 6 where he says that those who have been baptized into Christ(spiritually through faith) have also died to sin and as a matter of fact, can no longer live in sin because their entire disposition has changed.
   
3. Awakened to 1st & 2nd Greatest Commandments: only the Holy Spirit can work in the heart of a believer and awaken them to the 1st & 2nd great commandments in Scripture: to love God with one’s entire being and to genuinely love people because God loves them. In fact the entire book of 1 John is written to address this very issue: loving God correctly & loving people passionately. This is a powerful sign of true conversion because as Jonathan Edwards says, “The Prince of Darkness would never lead people to the Sun(of righteousness).”
   
4. Walking in the Light of Christ: this is directly connected to the Spirit’s work in conversion and the inner testimony He does the heart & spirit of the believer. The Spirit leads the new believer to the light of Scripture and convinces them of the truth & authority of the Gospel and the rest of Scripture. This “light” entails the pursuit of holiness & godliness, peace & joy with Christ, humility & service toward others, doctrine & a veracious appetite for Scripture in order to know Christ supremely(Phil 3:10), and a seeing & savoring of Jesus Christ and His Gospel above all things(sensus suavitatis).

False Signs:

1. Specious Faith: this means that the faith may look good on the outside, but inwardly it is a cold, dead, and dark faith because it lacks true affection for Christ and the Gospel. These are usually lukewarm “believers” in that they say they’re Christian, but lack zeal for Christ and are content with going through the motions without any commitment to discipleship, accountability, or Scripture intake. They might look & sound religious, but Christ is not their treasure and is really an afterthought in their daily life. Interestingly, Jesus spoke of receiving the Kingdom of Heaven(salvation) in terms of finding treasure: “The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.” In other words, true saving faith is rooted & grounded in the surpassing worth of knowing Christ supremely & joyfully(see also Philippians 3:7-11).
2. Believing Another Gospel: this “other” gospel can be any number of fallacious gospels that masquerade as the Christian gospel but really are counterfeits to the true Gospel of salvation by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ Jesus alone. This includes Mormon, Jehovah Witnesses, Seventh Day Adventist, and Pentecostal theology of which each adds numerous elements to the finished work of Jesus and calls it “gospel” (obviously many of the above mentioned also teach erroneous views of Christ, the Bible, salvation, etc. will further demonstrates their false gospel.) The Apostles were jealously adamant about contending for the true Gospel of the Scriptures, namely Jesus Christ and Him crucified, risen, and reigning over all as Lord, God, Savior, and Christ. The above mentioned religions deny one of those offices of Jesus and therefore depart from biblical orthodoxy and set themselves against the Christian Gospel. Within evangelicalism, the “other gospels” that those who attend evangelical churches are susceptible to believing in include adding the following to Christ crucified: good behavior & morality, baptism, the Lord’s Supper, church attendance, spiritual disciplines, observing the Saturday Sabbath, emotional(subjective) experiences and any other humanistic element that is not part of the biblical Gospel. Basically it boils down to ANYTHING that would lead you away from Solus Christus(“through Christ alone) and make it necessary for salvation.
3. Vacuous Theology: this is what I fear many in American Evangelical churches fall into, namely no hunger or thirst for knowing God and biblical theology. Many would label themselves “Christian” yet have no appetite for studying, learning, and growing in biblical theology and fellowshiping with God through His Word. The Bible is clear in that one of the distinguishing marks of true conversion is the intense desire to know God and fellowship with Him through His holy Word: “Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up into salvation–if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.”-1 Peter 2:2-3. “If you abide in My Word, you are truly My disciples…”-Jesus said in John 8:31. Just to be clear: I am not saying that abiding or reading the Bible is what makes one a Christian or necessary to maintain your salvation(obligatory), BUT what I am saying though is that those who are truly born of the Spirit abide in the Word of God because they want to abide in it. They long for more of God and His Word and sharing His Word with others. They want to study theology and doctrine because they want to know God as He has revealed Himself to mankind through His Scripture. Many evangelical churches today however downplay the role of doctrine & theology in the Christian life and in doing so STARVE their people literally to death(spiritual). The most important thing any pastor or teacher of a church that calls itself a biblical church can communicate to people is here’s who God is, here’s what He is like, and here’s what He has said & done in history. If your church doesn’t communicate that on a regular basis, watch out because they may be doing more bad than good in the grand scheme of the Kingdom of God and the forward progress of the Gospel.
4. Walking in the Darkness of the World: the darkness I have in mind here is the darkness consumed by the “lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, and pride in possessions” which John indicates as the 3 pillars of the world that are opposed to Christ and the Gospel. In saying that they are opposed to Christ and the Gospel I mean that they KEEP people from following Jesus, believing in the Gospel, and ultimately, out of heaven. Jesus said as much in the Parable of the Soils in Matthew 13:22 where He describes a response to the Gospel that “the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and it proves unfruitful“. In other words, one cannot serve two masters(Jesus and the world) because Jesus is rightly a jealous God who will not share His glory with anyone. John says in his first epistle, “If we say we have fellowship with Him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth.”-1 John 1:6. In other words, one cannot be a follower of Christ and still in bondage to sin, the world, rebellion, folly, and hatred toward Christ and His Gospel. This is not to say that believers do not sin or get ensnared with a particular sin, THEY DO–but they do not hate and openly blaspheme Christ. Christians have been delivered out of the domain of darkness and transferred into the Kingdom of Christ where they have redemption, the forgiveness and freedom of sin. See Colossians 1:13-14; Ephesians 1:7; Romans 3:24-26.

I leave this post with 5 crucial questions I would submit to as litmus test questions regarding the church you attend or are considering attending. These questions are not exhaustive and by no means am I saying they must be addressed every week or else. Rather, what I am saying is that these questions are a good measuring rod concerning the church’s view of the Gospel and its priority in the life & ministry of the church.

Crucial Questions:

• Does your church call for people to repent of their sin and false ideologies and be converted solely to Christ(“Christ alone”)? Remember: anything added to blood of Jesus is erroneous and must be contended against.
• Does your church preach the Gospel & call people to repent of both their sins and their religion? Both parties need to be addressed, the rebellious and the religious.  
• Is the Gospel explained lucidly & regularly that people might respond to it? We must remember that it is the Gospel that is the power of God unto salvation, NOT “your best life now”, “become a better you”, “the secret”, or any other pop-Christian garbage that is pantheistic at best, and satanic at worst.
• Who is the central figure of the church, Jesus or the man in the suit? The Apostle Paul was quick to point all attention & focus on Jesus as the remedy/answer to all of life’s questions, what does your pastor do? Is the focus on him or does he do everything in his power to magnify Christ as the preeminent One?
• Is Jesus taught as a means to an end or He is taught as the end itself? Another way of saying this is: Is Jesus viewed as somewhat of an afterthought or given but not really the substance of the Church? Is He taken for granted and really overlooked as the supposed Head of the Church? Many evangelical churches just assume those attending understand the Gospel and conversion when the statistics demonstrate that people really don’t understand the Gospel: Over 50% of those who attend evangelical churches believe Jesus is one of MANY ways to God.

God is the Gospel. He’s what you get. He’s the treasure that everyone spends their entire life looking for. He is not an afterthought but all of our thoughts should be about what pleases Him and brings Him the most glory. Anything less is not the Christian Gospel and borders on heresy.

Next post: View of Man

Vacuous. No other word better describes the American church’s attitude towards biblical theology than vacuous. In fact if you were to ask your average church goer what the term “biblical theology” means, you most likely would get a blank stare in return followed by something like “I’m not a theologian” or “I don’t use those “big words”, when in reality biblical theology is not that big of a word. All you are using are the words “Bible” and “theology”. In other words, biblical theology simply refers to what the Bible teaches about God, man, and the world around us. Frankly, nothing could be more important for the professing Christian than biblical theology.

The question then becomes: what is your church teaching? Is it regularly expositing Scripture or expositing something other than the Bible? In our postmodern, pluralistic, syncretistic, skeptical age where false doctrine and false religion are prolific,  you would think that evangelical churches would be pumping out biblical theology as quickly and as often as they possibly could. The statistics however, say otherwise. Recent Gallop polls reveal the following:

• 84% of Americans declare the Bible to be either “somewhat” or “very” important in making life decisions, yet only 50% could name even one of the four gospels(Matthew, Mark, Luke & John)
• Only 33& were able to identify Jesus as the individual who delivered the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5-7.
• Over 50% were not able to identify Genesis(“Origins” or “Beginnings”) as the Bible’s opening text
• Only 40%–who professed to be evangelical–were able to identify Cain as the one who said “Am I my brother’s keeper?” after he murdered his brother Abel.
• Over 50%–who professed to be evangelical–could not identify Jesus’ words, “Blessed are the poor in spirit” as part of His hallmark Sermon on the Mount.
• Over 50%–who professed to be evangelical–could not identify the Road to Damascus as the location of the Apostle Paul’s conversion in Acts 9.

Clearly, there is a famine of biblical theology within the realm of American Evangelicalism where the Gospel is supposed to be the central focus of evangelical churches. Most self-professed evangelical Christians are biblically illiterate when it comes to knowing & understanding the central themes of Scripture and the people/places concerning the themes. So if biblical theology refers to the exposition or explanation of what the Bible specifically teaches about God, mankind, and the world, then what exactly does the Bible teach about each of these crucial categories?

1. God: is the holy, eternal, Creator God of the universe, existing in 3 persons(Father, Son, and Spirit), who revealed Himself as the Savior of mankind beginning in the book of Genesis and reveals that He desires to have individual relationships with His people called covenants. God’s covenant with Abraham in Genesis 12-22 sets forward the plan of redemption through Abraham, His physical descendents(the nation of Israel), a holy land set apart for His people(the Promise Land), and the promise of an Seed who would bless all the nations of the earth. This Seed, according to the New Testament, was the promised Messiah, Jesus of Nazareth who came into human history as the God-Man to redeem mankind from their sins and reveal the true nature of the Creator God. This plan or covenant of redemption that God puts forward and initiates with mankind is completely mutually exclusive to all other religions and ideologies. In other words, the theology of God that the Bible teaches is completely different and incomparable to ALL other teachings and views of God for they are intermingled with paganism, mythology, mysticism, philosophy, and so forth.
2. Man: unlike the rest of creation, man alone was created Imago Dei that is in the image of God speaking of man’s preeminence over the rest of creation, his ability to reason and think critically, and most importantly, to worship & enjoy God forever in a covenantal relationship. However, man rebelled against God’s goodness & lordship over him and rejected God choosing to be his own god and subsequently fell into sin, depravity, and most notably, idolatry. Important: the Bible explicitly teaches that the worship of any other god other than the Triune God of the Bible is idolatry and the ultimate mark of man’s depraved & pernicious nature-see Romans 1:18-32. Because all men, women, and children are born with the effects of original sin(the fallen nature of Adam) they naturally have the strong proclivity towards idolatry which reaches its apex in false religion and narcissism. What’s interesting is that every single major world religion with the exception of biblical Christianity has at its core works righteousness, self-righteousness, justification by good works, etc. In other words, they exalt man in the sense of placing him in the role of God in dictating his destiny and salvation whereas the Bible says “There is none righteous, no not one. There is none who does good, not even one” and “All who rely on works of the law(good works) are under a curse”-see Rom 3:9-18; Gal 3:10-13. In other words, according to the Scripture, mankind cannot save or justify himself before God because He is guilty before God and enslaved to the very sin he would try to justify himself from. Therefore, he needs a Savior who can mediate between Him and God and rectify the animosity that stands between God and man. The Bible teaches that this Savior & Mediator is the Lord Jesus Christ who was the atonement or payment for sin that God the Father demanded from man, namely perfect righteousness. 1 Peter 3:18 says it like this: “For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might BRING US TO God.”
3. The World: according to Scripture, the world currently is not the way God intended it when He created it. According to Genesis 3, Isaiah 11, Romans 5, Romans 8, and Revelation 21-22 when man fell into sin, creation fell with him. This means that things such as sickness, diseases, pain, sorrow, suffering, evil, and death were not created by God, but rather by man’s rebellion and descent into depravity. The Bible also teaches though that a day is coming when “creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption” and “no more shall be heard the sound of weeping and the cry of distress.”-see Romans 8:18-22; Isaiah 65:19. This day is the Second Advent of the Savior King of mankind, Jesus Christ. And as history slowly winds down and that Day of Redemption draws nearer and nearer, the Triune God of the universe is saving people from their sins and calling them into covenant with Him through the atoning work Second Member of the Trinity, God the Son, and by the power and will of the Third Member of the Trinity, God the Spirit. In one of the most epic scenes in the Bible, the prophet Isaiah saw the LORD God in a vision seated upon His throne in heaven with angelic creatures(shading their faces from the holiness of God) crying out “Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts; the whole earth is full of His glory!” In other words, all of creation: the sun, the moon, the stars, the planets, the galaxies, the oceans, the clouds, the trees, the mountains, the birds & animals, and most directly, people, exist for God’s glory and reveal the glory & majesty of God. What is our response to this? In the words of David in Psalm 96:3 “Declare his glory among the nations, his marvelous works among all the peoples!”

Given these three general categories, what doctrines within biblical theology do I see serious deficiencies of in American Evangelicalism?

• Regarding theology of God: the holiness & justice of God, the sovereignty & glory of God, the person & work of Jesus(this is one of the major ones since without the proclamation of Jesus Christ and Him crucified, there can be no salvation–see Acts 4:12, 1 Cor 2:1-5), the biblical doctrines of predestination/election, and the central role of the Holy Spirit in the sanctification process of putting sin to death & growing in godliness in the life of the believer.
• Regarding theology of Man: without question the most neglected, if not completely ignored doctrine of man in most mainstream churches is the nefarious nature of man. Without a doubt, the majority of church-goers in America would agree with the statement that “man is basically good” whereas the Bible continually obliterates the “goodness” of man and says there is only one who is truly good, God Himself. The neglecting of the true nature of man is due to churches failing to teach the two doctrines that are inextricably connected to the biblical view of man: Original Sin & Total Depravity.
• Regarding theology of the World: the downplay of the role of the Fall and its explanation for the current condition of the world, the downplay of the Gospel as the only remedy for mankind and the world, the loss of focus on the forward progress of the Gospel into all the nations of the earth, and the syncretism of world religions with the Christian faith which truly reveals the heart/character of the pastor who would sadistically proclaim such a lie.

Until we have a resurgence of biblical theology throughout mainstream American Evangelicalism, the American Church will continue to become more and more secular and less and less holy. We are already seeing this with mainstream Protestant churches affirming same-sex relationships and the proliferation of relativism within Protestant churches. Clearly we are in dire need of a modern reformation.  The Bible makes it clear that we were created to worship, honor, glorify and enjoy the Triune God above everything else. It is breathtaking that we could not only know our Creator through His revelatory Word and Son, but also enjoy and delight in Him as the all-satisfying treasure of lives.

This is the end-all goal of all human existence and biblical theology is the ONLY means to that end.

Therefore, we must proclaim, declare, preach, and exclaim His marvelous excellencies to the nations…especially in America (more now than ever!)

“You are My witnesses, declares the LORD, “and My servant whom I have chosen, that you may know and believe Me and understand that I AM He. Before Me no god was formed, nor shall there be any after Me. I, I AM the LORD, and besides Me there is no savior. I declared and saved and proclaimed.”-Isaiah 43:10-12

Another distinguishing mark of a true evangelical church is Solus Christus (“in Christ alone) which is to say that salvation is exclusively through/in Jesus Christ alone and no other individual or religious system. Such a statement immediately wreaks of intolerance, dogmatism, and arrogance in our relativistic, pluralistic, postmodern age. Such a statement would be intolerant and arrogant if it was a subjective opinion but the Bible presents it as objective truth, meaning that it is the most loving, gracious, and important message the Evangelical Church could ever communicate, particularly in our increasingly secularly-religious American culture.

Who would have thought that we would ever see the day that the exclusivity of Jesus as being the only way to the Father and only sacrifice for sin would be in question, not in the culture but in the church itself. Recent Gallop rolls indicate that roughly only 50% of professing Evangelical Christians believe that salvation is found exclusively in Jesus Christ. Think about that! Only 50% of professing Evangelical Christians in America believe in the most crucial doctrine of the Christian Gospel–the very heart of Christianity. Solus Christus is what essentially sets Christianity apart from all other world religions, namely salvation and fellowship with the true God is only through the Gospel of Christ and Him crucified. All other religions reject some aspect of the Gospel whether that be the deity of Christ(Judaism, Islam), the full humanity of Christ (New Age, Gnostic writings, Dan Brown), or even the very fact that He was actually crucified (Jehovah’s Witnesses, Islam), a fact that is historically documented by both non-Christian & Christian historians of the 1st and 2nd centuries.

The Gospel message of the person and work of Jesus presents itself in Scripture as the only remedy for mankind’s most pernicious and deleterious issue: sin. The Scripture teaches that “all men have sinned and fallen short of God’s glory” (Rom 3:23), are born “dead in trespasses and sins” (Eph 2:1), and are by nature “children of wrath…without hope and without God” (Eph 2:3; 12), therefore leading to the most basic salvific truth that every man, woman, and child must understand: all, without distinction, lie under God’s condemnation and therefore must trust in a God who justifies the ungodly (Rom 4:5). What this means is that because God is the One who has been sinned against and therefore the offended party, only He can decide the means by which our debt to Him can be forgiven and we can be reconciled to Him. You MUST understand that because only when you understand that truth does the Gospel of Jesus make any sense. It’s the same principle as if someone stole your car and drove it into a lake and then attempted to hand you a $20 and said “Call it even?” You would emphatically reject their proposal and insist on the appropriate restitution being made–so it is with our Creator and Judge. We’ve sinned against Him, therefore only He can decide if we can right with Him and the MEANS by which we can get right with Him. According to Galatians 4:4-5, this is exactly what Jesus came to do:

• “But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might become sons of God.”

In other words, Jesus came into the world for a very specific purpose: to save sinners. Why? Because they could never save themselves. Galatians 3:10 lays out so clearly the predicament those who rely on their good works to justify themselves before God face:

• “For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse, for it is written: “Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law, and do them.”
  

According to Scripture, all Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Muslims, Jews, Hindus, New Agers, Agnostics, Atheists, and all others who reject the Atonement of Christ are under a curse because they rely on their good works, morality, righteous behavior, and religious observances to justify themselves and not the blood of Jesus that alone is sufficient to atone for sin. 

Therefore, the problem the Evangelical Church faces in America isn’t the rise of Islam or the further decadence of morality in America, no the problem the AEC faces is the rise of secularism inside the church and subsequently, the vacuous nature of biblical theology that seems to follow as secularism increases. When this happens the diamonds of the Christian faith(Sola Scriptura, The Gospel, the biblical Jesus, the depraved nature of man) are plundered by the enemy and, to use some of the stark language of the prophet Ezekiel, the church “plays the whore”. The famine of biblical theology in mainstream churches in America has no doubt contributed to the staggering statistic concerning evangelical teens of whom 80% will deny the Christian faith by the time they graduate from college. Such statistics reveal that the BT famine is effecting the whole evangelical world from adults to teens and children.

Only when a church makes the conscious decision to start actively teaching the Scriptures across the board(children, youth, and adults) will we begin to see the resurgence of biblical theology(particularly Christ & Him crucified) in American churches and the extirpation of liberalism, false teaching, and the overall lukewarmness that characterizes many in evangelical churches.

Arguably, a church’s soteriology is their most important statement of belief. This is because what a church believes about salvation reveals what they believe about man, the Trinity, the Gospel, and Jesus Himself. The Christian doctrine of salvation begins & ends with the person of Jesus as He is revealed in the Bible. The message of Scripture is clear: Jesus is the Son of God (second member of the Trinity) who was the ultimate revelation from God (the Trinity),  came to do for mankind that they could never do for themselves, namely satisfy God’s righteous requirement of the Law and reconcile a portion of humanity back to God through His suffering & death on Golgotha in 33AD. Isaiah 53, written 700yrs before the birth of Christ, prophesies about one Suffering Servant who will suffer on others’ behalf:

• “But he was wounded for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his stripes we are healed.”–Isaiah 53:6

The theologians refer to this doctrine as Penal Substitutionary Atonement. In those three words, we have the heart of Jesus’ ministry and the heart of the Gospel. Penal refers to the penalty for sin(death), substitutionary means Jesus died in my place for my sins, and atonement refers to the actual work Jesus accomplished to restore my relationship with God that I would have never been able to accomplish on my own.

The tragedy is that most evangelical churches do not speak or teach on PSA or more importantly, the implications of Penal Substitutionary Atonement, therefore leaving their people full of jokes, antidotes, stories, and the like and not with Jesus Himself. (Important: you cannot faithfully preach & teach the full counsel of God and not exposit the Atonement and its implications–its the central doctrine of the Bible!)

So here are the implications of the penal substitutionary death of Jesus Christ for all who will believe and trust in Him:

• Redemption: this speaks of the Christian being liberated, freed, or rescued from bondage and slavery from Satan, sin, and death. Jesus’ atoning work severs the root of sin in the life of the believer and because of that the believer now has the ability not to sin. St. Augustine, a well-known 4th century theologian and philosopher, characterized man’s depravity before Christ and after Christ this way: before Christ all we could do was sin, we could not, not sin, in other words we lacked the capacity to not sin, we were in complete bondage to the power of sin and the flesh; after Christ though, now we have the capacity to choose not to sin and just having that ability radically transforms the sinner into the image of Christ. Titus 2:14 captures the connection b/w PSA and redemption beautifully: “Christ gave Himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for Himself a people…”
• New Covenant Sacrifice: the soteriology of the Bible is presented in terms of covenant, not contract. This concept alone is unique to the Bible and not found in other religious books and dogmas. It appears more than 300 times in the Bible signifying its importance to understanding the doctrine of salvation. In Biblical Theology, covenant is best described as a particular relationship b/w two parties in which one of the parties initiates the terms (unilateral) and the other party responds. With the New Covenant, the entire Godhead initiates a covenant of grace with undeserving & ill-deserving sinners through the Atonement of Christ. The Father chooses the elect, the Son dies for the elect, and the Holy Spirit calls & secures the elect. In terms of duration, the New Covenant is an everlasting covenant that brings the Son’s sheep into eternity to enjoy fellowship with the Trinity who simply chose to show unmerited favor to hell-deserving sinners. Fact: All of this is centered around the person and work of the second member of the Trinity, the Son of God, Jesus Christ.
• Reconciliation: this term signifies the animosity that exists between God and lost sinners. It implies that we need to be reconciled to God because we are separated, alienated, hostile, and in exile from Him. As we saw earlier, we have sinned against God thereby separating ourselves from Him, therefore He must decide to reconcile us back to Himself and the terms by which such a reconciliation can take place. Enter Jesus. As 1 Peter 3:18 so beautifully captures this idea of reconciliation: “For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God.”
• Ransom: this speaks of the payment required by God to both atone for sin and appease His wrath. The Bible speaks of sin in terms of “falling short of the glory of God” and the “break of God’s holy law”. The penalty for such crimes is death (physical, spiritual, and eternal). The only way man can be forgiven his debt is if Someone WHO HASN’T SINNED pays His debt (that which is owed to God). Psalm 49:7-8 says “no man can ransom another, or give to God the price of his life, for the ransom of their life is costly and can never suffice.” Its clear as day, no one can work/pay/earn/barter their way with God in order to pay Him back for all the wrong they’ve committed against Him. Once again ONLY He can decide the means by which we can be forgiven by Him and verse 15 of Psalm 49 tells us exactly how He will do it: “But God will ransom my soul from the power of Sheol, for He will receive me.” Even the Psalmist understood the magnanimous and gracious nature of God in ransoming sinners unto Himself when they deserved to be anathematized. The question then is how? How does God ransom sinners out of  condemnation into justification? Jesus Himself tells us in Mark 10:45 “For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
• Righteousness: because of Jesus dying in my place for my sins, though He was innocent and I was guilty, God imputes His righteousness to my account while my sins were nailed to the cross on Calvary 2000yrs ago (Col 2:13-14). Martin Luther rightly called this “The Great Exchange” speaking of the sinner receiving Christ’s righteousness by way of imputation while their sins went to Christ on the cross. This doctrine is what justifies people before God and grants them entrance into the eternal presence and joy of God. 2 Corinthians 5:21 says it this way: “For our sake He made Him who knew no sin to become sin on our behalf so that in Him (Christ) we might become the righteousness of God.” No verse better captures the Christian Gospel than this verse.
• Justification: as a result of Christ imputing His righteousness, now I receive the gift of justification which means to be declared not guilty in the eyes of God. No other religion offers gift righteousness as a result of God Himself taking their punishment on directly, suffering on their behalf, dying the most horrific death ever devised by mankind, and then rising on the third day to vindicate His Atonement and to validate His claim as the Incarnate Son of God who came to rescue sinners. And this gift is by faith alone and not by any works of the law or moral ethics. We in Protestant Evangelical circles call this Sola Fide which means man is saved by faith alone and not by self-righteousness. Romans 5:1 says “Therefore since we have been justified by faith we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.”
• Propitiation: one of the most important aspects of the Atonement of Jesus Christ is propitiation. Once again this deals with one of the most neglected and taboo subjects in American Evangelicalism: the wrath of God. Most professing Christians today do not believe/accept the wrath of God as part of the attributes of the God of the Bible. Yet the Bible talks about the wrath of God Almighty some 600 times in connection with His relationship on sinners and their rebellion against Him (I will perhaps right an article dealing directly with the wrath and justice of God in the future). According to Scripture, the wrath of God against sin and thereby guilty & condemned sinners is very real as seen in Romans 1:18-32; Genesis 18-19; Matthew 24; and Revelation 6-19. However, the wrath of God against sin is most clearly seen on the Cross of Jesus. This is where the term propitiation comes into play as Jesus satisfied the wrath of God for His sheep, thereby appeasing it on their lives and transferring them out of darkness into light, out from under the wrath of God to under the mercy of God. Romans 3:25 captures the doctrine of propitiation: “Christ Jesus…whom God put forward as a propitiation by His blood (His death) to be received by faith.”
• Expiation: this term refers to “the cleansing from the stain of sin on the soul”. It has to deal extensively with the power & preciousness of the blood of Jesus. The Bible makes it clear in the book of Hebrews that “without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sins(9:22). Our remission of sin not only deals with our judicial & penal position before God, but also our metaphysical makeup as well. No one will deny that sin does defile and corrupt the human soul, in particularly sexual sin as the Bible (1 Cor 6:12-20; Rom 1:22-29) points out that when we sinned sexually we sin against our own bodies(only sin that is referenced this way). Therefore, one of the implications of the Atonement purchased by Jesus is the doctrine of expiation where God the Holy Spirit begins to cleanse & purify the human soul, giving the justified believer a new heart, new life, new desires, and the ability to receive healing from the old life. 1 John 1:7 beautifully captures this doctrine: “If we walk in the Light, as He is in the Light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin.”
• Definite Atonement: I will write exclusively on this issue in the weeks to come but for now I will just say this concerning the Atonement of Jesus: its a limited or definite or particular atonement, in that it is limited to those who will believe and trust in Messiah Jesus for the salvation of their souls (Solus Christus) and for nobody else. The Atonement of Christ is only applied to that particular group of humanity that God calls out of the world into the Kingdom of God, out of rebellion & hostility towards God into obedience & joy with God. The implications of definite atonement are that the Atonement is universal in the sense that it is for all people groups of the world both Jew and Gentiles, but it is limited in that its only applied to a particular group made up of those people groups, the Church. Jesus said in John 10: “I AM the Good Shepherd. I know My own and My own know Me, just as the Father knows Me and I know the Father; and I lay down My life for the sheep.”

So as you can see, there are many many aspects of the death of Jesus Christ but this one is the most important for you to grasp: SOLUS CHRISTUS. Through Christ alone comes salvation from Satan, sin, death and the lies of the world and other religions. If you do not believe, read & study the Bible for yourself and then dialogue with me.

Soli Deo Gloria

The second mark of a true Christian church is the Gospel . For American Evangelicals, there is no greater issue at stake in our day than the Gospel itself. The very name “evangelical” is transliterated from the Greek word euaggelion signifying the supposed centrality & supremacy of the Gospel of Jesus Christ within Protestantism. The Gospel is what is supposed to separate Protestant Christians from Roman Catholicism and Liberal Christianity. Roman Catholicism affirms the centrality of tradition while Liberalism affirms the centrality of the “social gospel” and tolerance, both of which according to Scripture are somewhat important (tolerance in the biblical sense of enduring shame from unbelievers while continuing to love them), but are not the Gospel and are not to be the central focus of the Church.

The New Testament clearly, boldly, and unapologetically presents the Gospel of Jesus Christ as the central event in human history, much less the church. Very simply the Gospel is the revelation of the Son of God, Jesus Christ, who the entire Bible preaches as:

• The very God who created the universe in human flesh: Is 7:14; 9:6-7; Matthew 1:21-23; Mark 14:62; John 1:1-18; John 8:58; Romans 9:5; Colossians 1:15-20; 2:9; Hebrews chapter 1; Revelation 1:5-8
• The promised Messiah of the Jews and to the rest of the world: Matthew 1:1; 2:1-11; 8:17; 9:27; 12:1-8; 15-21; 16:13-20; 21:1-11; 22:41-46; 26:63-66; Gal 3:13-16
• The only Saviour of mankind through His penal substitutionary death on the cross: Isaiah 52:13-53:12; Mk 10:45; Luke 22:19-20; John 1:29; 3:14-18; 36; 5:23; 6:37-45; 10:14-18; 11:25-26; 51-52; 14:6-9; chapter 17; Acts 4:12; 1 Tim 2:5; 1 John 2:22-23
• The only person who has ever lived that lived a perfect, sinless life; declared to be God Incarnate and then backed that claim by raising the dead, healing the lame, blind, sick, and crippled, exercised authority over nature, demons, and men, taught as only God could teach, foretold the destruction of Jerusalem 40+ yrs before it actually happened, foretold His own death & resurrection, and then accomplished exactly what He came to do: atone for the sins of His sheep by taking on their sins & punishment, dying for them, and then rising on the 3rd Day (as He said He would) demonstrating His power and authority over even death, something no other man, institution, or science can seem to conquer like Jesus did. All of this is found in the Gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke & John in the New Testament.

All of the above are nonnegotiables that separate genuine Christians from counterfeit Christians. The moment you compromise by denying any of the mentioned above you have cut yourself off from historic Christian doctrine and would place yourself in the category of proclaiming a false gospel of which the Apostle Paul characterized as the most egregious sin a human being could commit:

• “Even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed. As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed.”-Galatians 1:8-9

The Greek word for “accursed” is the word anathema which literally means to burn in hell. In other words, the New Testament writers did not mince words when it came to defending the central message of Christ. They rigorously contended for His Gospel because they knew what so few professing evangelical Christians today seem to know: that the Gospel is the only means by which sinners can be reconciled to God. The Reformers of the 16th & 17th centuries formed the 5 Solas as the pillars of the Gospel, those doctrines which cannot be compromised if the Biblical Gospel is to be preserved:

1. Sola Scriptura: the Scripture alone is the authority of the Church of Jesus Christ and it thereby determines the doctrine & theology of Christian faith & practice.
2. Sola Fide: based off Sola Scritpura, the unambiguous teaching of the Bible is that God saves sinners by faith alone, apart from any meritorious effort on their part. This is because the Scripture teaches that mankind is “dead in trespasses and sins”, “alienated from the life of God”, “by nature children of wrath”, “hostile to God and His Law”, “exchange the Biblical truth about God for their own lies” and completely void of any righteousness or obedience. See Eph 2:1-3; 4:18; Rom 8:6-8; 1:18-32; 3:9-18. Therefore, God MUST save sinners solely based on His own mercy and grace, and not on anything foreseen in them.
3. Sola Gratia: because God justifies sinners by faith alone, it naturally leads to the glorious doctrine of grace.  God’s salvific grace towards His people actually starts in eternity past when the Godhead(Father, Son, and Spirit) decided to make a covenant with each other to save a portion of humanity called the Church. See 2 Timothy 1:9. Salvation is based on God’s sovereign grace by which His gives believers the faith to believe in the Gospel and places them in His beloved Son. Only orthodox Protestants teach that salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone because only Protestants teach and hold fast to Sola Scriptura where all of these glorious truths are revealed.
4. Solus Christus: based off Sola Scritpura, the Scriptures clearly teach that salvation is found in Jesus Christ alone and no other person, faith, philosophy, ideology, or teaching. This is because Christ alone qualifies as God’s Mediator & Savior by His atoning death on the cross and subsequent resurrection & ascension.
5. Soli Deo Gloria: the summation of all Reformed & Biblical Theology is “to God alone be the glory!” The Reformers knew that they contributed nothing to their salvation and that it was based on God’s sovereign, undeserved, grace and favor that He saved anyone. Luther said that “if man contributes even the slightest good work, it does not justify, indeed it is not even faith!”  Therefore, the Biblical Theology of Salvation is found in Scripture alone, by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ Jesus alone, and for & to the glory of God alone.

The centrality & exposition of the Gospel in American Evangelical churches cannot be overstated or taken for granted.  Recent Gallop polls indicate that over 50% of those who attend Protestant Evangelical churches in America think that Jesus is not the only way to heaven.  In the same poll, Over 50% basically believe that people are naturally good and can earn God’s saving favor by living “good lives” and being “good people”. These statistics are utterly terrifying and should be awakening evangelical churches to the dire need of expository preaching where the Gospel is preached and not taken for granted. In our secular pluralistic society, one cannot take people’s knowledge & understanding of the Biblical Gospel for granted. I end with the following biblical points to look for when examining the marks of a true Christian church:

• The Centrality of the Gospel: Jesus, the apostles, and other biblical writers present the Gospel as the central focal point of human history and Christianity, therefore it only logical that the Christian Church 2000yrs later would continue that biblical commandment. Again, you can tell whether or not a church’s focus is on the Gospel by their view of Scripture: Sola Scriptura or no SS
• The Preaching of the Gospel: how often does the pastor/minister proclaim the Gospel on Sunday morning or gathering of the Church? As Luther so eloquently put it when his people complained about his frequency in declaring the Gospel: “The truth of the Gospel is the principle article of all Christian doctrine…Most necessary is it that we know this article well, teach it to others, and beat it into their heads continually.” Luther’s point is that we are prone to forgetting the Gospel and drift towards trusting in our own righteousness, therefore we must be reminded of it often.
• The Exposition of the Gospel: how often does the pastor/minister not only proclaim the Gospel but explain it as well? It’s not enough to say “Jesus Christ died on the cross for my sins and rose on the third day”, you must explain the implications and ramifications of the what Jesus did. This includes His prophecies & hand in the OT, His virgin birth and childhood, His public baptism, spirit-filled and driven temptation by Satan, His public teaching and preaching, His fulfillment of the Suffering Servant of Isaiah 52:13-52:12 in His passion and crucifixion, His glorious resurrection & ascension to the right hand of the Godhead, His rightful authority as Lord, God, Savior, & Christ, and His EPIC physical return to the earth at the end of the age. All is included in the exposition of the Gospel.
• The Implication of the Gospel: with the proper exposition of the Gospel, people can begin to grasp the implications of the Gospel: man’s dire need of salvation through Christ alone, Jesus’ claims of lordship & authority over all creation, the mission of the Church, the purpose of the Christian life, and so forth. The greatest implication of the Gospel is the Covenant of Redemption that the Father oversaw, the Son secured, and the Spirit applies to undeserving and ill-deserving sinners that transforms them from idolaters to worshippers of the true & living God.
• The Application of the Gospel: most Christians today do not understand the practicality of the Gospel and its rightful place in our everyday living. The best book I have read on this particular aspect is Mark Driscoll’s Death By Love where he judiciously presents the application of the Gospel in everyday real life situations like: lust & sexual addiction, adultery, American self-righteousness, sexual & physical abuse, parenting, terminal illnesses, family strife, and absolute truth in an age of relativism. By all means, go get this book. In the Church, the area that pastors must start focusing the application of the Gospel is marriage. With the divorce rate over 50% in the church, pastors and ministers must educate their people on the centrality of the Gospel specifically in Christian marriages and how it is because of what Jesus has done, that spouses can forgive and show grace to each other.
• The Defending of the Gospel: if the aforementioned 5 elements are earnestly sought after, then the defending of the Gospel at all costs will come naturally. However, if the Gospel is not the focal point of the church, it will be much more susceptible to false teaching and drifting into cultural compromises and affirmations(same-sex marriage, women pastors, denial of biblical inerrancy, etc.) Jude admonished his readers to “earnestly contend for the faith that was once for all delivered up to the saints” and my how that is needed today.  Remember: those who are weak on biblical theology, sound doctrine, expository preaching, will be weak in defending the Gospel and will be much more prone to strongly affirming things that the Bible clearly condemns(homosexuality).

I leave you with Jesus’ own words concerning His supremacy in Scripture and the Christian Church:

• “Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that repentance and forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things.”-Luke 24:45-48

You are the witnesses of these things. If you are in Christ, you are a witness who is to declare these things. For the evangelical church in America today, there can be no greater or more important message than the Gospel of Jesus Christ and Him crucified.

No theological doctrine reveals the true colors of a church than their view of Scripture.  A church’s Bibliology reveals their Theology, Christology, Pneumatology, Anthropology, Hamartiology, Soteriology, Ecclesiology, and so forth.  In other words, how they view & present the Bible reveals whether they submit to the biblical view of the Trinity, the Hypostatic Union of Christ, the doctrine of Original Sin, the doctrine of Total Depravity, the doctrines of Grace in salvation, and the centrality of the Gospel in the life of the church particularly the preaching of the Gospel in corporate worship. Such are the clear teachings of Scripture that to neglect or intentionally refrain from teaching them is to neglect to teach the “whole counsel of God”–see Acts 20:26-27.

Historic Christian theology has affirmed the following doctrines regarding the nature & character of the Bible: inspiration, inerrancy, infallibility, authority, veracity, sufficiency & normative.

• Inspiration: God-breathed, origin is from God not man
• Inerrant: without error or contradiction
• Infallible: incapable of error & trustworthy; what is recorded in Scripture is true to the fact.
• Authoritative: the only rule of faith and practice; tradition and experience are subject to & inferior to the teachings of Scripture.
• Veracious: the Scripture habitually speaks the truth
• Sufficient: no further divine revelation is needed for theology or salvation
• Normative: not just descriptive of what happened, but makes claims on mankind today.

Therefore, to reject any of those doctrines is to reject historic Christian orthodoxy. Theologically, the doctrine of inspiration is the cornerstone of all views of Scripture because the doctrine of inspiration is what validates the other elements such as inerrancy, authority, veracity, and so forth. When Paul says in 2 Timothy 3:16, “All Scripture is inspired by God“, he is gives the written text of the Bible the highest claim to authority. As noted OT scholar John Sailhamer says: “It is specifically “Scripture” that Paul points to as the locus of God’s revelation.”  And because Scripture is inspired by the sovereign Creator God of the universe, it must then therefore be:  completely true and reliable, without error or contradiction, authoritative in what it says because it derives from God, the final revelatory Word from God that closed at the end of the 1st century, and directly applicable to all people everywhere in every period of human history because: it alone is the only inspired, inerrant, infallible, veracious, authoritative, sufficient Word of God. This naturally rules out other books that claim to be revelatory in nature(the Koran, Book of Mormon, New World Translation) because these books came centuries after the canon of Scripture was closed and the Bible explicitly says in Galatians 1:8, “But even if we(the Apostle Paul) or an angel from heaven(Gabriel, Michael, Moroni) should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed.”

What Muslims, Mormons, and Jehovah Witnesses all say is that the Bible has been changed(naturally because this is the only feasible explanation they can come up with in light of passages like Galatians 1:8-9). But let me be clear here: if they are going to accuse the Bible of being corrupted and erroneous, then the burden of proof is on them to PROVE that the Bible has in fact been changed–NOT Christians. The simple truth is that the Bible hasn’t been changed and both historical & textual criticism backs that truth.  The only variances that exist in the text manuscripts are minor variations that are equivalent to punctuation errors in our english language–nothing regarding essential Christian theology such as the Trinity, deity & humanity of Christ, salvation by grace through faith in Christ alone, the veracity of Scripture, etc. The tragic reality is that most Muslims, Mormons, and JWs have never read the Christian Scriptures for themselves, apart from any coercion or manipulation from their own religion.  If they did, they would find that the New Testament which was written between 700-1800 yrs before each of their religions came into existent, explicitly condemns the very nature that each of their founders claimed they received their revelation from God.

How does the doctrine of Scripture relate to the Christian Church? The Protestant Reformers of the 16th century coined the phrase Sola Scriptura which speaks of the Bible being the highest authority for faith and practice, not traditions, experiences, dreams, visions, or opinions of men. Sola Scriptura was a direct response to the Roman Catholic Church’s view of holding tradition and Scripture on the same playing level and with the same esteem. The Reformers said “No, that is not the teaching of Scripture” of which they would point to passages such as 2 peter 1:16-21 where Peter speaks of his experience in seeing the glorified Christ on the Mount of Transfiguration and yet points to Scripture, not his experience, as the more trustworthy Word from God.

In other words, everything in Christian churches must be subject to and test by the Scriptures. In our day however, it’s not enough to simply say you affirm Sola Scriptura because many verbally affirm SS while their theology, methodology, ministry philosophies, etc do not affirm SS. Therefore, you must “Test the spirits” as the Apostle John says in 1 John 4:1 in the following ways to discern a church’s view of Scripture:

1. Their statement of faith: usually available on their website but if not ask for it when you visit. See if they use words like “inspired”, “inerrant”, “infallible”, “completely true”, etc. If not, avoid it at all costs.
2. Their view of preaching: what does the preacher preach about? The Bible? Himself or Herself(more on this in a minute)? Pop culture? Does the church preach expositionally through books of the Bible or mainly topical? The Scriptures were given to be read and explained, therefore expositiory preaching must be the norm in biblically faithful churches.
3. Their view of gender roles: the Bible is clear in 1 Timothy 2:12-14; 3:1-7; Titus 1:5-9 that pastor & elder roles are to be filled by men, not women. This is not to say that women are inferior to men or less in God’s eyes, no rather it is based on the creative social & spiritual order that God insituted back in Genesis 1-3 where He created man first, then woman and gave man leadership responsibilities and woman helper and nurturing responsibilities. Churches that ignore these clear teachings are going against God’s creative mandate and are always going to end up in theological error. Women most certainly can serve in ministry, but the roles of preaching & teaching over the flock God has reserved exclusively for qualified men.
4. Their view of the Gospel: I will write on this particular subject in the weeks to come as being one of the crucial marks of a true church, but for now you can tell a lot about a church on their view and use of the Gospel. It is my conviction that a lot of mainstream American evangelical churches are neglecting and bypassing the Gospel for more attractive methods and messages. Others take the Gospel has a given amongst their people, but as Martin Luther so eloquently put it: “Why do I continue to preach the Gospel? Do I need a reason?!? It is because you are so prone to forgetting it and my people must have it continually beat into their heads…” The person and work of Jesus Christ must be above all things, the doctrine that churches exult, rejoice, and exclaim above all other ministries, messages, or methods. Warning: listen for the Gospel more than listening for the name of Jesus, God, grace, etc. It is the Gospel itself that TELLS people about who Jesus is and what He has done. Many popular mainstream evangelical teachers and speakers love to say the name Jesus, but they never declare the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
5. Their view of theology: must like their view of the Gospel, a church’s view of theology will reveal what they believe about the Bible. If they have a high view of Scripture, they will have rich theology and preach and teach it. If they have a low of the Bible, they will have shallow theology and will not preach and teach it regularly.

Remember: True biblical theology delights, exults, and savors the person and work of Jesus Christ. As Jonathan Edwards said in his classic book The Religious Affections: “There is an inward burning desire that a saint has after holiness…a holy breathing and panting after the Spirit of God to increase holiness.” That holy breathing and panting comes through the revelation of Jesus Christ as seen in the pages of Holy Scripture.  True, sound, healthy biblical theology proclaims a high view of Scripture because the Scripture declares a high view of Jesus Christ.