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8/11/2019 Sound of Grace, Issue 210, September 2014
1/20
Notice ve things from these verses. To answer our
opening question, our aim in all of life should be to
have Christ highly honored. The Apostle/slave of Christ
writes, My eager expectation and hope is that I will not
be ashamed about anything, but that now as always, with
all boldness, Christ will be highly honored in my body,
whether by life or by death. His aim is to make much ofJesus. He wants Jesus to be shown to be great. Magnied.
Exalted.
The rst thing to notice about this aim is that we should
eagerly expect and hope to make much of Jesus. Paul ex-
pects and hopes. He can expect because he plans, by Gods
help, to live that way. He hopes because he knows he needs
Gods help.
Second, we should not be ashamed in making much
of Jesus but should
This is the rst in a series of studies in the Book of Hebrews. These stud-
ies are technically not a commentary, that is, I am not writing a verse by verse
exposition of the whole epistle to the Hebrews. It is an exposition of the major
theological sections that deal specically with the New Covenant. We will spend
a lot of time on some sections and will skip other sections altogether. Our goal is
to show how impossible it is to understand the Book of Hebrews without having
a working knowledge of New Covenant Theology (here after called NCT). It is
acknowledged by everyone who writes or preaches on this book that it has some
very difcult verses. Who has not struggled with Hebrews chapters 6 and 10?
We will begin by listing some things where there is nearly universal agreement.
Most agree that Hebrews sets forth a series of contrasts and comparisons. However, there is not an agreement as to
what is being contrasted and compared. In most cases the contrasts and comparisons are fairly clear unless the writer or
preacher allows his theology to obscure the obvious meaning. Let me give one illustration. All agree that it is essential
that we understand the primary purpose for which a given book was written. This
Issue 210 September 2014
It is good for the heart to be strengthened by grace Hebrews 13:9
Theology of HebrewsPart 1
John G. Reisinger
What is the over-arching purpose of your life? The
Holy Spirit through the Apostle helps us nd the God-giv-
en answer to that question in Philippians 1:20-26:
My eager expectation and hope is that I will not be
ashamed about anything, but that now as always, with
all boldness, Christ will be highly honored in my body,
whether by life or by death. For me, living is Christ and
dying is gain. Now if I live on in the esh, this means
fruitful work for me; and I dont know which one I
should choose. I am pressured by both. I have the desire
to depart and be with Christwhich is far betterbut
to remain in the esh is more necessary for you. Since
I am persuaded of this, I know that I will remain and
continue with all of you for your progress and joy in the
faith, so that, because of me, your condence may grow
in Christ Jesus when I come to you again.
Making Much of Jesus: Philippians 1:20-26
A. Blake White
ReisingerContinued on page 2
WhiteContinued on page 10
In This Issue
Theology of HebrewsPart 1
John G. Reisinger
1
Making Much of Jesus:Philippians 1:20-26
A. Blake White
1
Apologetics and Reformed
Theology: Approach #2
Steve West
3
Psalm 19: 7-11The Soul Satisfying Word
John Thorhauer
5
Hypothetical Statements
John G. Reisinge7
8/11/2019 Sound of Grace, Issue 210, September 2014
2/20
Page 2 September 2014 Issue 210Sound of Graceis a publication of Sovereign
Grace New Covenant Ministries, a tax exempt
501(c)3 corporation. Contributions to Sound of
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Sound of Graceis published 10 times a year.
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Sound of Grace Board: John G. Reisinger,
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Editor: John G. Reisinger; Phone: (585)396-
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ReisingerContinued from page 1
ReisingerContinued on page 4
will also entail understanding who
the specic person or persons are to
whom a given book is written. He-
brews is clear as to whom it is written.
All agree that the theme of Hebrews is
that Jesus Christ is better than any-
thing and everybody. In this epistle,contrast and comparison is the con-
stant message. Everything presented
is presented as better: a better hope, a
better priest, a better covenant, a better
promise, and a better sacrice.
If we are paying attention, we will
see the writer of Hebrews is giving a
master key to unlocking his epistle.
He consciously does not mention the
Gentiles in the epistle since they have
nothing to do with the writers pur-pose. One of the most tragic mistakes
you can make in trying to understand
the theology of Hebrews is to think
the writer is contrasting weak Chris-
tians with spiritual Christians. MacAr-
thurs comments on 5:11 are excellent.
There are, of course, many ex-
hortations for immature Christians to
grow up. Throughout the history of
the church there has been need of such
counsel, but I do not think that is what
is given here. He is saying to hesi-
tant Jews still hanging onto Judaism,
Come unto completion, to maturity,
in the New Covenant. This interpreta-
tion is not the most traditional, but I
think it is consistent with the whole
book and is defensible. The warning
and the appeal, as before, are evange-
listic. The maturity being called for
is not that of a Christians growing in
the faith, but of an unbelievers com-
ing into the faithinto the full-grown,
mature truths and blessings of the New
Covenant. It is the same maturity or
perfection (from teleioo) as in 10:1
and 14, which can only refer to salva-
tion, not to Christian growth.1
I cannot too highly recommend
MacArthurs commentary on He-
brews. If you can only afford to buy
1 John MacArthur, The MacArthur New
Testament Commentary-Hebrews
(Moody Bible Institute, Chicago, IL,
1983) 129.
one commentary on Hebrews, there is
no contest, buy MacArthurs. In the
following quotation he gives the best
summary of the message of the Book
of Hebrews I have ever read.
Throughout the book of Hebrews,
the many comparisons and contrasts
are basically between Christianity andJudaism. This truth is essential to a
proper interpretation of the epistle.
The central theme and message of
the book of Hebrews is the superiority
of the New Covenant to the Old, that
is, of Christianity to Judaism. Within
this theme are the sub themes of the
superiority of the new priesthood to
the old, the new sacrice to the old
ones, the new Mediator to the old one,
and so on. This is the key that unlocks
every section of Hebrews, and to useany other key is, I believe, to make
forced entry.
In the book of Hebrews the Holy
Spirit is not contrasting two kinds
of Christianity. He is not contrasting
immature Christians and mature ones.
He is contrasting Judaism and Christi-
anity, the unsaved Jew in Judaism and
the redeemed Jew in Christianity. He
is contrasting the substance and the
shadow, the pattern and the reality, the
visible and the invisible, the facsimileand the real thing, the type and the
anti-type, the picture and the actual.
The Old Testament essentially is
Gods revelation of pictures and types,
which are fullled in Christ in the
New Testament. The book of Hebrews,
therefore, compares and contrasts the
two parts of Gods revelation that our
division of the Bible reects.2
Look carefully at the better
things mentioned in Hebrews and
you will see that the writer cannotpossibly be contrasting Gentiles with
either converted or lost Jews. A Jew
who had trusted Christ as his Mes-
siah had a better hope than the most
spiritual believing Jew had while liv-
ing under the old covenant. The writer
is not saying that the Jews to whom he
was writing had a better hope than the
2 Ibid,p.127
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Issue 210 September 2014 Page 3
WestContinued on page 15
Apologetics and Reformed Theology: Approach #2
Steve West
In many ways,Reformed epis-
temology is both extremely simpleand extremely complicated. Episte-
mology is the branch of philosophy
that is concerned with knowledge. It
investigates the nature of knowledge,
the procedures by which knowledge
can be attained, and the limitations
of what humans can know. It should
go without saying that this is a highly
specialized eld. For apologetics,
Reformed epistemology is an attempt
to understand epistemology from a
Reformed perspective, and Reformedthinking from a perspective that is
informed about epistemology. To sim-
plify, some of the questions Reformed
epistemologists are asking include,
how do we know that God exists and
the gospel is true? and what episte-
mological position allows Christian
belief to be accepted as intellectually
justiable and responsible? Their de-
sire is to ensure that believing in God
does not fall outside of the boundariesof proper epistemology. This is a con-
cern shared by presuppositionalists,
although the proposed solutions differ.
One of the salient features of
Reformed epistemology is that it
has rejected the type of epistemol-
ogy on which the classical approach
to apologetics was based. Reformed
epistemologists have argued that,
since the Enlightenment, many West-
ern philosophers have accepted a view
of knowledge that makes it virtually
(if not actually) impossible to justify
belief in God. But belief in God is not
irrational. If God exists, it would seem
to follow that he could reveal himself
to people in a way which satises the
criteria that govern the formation of
beliefs in a proper epistemology. A
consequence of this is that if any view
of epistemology ruled out the possibil-
ity of actually knowing that the gospel
is true, that view of epistemology
itselfwould have to be false.A dominant view of epistemol-
ogy since the Enlightenment has
conceived of human knowledge as
a building. Not every belief that we
hold is of equal importance in our
intellectual structure. I might believe
that I ate dinner at a friends house last
Tuesday, only to be reminded that it
was really last Wednesday. My belief
that connected eating dinner with my
friend on Tuesday is quickly replacedwith the belief that the dinner actually
took place on Wednesday. This has
hardly caused a massive realignment
amongst all my intellectual beliefs!
There are other beliefs, however, that
are far more important. If my belief
about the day I ate dinner with my
friend can be compared to a dab of
paint on a house, other beliefs are
more like bricks in the wall. They are
far more integral to the structure than
the paint. Still, bricks can be replaced:it is more work, and there are more
implications, but it is still possible to
replace bricks without knocking the
entire house down.
At a deeper level of importance,
however, there are beliefs that func-
tion in our mental buildings like
a foundation functions in a house.
Not only are these beliefs extremely
important, and not only would replac-
ing them require a large-scale mentalrenovation project, our other beliefs
are actually dependent on them. If we
were to logically trace out what justi-
es us in holding a window-level
belief, we would nd that it ultimately
rests on one or more of our founda-
tional beliefs. Beliefs, like walls, can-
not hang in thin air.
This might seem fairly abstract,
but its not really that complex: we
just dont normally take the time to
think about what our beliefs are actu-
ally resting on. Take, for example, my
changed belief about the day I had
dinner at my friends house. Holding
the belief in the rst place assumes the
law of non-contradiction, because I
cant be both at my friends house and
not at my friends house at the same
time and in the same way. It assumes
that my senses work, because it was
presumablymy senses that carried
certain stimuli to my brain, which
were then interpreted as being myfriend, his house, food, the time of day
(supper, not breakfast), etc. It likewise
assumes that the universe is not per-
fectly random, that people maintain
their identities through time, that my
memory works, and a whole lot more.
In this epistemological model, the big
question is not whether some beliefs
are foundational, but which ones are
foundational. What kinds of beliefs
are so basic that they simply cannot bebuilt on any others?
In the traditional model, there
were three types of beliefs that were
considered foundational. The rst type
consisted of beliefs that are true by
denition. For example, the belief that
all bachelors are unmarried cannot be
false, because being unmarried is part
of the very denition of a bachelor.
The same is true of simple analytical
truths, like 1 + 1 = 2.
The second category of founda-
tional beliefs involved things that are
evident to our senses. At the present
moment, my senses are telling me that
Im looking at a computer screen. I
cannot be wrong that to me it seems
like Im looking at a computer screen.
Now this belief might be false be-
cause Im hallucinating, or my crafty
8/11/2019 Sound of Grace, Issue 210, September 2014
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Page 4 September 2014 Issue 210
Gentiles. The Gentiles did not have
any hope at all!They had no hope
because they had no covenant nor did
they have any promise. The Gentles
were not looking for a Messiah. They
were promised nothing but wrath. To
say that the Book of Hebrews is inany way teaching that Gentiles have a
better covenant, a better promise and a
better hope than the Jews is to ignore
what Hebrews and similar passages
clearly state. The word that describes
the state of the Gentiles is without. If
the writer of Hebrews wanted to con-
trast the state of the Jews in contrast
to the Gentles, he would have said the
same thing as Paul said in Ephesians.
The Gentiles did not need a better
hope, they needed a promise that gave
hope, period. Paul specically says the
Gentiles werewithout hope.He does
not say the Gentiles received a better
covenant,they had no covenant at all
until Christ came.
Wherefore remember, that ye
being in time past Gentiles in the
esh, who are called Uncircumci-
sion by that which is called the
Circumcision in the esh made by
hands;
That at that time ye were
without Christ, being aliens from
the commonwealth of Israel, and
strangers from the covenants of
promise, having no hope, and
without God in the world. (Eph.
2:11, 12).
MacArthur is not alone in his view
of Hebrews. A.W. Pink, like MacAr-
thur, openly admits that the classicalReformed view of Hebrews is differ-
ent than his.
The interpretation which we shall
give is not at all in accord with that
advanced by the older writers. It
differs considerably from that found
in the commentaries of Drs. Calvin,
Owen and Gouge, and more recently,
those of A. Saphir, and Dr. J. Brown.
Much as we respect their works, and
deeply as we are indebted to not a little
that is helpful in them, yet we dare
not follow them blindly. To prove
all things (1 Thess. 5:21) is ever our
bounden duty.3
No one had more respect for and
love of the Puritans than Pink, but
he did not hesitate to disagree with
them when he felt their theology waswrong. He basically says the same
thing as MacArthur on Hebrews 6:1-
3.
The writers mentioned above
understood the expression the prin-
ciples of the doctrine of Christ, or
as the margin of the Revised Version
more accurately renders the word of
the beginning of Christ, to refer to
the elementary truths of
Christianity, a summary
of which is given in thesix items that follow in
the second half of verse
1 and the whole of verse
2; while the Let us go
on unto perfection,
they regarded as a call
unto the deeper and
higher things of the Chris-
tian revelation. But for reasons which
to us seem conclusive, such a view of
our passage is altogether untenable. It
fails to take into account the central
theme of this Epistle, and the purposefor which it was written. It does not do
justice at all to the immediate con-
text. It completely breaks down when
tested in its details.4
Our English Bibles says, The
Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the He-
brews. I am sure most of our readers
are aware that the titles found at the
head of the different books of the Bi-
ble are not divinely inspired. In some
instances such tiles are helpful and inother cases they are grossly erroneous.
As an example of the latter, the last
book in the Bible has the title The
Revelation of St. John the Divine,
but the opening sentence of the book
itself designates it The Revelation of
3 A. W. Pink,An Exposition of Hebrews
(Baker Book House, Grand Rapids,
Michigan, MI, year ?) 272
4 Ibid, 27
Jesus Christ!
In almost all of the Epistles there
is a Divinely-named addressee in the
opening verses. However, the contents
of each Epistle are not to be restricted
to those immediately and locally
addressed. The Epistle of James is ad-
dressed to the Twelve Tribes, whichare scattered abroad. But the truth of
this book is applicability for all saints.
Epistles like Philippians and Colos-
sians are clearly addressed to the
church in local cities but it is obvious
that they were not meant to apply only
to those local churches. The truth is
that what Christ said to the apostles in
Mark 13:37What I say untoyou, I
say unto all may well
be applied to the wholeof the Bible.All Scripture
is needed by us (2 Tim.
3:16, 17), and all Scrip-
ture is Gods word to us.
Note carefully that while
at the beginning of his
Epistle to Titus Paul only
addresses Titus himself (Ti-
tus 1:4), yet at the close of this letter
he expressly says, Grace be with you
all! (Titus 3:15)
Although we are at once struck
by the absence of any Divinely-given
title in the opening verses of Hebrews,
the rst sentence enables us to identify
at once those to whom the Epistle was
originally sent: see Hebrews 1:1, 2.
God spake through the prophets to the
children of Israel in the Old Covenant.
It was also unto them He had spoken
through His Son. However, it was not
the Jewish nation at large which was
addressed, but the holy brethren, par-
takers of the heavenly calling among
them.
The Epistle itself contains further
details which serve to identify the
addressees. That it was written to
saints who were by no means young
in the faith is clear from Hebrews
5:12. That it was sent to those who
had suffered severe persecutions
ReisingerContinued from page 2
ReisingerContinued on page 6
All Scripture is
needed by us (2 Tim.
3:16, 17), and all
Scripture is Gods
word to us.
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Issue 210 September 2014 Page 5
ThorhauerContinued on page 16
Introduction:
What do these men all have in
common: Christopher Columbus,
Amerigo Vespucci, Ponce de Leon,
Ferdinand Magellan, Hernando Cor-
tez, Francisco Pizarro, and Hernando
de Soto?
They were Spanish explorers. They
were all part of one countrys effort
to gain essentially one thing, gold.
Spain was at the forefront of exploring
the new worlds because they hopedfor riches in gold. There were other
reasons mixed in with the end goal
of riches, but it is a sure thing that
riches are what drove the men to sail,
and riches are what drove the rul-
ers to support these explorers. Gold
was valuable 500 years ago and gold
is still valuable today. The countries
that led the exploration of the new
world poured much of their resources
into nding gold in the new world.
Five-hundred years later things havechanged very little in this regard.
I recently watched the show Gold
Rushon the Discovery Channel. It is
the story of modern day gold miners
in Alaska. These men spend millions
of dollars and work from dawn till
dusk for days on end for what seems
like a tiny amount of gold. This small
bit of gold is worth a lot of money;
it is precious and it is valuable. For
centuries people have been known topour their lifes resources into attain-
ing it. The men of Gold Rushleave
their families behind, mortgage their
houses, and even risk their health if
necessary in order to get this gold.
And then they create a TV show so we
can watch as they pursue their endeav-
or! And yet, almost every one of you
has something in your possession that
has qualities which make it even more
desirable than gold!
Lets read about it now.
Psalms 19:7-11
7The law of the Lord is perfect,
reviving the soul;
the testimony of the Lord is
sure,
making wise the simple;
8the precepts of the Lord are
right,
rejoicing the heart;
the commandment of the Lord
is pure,
enlightening the eyes;
9the fear of the Lord is clean,
enduring forever;
the rules of the Lord are true,
and righteous altogether.
10More to be desired are they
than gold,
even much ne gold;
sweeter also than honey
and drippings of the honeycomb.
11Moreover, by them is your
servant warned;
in keeping them there is great
reward. (ESV)
These verses show a typical
example of Hebrew poetry in which
we see six parallel statements about
the Word of God. Each one tells us
a critical detail about the nature and
function of the Word. In this article,
we will approach this passage by rst
looking at the nature of Gods Word
in each verse. After understanding
the nature of the Word we will then
look to understand the function of this
Word for our lives. So rst the nature,
then the function, or to put in very
simple terms we will look at what the
Word isand what the Word does.
I. The Word is:
Lets focus rst on what the Word
is. There are a couple of reasons for
this. First, this is what David did. No-
tice in each verse we rst see a state-
ment of what the Word is, that is, we
see a description of an attribute of the
Word: perfect, sure, right, and so on.
Then from that we see a function that
follows: revives, endures, makes one
wise. Since this is Davids approach,so it will be ours as well. But there
is also a practical aspect to this. We
need to know the characteristics of the
Word before we can truly appreciate
how the Word is to function. In short,
we must understand what it is so that
we can then understand what it does.
Perfect - v7a The law of the
LORD isperfect, reviving the soul;
David tells us that the law of the
Lord is perfect. The word law here hasthe sense of the revealed will of God.
It is the very will of God made plain
to us in the pages of Scripture. We are
told that this book is perfect. When
David says it is perfect he means that
it is not lacking in any way. It is com-
plete; it is beautiful; it is practical.
It is complete in its content as the
revealed will of God. That is, it does
not lack content. It is beautiful in its
expression of God and his will. It ispractical; it is very real in its descrip-
tion of the world and of man, which
makes it very useful.
Now, what does the world do with
things that are in a sense perfect?
There are things we can hold and see
in this world every day that might be
described as complete, beautiful, and
real. What does the world do with
Psalm 19:7-11
The Soul Satisfying Word
John Thorhauer
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Page 6 September 2014 Issue 210
ReisingerContinued on page 8
was written, of those in Israel who had
believed on the Lord Jesus. Unlike
the Gentiles, who, for long centuries
past, had lost all knowledge of the true
God, and, in consequence, worshipped
idols, the Jews had a Divine religion,
and a Divinely-appointed place of
worship. To be called upon toforsake
these, which had been venerated bytheir fathers for over a thousand years,
was to make a big demand upon them.
It was natural that even those among
them who had savingly believed on
Christ should want to retain the forms
and ceremonies amid which they had
been brought up; the more so, seeing
that the Temple still stood and the
Levitical priesthood still functioned.
An endeavor had been made to link
Christianity on to Judaism, and as
Acts 21:20 tells us there were many
thousands of the early Jewish Chris-
tians who were zealous of the law
as the next verses clearly show, the
ceremonial law.6
Basically, the early Jewish believ-
ers wanted to Judaize Christianity
and Christianize Judaism. However,
in order to accomplish that
they had to deny the
clear teaching of the New
Covenant. They literally
had to give up the reli-gion they had practiced
all their life and embrace
the Gospel as the fulll-
ment of what was prom-
ised in the Old Covenant and
fullled in Christ.
It was a small thing that their
goods had been conscated; but they
had also been banished from the holy
places. Hitherto they had enjoyed
the privileges of devout Israelites:
they could take part in the beautifuland God-appointed services of the
sanctuary; but now they were treated
as unclean and apostates. Unless they
gave up faith in Jesus, and forsook the
assembling of themselves together,
they were not allowed to enter the
Temple, they were banished from the
altar, the sacrice, the high priest, the
house of Jehovah.
6 Ibid, 11
(cf. Acts 8:1) is plain from what we
read in Hebrews 10:32. That it was
addressed to a Christian community
of considerable size is evident from
Hebrews 13:24. From this last refer-
ence we are inclined to conclude that
this Epistle was rst delivered to the
church in Jerusalem (Acts 11:22), orto the churches in Judea (Acts 9:31),
copies of which would be made and
forwarded to Jewish Christians in
foreign lands. Thus, our Epistle was
rst addressed to those descendants of
Abraham who, by grace, had believed
on their Savior-Messiah.5
The purpose for writing Hebrews
is clear. It was to instruct Jewish
believers that Judaism had been su-
perseded by Christianity. We must re-
member that most of the earliest con-
verts to Christ were Jews by natural
birth. They really struggled with leav-
ing their former religion behind. They
were not free from most of the Jewish
prejudices especially when it came to
accepting the saved Gentiles as true
children of God. On several
occasions we have noted
that two things happened
on the Day of Pentecost
that Jewish believers had
difculty accepting. One
was not just accepting
Gentiles as true children
of God but realizing that
the saved Gentile was raisedto total equality in every way to a saved
Jew. The second thing was that the Jews
who rejected Christ were lowered to
an equal status with the pagan Gen-
tiles. The Jew/Gentile designation
was 100% dropped and there was a
total equality of Jew and Gentile bothin and outside of Christ. In his early
Epistles the apostle Paul wrote several
times on this point, and sought to
wean them from an attachment to the
Mosaic institutions. But only in this
Epistle does the writer deal fully and
systematically with the subject.
It is difcult for us to appreciate
the position, at the time this Epistle
5 Ibid, 12
By clinging to the Messiah they
were to be severed from Messiahs
people. This was, indeed, a great and
perplexing trial; that for the hope
of Israels glory they were banished
from the place which God had chosen,
and where the divine Presence was
revealed, and the symbols and ordi-
nances had been the joy and strengthof their fathers; that they were to be
no longer children of the covenant and
of the house, but worse than Gentiles,
excluded from the outer court, cut off
from the commonwealth of Israel.
This was indeed a sore and mysteri-
ous trial. Cleaving to the promises
made unto their fathers, cherishing
the hope in constant prayer that their
nation would yet accept the Messiah,
it was the severest test to which their
faith could be put, when their loyalty
to Jesus involved separation from all
the sacred rights and privileges of
Jerusalem.7
It is obvious that the stakes were
high when a Jew embraced the Gos-
pel. If ever it was essential to be sure
you understood the God ordained re-
lationship of the Old Covenant to the
New Covenant, it was in those early
days of the church. The Jews went
from a religion that was based on vis-
ible ceremonies that were all withoutquestion ordained of God to a religion
based on things unseen. They had a
better priest than Aaron but he was in
heaven and totally unseen. A verbal
promise had replaced Aaron and his
beautiful robes and the ritual of the
Day of Atonement.
The theme of Hebrews is the
super-abounding excellence of Chris-
tianity over Judaism. The sum and
substance, the center and circumfer-
ence, the light and life of Christian-ity, is Christ. Therefore, the method
followed by the Holy Spirit in this
Epistle, in developing its dominant
theme, is to show the immeasurable
superiority of Christ over all that had
gone before. One by one the various
objects in which the Jews boasted are
taken up, and in the presence of the su-
7 Ibid, 12
ReisingerContinued from page 4
Basically, the early
Jewish believers want-
ed to Judaize Christi-anity and Christianize
Judaism.
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Issue 210 September 2014 Page 7
Jesus answered, If I glorify
myself, my glory is nothing. It is
my Father who glories me, ofwhom you say, He is our God.
But you have not known him. I
know him. If I were to say that I
do not know him, I would be a liar
like you, but I do know him and
I keep his word (John 8:54-56
ESV).
The New Testament sometimes
uses hypothetical statements. We
must recognize such statements as
hypothetical and not use them tooverthrow clear doctrines. Some of
the most well-known of these hypo-
thetical statements are in the Book of
Hebrews:
For it is impossible to restore
again to repentance those who
have once been enlightened, who
have tasted the heavenly gift, and
have shared in the Holy Spirit,
and have tasted the goodness of
the word of God and the powers
of the age to come, if they then fall
away, since they are crucifying
once again the Son of God to their
own harm and holding him up to
contempt (Heb. 6:4-7 ESV)
For if we go on sinning delib-
erately after receiving the knowl-
edge of the truth, there no longer
remains a sacrice for sins, but a
fearful expectation of judgment,
and a fury of re that will consume
the adversaries. Anyone who has
set aside the law of Moses dieswithout mercy on the evidence
of two or three witnesses. How
much worse punishment, do you
think, will be deserved by the one
who has spurned the Son of God,
and has profaned the blood of the
covenant by which he was sancti-
ed, and has outraged the Spirit of
grace? (Heb. 10:26-29 ESV).
These texts certainly, on the
surface, appear to contradict the truthof the believers absolute security in
Christ. They seem to teach you can be
saved and then be lost.
1. Do these texts prove a true
Christian can lose his or her salvation?
No!
2. Do these texts teach that IF you
renounce your faith in Christ you will
be lost? Yes!
3. Does the assurance that a Chris-
tian cannot be lost do away with the
absolute necessity of his or her perse-
verance in faith unto the end? No!
Isnt this a contradiction? No!
One of the texts that helped me
with the Hebrew texts mentioned is
John 8:54, 55, quoted above.
1. Could Jesus lie? No!
2. If Christ would have said, I do
not know Him, would he have been
lying? Yes!
3. Because Jesus could not lie,does that mean He did not have to tell
the truth? No!
4. Is this a contradiction? No!
The problem is confusing the fact
that a true believer is secure in Christ
and can never be lost with labeling, in
an absolute sense, a given individual
as saved.
1. Can I tell a specic individual
who professes to be a Christian thatIF he forsakes Christ he will be lost?
Yes!
2. Can I tell him that if he is a true
Christian he is secure in Christ? Yes!
3. Can I give any specic person
absolute assurance that they are a true
Christian and can never perish? No!
4. Isnt that a contradiction? No!
5. Can I proclaim, You are saved
as long as you believe? Yes!
6. Can you quit believing and still
be saved? No!
7. Does being eternal secure in
Christ do away with the necessity of
perseverance in faith? No!
8. Will every true Christian keep
on believing to the end? Yes!
Hypothetical Statements
John G. Reisinger
Consider your state. You are a pardoned sinner, not under the law but under grace, freely, fully saved from the
guilt of all your sins. There is none to condemn, God having justied you. He sees you in his Son, washed you
in his blood, clothed you in his righteousness, and he embraces him and you, the head and the members, with the
same affection.
William Romaine
Treatises on the Life, Walk and Triumph of Faith, 1830, p. 305.
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Page 8 September 2014 Issue 210ReisingerContinued from page 6
perlative glory of the Son of God they
pale into utter insignicance. We are
shown First, His superiority over the
prophets, Hebrews 1:1-3. Second, His
superiority over angels in Hebrews 1:4
to Hebrews 2:18. Third, His superior-
ity over Moses in Hebrews 3:1-19.
Fourth, His superiority over Joshua,Hebrews 4:1-13. Fifth, His superiority
over Aaron in Hebrews 5:14 to 7:18.
Sixth, His superiority over the whole
ritual of Judaism, which is developed
by showing the surpassing excellency
of the new covenant over the old,
in Hebrews 7:19 to Hebrews 10:39.
Seventh, His superiority over each
and all of the Old Testament saints,
in Hebrews 11:1 to Hebrews 12:3. In
the Lord Jesus, Christians have the
substance and reality, of which Juda-
ism contained but the shadows and
gures.8
Hebrews divides itself into two
parts, the rst from 1:1 to 10:18 is
doctrinal, and the second, from 10:19
to the end is practice. In some obvious
respects Hebrews differs from all the
other Epistles of the New Testament.
The name of the writer is omitted,
there is no opening salutation, the
people to whom it was rst specical-
ly and locally sent are not mentioned.On the positive side we may note, that
the typical teachings of the Old Testa-
ment are expounded here at greater
length than elsewhere; the priesthood
of Christ is opened up, fully, only in
this Epistle.
The rst time that Christ is re-
ferred to in this Epistle it is as seated
at the right hand of the Majesty
on high (Heb. 1:3), for it is with a
heavenly Christ that Christianity hasto do: note the other reference in this
Epistle to the same factHebrews
1:13, 8:1, 10:12, 12:2. In perfect ac-
cord with Hebrews 1:3, which strikes
the keynote of the Epistle, in addition
to the heavenly Christ, reference is
made to the heavenly calling (Heb.
3:1), to the heavenly gift (Heb. 6:4),
to heavenly things (Heb. 8:5), to
8 Ibid, 13
the heavenly Country (Heb. 11:16),
to the heavenly Jerusalem (Heb.
12:22), and to the church of the
First-born, whose names are written in
Heaven (Heb. 12:23). This emphasis
is easily understood when we remem-
ber that our Epistle is addressed to
those whose inheritance, religiousrelationships, and hopes, had been all
earthly.
The doctrinal importance of this
book is exceeded by none, not even by
the Roman Epistle. Where its teach-
ings are believed, understood, and
embodied in the life, ritualism and
legalism (the two chief enemies of
Christianity) receive their death blow.
In no other book of Scripture are the
sophistries and deceptions of Roman-
ism so clearly and systematically ex-posed. So fully and pointedly are the
errors of Popery refuted, it might well
have been writtensince that satanic
system became established? Well did
one of the Puritans say, God foresee-
ing what poisonous heresies would
be hatched by the Papacy, prepared
this antidote against
them.9
There is no
agreement about
the author ofHebrews. Most
recent writers
doubt that Paul
wrote Hebrews.
Pink says it was
Paul. Dr. S. Lewis
Johnson said if
you read Hebrews in an English
translation, you would think Paul
wrote it, but if you read it in the
original Greek, you would believe
Paul could not possibly have writ-
ten it. I will leave that subject for
those more capable than I am. It is
enough for me to believe the Holy
Spirit is the real author regardless
of what human pen he was pleased
to use.
The opening verses of Hebrews
immediately show the writers inten-
9 Ibid, 14
tion.
In the past God spoke to our
ancestors through the prophets at
many times and in various ways,
but in these last days he has spo-
ken to us by his Son (Heb. 1:1-2).
The rst thing to note is that Godreveals himself to his people. He does
not play hide and seek. He sometimes
speaks verbally and directly, he some-
times speaks through prophets and
he uses various other ways. Gods
speaks his full and nal message in
his son and the message God seeks
to convey is complete in Christ. The
Bible is Gods word revelation and
is divided up into two sections, the 39
books of the Old Testament written
before Christ came, and the 27 booksof the New Testament written after
Christ came. The subject is the same
in both sections. The 39 books written
before Christ reveal the promise that
Christ the Messiah is coming. The 27
books written after Christ came teach
that the promise has
been fullled.
God cannot be
known in a saving
sense unless he isplease to reveal him-
self and he reveals
himself in saving
grace only by his
Holy Spirit using his
Holy Word. Creation
reveals enough about
God to justly condemn all men but it
does not reveal enough to save any
man. Paul is quite emphatic concern-
ing an unregenerate mans totally in-
ability to understand spiritual things.
In I Corinthians Paul sums up the
various ways we gain knowledge.
But as it is written, Eye hath
not seen, nor ear heard, neither
have entered into the heart of
man, the things which God hath
prepared for them that love him (1
Cor. 2:9 KJV).
There is thescientic method-eye
God cannot be known
in a saving sense unless
he is please to reveal himself
and he reveals himself in
saving grace only by his Holy
Spirit using his Holy Word.
Creation reveals enough about
God to justly condemn all men
but it does not reveal enough
to save any man.
8/11/2019 Sound of Grace, Issue 210, September 2014
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Issue 210 September 2014 Page 9hath not seen we learn by observ-
ing facts and forming laws seeking to
describe reality. However, no scien-
tists eye will ever see God in either
a microscope or telescope. Unsaved
man can see Gods footprints but can
only see God himself in the atoning
work of Christ. Science at its best can-not nd God unless God is pleased to
open any persons eyes.
There is the historical method-ear
hath not heard. We learn by listening
to the great historians and philoso-
phers. Again, we come up empty if we
want to know what God is like. We
may examine every history book ever
written and digest every philosophical
treatise propounded and our ears will
never hear God speak words of savinggrace.
There is the artistic method-
neither entered into the heart of
man.The artist, whether he uses
paint and brush or music notes and
instruments is supposed to be able to
feel and express reality. However, no
artist of any kind can create a true pic-
ture of God. The artist is supposed to
have a deeper sense of realty than we
ordinary folks do but all of his depic-
tions of God are often among the most
ridiculous. How simple and satisfying
are the words of God. A ten year
old on his knees who understands the
catechism can see more spiritual truth
that a philosopher does on his tiptoes.
The writer of Hebrews sees Christ
as the full and nal revelation of God.
All we need to know about God is
found in the life and work of Christand the New Testament is the full and
nal revelation of that life and work.
Every heresy will involve either add-
ing something to the Word of God
or denying something written in the
Word of God. The Apostles alone are
inspired by the Holy Spirit to give the
Church holy inspired Scripture.
One other important thing should
be noted in the introduction. It is often
said that we must learn to separate thegood from the better and the bet-
ter from the best. This is certainly
true when we study the Book of He-
brews. There is a list of specic things
mentioned as being done away and
replaced by something better. Not a
single one of those things those things
are done away because they are bad
in any sense whatever. They are done
away only because they had served
the purpose for which God originallyestablished them. When we insist the
Aaronic priesthood has been totally
done away and replaced by Christ,
we are in no sense saying or inferring
that Aaron was anything less than a
godly man who faithful served God
his whole life. His ministry was done
away and replaced by a better ministry
that could accomplish what Aarons
ministry could never accomplish.
We must never think that compar-
ingtwo things and determining one
is better than the other is the same
saying one of the two things being
compared is wrong.It is quite clear
that the Law, as covenant terms, is
done away in Christ, but it is just
as clear that the Law is still just as
holy, just and good (Romans 7:12)
as it was when God wrote it with his
nger at Mount Sinai. The law, asthe words of the covenant (Exodus
34:28), is done away in Christ because
its propose has been accomplished.
The tables of the covenant (Deut.
9:9-11) were holy, just and good
but the New Covenant terms of Christ
are better (Hebrews 8:6). In all of the
contrasts in Hebrews, we are not deal-
ing with bad things compared with
good things. We are dealing withgood
thingsbeing compared with better
things.
The School of Pain
J. R. Miller, "Life's Byways and Waysides"
Everyone has sorrow. Being a Christian does not exempt anyone from grief. But faith in Christ brings a transfor-
mation of sorrow. Not only are we taught to endure the sorrows that come to us patiently and submissivelybut we
are assured that there is a blessing in them for us, if we accept them with love and trust.
One of the deepest truths taught in the Bible
is that earthly sorrow has a mission in the sanctifying of life. "Nodiscipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and
peace for those who have been trained by it. God disciplines us for our goodthat we may share in His holiness."
Hebrews 12:10-11
We dread pain! And yet the person who has not experienced painhas not yet touched the deepest and most pre-
cious meanings of life. There are things we never can learnexcept in the school of pain! There are heights of life
we never can attainexcept in the bitterness of sorrow. There are joys we never can haveuntil we have walked in
the dark ways of sorrow. Not to have sorrow, in some form, is to miss one of life's holiest opportunities. We get our
best thingsout of afiction! "I have rened you in the furnace of suffering!" Isaiah 48:10
Courtesy of Grace Gems: www.GraceGems.org
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Page 10 September 2014 Issue 210
WhiteContinued from page 1 faith in the Son of God, who loved
me and gave Himself for me. Now,
your number one priority is no longer
you but Christ. According to 2 Cor-
inthians 5:15, part of the reason Jesus
came was to rescue us from living for
ourselves: And He died for all so that
those who live should no longer livefor themselves, but for the One who
died for them and was raised.
Life is for Christ and is for Christ-
centered ministry.2Philippians 1:22
reads, Now if I live on in the esh,
this means fruitful work for me; and
I dont know which one I should
choose. Then he writes, Since I am
persuaded of this, I know that I will
remain and continue with all of you
for your progress and joy in the faith,so that, because of me, your con-
dence may grow in Christ Jesus when
I come to you again. (Phil 1:25-26).
Paul gives his life for the strengthen-
ing and encouragement of the body of
Christ. He loved Christ and therefore
loved the body of Christ. The purpose
of this Christ-centered ministry is so
that your condence may grow. As
he said in Philippians 1:14:
Most of the brothers
in the Lord have gainedcondence from my
imprisonment and dare
even more to speak the
message fearlessly. God
wants us as believers to
grow in our condence
to speak the word of Christ
without fear, to be unashamed in
representing Him, and to progress and
increase in joy in the faith. This is
what our life is for!
As far as Pauls own personal
interests are concerned, it is better for
him to die and be with Jesus, but it is
better for the Philippians if he re-
mains. As we have seen and will see,
this principle of love, of dying to self
2 Stephen E. Fowl,Philippians (Grand
Rapids: Eerdmans, 2005), 33; D.A.
Carson,Basics for Believers (Grand
Rapids: Baker, 1996), 29.
for the good of others is vital to true
Christianity.3In chapter two he will
call it the Jesus mindset:
Do nothing out of rivalry or conceit,
but in humility consider others as more
important than yourselves. Everyone
should look out not only for his own
interests, but also for the interests ofothers. Make your own attitude that of
Christ Jesus, who, existing in the form
of God, did not consider equality with
God as something to be used for His own
advantage. Instead He emptied Himself
by assuming the form of a slave, taking
on the likeness of men. And when He had
come as a man in His external form, He
humbled Himself by becoming obedient
to the point of deatheven to death on a
cross(Phil. 2:3-8).
Living is for Christ and Christ-centered ministry.
Fifth, we should make it our aim to
make much of Jesus by death whether
by life or by death. Why? Because
death is gain. For me, living is Christ
and dying is gain. Putting it together,
we should make much of Jesus in life
because living is Christ and we should
make much of Jesus in our death
because death is gain. Paul desires to
depart and be with Jesus. I have thedesire to depart and be with Christ -
which is far better (Phil. 1:23). It is
literally much more better to go and
be with our King.
To die is gain? He desires to
depart? In other words, he desires to
die? This is the opposite of the way
the world views death. People try to
deal with the fear of death by denying
it. Just look at the cosmetic surgery
industry. We refuse to admit we are
outwardly wasting away. Look at the
millions of dollars spent during the
last weeks of life. Every gray hair (or
lost hair) and wrinkle is an indict-
ment. The wages of sin is death. Do
you ever notice how our culture is
fascinated with youth? How often
do you see elderly people holding
microphones? We have a youth fetish.
3 Fowl,Philippians,52.
do so with all boldness. In Ephesians
6:19-20, Paul writes, Pray also for
me, that the message may be given to
me when I open my mouth to make
known with boldness the mystery of
the gospel. For this I am an ambas-
sador in chains. Pray that I might bebold enough in Him to speak as I
should. We shouldnt cower at the
thought of ridicule but should repre-
sent the King with condence because
He is the King.
Third, we should make it our aim
to make much of Jesus all the time.
My eager expectation and hope is
that I will not be ashamed about any-
thing, but that now as always, with all
boldness, Christ will be highly hon-ored in my body, whether by life or by
death. Now and always. All the time.
Are we this Christ-obsessed? Is he
central in our hearts and lives? Every
moment in life presents us with an op-
portunity to be ashamed of Christ or
to make much of Christ. Annie Dillard
once said, How we spend our days is,
of course, how we spend our
lives. Lives spent exalt-
ing Christ consist of days
spent exalting Christ, anddays spent exalting Christ
consist of a hundred
small, everyday moments
in which we seek to live
for King Jesus.
Fourth, we should seek
to make much of Jesus by our life.
Paul says whether by life or by
death. Then he gives us the reason:
because (gar)living is Christ. For
me, living is Christ and dying isgain. To live is Christ. Our life is no
longer our own. Our life is now hid
with Christ. The nest commentary
on this verse is Galatians 2:20: I no
longer live, but Christ lives in me. The
life I now live in the body,1I live by
1 Body here simply means bodily
life. Karl Barth,Epistle to the Philip-
pians (Louisville: Westminster John
Knox, 2002), 35.
. . . this principle oflove, of dying to self
for the good of others
is vital to true Christi-
anity.
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Issue 210 September 2014 Page 11
WhiteContinued on page 12
Sadly, Evangelical churches have
largely followed our culture. Our
culture nds elderly people disturbing
and annoying. This is because age and
deterioration is a reminder to them
that death is coming.
You will die. Woody Allen said
that he didnt fear death, just didntwant to be there when it happens.
Louis XV even demanded that those
around him not even use the word
death! Guess what? He died anyway.
Try to deny as they might, graveyards
continue to ll up. Death is the judg-
ment of God on sin. God warned our
rst parents that if they did not obey
him they would die. Praise God that
he has loved us in this way: He sent
his one and only Son so that if we willtrust in him, we will not die but will
live with him forever.
Christian, do you view death as
gain? It is okay to dread death (see
Phil. 2:27), but that is not the same as
fearing it. Christians have no reason to
fear death. Why would we? Hebrews
2:14-15 says that Jesus shared in our
humanity so that through His death
He might destroy the one holding the
power of deaththat is, the Devil -and free those who were held in slav-
ery all their lives by the fear of death.
For those in Christ what or better,
whom - is on the other side of death
is gain. Ligon Duncan writes, On
the one hand, death is the last enemy.
Believers, too, are sinners, and so un-
less the Lord comes soon, we will all
taste death. The Christian views death
as an enemy; it is not a natural part of
life. Death is actually the way things
were never intended to be. Death is ajudgment of God against sin. Death is
the most unnatural thing in this world.
But on the other hand, death has be-
come for the believer an entrance into
glory.4For those in Christ, death has
lost its sting. Death has been defeated
through the death of Jesus. Through
death, Jesus destroyed death. We need
4 Ligon Duncan,Fear Not!(Scotland:
Christian Focus, 2001), 17.
not fear it. How freeing? The evan-
gelist D.L. Moody once remarked,
Some day you will read in the papers
that D.L. Moody, of East Northeld,
is dead. Dont you believe a word of
it! At that moment I shall be more
alive than I am now.5
Paul uses this same word gain(kerdos) in the next chapter. What
was gain to him is now loss because
of Jesus. But everything that was a
gain to me, I have considered to be
a loss because of Christ (Phil. 3:7).
So death is gain because we have
already counted all but Christ as loss.
In death, we gain Christ in a fresh
way. If the thought of being with your
Lord does not excite you, I am not
sure why you are a Christian?There are better hobbies.
Our desire should be to be
with the Lord. Incidentally,
our main desire for heaven
should not be to reunite
with family. I recall attend-
ing a youth evangelistic
event called Heavens
Gates, Hells Flames. True
to its Finneyistic theology, the method
is to manipulate the emotions and lit-
erally scare the hell out of kids. Onescene portrays the death of a young
girl in a car accident. Her parents had
died years before. As the little girl
was running to the gate of heaven,
Jesus is treated as a door man! He
opens the gate and the little girl runs
right past Jesus into the arms of her
parents. You want to see your family
again after death, dont you? Pray this
prayer. Sign this card. Youre good.
Obviously this is a distortion of real-
ity. Yes, in Gods kindness, we will
see dead family members who are in
Christ, but our primary desire ought to
be to be with Jesus.
Here in these verses we learn a bit
5 William R. Moody, The Life of Dwight
L. Moody(Grand Rapids: Revell,
1900), iii quoted in Matt Chandler, To
Live is Christ To Die is Gain (Colora-
do Springs: David C. Cook, 2013), 38.
about what happens when we die be-
fore Christ returns (what is commonly
called the intermediate state). When
a Christian dies, they are ushered into
the presence of the Lord. I have the
desire to depart and be with Christ
(Phil. 1:23; cf. 2 Cor. 5:8). Jesus as-
sured the thief on the cross that hewould be with Jesus in paradise that
very day (Luke 23:43). This going to
be with the Lord is what we mean by
heaven. I hasten to add there is not a
syllable in Scripture to undergird the
doctrine of purgatory. Rather, my sin,
not in part but the whole, has been
nailed to the cross.
So heaven will be glorious. It will
be much more better, but heaven is
not our nal destination.N.T. Wright writes,
The ultimate destina-
tion is (once more) not
going to heaven when
you die but being bodi-
ly raised into the trans-
formed, glorious like-
ness of Jesus Christ.6
I own a great little book
called,Heaven Its Not the End of
the World.7Our nal destination is the
resurrection of the body and the reno-
vation of the earth. We see this toward
the end of this very letter. Philippians
3:21 reads, He will transform the
body of our humble condition into
the likeness of His glorious body, by
the power that enables Him to subject
everything to Himself (cf. 3:11). This
is why the Bible calls death sleep,
which means an awakening will occur
(1 Cor.15:51-52, 1 Thess. 4:14). We
go to be with the Lord, soul ripped
asunder from body, but when Christ
returns they will be reunited as they
were meant to in resurrection life.
Thomas Boston wrote, All men
6 N.T. Wright, Surprised by Hope(New
York: HarperOne, 2008), 168.
7 David Lawrence,Heaven Its Not the
End of the World (London: Scripture
Union, 1995).
For those in Christ
what or better,
whom - is on the other
side of death is gain.
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Page 12 September 2014 Issue 210
must die, but as mens lives are very
different, so their account in death is,
also. To an ungodly man, death is loss,
the greatest loss; but to a believer, it
is gain, the greatest gain.8Our hope
is not in the here and now but in the
there and then.9
So again we see that all of life is
about worship. Honoring King Jesus
must be on our minds all the time,
not just Sundays. We must seek to
make much of Jesus now and always,
not being ashamed but bold in repre-
senting our Lord, whether by life or
by death. Paul was sold out for the
8 Quoted in Duncan,Fear Not!, 27.
9 Michael E. Wittmer, The Last Enemy(Grand Rapids: Discovery House,
2012), 107.
WhiteContinued from page 12 Lord in this way. For him, life meant
ministry, death was gain, and suffering
made him like Jesus and advanced the
gospel. What can the world or Satan
do to a man or woman of God who
sees life as Christ and death as gain
because they will be with Christ?10
John Chrysostom, the famous monkturned priest who was born in 349,
writes, If the empress wishes to ban-
ish me, let her do so; the earth is the
Lords. If she wants to have me sawn
asunder, I will have Isaiah for an ex-
ample. If she wants me to be drowned
in the ocean, I think of Jonah. If I
am to be thrown in the re, the three
men in the furnace suffered the same.
If cast before wild beasts, I remem-
ber Daniel in the lions den. If she
wants me to be stoned, I have before
10 Chandler, To Live is Christ,24-25.
me Stephen, the rst martyr. If she
demands my head, let her do so; John
the Baptist shines before me. Naked I
came from my mothers womb, naked
shall I leave this world. Paul reminds
me, If I still pleased men, I would not
be the servant of Christ.11
This is why you were created. This
is why you are here. To make him
look great! The over-arching purpose
of your life should be to see Christ
made much of. All the time. With all
boldness. Whether in life or death.
11 Saint Chrysostom, Saint Chrysostom
on the Priesthood Ascetic Treatises,
Select Homilies and Letters and Homi-
lies on the Statutes,ed. Philip Schaff
(Whitesh, Mont.: Kessinger Publish-ing, 2004), 14 quoted in Chandler, To
Live is Christ, 24-25.
Rethinking the Lawby Eric LaneIs the Law of Moses (the Sinai code beginning with the Ten Commandments) the rule of life
for the Christian, as it was for the Israelite in Old Testament times?
This question concerns many Christians, as it did the author of this book, and in fact it was the
main motive for writing it. This question cannot be answered without a thorough examination ofthe whole subject of the Law in both testaments. The author is convinced that he has made this
examination and in so doing has answered the question about the Christians rule of life. He offers
his ndings to other Christians in the hope that this will deepen their understanding of the whole
subject and of Scripture generally.
Eric Lane was born and raised in London. He served in the Royal Air Force and is a graduate of Cambridge Uni-
versity with degrees in English and Theology. Eric served for nine years in the Anglican ministry in Carlisle and Lon-
don, UK. After that he ministered in independent evangelical churches in various parts of the UK. He is now retired
and living in Yateley, Hampshire.
226 pages, paperback with scripture index, see pages 13 & 14 for price and ordering information.
The New Covenant ChurchEkklesiaof ChristJohn G. Reisinger, with his familiar clarity and respect for the Scriptures, investigates the nature of
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cers and by-laws? Or is the church rst and foremost those called to faith in Christ, by the Holy Spirit,
through the Word of God proclaimed? The true and accurate translation of the word ekklesiademon-
strates, namely, that the ekklesiaof Christ is they, meaning people, and not it, meaning an organization.
If you cannot speak of the ekklesiaas they but constantly think and speak in terms of it you have not
totally come out of Romanism!
John G. Reisinger has served the body of Christ for over sixty years. This is his twenty-fourth title in
print. He is well known and loved for his gift of making seemingly difcult topics easily understandable
to the edication of The New Covenant Church Ekklesiaof Christ.
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8/11/2019 Sound of Grace, Issue 210, September 2014
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Issue 210 September 2014 Page 15WestContinued from page 3
colleague replaced my monitor with a
holographic image, or my senses are
just always mistaken about the exter-
nal world. So the claim that I seem to
be seeing a computer screen is not a
claim that there really is a computer
screen in the external world: it is themuch less important claim that it
seems to me there is one, and I cannot
be wrong about how things seem to
me in my internal world.
The third type of foundational
beliefs is classied as incorrigible.
These are beliefs that cannot be bro-
ken down and disavowed; they cannot
be corrected (French etymology). A
common example of an incorrigible
belief would be the belief that I am ina state of pain (when I actually am in
a state of pain). There might not be
any organic cause for my pain, or it
might be generated in a psychosomat-
ic way, but nevertheless if I am in a
state of pain, I cannot be wrong about
how Im feeling and the state that Im
experiencing.
What these three types of belief
all share is the fact that they do not
depend on other beliefs for their
plausibility. They rest on themselves,
by virtue of the fact that they cannot
be wrong. The goal for knowledge in
this traditional foundationalist model
was to build all other beliefs on top of
these. If other beliefs did not rest logi-
cally on these foundational beliefs,
then they were rejected. Furthermore,
other beliefs were held probabilisti-
cally, because one could not be 100%
sure that they were true. If this was
rigorously applied, rampant skepti-cism could result. It could also make
ethical and religious beliefs highly
suspect, or even positively irrational,
since they didnt t very well on the
type of beliefs that were admitted into
the foundation.
Often in the post-Enlightenment
world, Christian apologists tried to
defend the faith by showing how
Christian belief could be justied on
the standard laid down by the foun-
dationalists. The Reformed episte-
mologists have denied that this is
necessary. In fact, they have argued
that Christians have no need whatso-
ever to meet the challenge posed by
such a strong foundationalist point of
view. One of the reasons they have forrejecting foundationalism is that the
whole paradigm is incoherent. We do
not have time to follow their critique,
but part of the rationale is that the
foundational system fails its own test.
The acceptance of foundationalism as
an epistemological model is not itself
a belief that is foundational, nor does
it logically connect to the categories
of foundational belief that the model
posits. As a result, the foundational
paradigm fails to be properly justiedon the basis of its own standards.
Anotherand more important
reason for their rejection of the foun-
dationalist challenge is that Christians
simply do not come to believe in God
on the basis of long chains of reason-
ing from premises to conclusions. On
the contrary, Christians nd belief in
God simply rising up inside of them.
They might stand under a starry sky,
and the absolute awe and grandeurcan spontaneously convince them
that there is a God. They might hear
a sermon on the cross of Christ and
nd themselves profoundly convinced
that the gospel is true. This reality of
belief-formation allows illiterate be-
lievers and young children to be justi-
ed in their intellectual acceptance of
Christian truth. Part of the problem
with classical proofs for the existence
of God is that very few people have
the specialized training to even follow
the drift of the arguments, let alone
evaluate their strength. If believing
in God could only be justied on the
basis of a long philosophical defense,
hardly any Christians would be intel-
lectually justied in their faith.
Reformed epistemologists do not
reject foundationalism entirely; they
simply recognize that the traditional
model is unsustainable. Foundational-
ism can be maintained, but only in a
modied form. The foundation needs
to be made wider, and more beliefs
need to be included. Beliefs that are
foundational are called basic beliefs.
These are beliefs that are not mediated
by other beliefs, or beliefs that are ac-cepted as the conclusion of chains of
reasoning and logical deduction. The
great distinctive of Reformed episte-
mology is that it maintains that belief
in God is a properly basic belief.
Believing in God can be a founda-
tional belief. As a result, you do not
need long philosophical arguments
to justify your belief in God: on the
contrary, given certain circumstances,
you cant help but believe in God!
Reformed epistemologists ar-
gue that God has designed us with a
faculty (or a noetic process) called the
sensus divinitatis (i.e., the sense of
deity, or the sense of the divine). This
faculty can produce belief in God.
According to Reformed epistemol-
ogy, the person who stands under the
starry sky and nds a belief in God
spontaneously arising within him
is experiencing the workings of the
sensus divinitatis. This belief is notpredicated on other beliefs: it is self-
generating and self-supporting.
But there is certainly more to
Christianity than a belief in theism.
Christian belief requires faith in Jesus
Christ and acceptance of his atoning
death on the cross as well as his resur-
rection to eternal life. For Reformed
epistemology, accepting these be-
liefs does not take place through the
work of thesensus divinitatis. Theseparticular beliefs are produced by the
internal work of the Holy Spirit inside
the believers heart and mind. The
cardinal truths of Christianity (what
the Reformed epistemologists refer to
as the great things of the gospel) are
conrmed in our hearts by the Spirit.
In this model, then, belief in God
WestContinued on page 18
8/11/2019 Sound of Grace, Issue 210, September 2014
16/20
Page 16 September 2014 Issue 210
them? They tend to order their lives
around such things. It might be an
electronic gadget such as an iPhone
that seems to fulll its function almost
perfectly without sacricing a beauti-
ful design. It might be a movie that
tends to grip us because it powerfullydepicts the reality of life in a beautiful
way.
These are just a couple of ex-
amples. What does the culture do with
these things that are seen as perfect
in their sphere? The culture seeks
out these things, seeks to be associ-
ated with these things, and seeks to
tell others about these things. What
do you do with the one thing that has
been given to you that truly isper-fect and lacks nothing? The Word is
perfect. Do you seek it? Do you tell
others about it? Are you attached to it
as something of value in your life?
Sure - v7b the testimony of the
LORD is sure, making wise the
simple;
Next David tells us that the testi-
mony of the Lord is sure. The Word of
God is a testimony or a witness to the
truth. This witness is a sure witness.
I had to spend a day in court
recently to testify on someone elses
behalf. I was a witness to events sur-
rounding a very serious assault. These
events occurred about nine months
ago. I found myself trying and failing
to remember with surety some of the
details of what I saw. That was a very
unsettling feeling. I was worried that
the outcome of this hearing might turn
on my recollection (accurate or other-
wise) of specic details and events. As
it turns out, I did not have to testify.
The world is full of inaccurate and
incomplete testimony to what is true
about us and the world we live in.
These testimonies come to us in en-
tertainment, in news, in education, in
politics. All of these claim to give us
a sure testimony but they fail. Gods
word does not fail. It is sure.
Right - v8a the precepts of the
LORD are right,rejoicing the heart;
The Word of God is also right. The
sense here is not simply that the Word
of God is not wrong. It is not just
correct but much more than that. It is
right in a way that produces satisfac-
tion in it. It is right in the same sensethat a cornerstone for a building must
be right and true. It must be per-
fectly square and straight. A piece of
stone like this has a beauty to it. It is
admirable. Gods Word is right in this
sense. It has accuracy and precision
that is amazing and beautiful.
Pure v8b-9a the commandment
of the LORD ispure,enlightening
the eyes; the fear of the LORD is
clean, enduring forever;
There is no distortion or con-
tamination in the Word of God. The
commandments of God are not tainted
by sin. This means when we open this
Book we read declarations of truth
and commands to live by which have
never been compromised in the least
by sinful pride, jealousy, ignorance,
lust, and the list goes on. Gods Word
is pure.
Where in this world will you look
and nd any such revelation? Is sci-
ence, in all its ndings, free from the
any sense of ignorance? Is your favor-
ite talk show host free of any sense of
pride that might cloud their thinking?
The Word of God is perfect in these
things. Search it out and you will see.
True 9b the rules of the LORD
are true, and righteous altogether.
The Word of God is reliable. It hasintegrity. You can rely on it. It is this
quality of honesty and a sense of in-
corruptibility that makes these words
worthy of our trust. It comes from a
source that is beyond questioning and
is communicated to us in the exact
manner that God intended for it to be.
This Word is worthy of our trust.
So we have seen that the revelation
of Gods will, which we refer to as
the Word of God, the Bible, is true, is
pure, is right, is sure, and is perfect. If
this is the case then this Book contains
words that, by Gods Spirit, have great
power. This Word is not just a set of
propositions or idle statements. This
Word is the very power of God to act
in this world. It is, as the writer ofHebrews puts it:
living and active, sharper
than any two-edged sword, pierc-
ing to the division of soul and of
spirit, of joints and of marrow, and
discerning the thoughts and inten-
tions of the heart. (Heb 4:12).
This Word acts upon us. It is not
just a bunch of inanimate pixels on
a page. It is the very breath of God
breathed out to give us life. This truthhas great implications for how we live
the Christian life.
When the power goes out a funny
thing happens. If the power is out for
long enough, we do some silly things,
dont we? How many of you have
had the experience of losing power
in your home and then walking into a
room and icking on the light switch
only to nd there is no light? Why
does that happen? Why do we all dothat? Because we have gotten so used
to ipping that switch and having the
light come on.
We have absolutely no thought of
what is going on behind that wall to
make the switch and light work. We
have become conveniently unaware
of our daily need for electricity to
be owing through the wires. Our
brains think ip switch > light on.
But that is not really what is go-
ing on in there, is it? There is built
into that system a need for power, a
need for something that we do not
provide. You can stand there and ip
that switch all day but it is not going
to do anything unless there is electric-
ity running through the wires. But we
dont do that, do we? As soon as we
ip the switch once we are reminded.
Oh yes, the electricity is off.
ThorhauerContinued from page 5
8/11/2019 Sound of Grace, Issue 210, September 2014
17/20
Issue 210 September 2014 Page 17But what do we do with our lives,
with our souls? We are often standing
there ipping the switch on/off/on/
off and wondering why the light does
not come on. We have forgotten that
there is more to it than just ipping
the switch. If we are not seeking the
power source which God has designedfor us to seek then we are merely ip-
ping a switch with no power behind
it. God has given us his Word. It is the
active ingredient in powering the soul
in so many ways. Lets look at those
ways now.
We have considered what the
Word isnow we will go back through
verses 7-11 and consider what the
Word does.
II. The Word:
Revives v7a The law of the
LORD is perfect, reviving the soul;
Going back to verse 7 we see that
this quality of perfection means that
this Word is capable of and indeed ac-
tually does revive the soul. We are all
sinners in need of reviving, in need of
restoration. In and of ourselves we are
bent on sin and evil acts. We are dead
in our trespasses and sin. We need to
be revived. Thankfully, God gives us
his perfect word. It lacks nothing and
in its perfection it is also complete in
its ability to bring life to a dead soul
and to restore a so