Page:Southern Presbyterian Journal, Volume 13.djvu/739

 "In fact the whole Protestant world is under the spell of this conviction. A united Christian Church may be a commendable goal but the necessary doctrinal vagueness which must result from such a union would vitiate the whole enterprise. Any large union which may result in the future is most likely to be along doctrinal lines rather than denominational ones. The time has come in each denomination for a separation between those who believe the Bible and those who do not; such a division would result in real Christian unity. But such vague and meager doctrinal bases which have been proposed so far as the foundation for a united Christendom would create a church which the historic Christian Church would hardly be able to recognize and which would certainly be ineffective for great spiritual work among individuals and the nations. What is needed, and needed badly, is a rebirth of genuine enthusiasm for and belief in the miraculous gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ which proclaims that all men are lost in sin and separated from God and in need of redemption and reuniting with God, the Father. This should be the great message of the Church; it should be the consuming desire of every minister in the Christian Church. If that comes to pass, all ideas of a false and feeble outward church union will be forgotten and the Church will have returned to its true mission.

"The spirit of unionism in the Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. is strong and will continue to grow as the doctrinal witness and consciousness of the Church becomes weaker. It is safe to predict that, if Modernism continues its present hold on the life of that Church, union enterprises on a vague, meaningless doctrinal basis will be entered into and very likely consummated."

In the study of our Confession one theme becomes more and more vivid as we proceed from chapter to chapter. It is that the Confession and the Bible teach a system of doctrine. God does not ramble in his message to us. His thoughts are not desultory and disconnected. On the contrary God speaks with logical consistency. Therefore the later chapters of the Confession depend on the earlier.

If God had not begun a good work in us, totally depraved as human nature is, the work would not have begun. If God did not intend to complete that good work in us, it would not be completed. And if there were the slightest possibility that it would not be completed, we could not have the comfort of assurance. That is to say, as the "perseverance of the saints depends not on their own free will, but upon the immutability of the decree of election," so assurance of salvation presupposes the perseverance of the saints.

An Arminian may be a truly regenerate Christian; in fact, if he is truly an Arminian and not a Pelagian who happens to belong to an Arminian church, he must be a saved man. But he is not usually, and cannot consistently be assured of his salvation. The places in which his creed differs from our Confession confuse the mind, dilute the Gospel, and impair its proclamation.

The Arminian system holds (1) that God elects persons to eternal life on the condition of their reception of grace and their perseverance as foreseen; (2) that Christ died, not as the substitute for certain men, definitely to assume their penalty, but to render a chance of salvation indifferently possible to all men; (3) that all men have the same influence of the Holy Ghost operating on them, so that some are saved because they cooperate, and others are lost because they resist, thus in effect making salvation depend on the will of man; and (4) that since salvation is not made certain by God's decree nor by Christ's sacrifice, and since man's will is free or independent of God's control, a regenerate man can unregenerate himself and ultimately be lost.

In contrast the Calvinist, the Confession, and the Bible teach (1) that election is unconditional and that sovereign grace is irresistable; (2) that Christ offers us a difference, you know; (3) that human cooperation is not the cause of regeneration, which depends on God and not on the will of man; and (4) that the new birth begins an eternal life, i. e. a life that does not end in a year or two.

Fortunately not all Arminians, and unfortunately not all Calvinists are consistent; for the former occasionally have some sort of assurance and the latter are now and again without it. It is not true that a man cannot have eternal life unless he knows it, as some brash evangelists declare. "Infallible assurance doth not so belong to the essence of faith, but that a true believer may wait long and conflict with many difficulties before he be partaker of it; yet, being enabled by the Spirit to know the things which are freely given him of God, he may, without extraordinary revelation, in the right use of ordinary means, attain thereunto. And therefore it is the duty of everyone to give all diligence to make his calling and election sure, that thereby his heart may be enlarged in peace and joy in the Holy Ghost, in love and thankfulness to God, and in strength and cheerfulness in the duties of obedience, the proper fruits of this assurance—so far is it from including men to looseness."

In individual psychology Christian lives show great variety, as section IV goes on to indicate. Not only because of particular sins and temptations, but also because of differences of temperament, JANUARY 19, 1955