Understanding Grace: Navigating Legalism and Antinomianism

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And the question that students who were seeking to be licensed and ordained were always asked was whether it was orthodox doctrine to teach that we must forsake sin in order to our coming to Christ. Is it right and orthodox doctrine to teach that we must forsake sin in order to our coming to Christ? [00:06:45]

It was really meant to unearth whether people thought that there were certain qualifying marks you could attain in your life in order to prepare yourself for the grace of God in Jesus Christ. Those of you who are familiar with the Westminster Confession of Faith will remember how it emphasizes that it's not possible for an individual to do anything to prepare himself to come to Christ. [00:07:43]

And Boston said, "You know I have found great help for myself in a book called The Marrow of Modern Divinity." And this man got so interested in the book, he got a copy and some of the ministers made arrangements for this book to be republished. It was a book written in the seventeenth century by a man called Edward Fisher. [00:09:33]

There is a new convert, there is a legalist, there is an antinomian, and then there is a wise pastor. And during the course of two volumes of The Marrow of Modern Divinity, there's a series of really significant theological and pastoral points discussed. One is the free offer of the gospel. [00:10:14]

The third question was the issue of antinomianism, the kind of question that Paul raises in end of Romans 5, beginning of Romans 6. Where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more. Isn't the logic of that that if there is grace to cover all our sin, then it doesn't really matter whether we slip or fall. [00:11:11]

And in his autobiography and his memoirs, he expresses that at one point in a very interesting way. He says that people told him they noticed the difference between his preaching and the preaching of most other ministers. The way he puts it is that there was a tincture, a tincture, a tincture of grace about his preaching. [00:12:25]

Geerhardus Vos says that the essence of legalism, listen to this, the essence of legalism … what would you say the essence of legalism was? Listen to Vos, "The essence of legalism is to dislocate the law of God from the person of God." That's what was happening in the Garden of Eden. [00:21:23]

And as I read that and wrestled with this a little like Thomas Boston, it dawned on me that contrary to what we tend to think legalism and antinomianism are actually symptoms of one and the same disease, and that disease is at root cause, a suspicion of God, a mistrust of His character, an inability to take in and to act upon the reality of His grace. [00:22:31]

And the truth of the matter is that's almost a reversal of the gospel, isn't it? But you see what it insinuates into our minds. If the reason the Father loves us is because the Son died for us, then without the Son dying for us the Father would never have loved us. [00:24:23]

And it's incredible, but it's true, that the verse that says the very reverse of that is what? John 3:16. God, in John 3:16, is a reference to the Father because the antecedent of Son in John 3:16, is the Father. "The Father so loved the world that He gave His only Son that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." [00:24:50]

And that therefore the remedies that had often been used in the evangelical church, an antinomian you know, sprinkle in some legalism, and they'll be fine. Or a legalist, sprinkle in a little antinomianism, don't take the law so seriously, would never produce spiritual health. [00:25:34]

But the knowledge of the grace of God and the Lord Jesus Christ would provide the pharmaceutical that would dissolve both legalism and antinomianism and lead to a happy bondage to the love of the heavenly Father demonstrated, as Paul says in Romans 5, in the death of his Son and sealed in our hearts by the gift of the Holy Spirit. [00:26:06]

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