"The natural man according to Paul does not understand the true significance of the words and deeds of his fellow-men; he does not use them to attest spiritual facts. The man who is in Christ, on the contrary, even when he uses ordinary means of information, is acquiring knowledge of spiritual relationships, relationships which exist in the new world. So it is also with the knowledge of Christ. The natural man may acquire a certain knowledge of Christ; he may learn what Christ said and did and what were the worldly circumstances of His life. But such knowledge is a knowledge according to the flesh; it does not attain to the true significance even of those facts which are learned." - J. Gresham Machen, The Origin of Paul's Religion, Page 56
Showing posts with label J. Gresham Machen. Show all posts
Showing posts with label J. Gresham Machen. Show all posts
Sunday, October 22, 2023
The Natural man does not understand the Scriptures to be true
It is not that one believes facts only and another does not believe facts only. The difference Machen is talking about is that one understands the facts and believes them in their true import, the other does not.
Thursday, October 17, 2019
Faith is passive
The reception of that gift is faith: faith means not doing something but receiving something; it means not the earning of a reward but the acceptance of a gift. A man can never be said to obtain a thing for himself if he obtains it by faith; indeed to say that he obtains it by faith is only another way of saying that he does not obtain it for himself but permits another to obtain it for him. Faith, in other words, is not active but passive; and to say that we are saved by faith is to say that we do not save ourselves but are saved only by the one in whom our faith is reposed; the faith of mam presupposes the sovereign grace of God. - J. Gresham Machen, What is Faith, pg. 195
"And so at every mention of mercy we must remember that this requires faith, which accepts the promise of mercy. Similarly, at every mention of faith we are thinking of its object, the promised mercy. For faith does not justify or save because it is a good work in itself, but only because it accepts the promised mercy." - Apology of thr Augsburg Confession, The book of Concord, pg. 114
Wherefore it is necessary to come to this remedy; that believers should conclude that they cannot hope for an inheritance in the kingdom of heaven on any other foundation, but because, being ingrafted into the body of Christ, they are gratuitously accounted righteous. For with respect to justification, faith is a thing merely passive, bringing nothing of our own to conciliate the favour of God, but reserving what we need from Christ. - John Calvin, The Institutes, 3. 13. 5. Pg. 688
"Now faith is called justifying, only as it hath justification for its object, and as it goes out to Christ for justification; so that all that shall be spoken must be confines to this alone, as the intendment of the next." -Thomas Goodwin, Christ the Object of Faith, pg. 13
Archibald Alexander also says our faith is not the righteousness which is the ground of justification and that those who say it is are pure Arminians. He says, "The theory of justification whixh considers the act of believing the ground of our acceptance with God is, perhaps, the most plausible of any of our erroneous schemes of justification, for the single reason that it has the appearance of scriptural support. This is pure Arminianism, as held and inculcated by Arminius himself; also Limborch, and by Whitby." - A Treatise on Justification by Faith, pg. 14
"It is Christ's blood that stamps all virtue upon our faith. No virtue or influence whatever can be added by our faith, to or upon that blood. Observe, how in Rom. 5:9, it is 'justified by his blood,' and faith not at all expressed." - Joseph Hussey, God's Operations of Grace, Pg. 162 - 163
"Faith is the tongue that begs pardon? Faith is the hand that receives it, it is the eye that seeth it; but it is no price to buy it. Faith useth the gospel-plea for pardon; but itself, neither in habit nor act, is the plea itself. That is only Christ's blood. Christ's blood goes for the remission of your sins, if ever they be forgiven; and is the only plea to be heard at the throne of grace." - Robert Traill, Sermons concerning the Throne of Grace, pg. 31, Vol 1
In the same volume work, Traill says, "That faith in Jesus Christ doth justify (although by the way it is to be noted, that it is never written in the word, that faith justifieth actively, but always passively: that a man is justified by faith, and that God justifieth men by, and through faith; yet admitting the phrase) only as a mere instrument receiving that imputed righteousness of Christ, for which we are justified." - Robert Trail, The Doctrine of Justification Vindicated, Pg. 277
"And so at every mention of mercy we must remember that this requires faith, which accepts the promise of mercy. Similarly, at every mention of faith we are thinking of its object, the promised mercy. For faith does not justify or save because it is a good work in itself, but only because it accepts the promised mercy." - Apology of thr Augsburg Confession, The book of Concord, pg. 114
Wherefore it is necessary to come to this remedy; that believers should conclude that they cannot hope for an inheritance in the kingdom of heaven on any other foundation, but because, being ingrafted into the body of Christ, they are gratuitously accounted righteous. For with respect to justification, faith is a thing merely passive, bringing nothing of our own to conciliate the favour of God, but reserving what we need from Christ. - John Calvin, The Institutes, 3. 13. 5. Pg. 688
"Now faith is called justifying, only as it hath justification for its object, and as it goes out to Christ for justification; so that all that shall be spoken must be confines to this alone, as the intendment of the next." -Thomas Goodwin, Christ the Object of Faith, pg. 13
Archibald Alexander also says our faith is not the righteousness which is the ground of justification and that those who say it is are pure Arminians. He says, "The theory of justification whixh considers the act of believing the ground of our acceptance with God is, perhaps, the most plausible of any of our erroneous schemes of justification, for the single reason that it has the appearance of scriptural support. This is pure Arminianism, as held and inculcated by Arminius himself; also Limborch, and by Whitby." - A Treatise on Justification by Faith, pg. 14
"It is Christ's blood that stamps all virtue upon our faith. No virtue or influence whatever can be added by our faith, to or upon that blood. Observe, how in Rom. 5:9, it is 'justified by his blood,' and faith not at all expressed." - Joseph Hussey, God's Operations of Grace, Pg. 162 - 163
"Faith is the tongue that begs pardon? Faith is the hand that receives it, it is the eye that seeth it; but it is no price to buy it. Faith useth the gospel-plea for pardon; but itself, neither in habit nor act, is the plea itself. That is only Christ's blood. Christ's blood goes for the remission of your sins, if ever they be forgiven; and is the only plea to be heard at the throne of grace." - Robert Traill, Sermons concerning the Throne of Grace, pg. 31, Vol 1
In the same volume work, Traill says, "That faith in Jesus Christ doth justify (although by the way it is to be noted, that it is never written in the word, that faith justifieth actively, but always passively: that a man is justified by faith, and that God justifieth men by, and through faith; yet admitting the phrase) only as a mere instrument receiving that imputed righteousness of Christ, for which we are justified." - Robert Trail, The Doctrine of Justification Vindicated, Pg. 277
Friday, December 9, 2016
By Faith do we do good works
Faith may result in action, and certainly true faith in Jesus always will result in action; but faith itself is not doing but receiving. - J. Gresham Machen
The Augsburg says something similar:
"It is also taught among us that such faith should produce good fruit and good works and that we must do all such good works as God has commanded, but we should do them for God's sake and nor place our trust in them as if thereby to merit favor before God." - Augsburg Confession, Article 6
The basic idea is that Faith causes good works. This is true.
Gill says,
"Doctrine has an influence upon practice, especially evangelical doctrine, spiritually understood, affectionately embraced, and powerfully and feelingly experienced; so true is what the Apostle asserts, that the Grace of God, that is, the Doctrine of the Grace of God, that bringeth Salvation, the good news, the glad tidings of salvation by Christ, which is peculiar to Gospel Doctrine, hath appeared to all men, Gentiles as well as Jews, in the external ministry of the word; teaching us, to whom it comes with power and efficacy in the demonstration of the Spirit, that denying ungodliness and worldly lust, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world, Tit. ii. 11, 12." - John Gill, Introduction to the Body of Divinity, Pg. xxiii
I like what he says here. Doctrine has an influence upon practice. Of course we know that we may believe the truth and yet sometimes what is believed does not right away translate in what we practice. But the order is first doctrine and then practice. Not that we look to doctrine first and then second to our practice but rather it is the case that as we look to doctrine always that it SHOULD turn out to practice.
Monday, July 13, 2015
Faith accepts the truth
"Acceptance of the Lord Jesus Christ, as He is offered to us in the gospel of His redeeming work, is saving faith." - J. Gresham Machen, What is Faith
Not by works of anykind
The Epistle to the Galatians is directed just as much against the modern notion of 'salvation by character' or salvation by 'making Christ Master' in the life or salvation by a mere attempt to put into practice 'the principles of Jesus,' as it is directed against the Jewish ceremonialists of long ago: for what the Apostle is concerned to deny is any intrusion of human merit into the work by which salvation is obtained. - J. Gresham Machen, What is Faith?
Monday, July 6, 2015
We can know God because we are made with the capacity to reason
To the pragmatist skepticism of modern religious world, therefore, the Bible is sharply opposed; against the passionate anti - intellectualism of a large part of modern Church it maintains the primacy of the intellect; it teaches plainly that God has given to man a faculty of reason which is capable of apprehending truth, even truth about God.
That does not mean that we finite creatures can find out God by our own searching; but it does mean that God has made us capable of receiving the information which He chooses to give. I cannot evolve an account of China of my own inner consciousness, but I am perfectly capable of understanding the account which comes to me from travellers who have been there themselves. So our reasoning is certainly insufficient to tell us about God unless He reveals Himself; but it is capable (or would be capable if it were not clouded by sin) of receiving revelation when once it is given. - J. Gresham Machen, What Is Faith?
That does not mean that we finite creatures can find out God by our own searching; but it does mean that God has made us capable of receiving the information which He chooses to give. I cannot evolve an account of China of my own inner consciousness, but I am perfectly capable of understanding the account which comes to me from travellers who have been there themselves. So our reasoning is certainly insufficient to tell us about God unless He reveals Himself; but it is capable (or would be capable if it were not clouded by sin) of receiving revelation when once it is given. - J. Gresham Machen, What Is Faith?
Faith in a person includes knowledge of the person
"But - and here we come to the point which we think ought to be emphasized above all others just at the present day - it is impossible to have faith in a person without having knowledge of the person; far from being contrasted with knowledge, faith is founded upon knowledge." - J. Gresham Machen, What is Faith?
Later he says:
"It is impossible to have faith in a person without having knowledge of the person; faith is always based upon knowledge." - J. Gresham Machen, What is Faith?
Later he says:
"It is impossible to have faith in a person without having knowledge of the person; faith is always based upon knowledge." - J. Gresham Machen, What is Faith?
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