The Christian wars with the system of darkness

In the first chapter of the Gita, the main character, who is about to enter battle with his family and friends, is overcome with a sense of pity and wishes not to enter into battle any more. The reason is that these men are his kin. He knows them and it would therefore be a grievous evil to battle against them, though they wanting to kill him would do so within a heart beat. Here the main character presents to us several ideas 1) should we go to war? 2) ought we to remain passive? 3) how should we think of our beliefs as suppose to others?

For the Christian, however, ideas are different. A Christian is one who accepts the gospel of God's free grace revealed in the Cross work of Christ alone. They see they are sinners lacking a righteousness of their own and so see that the righteousness that they have is the only righteousness that God imputes to them by free and sovereign grace in Christ alone. The Christian therefore sees any other worldly system as bulstering up of man's pride and selfrighteousness. Their aim, therefore, as a result of them being born again by grace alone, and as a result seeing their sin, and their need of a saviour and believing in Him alone for righteousness, is to present the points of the Scripture to their friends and family and to all who do not know God as their Saviour. They rather than succumbing to the idea that any one human being is ok and so therefore everyone is ok make war with the satanic doctrine with the gospel doctrine. They overcome evil with good and not with evil. The Christian does not do this out of pride for they did not come to these things on their own. Instead it was God that changed their minds and gave them a new set of beliefs.

As Paul says we make war but not with the weapons of the world.

To be Regenerated is to be converted

"Every regenerate person has the Spirit of Christ and is led by Him, is in Christ, has Christ living in him, is a son of God, has the seed of God remaining in him, is a sharer of the kingdom of heaven, has a cleansed heart, is holy, a servant of righteousness, and free from sin." - Johannes Cocceius, The doctrine of the covenant and Testament of God, pg. 331

Scripture alone is the alone infallible rule of faith

It is a constitutional rule of the great Bible Societies that they are to circulate the Bible 'without note or comment.' This is a noteworthy and significant fact. It indicates that the Bible is a self-contained and a self-explanatory book, a book which does not have and cannot have an authoritative introduction; and untold thousands have found the Saviour and been built up in our most holy faith by simple reading and study of the Word, under the guidance and illumination of the Holy Spirit. It is true of the Bible, as of no other book, that 'the infallible rule of interpretation of Scripture is the Scripture itself.' - Oswald T. Allis, The Old Testament Its Claims and Its Critics, pg. 1

There is nothing special in the sacrament itself

"In order that we may obtain this faith, the ministry of teaching the Gospel and administering the sacraments was instituted. For through the Word and the sacraments, as through instruments, the Holy Spirit is given, and the Holy Spirit produces faith, where and when it pleases God, in those who hear the Gospel. That is to say, it is not on account of our own merits but on account of Christ that God justifies those who believe that they are received into favor for Christ's sake. Gal. 3:14, 'That we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.'
Our churches condemn the Anabaptist and others who think that the Holy Spirit comes to men without the external Word, through their own preparations and works." - The Book of Concord, The Augsburg Confession, Pg. 31 Article 5 [The ministry of the Church]

1 Peter 1 is about the holiness that comes from Christ's imputed righteousness

1 Peter 1 talks of the holiness that comes by the blood of Christ alone. It is because of him (by his death which he took our sins and by his imputed righteousness to us) that we know and believe the gospel.

The Spirit uses the word of God alone to speak to his people.

"How diabolical, then, is that madness which pretends that the use of the Scripture is only transient and temporary, which guides the sons of God to the highest point of perfection! I would also ask them another question - whether they have imbibed a different spirit from that which the Lord promised to his disciples? Great as their infatuation is, I do not think them fanatical enough to hazard such an avowal. But what kind of Spirit did he promise? One, truly, who should 'not speak of himself,' but suggest and instil into their minds those things which he had orally delivered. The office of the Spirit, then, which is promised to us, is not to feign new and unheard of revelations, or to coin a new system of doctrine, which would seduce us from the received doctrine of the Gospel, but to seal to our minds the same doctrine which the Gospel delivers." - John Calvin, The Institutes, I. IX. I.

"But in the same place the Apostle also calls his preaching 'the ministration of the Spirit;' doubtless intending, that the Holy Spirit so adheres to his own truth, which he hath expressed in the Scriptures, that he only displaces and exerts his power where the word is received with due reverence and honour. Nor is this repugnant to what I before asserted, that the word itself has not much certainty with us, unless when confirmed by the testimony of the Spirit. For the Lord hath established a kind of mutual connection between the certainty of his word and of his Spirit; so that our minds are filled with a solid reverence for the word, when by the light of the Spirit we are enabled therein to behold the Divine countenance; and on the other hand, without the least fear of mistake, we gladly receive the Spirit, when we recognize him in his image, that is, in the word. This is the true state of the case." - Ibid. I. IX. III.

There is no separating the agency of the Holy Spirit from the knowledge of the truth. To know the truth is life eternal; and this life is begun and supported by the Spirit of Christ. On the other hand, all who resist the truth, and do not admit its evidence, are expressly said to resist the Holy Ghost. We ought not, then, to imagine, with the popular preachers that the gospel can in any respect be considered as a dead letter, or destitute of Divine power. For being the voice of God, it is unchangeably powerful to save all who believe it, and to destroy all who oppose it. Believers are said to grieve the Holy Spirit, when they neglect to hearken to the words of the gospel, and their consciences are answerably grieved, when they are brought to repentance. - Robert Sandeman, Letters on Theron and Aspasio

We are persuaded of the authenticity of Scripture by God alone

"Let it be considered, then, as an undeniable truth, that they who have been inwardly taught by the Spirit, feel an entire acquiescence in the Scripture, and that it is self-authenticated, carrying with it its own evidence, and ought not to be made the subject of demonstration and arguments from reason, but it obtains the credit which it deserves with us by the testimony of the Spirit. For though it conciliate our reverence by its internal majesty, it never seriously affects us till it is confirmed by the Spirit in our hearts. Therefore, being illuminated by him, we now believe the divine original of the Scripture, not from our own judgment or that of others, but we esteem the certainty, that we have received it from God's own mouth by the ministry of men, to be superior to that of any human judgment, and equal to that of an intuitive perception of God himself in it. We seek not arguments or probabilities to support our judgment, but submit our judgments and understandings as to a thing concerning which it is impossible for us to judge; and that not like some person, who are in the habit of hastily embracing what they do not understand, which displeases them as soon as they examine it, but because we feel the firmest conviction that we hold an invincible truth; nor like those unhappy men who surrender their minds captives to superstitions, but because we perceive in it the undoubted energies of the Divine power, by which we are attracted and inflamed to an understanding and voluntary obedience, but with a vigour and efficacy superior to the power of any human will or knowledge." - John Calvin, The Institutes, I. VII. V.

Love is a volition and not an emotion

"Palmer (pp. 77, 78) stresses man's need of regeneration because of total depravity. Well and good. But to substantiate man's sinfulness, after speaking of man's intellect and will, he adds, 'And as far as his emotions are concerned, he cannot love God, 'because the mind of the flesh is enmity against God' (Romans 8:7).' That an unregenerate man cannot love God is indubitably true, but the 'mind of the flesh' is not the emotions. The history of orthodox theology, at least from Augustine on, teaches that Biblical love is a volition, not an emotion. Paul himself has small respect for the emotions. In Colossians 3:5 he says, 'Mortify therefore your members which are upon earth, fornication, uncleanness, pathos, inordinate affections. . . .' The New American Standard translates the last two words as 'evil desire.' Desire may or may not be an emotion; fornication and uncleanness seem to be emotions; and pathos surely is.  The New American Standard translates it 'passion' - the English cognate. Arndt and Gingrich give 'suffering' which makes no sense in this verse, and then add 'passion, especially of a sexual nature,' and also 'anger.' The supreme of all lexicons, Liddell and Scott, has accident, experience, misfortune, death. None of these make sense in this verse. But the continuation is, emotion, passion, sensation, and in literature, emotional style. Paul therefore instructs us to suppress our emotions; and if so, love is not an emotion. It is a volition. Palmer himself escapes nearly all the religious deterioration this misinterpretation has so widely caused in recent years. But the congregations subjected to semi-Christian psychologies need constant warnings." - Gordon H. Clark, The Holy Spirit, Pg. 32 -33

Regeneration presuppose Total Depravity

"The idea of regeneration presupposes that men are sinners. This does not mean simply - ah, yes, even the statement that men are sinners requires explanation, for Protestants and Catholics, Calvinists and Arminians, differ as to what sin is - so this does not mean simply that men, even all men, occasionally do something wrong. It means that they were born in sin and in sin did their mothers conceive them. It means that all human beings are totally depraved, i.e., sin affects their total personality, and that therefore they cannot save themselves, or even help to save themselves from that condition." -Gordon H. Clark, The Holy Spirit, Pg. 31-32

Gordon H. Clark on theologians who spout meaningless verbage on top of encouragement not to understand

"It is true that systematic theologies say very little. But are there not special works on the Spirit? W. H. Griffith-Thomas is rather pessimistic. 'The probable explanation of some modern [distorted] views on the subject [of Christ, salvation, and the Scriptures] is the absence of any true doctrine of the Holy Spirit. It is significant that amid the multitude of theological works of high value which have proceeded from able writers in Germany, England, Scotland, and America during the last century, very few have treated with anything like proper fulness and emphasis the Scripture revelation of the Holy Spirit' (the Holy Spirit of God, The Bible Institute Colportage Association, 1913, p. 162).
This judgment seems a bit harsh, even if restricted to the nineteenth century. Perhaps Robert Phillip's Love of the Spirit (1832) and C.R. Vaughn's The Gift of the Holy Spirit (1894) do not qualify as 'works of high value . . . from able writers . . . with the proper fullness.' Many volumes on the Holy Spirit are distressingly vague. Their devotional language may stir the emotions of some people, but they disappoint all who wish to understand what God teaches. The book last mentioned, since it was reprinted in 1975, serves as a good example. Strangely enough it does not get to the personality of the Spirit until the fourteenth chapter of Part Two, the final chapter in the book, although one would expect this subject to come in the first or at least in the second chapter. regeneration precedes personality in chapters six to nine of Part One. The negations in these chapters are for the most part true. He speaks of the necessity of regeneration; he denies that it is merely a 'change in the external relations effected by a visible rite' (p. 136); and 'all attempts to identify this change with the ordinance of baptism . . . are useless. But the positive statements convey little meaning. For example, 'The new birth also involves the creation and the grant of a new nature . . . gaining a new nature, making a new man . . . introducing this new nature into a new life . . . new views, new feelings . . . new action determined by this great change' (p. 135).
Now these sentences are not so much false as meaningless. Literally they are true, but they do not distinguish feelings and actions resulting from regeneration by the Holy Spirit from feelings and actions resulting from other sources. Various people have various feelings and various views. Stalin, or was it Lenin? was once a seminary student; he then experienced a great change so that he had other views, new feelings, and different actions.
Furthermore, though regeneration may give one a new nature, the theologian quoted does not tell us what is meant by nature. This criticism is not simply a conclusion which a reader might infer. It is explicitly stated: 'It is obvious from these positive and most peculiar statements that all attempts to construe the Christian doctrine of regeneration out of all its high mysterious and spiritual significance must be altogether incompetent interpretations of the language used to describe it in the sacred record.' In other words, we should not try to understand the Bible." -Gordon H. Clark, The Holy Spirit, Pg. 2-3

We are regenerated to believe the Gospel truth of Christ Jesus alone

Regeneration is not simply that the Spirit changes people's minds in repentance and faith; or else anytime a person changes his mind about something it would be an act of the Spirit in regeneration. Regeneration is the new spiritual life in which sinners once dead who once hated the truth now with a change mind assent or accept the truth. How do we know that one is regenerated? It is that they now believe the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Legalist are in fact Antinomians

"No man exercises evangelical repentance even in the smallest degree but he who repents of this diabolical enmity and opposition of his heart to 'the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.' And none has ever begun to mortify the members of the body of sin in his heart except he who is mortifying this self-righteous temper. Unbelief and a legal spirit, are the very soul or life of the body of sin. From 1 Corinthians 15:56, Mr. Ralph Erskine infers, 'The dangerous influences of legal doctrine tends to keep sinners under the law; for thus they are under the power of sin. The text says, 'The strength of sin is the law.' The legal strain, under covert of zeal for the law, has a native tendency to mar true holiness and all acceptable obedience to the law; insomuch that the greatest legalist is the greatest antinomian, or enemy to the law.' Unless the mortification of sin, therefore, begins in them, it cannot penetrate the whole body of sin." - John Colquhoun, A Treatise on the Law and the Gospel


That is right an antinomian is not only one who believes that the believer is not to obey the law as a rule of life in Christ but is one who believes that the law does not condemn and so he can live by its commands as a covenant of works without penalty.

Hearing is not the same as actually hearing someone

"What did the Apostle John mean when he spoke of seeing with the eyes and handling with the hands? Did he mean aisthesis, proper sensibles, common sensibles, sensation per accidens, or what?
In greek the first word of 1 John designates the Word of Life, who in verse 4 is identified as Jesus Christ. Since the Epistle and the Gospel have the same author, it is permissible to connect this Word of Life with the Word of John 1:1. And no one should object if we equate this Word wit...h him whom Paul calls 'the Power of God' and 'the Wisdom of God.' This second person of the Trinity is the subject of John's declaration. Can this eternal Wisdom be heard with the ears, seen with the eyes, and handled with the hands? Is the second person of the Trinity an object of sense? The word hearing comes first; seeing comes second. This discussion will take them in turn.
As for hearing, one should note that no one can ever hear a piece of music or a line of poetry. Our opponents, who insist on sensation as the origin of knowledge, cannot well object to an instance taken from experience. St. Augustine pointed out that to 'hear' music or poetry, one must at least 'perceive' the rhythm. But there is no rhythm in a single sensation. Even beyond perception it is necessary to have memory before a line of poetry can be recognized as poetry. A single sound has no rhythm or meter. The first sounds of a line must be remembered until the last sound occurs; note also that the first sound no longer exists when the last sound sounds. Therefore no one ever senses music or poetry. This Augustinian remark should satisfy any empiricist; but, of course, it is not exegesis.
As the noun aesthesis in Scripture does not mean sensation, so, too, the verb to hear does not do so, either. Exodus 15:14 'The people shall hear and be afraid.' The meaning is that the enemies of Israel will understand the danger of being defeated in battle." - John Robbins (?), Clark Speaks From The Grave

Conversion is a work of God alone

"It is necessary, on the other hand, to consider the remedy of Divine grace, by which the depravity of nature is corrected and healed. For since the Lord in the assistance which he affords us, bestows on us that which we need, an exhibition of the nature of his work in us will immediately discover the nature of our necessity. When the Apostle tells the Philippians, that he is 'confident that he which hath begun a good work in them will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ;' by the beginning of a good work he undoubtedly designs the commencement of conversion, which takes place in the will. Therefore God begins the good work in us by exciting in our hearts a love, desire, and ardent pursuit of righteousness, or, to speak more properly, by bending, forming, and directing our hearts toward righteousness, but he completes it, by confirming us to perseverance. That no one may cavil, that the good work is begun by the Lord, inasmuch as the will, which is weak of itself, is assisted by him, the Spirit declares in another place how far the ability of the will reaches, when left to itself. 'a new heart also,' says he, 'will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you; and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes.' Who will assert that the infirmity of the human will is only strengthened by assistance, to enable it efficaciously to aspire to the choice of that which is good, when it actually needs a total transformation and renovation?" - John Calvin, Insistutes, 2. 3. 6.

Turn to God does not mean we by our own will turn to Him

"Our more subtle adversaries cavil at all these testimonies, because there is no impediment, they say, that prevents our exerting our own ability, and God assisting our weak efforts. They adduce also passages from the Prophets, where the accomplishment of our conversion seems to be divided equally between God and us. 'Turn ye unto me, and I will turn unto you' What assistance we receive from the Lord has already been shown, and needs not to be repeated here. I wish only this single point to be conceded to me, that it is in vain to infer our possession of ability to fulfill the law from God's command to us to obey it; since it is evident, that for the performance of all the Divine precepts, the grace of the Legislator is both necessary for us, and promised to us; and hence it follows that at least more is required of us than we are capable of performing. Nor is it possible for any cavils to explain away that passage of Jeremiah, which assures us, that the covenant of God, made with his ancient people, was frustrated because it was merely a literal one, and that it can only be confirmed by the influence of the Spirit, who forms the heart to obedience. Nor does their error derive any support from this passage: 'Turn ye unto me, and I will turn unto you' For this denotes, not that turning of God in which he renovates our hearts to repentance, but that in which he declares his benevolence and kindness by external prosperity; as by adversity he sometimes manifests his displeasure. When the people of Israel, therefore, after having been harassed with miseries and calamites under various forms, complained that God was departed from them, he replies that his benignity will not fail them if they return to rectitude of life, and to himself, who is the standard of righteousness. The passage, then is miserably perverted, when it is made to represent the work of conversion as divided between God and men. We have observed the greater brevity on these points, because it will be a more suitable place for this argument when we treat of the Law." John Calvin, Institutes. 2. 5. 9.

What is Sanctification?

"In the Larger Catechism of the Westminster Assembly the question is asked, "What is sanctification?" To which the following answer is returned: "Sanctification is a work of God’s grace, whereby, they whom God hath before the foundation of the world chosen to be holy, are in time through the powerful operation of His Spirit, applying the death and resurrection of Christ unto them, renewed in their whole man after the image of God; having the seeds of repentance unto life and all other saving graces, put into their hearts, and those graces so stirred up, increased, and strengthened, as that they more and more die unto sin and rise unto newness of life."

Now far be it from us to sit in judgment upon such an excellent and helpful production as this Catechism, which God has richly blest to thousands of His people, or that we should make any harsh criticisms against men whose shoes we are certainly not worthy to unloose. Nevertheless, we are assured that were its compilers on earth today, they would be the last of all to lay claim to any infallibility, nor do we believe they would offer any objection against their statements being brought to the bar of Holy Scripture. The best of men are but men at the best, and therefore we must call no man "Father." A deep veneration for servants of God and a high regard for their spiritual learning must not deter us from complying with "Prove all things: hold fast that which is good" (1 Thess. 5:21). The Bereans were commended for testing the teachings even of the apostle Paul, "And searched the Scriptures daily whether those things were so" (Acts 17:11). It is in this spirit that we beg to offer two observations on the above quotation.

First, the definition or description of sanctification of the Westminster divines is altogether inadequate, for it entirely omits the most important aspect and fundamental element in the believer’s sanctification: it says nothing about our sanctification by Christ (Heb. 10:10; 13:12), but confines itself to the work of the Spirit, which is founded upon that of the Son. This is truly a serious loss, and affords another illustration that God has not granted light on all His Word to any one man or body of men. A fuller and better answer to the question of, "What is sanctification?" would be, "Sanctification is, first, that act of God whereby He set the elect apart in Christ before the foundation of the world that they should be holy. Second, it is that perfect holiness which the Church has in Christ and that excellent purity which she has before God by virtue of Christ’s cleansing blood. Third, it is that work of God’s Spirit which, by His quickening operation, sets them apart from those who are dead in sins, conveying to them a holy life or nature, etc."

Thus we cannot but regard this particular definition of the Larger Catechism as being defective, for it commences at the middle, instead of starting at the beginning. Instead of placing before the believer that complete and perfect sanctification which God has made Christ to be unto him, it occupies him with the incomplete and progressive work of the Spirit. Instead of moving the Christian to look away from himself with all his sinful failures, unto Christ in whom he is "complete" (Col. 2:10), it encouraged him to look within, where he will often search in vain for the fine gold of the new creation amid all the dross and mire of the old creation. This is to leave him without the joyous assurance of knowing that he has been "perfected forever" by the one offering of Christ (Heb. 10:14); and if he be destitute of that, then doubts and fears must constantly assail him, and the full assurance of faith elude every striving after it." - A.W. Pink, The Doctrine of Sanctification

Either you Believe or you do not

What do you do with a report? You either believe it or you don't, there is no middle ground. Likewise, you hear the good news of Christ; the report of what Christ has done. You either believe the report or do not. Faith comes by hearing. You cannot believe something you have not heard before. Now if your wife is sick and she tells you, you either believe her or you do not. Perhaps if you do believe her then this entails that you go buy medicine. By faith alone do we work. Of course the difference between the species of faith is the object.

The Spirit does not work apart from the truth nor does the truth come apart from the Spirit

There is no seperating the agency of the Holy Spirit from the knowledge of the truth. To know the truth is life eternal; and this life is begun and supported by the Spirit of Christ. On the other hand, all who resist the truth, and do not admit its evidence, are expressly said to resist the Holy Ghost. We ought not, then, to imagine, with the popular preachers that the gospel can in any respect be considered as a dead letter, or destitute of Divine power. For being the voice of God, it is unchangeably powerful to save all who believe it, and to destroy all who oppose it. Believers are said to grieve the Holy Spirit, when they neglect to hearken to the words of the gosoel, and their consciences are answerably grieved, when they are brought to repentance. - Robert Sandeman, Letters on Theron and Aspasio

Repentance

Recently I have been considering a great deal about repentance. What is it exactly? In recent times I have considered that it is an act in which the sinner repents from his self-pride and turns to Christ by faith/assent alone in His gospel. The gospel says that no one is counted righteous outside of Christ, but that all have sinned and fall short of God's holiness which is His glory. It is only in Christ alone that the elect sinner is made right with God because Christ Jesus actually took upon Himself their sins so that by this the Spirit who works upon the particular sinners heart/mind repents from his wicked ways and turns to Christ trusting in Him alone for justification. From this all of our Christian life is about eradicating the false gospel/doctrine we once held dear to upholding the good news.

I am learning and growing in my knowledge of this. But I am no longer a Lordship-Salvationist guy.

On the End of the Christian Life by Tobias Crisp

"But you will say further to me (for, except a man be a mere Papist, I am sure he cannot deny but that the righteousness by which I stand righteous before GOD, is the righteousness Christ doth for me, and not that I do for myself, you will ask me, I say, Doth not this take off all manner of obedience and all manner of holiness?
I answer, and thus much I say, It takes them off from those ends which they aim at in their obedience: namely, The end for which Christ’s obedience served: as much as to say, Our standing righteousness, by what Christ hath done for us, concerns us in point of justification, consolation, and salvation. We have our justification, our peace, our salvation, only by the righteousness Christ hath done for us: but this doth not take away our obedience, nor our services, in respect of those ends for which such are now required of believers. We have yet several ends for duties and obedience, namely, That they may glorify God, and evidence our thankfulness, that they may be profitable to men, that they may be ordinances wherein to meet with God, to make good what he hath promised." Tobias Crisp (Found this one on a website)

Some might say that Tobias Crisp was Antinomian. I do not think so. But again I have not read his works as of yet. I recently bought his Christ Alone Exalted. So I am looking forward to that.