Gambling: The Antithesis of Christianity

Ephesians 4:28: “Let him that stole steal no more: but rather let him labour, working with his hands the thing which is good, that he may have to give to him that needeth.”

There’s far more in that commandment than merely a prohibition against stealing. It also suggests that the proper way to earn wealth is by some form of work. It furthermore reminds us that a wonderful use of surplus wealth is charity towards the poor. Gambling subverts all those principles.

Gambling is economic fraud. It produces nothing. It adds nothing to the larger economy. When you invest money in the stock market, that money goes to work in the economy. It is not like a gambling stake, which just sits there in the jackpot, waiting to be won by one of the players.

Whatever taxes and commissions are skimmed from government-regulated lotteries and actually put back into the economy are more than offset by the losses of people who purchase tickets and do not win. Statistics show clearly that the most profoundly negative economic effects of gambling are felt in the sectors of society where the poverty level is already high. So gambling’s worst impact hurts the very same segments of society where charity would have done the most good.

The corollary of this is that the apparent prosperity of casinos in places like Las Vegas is gained at the direct expense of other communities, industries, and individuals. Gambling is always a zero-sum game.

Gambling simply transfers money from the hands of many to the hands of the few through frivolous means fraught with questionable motives—just the opposite of all sound economic principles.

The Bible does spell out some clear principles regarding economics and the exchange of money, goods, and services.

Of course, property and possessions were normally passed on within one’s own family (or to one’s legal heirs) by inheritance.

Beyond that, however, there are three legitimate means of exchanging wealth and transferring property to others. One is through labor, where money is earned by effort expended (Ephesians 4:28; 2 Thessalonians 3:11-12; Luke 10:7). Another is through commerce (including buying, selling, and otherwise investing—Matthew 25:14-29). The third is through giving—including gifts of charity (Luke 19:8; Ephesians 4:28).

Gambling has none of the elements that make those enterprises good. It involves no work. It contributes nothing of value to the economy. And it is the moral antithesis of charity.

Speaking of gambling’s macro effects on the economy, much more could be said about the evil that surrounds the gambling industry. It breeds crime and corruption; it undermines character; it does not promote godliness; it violates private industry; it undermines the good of society; it exploits the poor; and it promotes false values.

Furthermore, when government sanctions and even participates in sponsoring gambling, it departs from (and even works against) the God-ordained role of government, which is to seek the public welfare by punishing crime, keeping order, and defending against foreign attacks. State-sanctioned gambling makes the government the oppressor of the poor and the promoter of activities that spawn all kinds of corruption and evil.

As Christians, we are commanded to be content with what we have, and to trust God as our Provider. We are forbidden to covet what belongs to our neighbor, and we are commanded to love that neighbor as ourselves. We are commanded to do unto others as we would have them do unto us. We are commanded to shun that which is evil—abstaining from every form of evil.

That’s why, although I have acknowledged that penny-ante games are often trivial (and by no means any major concern of mine), my counsel to believers who ask about the issue would be this: it’s naive and potentially dangerous to toy with any kind of gambling as a form of “recreation.” If gambling is indeed wrong in principle (as I believe the weight of all the biblical arguments demonstrates) then it is surely wise to avoid the practice no matter the amount or the frequency.

In closing, let me say . . .

Some people have asked me to address the question of whether raffles, door prizes, and carnival-style contests as fund-raising devices are morally equivalent to gambling. My short answer is that it depends on the circumstances. The definition of gambling I gave at the outset is my best answer to that. If the raffle prize is a donated item given to charity and not a “stake” paid for by entry fees, it wouldn’t be gambling by most legal definitions.

I’m not fond of such gimmicks for fund-raising anyway—especially for churches and Christian organizations. But I would not suggest that it’s always a “sin” to participate in them, especially if the bulk of the funds collected really do go to some legitimate charity. Such cases, however, wouldn’t fit likely my definition of gambling, so the point is really moot, I think.

I’ll leave the intricate dissection of countless hypothetical cases and counter-examples to people who love that sort of casuistry.

Speaking of which, I’ve gotten some messages from a few people who have claimed my biblical arguments prove nothing about whether gambling per se is wrong, because (in the words of one correspondent): “You don’t know people’s hearts, so you can’t prove that everyone who gambles is really coveting his neighbor’s possessions.”

Well, it certainly seems obvious that the gambler is trying to win his neighbor’s possessions, and I honestly can’t think of many righteous motives for doing that. But the argument about reading another person’s heart is true in exactly the same sense that I can’t prove every man who fills his spare time looking at pornography on the internet is sinfully lusting. I still tell men they should not do that under any circumstances. In any case, the guy who gets caught doing it is probably going to have a hard sell convincing his own wife it was all so innocent. In a case like that, I’m happy to let the man answer to God and his own wife.

Similarly, to those who are so keen to justify penny-ante and “recreational” gambling, I’m quite happy to leave the issue between you, your conscience, and the Lord, who judges righteously. Don’t feel obliged to try to convince me that what you’re doing isn’t tainted with covetousness or presumption or any of the other bad motives I have associated with the act of gambling.

To be perfectly clear: the evil motives are what I say is sin, not the gaming aspects of gambling. I’m not trying to establish a legalistic rule on issues where the Bible doesn’t spell out a rule. I’m trying to give a little pastoral counsel and shed some biblical light on the complex of evils that surround gambling, so that you can give a fuller answer to the question of whether gambling is OK than the bare (and foolish) assertion that since there’s no proof text that says gambling’s “sin,” Christians shouldn’t say anything against it.

On the contrary, it is a plague on our culture (and every culture where it has been legalized) and Christians should not be silent or neutral about it.

Pastor Michael Huffman

Emmanuel Baptist Church

Textual Criticism- Part 2

At the same time the distinctiveness of a local text tended to become diluted and mixed with other types of text. A manuscript of the Gospel of Mark copied in Alexandria, for example, and taken later to Rome would doubtless influence to some extent copyists transcribing the form of the text of Mark heretofore current at Rome. On the whole, however, during the earliest centuries the tendencies to develop and preserve a particular type of text prevailed over the tendencies leading to a mixture of texts. Thus there grew up several distinctive kinds of New Testament text, the most important of which are the following.

The Alexandrian text, which Westcott and Hort called the Neutral text (a question-begging title), is usually considered to be the best text and the most faithful in preserving the original. Characteristics of the Alexandrian text are brevity and austerity. That is, it is generally shorter than the text of other forms, and it does not exhibit the degree of grammatical and stylistic polishing that is characteristic of the Byzantine type of text. Until recently the two chief witnesses to the Alexandrian text were codex Vaticanus (

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The chief characteristic of Western readings is fondness for paraphrase. Words, clauses, and even whole sentences are freely changed, omitted, or inserted. Sometimes the motive appears to have been harmonization, while at other times it was the enrichment of the narrative by the inclusion of traditional or apocryphal material. Some readings involve quite trivial alterations for which no special reason can be assigned. One of the puzzling features of the Western text (which generally is longer than the other forms of text) is that at the end of Luke and in a few other places in the New Testament certain Western witnesses omit words and passages that are present in other forms of text, including the Alexandrian. Although at the close of the last century certain scholars were disposed to regard these shorter readings as original (Westcott and Hort called them “Western non-interpolations”), since the acquisition of the Bodmer Papyri many scholars today are inclined to regard them as aberrant readings (see the Note on Western Non-Interpolations, pp. 164–166).

In the book of Acts the problems raised by the Western text become most acute, for the Western text of Acts is nearly ten percent longer than the form that is commonly regarded to be the original text of that book. For this reason the present volume devotes proportionately more space to variant readings in Acts than to those in any other New Testament book, and a special Introduction to the textual phenomena in Acts is provided (see pp. ).

An Eastern form of text, which was formerly called the Caesarean text,6 is preserved, to a greater or lesser extent, in several Greek manuscripts (including

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Another Eastern type of text, current in and near Antioch, is preserved today chiefly in Old Syriac witnesses, namely the Sinaitic and the Curetonian manuscripts of the Gospels and in the quotations of Scripture contained in the works of Aphraates and Ephraem.

The Byzantine text, otherwise called the Syrian text (so Westcott and Hort), the Koine text (so von Soden), the Ecclesiastical text (so Lake), and the Antiochian text (so Ropes), is, on the whole, the latest of the several distinctive types of text of the New Testament. It is characterized chiefly by lucidity and completeness. The framers of this text sought to smooth away any harshness of language, to combine two or more divergent readings into one expanded reading (called conflation), and to harmonize divergent parallel passages. This conflated text, produced perhaps at Antioch in Syria, was taken to Constantinople, whence it was distributed widely throughout the Byzantine Empire. It is best represented today by codex Alexandrinus (in the Gospels; not in Acts, the Epistles, or Revelation), the later uncial manuscripts, and the great mass of minuscule manuscripts. Thus, except for an occasional manuscript that happened to preserve an earlier form of text, during the period from about the sixth or seventh century down to the invention of printing with moveable type (a.d. 1450–56), the Byzantine form of text was generally regarded as the authoritative form of text and was the one most widely circulated and accepted.

After Gutenberg’s press made the production of books more rapid and therefore cheaper than was possible through copying by hand, it was the debased Byzantine text that became the standard form of the New Testament in printed editions. This unfortunate situation was not altogether unexpected, for the Greek manuscripts of the New Testament that were most readily available to early editors and printers were those that contained the corrupt Byzantine text.

The first published edition of the printed Greek Testament, issued at Basel in 1516, was prepared by Desiderius Erasmus, the Dutch humanist scholar. Since Erasmus could find no manuscript that contained the entire Greek Testament, he utilized several for the various divisions of the New Testament. For the greater part of his text he relied on two rather inferior manuscripts now in the university library at Basel, one of the Gospels and one of the Acts and Epistles, both dating from about the twelfth century. Erasmus compared them with two or three others, and entered occasional corrections in the margins or between the lines of the copy given to the printer. For the book of Revelation he had but one manuscript, dating from the twelfth century, which he had borrowed from his friend Reuchlin. As it happened, this copy lacked the final leaf, which had contained the last six verses of the book. For these verses Erasmus depended upon Jerome’s Latin Vulgate, translating this version into Greek. As would be expected from such a procedure, here and there in Erasmus’s reconstruction of these verses there are several readings that have never been found in any Greek manuscript—but which are still perpetuated today in printings of the so-called Textus Receptus of the Greek New Testament . In other parts of the New Testament Erasmus also occasionally introduced into his Greek text material derived from the current form of the Latin Vulgate.

So much in demand was Erasmus’s Greek Testament that the first edition was soon exhausted and a second was called for. It was this second edition of 1519, in which some (but not nearly all) of the many typographical blunders of the first edition had been corrected, that Martin Luther and William Tyndale used as the basis of their translations of the New Testament into German (1522) and into English (1525).

In the years following many other editors and printers issued a variety of editions of the Greek Testament, all of which reproduced more or less the same type of text, namely that preserved in the later Byzantine manuscripts. Even when it happened that an editor had access to older manuscripts—as when Theodore Beza, the friend and successor of Calvin at Geneva, acquired the fifth-century manuscript that goes under his name today, as well as the sixth-century codex  Claromontanus—he made relatively little use of them, for they deviated too far from the form of text that had become standard in the later copies.

Noteworthy early editions of the Greek New Testament include two issued by Robert Etienne (commonly known under the Latin form of his name, Stephanus), the famous Parisian printer who later moved to Geneva and threw in his lot with the Protestants of that city. In 1550 Stephanus published at Paris his third edition, the editio Regia, a magnificent folio edition. It is the first printed Greek Testament to contain a critical apparatus; on the inner margins of its pages Stephanus entered variant readings from fourteen Greek manuscripts, as well as readings from another printed edition, the Complutensian Polyglot. Stephanus’s fourth edition (Geneva, 1551), which contains two Latin versions (the Vulgate and that of Erasmus), is noteworthy because in it for the first time the text of the New Testament was divided into numbered verses.

Theodore Beza published no fewer than nine editions of the Greek Testament between 1565 and 1604, and a tenth edition appeared posthumously in 1611. The importance of Beza’s work lies in the extent to which his editions tended to popularize and stereotype what came to be called the Textus Receptus. The translators of the Authorized or King James Bible of 1611 made large use of Beza’s editions of 1588–89 and 1598.

Textual Criticism- Part 1

In the earliest days of the Christian church, after an apostolic letter was sent to a congregation or an individual, or after a gospel was written to meet the needs of a particular reading public, copies would be made in order to extend its influence and to enable others to profit from it as well. It was inevitable that such handwritten copies would contain a greater or lesser number of differences in wording from the original. Most of the divergencies arose from quite accidental causes, such as mistaking a letter or a word for another that looked like it. If two neighboring lines of a manuscript began or ended with the same group of letters or if two similar words stood near each other in the same line, it was easy for the eye of the copyist to jump from the first group of letters to the second, and so for a portion of the text to be omitted (called homoeoarcton or homoeoteleuton, depending upon whether the similarity of letters occurred at the beginning or the ending of the words). Conversely the scribe might go back from the second to the first group and unwittingly copy one or more words twice (called dittography). Letters that were pronounced alike were sometimes confused (called itacism). Such accidental errors are almost unavoidable whenever lengthy passages are copied by hand, and would be especially likely to occur if the scribe had defective eyesight, or was interrupted while copying, or, because of fatigue, was less attentive to his task than he should have been.

Other divergencies in wording arose from deliberate attempts to smooth out grammatical or stylistic harshness, or to eliminate real or imagined obscurities of meaning in the text. Sometimes a copyist would substitute or would add what seemed to him to be a more appropriate word or form, perhaps derived from a parallel passage (called harmonization or assimilation). Thus, during the years immediately following the composition of the several documents that eventually  were collected to form the New Testament, hundreds if not thousands of variant readings arose.

Still other kinds of divergencies originated when the New Testament documents were translated from Greek into other languages. During the second and third centuries, after Christianity had been introduced into Syria, into North Africa and Italy, into central and southern Egypt, both congregations and individual believers would naturally desire copies of the Scriptures in their own languages. And so versions in Syriac, in Latin, and in the several dialects of Coptic used in Egypt were produced. They were followed in the fourth and succeeding centuries by other versions in Armenian, Georgian, Ethiopic, Arabic, and Nubian in the East, and in Gothic, Old Church Slavonic, and (much later) Anglo-Saxon in the West.

The accuracy of such translations was directly related to two factors: (a) the degree of familiarity possessed by the translator of both Greek and the language into which the translation was made, and (b) the amount of care he devoted to the task of making the translation. It is not surprising that very considerable divergencies in early versions developed, first, when different persons made different translations from what may have been slightly different forms of Greek text; and, second, when these renderings in one or another language were transmitted in handwritten copies by scribes who, familiar with a slightly different form of text (either a divergent Greek text or a divergent versional rendering), adjusted the new copies so as to accord with what they considered the preferable wording.

During the early centuries of the expansion of the Christian church, what are called “local texts” of the New Testament gradually developed. Newly established congregations in and near a large city, such as Alexandria, Antioch, Constantinople, Carthage, or Rome, were provided with copies of the Scriptures in the form that was current in that area. As additional copies were made, the number of special readings and renderings would be both conserved and, to some extent, increased, so that eventually a type of text grew up that was more or less peculiar to that locality. Today it is possible to identify the type of text preserved in New Testament manuscripts by comparing their characteristic readings with the quotations of those  passages in the writings of Church Fathers who lived in or near the chief ecclesiastical centers.

 

More Later…….

Titus 2:11 and Definite Atonement

Titus 2:11, “For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people” (LEB). I recently heard a synergistic preacher preach from this text with these words, “There are those people, some Baptists, that like to limited the atonement, but I have never had one of them get around this verse”.  Let me say first of all that he probably has not had anyone “get around this verse” because, for the person who believes in the Doctrines of Grace, it is not an issue. We celebrate this verse.

Let me also say that I do not like the term “Limited Atonement”, because I do not believe that there was some kind of defect in the atonement. In other words, I do not believe that the atonement was or is ever limited in its power. I have always preferred the phrase “Definite Atonement” or “Particular Redemption”. Yet, I believe that the people who believe in an “unlimited atonement”, really do not think things all the way through.

My question, before I deal with the verse, to this bother would be, “what do you believe actually happened at the cross”. If he is your typical synergistic preacher, which I believe he is, he no doubt would say that Jesus died to atone for the sins of all people.  But was the atonement actual or potential? I do not see anywhere in any language of the Scriptures where it even intimates that the atonement was potential. Jesus said, “It is finished”; that is not language of potentiality but of actuality.

But if we say that the atonement paid in full  the the sins of all people everywhere, then I ask, “What of those people who were already in hell at the time of this atonement? If Jesus paid the sin debt of every single person without exception at the cross, then what sin do they commit that causes them to die and go to hell? I ask that question because people do die and go to hell, so if Jesus died to atone for the sins of people already in hell and those that will go to hell, what sin did He NOT atone? Some say “unbelief”. So the atonement was incomplete? You see the circle that such thinking takes you. The Scripture say nowhere that unbelief is the one sin for which Jesus did not atone.  The greatest picture of an “unjust God” (for which I am blamed as believing in… hmm, strange) is for God to pour out His wrath for sin on Jesus for all men, and then for most men (Matt 7) to spend an eternity in hell in judgment for the sins poured out on Christ.  John Owen spoke of this as double jeopardy.

But now to the verse at hand. Why would anyone assume that the phrase “πᾶσιν ἀνθρώποις” is referring to every single person without exception? Answer, of course, is because they are looking at it through the eyes of tradition and not allowing the text to speak for itself. There seems to be the constant assumption that “all” is always referring to every single person without exception. Context must be our teacher. It is easy to rip a verse from its natural context and form a theology, but usually it is bad theology.

Context is King!! Paul spends the whole chapter speaking to different kinds of believers; Old men, young men, old women, young women, and slaves. And how they should be godly, self-controlled, obedient, demonstrating dignity; etc. The point is that such is not the language that would be spoken to unbelievers or in a context speaking about unbelievers. Unbelievers do not have the ability to be any of those things; so by natural context, the audience is believers. Such is not, I hope, up for debate.

The debate comes in when you get to verse 11 and what exactly did Paul mean and to whom was he speaking.  Paul says that our life should demonstrate all good faith, doing credit to the teaching of God..then you have verse 11. Please note:

“For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all people, (comma, continuation of thought), training US,….” did you see that vital pronoun? This grace that Paul is referring to that brings salvation, is for the training of the believers. This, in its natural context, does not speak about salvation for all men, in the idea of all people without exception, but what is being referenced is the grace that brought salvation to the ones Paul is speaking, the saved. Because this grace teaches US. This is speaking about grace that God extended to the ones saved, not some grace that God extends to every person without exception. This grace was not for all in some universal sense, but was for all in the ecclesiastical sense (those in the Church).

I trust that it can be clearly seen, that a universal application of this verse is simply reading into the text what is not there, instead of allowing the text read for itself.

The Christian Master Narrative

The reversal of the curse of sin originates in God’s love and his sovereign determination to save sinners, and it is grounded in the cross and resurrection of Christ. The atonement of Jesus Christ accomplishes our salvation from sin. Nevertheless, the New Testament makes clear that we are awaiting the transformation of our bodies and the arrival of the Kingdom in fullness. Any honest reading of the New Testament leaves us knowing that our salvation is secure in Christ, but we await the final display of Christ’s glory in the Kingdom’s fullness.

In understanding the Kingdom, we benefit by considering the fact that the Kingdom is already here, inaugurated by Christ, but is not yet fully come. The “already/not yet” character of the Kingdom explains why, though sin is fully defeated, we still experience sin in our lives. Death was defeated at the cross, but we still taste death. The created order continues to cry out for redemption, and the venom of the serpent still stings.

The Christian doctrine of eschatology provides the Christian worldview with its mature understanding of history. Every worldview must provide an account of where history is headed and whether human history has any purpose at all. Christianity grounds the meaning of human existence in the fact that we are made in the image of God and the meaning of human history in the security of God’s providential rule. Thus, the Christian worldview dignifies history and assures us that history is indeed meaningful. The Gospel of Christ is itself grounded in historical events – and so is the promise of things to come.

At the end of this age, Christ will return to bring his Kingdom in fullness. He will rule with perfect righteousness and will both judge the nations and vindicate his own cause. The unfolding events point to a conclusive final judgment at the end of history.

This final judgment is made necessary by the fact of human sin and the infinite reality of God’s holiness. The Bible straightforwardly presents the assurance of a final judgment that will demonstrate the perfection of God and the glory of his justice. This final judgment will demonstrate God’s mercy to those who are in Christ and God’s wrath righteously poured out upon sin.

This judgment will be so perfect that, in the end, all must know that God alone is righteous and that his decrees are absolutely perfect. God’s power will be demonstrated when all authorities are brought under submission to the Lord Jesus Christ, when every earthly kingdom yields, and when every knee bows and every tongue confesses that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father (Phil. 2:10).

The glory of the Garden of Eden will be surpassed by the glories of the New Heaven and the New Earth. The saints will rule with Christ as his vice-regents, and perfect peace will dawn in the messianic Kingdom.

Every single moment of human history cries out for judgment. Every sin and every sinner will be brought before the throne of God, and full satisfaction will be made. The demands of divine justice will be fully met, and the mercy and grace of God will be fully demonstrated. The great dividing line that runs through humanity will be the one that separates those who are in Christ and those who are not.

The backdrop of eternity puts the span of a human life into perspective. Our time on earth is short, but eternity dignifies time even as it reminds us of our finitude. The concluding movement of the biblical narrative reminds us that we are to yearn for eternity and for the glory that is to come.

On this Day of Judgment, all human attempts at justice will be shown to fall far short of authentic justice. On this day, God’s perfect justice will indeed flood like a mighty river. The destiny of the unrepentant sinner is eternal punishment. But God’s justice is also restorative, and those who are in Christ will come to know the absolute satisfaction, peace, wholeness, and restoration that Christ promises. Every eye will be dry, and every tear will be wiped away (Rev. 7:17; 21:4).

The reversal of the curse and the end of history serve to ground Christians in this age within the secure purposes and the sovereign power of God. The Christian worldview rejects all human utopianisms, all claims of lasting earthly glory, and all denials of the meaningfulness of history and human experience.

In other words, the conclusion of the Christian master narrative reminds believers that we are not to seek ultimate fulfillment in this life. Instead, we are to follow Christ in obedience and give the totality of our lives to the things that will bring glory to God in the midst of this fallen world. We will refrain from optimism grounded in humanity and will rest in the hope that is ours in Christ. We will suffer illness, injury, persecution, and death—but we know ourselves to be completely safe within the purposes of God. And so we wait. And so we pray, “Even so, Lord, come quickly.”

Inspiration-The Effectual Call

We believe in the inerrancy of the Holy Scriptures, that is, that the Holy Scriptures are without error. That the words of the Scripture are wholly perfect and not only are without error, but are incapable of containing error. When you consider the Doctrine of Inspiration, what some believers miss is the fact of the moulded will. What exactly do I mean by that? It means that we believe that God can work in such a way that the human will wills to do what God wills that will to do. We do not believe that God had to force the Apostle Paul to write the letter to the Romans or to the Ephesians. We believe that every word of the Holy Scriptures convey God’s perfect message because God formed Paul’s will to do what the Father’s will, willed to do.

That is the idea of 2 Peter 1:21, where the Apostle Peter says that the Scripture did not come by the will of man, by Holy men were “moved” by the Holy Spirit. “Moved” is a Greek term that literally means “to be moved along”. The Holy Spirit, as it were, took the writters of the Scripture and moved them into what to say, yet using their personal characteristic style. They were not robots penning the Holy Scripture, their own style was used (which is how we can identify writters of books that are not plainly stated, based on style), and the Holy Spirit formed their wills to write what the Father willed to be written. In other points of theology, as in inspiration, the Father can and does change the will in order for the Father’s will to be done. Inspiration is just one example of this.

Whosoever Will……

It amazes me the things my mind catches and clings too. I heard a preacher say the other day in his sermon, “I am not a Calvinist, I believe in ‘whosoever will’”.
Well, that statement caught my attention and immediately I thought, “this man does not know what Calvinists believe, because a good and Biblical Calvinist believes in “whosoever will”.
Now, while I am not a Calvinist (although I believe wholeheartedly in the Doctrines of Sovereign Grace, I stay away from “Calvinist” because I believe John Calvin would be offended at naming a system of Biblical beliefs after him), but I know that those who do go by that name (unless you are a hyper-calvinist, then you are an anti-calvinist), believe and celebrate “whosoever will”.
One of the differences between us and our synergist friends is that we believe that the Scriptures teach that before a person is willing, they must be enabled by the Holy Spirit. Jesus could not be any more clear then when He told the crowd in John 6 that “no man CAN COME to me unless it is granted to him by the Father”.
The “whosoever will” thats comes will come only as they are given regenerated life from the Holy Spirit. As Paul said in Romans 8:7-8 that those that are according to flesh cannot please God. Questions; is repentance and faith things that are pleasing to the Father? That goes without saying. So if people in the flesh cannot repent and believe in the natural state, then they MUST have another at work in them to cause them to be willing.
Paul says in Ephesians 1 that we have been chosen before the foundation of the world. He foreloved us. He made us willing.
I was not a robot the day I repented and believed; the Lord took out my heart of stone and gave me a heart of flesh. THE LORD DID ALL THESE THINGS.
we believe in “whosoever will” and celebrate it. However the only way we can be willing is for the Spirit to change us and cause us to be willing.

The Doctrine of Charles Finney

Many Christians over the years have given rave reviews to the eighteenth century revivalist, Charles G. Finney. Books have been written about his life, preachers quote him from the pulpit and lest we forget the great number of people that “came to the Lord” as a result of his ministry. However, as you begin to review the life and the beliefs of Charles Finney, you will find that he was very much NOT an evangelical, and not at all orthodox in his beliefs.

Charles Finney was born in 1792 in Connecticut but lived most of his life in Oneida County, New York. Raised by unsaved parents, he grew up largely ignorant of Christian doctrine. The religion that Finney remembered as a child was, he said later, “of a type not at all calculated to arrest my attention”. Finney characterized his pastor’s sermon content as “a dry discussion of Theology”.

Finney decided to study law and took an apprenticeship in Adams, New York, where for the first time he became actively involved in Church. The local Presbyterian Pastor, George W. Gale, took a special interest in Finney and made him choir director. Then over the years, Finney made a profession of faith and later felt the call of God to preach. It was, I believe, extremely unfortunate that Finney chose to pursue a preaching ministry immediately after his conversion. Devoid of any solid Christian influence in his life, he was almost completely ignorant of the Scriptures and Theology. He was a brilliant man; however, and his legal training had conditioned him to think logically, but it also saddled him with a world of wrong presumptions. Finney’s notions about justice, guilt, righteousness, transgression, forgiveness, responsibility, sovereignty, and a host of other terms were drawn from his legal studies, not the Scriptures.

Wherever Finney preached, people responded enthusiastically. Finney boldly challenged conventional doctrine and persuasively championed his own rather novel set of doctrines. He interpreted everything from a nineteenth-century American legal standard to every biblical statement. “I had read nothing on the subject of the atonement except in my Bible”, he wrote, “and what I found on the subject, I had interpreted as I would have understood the same or like passages in law books”. He concluded that God’s justice demanded that He extend grace equally to all. He reasoned that God could not righteously hold mankind guilty for Adam’s disobedience. In his opinion, a just God would never condemn people for being sinners. Finney wrote, “The Bible defines sin to be a transgression of the law. What law have we violated inheriting this sin nature? What law requires us to have a different nature from that which we possess? Does reason affirm that we are deserving of the wrath and curse of God forever, for inheriting from Adam a sinful nature”.  Thus Finney discarded the clear teaching of Romans 5:16-19 in favor of human reason. Worse yet, Finney denied that a holy God would impute people’s sin to Christ and of Christ’s righteousness to believers. Finney concluded that the doctrines clearly taught in Romans 3-5 were “theological fiction”. In essence he denied the core teachings of evangelical theology.

Unfortunately, Finney’s early success in preaching obscured his serious flaws in Theology. Finney himself admitted that when he was being examined by his Church to be licensed to preach, the presbytery, “avoided asking questions that would naturally brings my views into collision with theirs”.  When asked if he agreed with the Westminster Confession of Faith, he said, “I replied that I received it for substance of doctrine, so far as I understood it”. Then later confessed that he had never read it.

There is much more that I could say about him and if anyone is interested I will share, but for my purposes on this article what I have said will suffice, because you get the message. One of the  marks that you always hear about  Finney is the great number of people that came to “know the Lord” under his preaching. In closing I want to quote a contemporary of Finney, “During ten years, hundreds, and perhaps thousands, were annually reported to be converted on all hands, but now it is admitted that Finney’s real converts are comparatively few”. It is declared, even by himself, that “the great body of them are a disgrace to religion”; as a consequence of these defections, practical evils, great, terrible, and innumerable, are in various quarters rushing into the Church.

Finney’s logical way of thinking, instead of biblical, and heretical teaching caused the superficial “conversion” of many. He denied the most cardinal doctrines of the Christian faith, and his presentation of the Gospel bore little fruit. Thank God for pastors who are strong on Biblical doctrine.

Understanding Jesus knocking in Revelation 3:20

Have you seen the old portrait that portrays Christ as the effeminate Savior standing at a doorway knocking on the door waiting for someone to open it? Such is really a tasteless view of the Master. He is not some wimpy shepherd that stands at a door and knocks with absolutely no power to open the door. So what does Revelation 3:20 mean?
Many people include this verse in their evangelistic attempts to lost people. Usually saying something like, “Jesus is knocking at the door of your heart waiting for you to open it”. Such is not the Biblical doctrine of Salvation, nor the clear context of Revelation 3.
In Revelation 3 Christ is speaking, not to group of unredeemed people, but to the Church; the Church of Ladocia in particular. Jesus was trying to get back into the Church not trying to get into the heart of an individual person or persons in Salvation. These people were already saved. To use this verse in an evangelistic sense is to take the verse from its context and force a meaning on it the Holy Spirit never intended.
This is another example of so many people just taking a verse to mean a certain thing because they have always heard it taught like that. The Scripture must be allowed to speak for itself, not the way we have always heard it spoken for. Let us be faithful to allow the Word to speak for itself.

Grandville Sharp and the Deity of Christ

In our Church, just a few weeks ago, we had a visting preacher who made this statement that he had made to a Jehovah’s Witness: “If I could show you from your bible (exphasis on lower case, because it is really NOT the Bible), the deity of Christ, would you believe me?” Now, I do not know the outcome of that meeting, but it sparked an interest in my mind.

So, I went and looked at a copy of the New World Translation and found the reference for Titus 2:13; one of the greatest examples of the Deity of Christ. Sure enough, it says almost identical to the true Word of God. Which is very suprising, seeing as how Charles Russell did not know Greek and could not even quote you the Greek Alphabet (which a couple of my sons can do). But another question was raised in my mind, “Well the JW would just say that the verse was referring to two different people”. Thus we are introduced to the Granville Sharp Rule, a rule introduced to me my second year in Greek.

Basically, Granville Sharp’s rule states that when you have two nouns, which are not proper names (such as Cephas, or Paul, or Timothy), which are describing a person, and the two nouns are connected by the word “and,” and the first noun has the article (“the”) while the second does not, *both nouns are referring to the same person*. In our texts, this is demonstrated by the words “God” and “Savior” at Titus 2:13 and 2 Peter 1:1. “God” has the article, it is followed by the word for “and,” and the word “Savior” does not have the article. Hence, both nouns are being applied to the same person, Jesus Christ. This rule is exceptionless. One must argue solely on theological grounds against these passages. There is truly no real grammatical objection that can be raised. Not that many have not attempted to do so, and are still trying. However, the evidence is overwhelming in favor of the above interpretation. Lets look at some of the evidence from the text itself.

In Titus 2:13, we first see that Paul is referring to the “epiphaneia” of the Lord, His “appearing.” Every other instance of this word is reserved for Christ and Him alone. It is immediately followed by verse 14, which says, who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for Himself a people for His own possession, zealous for good works. The obvious reference here is to Christ who “gave Himself for us” on the cross of Calvary. There is no hint here of a plural antecedent for the “who” of verse 14 either. It might also be mentioned that verse 14, while directly referring to Christ, is a paraphrase of some Old Testament passages that refer to Yahweh God. (Psalm 130:8, Deuteronomy 7:6, etc). One can hardly object to the identification of Christ as God when the Apostle goes on to describe His works as the works of God!

The passage found at 2 Peter 1:1 is even more compelling. Some have simply by-passed grammatical rules and considerations, and have decided for an inferior translation on the basis of verse 2, which, they say, “clearly distinguishes” between God and Christ. Such translation on the basis of theological prejudices is hardly commendable. The little book of 2 Peter contains a total of five “Granville Sharp” constructions. They are 1:1, 1:11, 2:20, 3:2, and 3:18. No one would argue that the other four instances are exceptions to the rule. For example, in 2:20, it is obvious that both “Lord” and “Savior” are in reference to Christ. Such is the case in 3:2, as well as 3:18. No problem there, for the proper translation does not step on anyone’s theological toes. 1:11 is even more striking. The construction here is *identical* to the construction found in 1:1, with only one word being different. Here are the passages as they are transliterated into English:

1:1: tou theou hemon kai sotaros Iesou Christou

1:11: tou kuriou hemon kai sotaros Iesou Christou

Notice the exact one-to-one correspondence between these passages! The only difference is the substitution of “kuriou” for “theou”. No one would question the translation of “our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ” at 1:11; why question the translation of “our God and Savior, Jesus Christ” at 1:1? Consistency in translation demands that we not allow our personal prejudices to interfere with our rendering of God’s Word.

Dr. A. T. Robertson examined this very subject, and in conclusion said,

Sharp stands vindicated after all the dust has settled. We must let these passages mean what they want to mean regardless of our theories about the theology of the writers.

There is no solid grammatical reason for one to hesitate to translate 2 Pet. 1:1, “our God and Saviour Jesus Christ,” and Tit. 2:13, “our great God and Saviour Christ Jesus.”… Scholarship, real scholarship, seeks to find the truth. That is its reward. The Christian scholar finds the same joy in truth and he is not uneasy that the foundations will be destroyed.

Hopefully all involved can echo Dr. Robertson’s words. We need not think that God’s Word is our enemy, or that we must twist it around to suit our needs. God’s truth will stand firm, despite all of mankind’s attempts to hide it, or twist it. Christians are looking for that blessed hope; the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ. In the meantime, let us do good deeds to others, living in the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ.