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Repentance

According to Scripture repentance is wholly an inward act, and should not be confounded with the change of life that proceeds from it. Confession of sin and reparation of wrongs are fruits of repentance. Repentance is only a negative condition, and not a positive means of salvation. While it is the sinner's present duty, it does not offset the claims of the law on account of past transgressions. Moreover, true repentance never exists except in conjunction with faith, while on the other hand, wherever there is true faith, there is also real repentance. The two are but different aspects of the same turning, -- a turning away from sin in the direction of God. It should be borne in mind, however, that the faith and repentance cannot be separated; they are simply complementary parts of the same process.

On the Lutheran side, repentance and the remission of sin are two main "heads of doctrine" and comprise the elements of saving faith. Repentance requires a right concept of sin, and true conversion adds to this, requires, faith in Christ's priestly work and the forgiveness of sin. The source of repentance is the external Word of God and, in the narrow sense, is a work of the law creating in the sinner terrors of God's righteous condemnation. The Gospel is then preached to the contrite, and announces to him/us/me that solely for the sake of Christ and His vicarious atoning death the sinner is absolved-- solely "for Christ's sake."

Repentance is not just a "once for all act" but is part of the daily experience of the Christian. Luther stated, "The whole Christian life is one of continual repentance." Repentance is a "fruit of faith" and flows from a love of God as an effect of being converted.

 

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The Resurrected Body

Resurrection is not resuscitation. We are not talking about a body brought back to its former life, a body that needs food, can get sick, can age, and must eventually die again. When Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, he did not resurrect him; he resuscitated him. A resurrected state, however, is a body that is physical yet incorruptible-it cannot die, age, or become ill.

 

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Reverence

Reverence is the acknowledgement of God's transcendence and majesty, and the creature's comparative littleness; of the divine lordship, justice, and sovereign claims. Such reverence expresses awe before the absolutely holy, as well as a deference and submission based on a sense of complete dependence.

 

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Revivalism

Revivalism, narrowly defined, is the use of special techniques to awaken interest in religion. More broadly, it embraces those Christian movements whose thought-life and culture honour this formalized pursuit of spiritual renewal. Its distinguishing elements include charismatic evangelists, mass audiences, Bible-based preaching, a gospel of repentance, the elevation of the heart and experience over head and theology, and the proliferation of dramatic, often physical, experiences of conversion. Revivalism has been primarily, but not exclusively, a feature of evangelical Protestant movements; its roots and characteristic expressions are North American, but the phenomenon has spread throughout the globalizing of Anglo-American evangelicalism. For Christians it has continued to raise questions about divine agency, the role of human instrumentality, and the psychological, sociological, and teleological role of revival in the late-modern world. Concerns over showmanship, evanescence, and manipulation of the vulnerable, questionable spiritual outcomes, and even charlatanism jostle alongside apprehensions of the Holy Spirit and God's power.

 

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Rule of Interpretation of Scripture

VII. All things in Scripture are not alike plain in themselves, nor alike clear unto all: yet those things which are necessary to be known, believed, and observed for salvation are so clearly propounded, and opened in some place of Scripture or other, that not only the learned, but the unlearned, in a due use of the ordinary means, may attain unto a sufficient understanding of them.

IX. The infallible rule of interpretation of Scripture is the Scripture itself: and therefore, when there is a question about the true and full sense of any Scripture (which is not manifold, but one), it must be searched and known by other places that speak more clearly.

 

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The Sacraments

Reformed View:
We believe that our gracious God, taking account of our weakness and infirmities, has ordained the sacraments for us, thereby to seal unto us His promises, and to be pledges of the good will and grace of God towards us, and also to nourish and strengthen our faith; which He has joined to the Word of the gospel, the better to present to our senses both that which He declares to us by His Word and that which He works inwardly in our hearts, thereby confirming in us the salvation which He imparts to us. For they are visible signs and seals of an inward and invisible thing, by means whereof God works in us by the power of the Holy Spirit. Therefore the signs are not empty or meaningless, so as to deceive us. For Jesus Christ is the true object presented by them, without whom they would be of no moment. Moreover, we are satisfied with the number of sacraments which Christ our Lord has instituted, which are two only, namely, the sacrament of baptism and the holy supper of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Lutheran View:
Of the Use of the Sacraments they teach that the Sacraments were ordained, not only to be marks of profession among men, but rather to be signs and testimonies of the will of God toward us, instituted to awaken and confirm faith in those who use them. Wherefore we must so use the Sacraments that faith be added to believe the promises which are offered and set forth through the Sacraments. They therefore condemn those who teach that the Sacraments justify by the outward act, and who do not teach that, in the use of the Sacraments, faith which believes that sins are forgiven, is required.

 

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Sanctification

Sanctification is the fruit of justification. It is the gracious and continuous operation of the Holy Spirit by which He delivers the justified sinner from the pollution of sin, renews his whole nature in the image of God, and enables him to perform good works. Sanctification never reaches perfection in this life (believers continue to struggle with sin), but by virtue of the believer's union with Christ, real conformity to the image of Christ occurs by means of the Word and sacraments.

 

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The Scope of Scripture

The Reformation insisted on the centrality of Christ to the entire Scripture. This centrality does not result merely from the fact that Christ is the goal and center of the messianic and covenantal history between the call of Abraham and the eschaton, but also from the ultimate focus of meaning of every text in Scripture on the work of God in Christ. Luther could insist that the genuine books of Scripture were known by their witness to Christ. Ursinus likewise declared that Christ is taught throughout the whole of Scripture as the foundation of doctrine and as the summation and focal point of the biblical message. On the one hand, this view could lead to a highly Christological reading of the Old Testament, particularly of the Psalms and the prophets. On the other, granting the relationship between Christ as the word incarnate and Scripture as the accommodated form of the eternal word and wisdom of God, it served to reinforce the doctrine of Scriptural authority and to main a more dynamic view of the text in relation to doctrine.

 

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Secularism

Secularism is an ideology; its proponents consciously denounce all forms of supernaturalism and the agencies devoted to it, advocating non­religious or antireligious principles as the basis for personal morality and social organization.

The view that holds the separation of God from his creation and denies his presence in the world, if not his existence. The secular city is the world of men and things moving on without him, doing without religion. This secularism as a world view and way of life denies the immanence of God or his existence and man's religious nature. Secularism denies as well the hidden presence and action of God or the cosmic role of Christ. This is a desacralization that denies two basic truths of the Christian faith: creation and incarnation.

 

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Sin

Q. 24. What is sin?
A. Sin is any want of conformity unto, or transgression of, any law of God, given as a rule to the reasonable creature.

Q. 25. Wherein consists the sinfulness of that estate where into man fell?
A. The sinfulness of that estate where into man fell, consists in the guilt of Adam's first sin, the want of that righteousness wherein he was created, and the corruption of his nature, whereby he is utterly indisposed, disabled, and made opposite unto all that is spiritually good, and wholly inclined to all evil, and that continually; which is commonly called original sin, and from which do proceed all actual transgressions.

 

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Skepticism

A proposition about the limitations of knowledge: that no knowledge at all or that no absolute unquestionable, trustworthy, certain: complete, or perfect knowledge (or rationally justifiable belief) is attainable by man or that such is not attainable by any knower; or that none of these kinds of knowledge, if attained, would be recognizable as such; or that no such knowledge is attainable about certain subjects, e.g., questions about existence, ultimate reality, certain religious beliefs, or the existence or nature of certain entities (e.g., God, one's self, other selves, values, an external world, or causal connections); or that one or more or all of these types of knowledge is not attainable by certain methods or media, e.g., reason, inference, revelation, any non-empirical method, direct observation, or imme­diate experience (hence identification of skepticism variously with anti­rationalism, anti-supernaturalism, or doctrines of relativity of the senses or relativity of all knowledge).

 

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Sola Gratia

The teaching of the Reformers and of their scholastic successors that grace alone is the ground of salvation and that individuals are justified by grace alone through faith. The term allows only grace to be the active power in justification and leaves nothing to the human will or to human works. Synergism, or cooperation between man and God, is therefore effectively ruled out of the initial work of salvation. Even faith is a result of grace and cannot be considered as the result of human effort.

 

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Solo Christo:
The Erosion of Christ-Centered Faith

As evangelical faith becomes secularized, its interests have been blurred with those of the culture. The result is a loss of absolute values, permissive individualism, and a substitution of wholeness for holiness, recovery for repentance, intuition for truth, feeling for belief, chance for providence, and immediate gratification for enduring hope. Christ and his cross have moved from the center of our vision.

We reaffirm that our salvation is accomplished by the mediatorial work of the historical Christ alone. His sinless life and substitutionary atonement alone are sufficient for our justification and reconciliation to the Father.

We deny that the gospel is preached if Christ's substitutionary work is not declared and faith in Christ and his work is not solicited.

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Soteriology

(From the Greek sōtēria, "salvation") The doctrine of salvation.

 

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Special Revelation and Scripture

It is only through Scripture that we receive any knowledge of the direct revelations of God in the past. We know absolutely nothing about God's revelations among Israel through the prophets and finally in Christ, except from the Bible. If this is set aside, we abandon the whole of God's special revelation, including that in Christ. It is only through the word of the apostles that we can have communion with Christ. Consequently, it is unthinkable that God gave a special revelation and then took no measures to preserve it inviolate for coming generations. Scripture derives its significance exactly from the fact that it is the book of revelation. By means of Scripture God constantly carries His revelation into the world and makes its content effective in the thought and life of man. It is not merely a narrative of what happened years ago, but the perennial speech of God to man. Revelation lives on in Scripture and brings even now, just as it did when it was given, light, life, and holiness. By means of that revelation God continues to renew sinners in their being and consciousness. Scripture is the Holy Spirit's chief instrument for the extension and guidance of the Church, for the perfecting of the saints, and for the building up of the body of Jesus Christ.

 

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Spin

[Edward L. Bernays] argued that the P.R. professional could "continuously and systematically" perform the task of "regimenting the public mind." He wasn't talking about lying. He was talking about artful, staged half- truth. It's the kind of sly deception that we've come to associate with the Reagan Administration's intricately scripted photo ops (the cowboy hats, the flannel shirts, the horse), with the choreographed folksiness of Clinton's Town Hall meetings, with the "Wag the Dog" world of political operatives, and with the Dilbertian byways of boardroom euphemism, in which firing is "rightsizing" and dismembering companies becomes "unlocking shareholder value." Edward L. Bernays invented spin.

Spin, the political columnist E.J. Dionne wrote recently, "obliterates the distinction between persuasion and deception."

The spin fantasy offers a far more satisfying explanation for the world around us. Spin suggests a drama, a script to decode, a game played at the highest of levels. Spinning is the art of telling a story, even when there is no story to tell, and this is irresistible (particularly to journalists, who make a living by telling stories even when there is no story to tell). In truth, the world of persuasion is a good deal more prosaic. Ideas and candidacies--not to mention albums--are sold by talking plainly and clearly, and the louder and faster the whirring of the spinners becomes, the more effective this clarity and plainspokenness will be.

 

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Spiritual and Civil Righteousness

In this way, then, things are well-balanced, and you satisfy at the same time God's kingdom inwardly and the kingdom of the world outwardly, at the same time suffer evil and injustice and yet punish evil and injustice; at the same time do not resist evil and yet resist it. For in the case you consider yourself and what is yours, in the other you consider your neighbor and what is his.

 

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Substitutionary Atonement

"The process of propitiation envisaged in the Bible is one which involves an element of substitution. In both the Old and New Testaments the means of propitiation is the offering up of a gift, the gift of a life yielded up to death by God's own appointment. The Scripture is clear that the wrath of God is visited upon sinners or else that the Son of God dies for them.... Either we die or He dies. But 'God commendeth His own love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us' (Rom 5:8)."

"By the blood of Christ a propitiation is effected so that those who are of faith no longer need fear the wrath. Thus we see that, whereas originally sinners were liable to suffer from the outpouring of the wrath of God, Christ has suffered instead of them, and now they may go free. But to say this is to say substitution."

 

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The Sufficiency of Scripture

We believe that this Holy Scripture contains the will of God completely and that everything one must believe to be saved is sufficiently taught in it. For since the entire manner of service which God requires of us is described in it at great length, no one-- even an apostle or an angel from heaven, as Paul says-- ought to teach other than what the Holy Scriptures have already taught us. For since it is forbidden to add to or subtract from the Word of God, this plainly demonstrates that the teaching is perfect and complete in all respects.

Therefore we must not consider human writings-- no matter how holy their authors may have been-- equal to the divine writings; nor may we put custom, nor the majority, nor age, nor the passage of time or persons, nor councils, decrees, or official decisions above the truth of God, for truth is above everything else. For all human beings are liars by nature and more vain than vanity itself.

Therefore we reject with all our hearts everything that does not agree with this infallible rule, as we are taught to do by the apostles when they say, "Test the spirits to see if they are of God," and also, "If anyone comes to you and does not bring this teaching, do not receive him into your house."

 

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Theology

Theology is to be defined essentially, if rather generically, as the overspill of divine faith into all the levels of human reasonableness, its wit, humor, poetic imagery, sense of analogy, power of coordination, openness to be taught, and search for reasons why, whence, how, and what it is all about. God's revelation is the source of theology, and the Holy Scripture is the record of God's special revelation. Theology is the Church thinking aloud, and here, it may be remarked, the people not the professionals, have sometimes led the way-the distinction is not that between laity and clergy.

The mention of "theologian" may suggest a professional expert. This is a special vocation for some, but all the people of God, to the extent they are called upon to think at all, are called to think theologically, for all issues, are at bottom theological.

Accordingly, Christian theology takes place within the household of the faith. To look at divine revelation from outside, in so far as that be possible, would not be theology, but a detached and critical philosophy of religion, and the same can be said about "natural theology," when treated merely as a part of the natural, moral, and metaphysical philosophy out of its context in salvation history.

 

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Theology of the Cross vs. Theology of Glory

This distinction can be seen as Martin Luther's most profound contribution to theological thought. Standing in opposition to the theology of glory, the theology of the cross is best understood in concert with the "the hidden God" and the "the revealed God".

Because of the Fall of man the revealed God became the hidden God. The only way the shattered fellowship could be restored was by means of redemption. God's consummate meeting place was unveiled at the cross of Christ. God is known and understood not in strength but in weakness, not in an awesome display of majesty and power but in the exhibition of a love willing to have the Son of God suffer. Unfortunately, modern man is determined to know God as the Revealed One. The heathen sees God's power in the created cosmos but is led from one degree of idolatry to another.

The theology of glory is the antithesis of the theology of the cross. So strongly did Luther feel about the distinction between these theologies that he stated unequivocally that only those who hold to and teach the theology of the cross deserve to be called theologians.

The potential danger of a theology of glory is that it could lead to a form of moralistic works righteousness, a propensity to strike a bargain with God on the basis of personal achievement. The theology of the cross repudiates humanity's own accomplishments and permits God to do everything to effect and preserve his salvation. Such theology redirects from moralistic activism to genuine receptivity.

 

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Total Inability

Therefore, all people are conceived in sin and are born children of wrath, unfit for any saving good, inclined to evil, dead in their sins, and slaves to sin; without the grace of the regenerating Holy Spirit they are neither willing nor able to return to God, to reform their distorted nature, or even to dispose themselves to such reform.

 

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Tradition in the Church

According to Heiko Oberman, there were two competing understandings of the relations between tradition and Scripture in the pre-modern church. He described the first approach, the "single exegetical tradition of interpreted Scripture," as "Tradition I." The "two-sources theory which allows for extra-biblical oral tradition" he called "Tradition II." He argued that the Council of Trent represented Tradition II and the Reformers represented Tradition I.

In contrast to Tradition II, in which Scripture is controlled by a parallel source of authority in a developing tradition, the classical Reformed approach controlled tradition with the Scriptures but did not reject tradition as such. The Reformed tradition is what Johannes Wollebius called the "ministerial testimony" to the Scriptures.

The confessional Reformed approach to tradition (Tradition I), however, neither canonizes the past nor ignores it nor suspects it as an enemy, but rather it treats it with the respect deserved by fellow brothers and sisters in Christ.

 

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True Saving Faith

True saving faith is a faith that has its seat in the heart and is roots in the regenerate life. The seed of the faith is implanted by God in the heart in regeneration, and it is only after God has implanted this seed in the heart that man can actively exercise faith. The conscious exercise of it gradually forms a habit, and this becomes a powerful aid in the further exercise of faith. When the Bible speaks of this faith it generally, though not always, refers to it as an activity of man. It may be defined as a certain conviction, wrought in the heart by the Holy Spirit, as to the truth of the gospel, and a hearty reliance on the promises of God in Christ.

 

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Turning Your Gaze Away from Yourself

If you want health for your souls, and if you want to be the instruments of bringing health to others, do not turn your gaze forever within, as though you could find Christ there. Nay, turn your gaze away from your own miserable experiences, away from your own sin, to the Lord Jesus Christ as He is offered to us in the gospel. "As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up." Only when we turn away from ourselves to that uplifted Savior shall we have healing for our deadly hurt.

It is the same old story, my friends -- the same old story of the natural man. Men are trying today, as they have always been trying, to save themselves -- to save themselves by their own act of surrender, by the excellence of their own faith, by mystic experiences of their own lives. But it is all in vain. Not that way is peace with God to be obtained. It is to be obtained only in the old, old way - by attention to something that was done once for all long ago, and by acceptance of the living Savior who there, once for all, brought redemption for our sin. Oh, that men would turn for salvation from their own experience to the Cross of Christ; oh, that they would turn from the phenomena of religion to the living God!

That that may be done, there is but one way. It is not found in a study of the psychology of religion; it is not found in "religious education"; it is not found in an analysis of one's own spiritual status. Oh, no. It is found only in the blessed written Word. There are the words of life. There God speaks. Let us attend to His voice. Let us above all things know the Word. Let us study it with all our minds, let us cherish it with all our hearts. Then let us try, very humbly, to bring it to the unsaved. Let us pray that God may honor not the messengers but the message, that despite our unworthiness He may make His Word upon our unworthy lips to be a message of life.

 

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The Two Kingdoms

Reformed
The two kingdoms doctrine teaches that God rules all things, but rules all things in two fundamentally distinct ways. In the Reformed version of this doctrine, the civil kingdom consists of the state and other cultural institutions and activities of this life. God rules this kingdom as creator and sustainer, bestowing rain and sunshine and all sorts of other earthly goods upon all people and upholding some measure of justice and prosperity in their cultural lives. The spiritual kingdom, on the other hand, is a heavenly, eschatological realm, but one that has also broken into the present world through the ministry and life of the church. God rules this kingdom as redeemer, bestowing not temporal provisions of natural earthly life upon all people but the blessings of salvation and eternal life to his redeemed people.

Lutheran
Of Civil Affairs they teach that lawful civil ordinances are good works of God, and that it is right for Christians to bear civil office, to sit as judges, to judge matters by the Imperial and other existing laws, to award just punishments, to engage in just wars, to serve as soldiers, to make legal contracts, to hold property, to make oath when required by the magistrates, to marry a wife, to be given in marriage.

They condemn also those who do not place evangelical perfection in the fear of God and in faith, but in forsaking civil offices, for the Gospel teaches an eternal righteousness of the heart. Meanwhile, it does not destroy the State or the family, but very much requires that they be preserved as ordinances of God, and that charity be practiced in such ordinances. Therefore, Christians are necessarily bound to obey their own magistrates and laws save only when commanded to sin; for then they ought to obey God rather than men. (Acts 5:29)

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Union with Christ

Phrase referring to the way in which believers share in Christ in eternity (by election), in past history (by redemption), in the present (by effectual calling, justification, and sanctification), and in the future (by glorification). This union is mystical, legal, and organic.

 

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Vocation

Before the Reformation vocation was understood and experienced in two ways: being assigned to a specific station in the medieval hierarchy, such as feudal lord or serf;... and being called away from the world into a religious and higher order-be it priestly or monastic-that attains a life that is closer to the perfection God has promised, a view made popular by the medieval church.

Martin Luther modified these views and redefined vocation as a call to serve the neighbor in the world rather than withdrawing from the world.... Luther used the German word for vocation for the first time to describe a wide range of callings.

 

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The Weaker Brother

In Romans 14, the weaker brother is the Christian whose conscience has scruples (an uneasy feeling arising from conscience or principle that tends to hinder action) against certain activities which are not explicitly forbidden by God in Scripture. The weaker brother is not the person who is easily misled in doctrine; the weaker brother is the person whose conscience is not yet convinced that he or she has the liberty to participate in certain activities as a Christian.

 

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What to Preach

"I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching. For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry."

"Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men."

"For Moses writes about the righteousness that is based on the law, that the person who does the commandments shall live by them. But the righteousness based on faith says, ‘Do not say in your heart, 'Who will ascend into heaven?'‘ (that is, to bring Christ down) or ‘'Who will descend into the abyss?'‘ (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). But what does it say? ‘The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart’ (that is, the word of faith that we proclaim); because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved… How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, ‘How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!’ But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, ‘Lord, who has believed what he has heard from us?’ So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ."

"But I, brothers, could not address you as spiritual people, but as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ. I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for it. And even now you are not yet ready, for you are still of the flesh."

"About this we have much to say, and it is hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing. For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food, for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child. But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil."

 

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Why We Gather for Worship

Whenever we gather for public worship, it is because we have been summoned. That is what "church" means: ekklesia, "called out." ...[Public worship] is a society of those who have been chosen, redeemed, called, justified, and are being sanctified until one day they will finally be glorified in heaven. We gather each Lord's Day not merely out of habit, social custom, or felt needs but because God has chosen this weekly festival as a foretaste of the everlasting Sabbath day that will be enjoyed fully at the marriage supper of the Lamb. God has called us out of the world and into his marvelous light: That is why we gather.

 

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Word-Faith Movement

The "word-faith" teaching may be summarized as follows: God created man in "God's class," as "little gods," with the potential to exercise what they refer to as the "God-kind of faith" in calling things into existence and living in prosperity and success as sovereign beings. Of course, we forfeited this opportunity by rebelling against God in the Garden and taking upon ourselves Satan's nature. To correct this situation, Jesus Christ became a man, died spiritually (thus taking upon Himself Satan's nature), went to hell, was "born again," rose from the dead with God's nature again, and then sent the Holy Spirit so that the incarnation could be duplicated in believers, thus fulfilling their calling to be what they call "little gods." Since we're called to experience this kind of life now, we should be successful in virtually every area of our lives. To be in debt, then, or be sick, or (as is even taught by the faith teachers) to be left by one's spouse, simply means that you don't have enough faith - or you have some secret sin in your life, because if you didn't, you would be able to handle all of these problems.

Now, while certain aspects of the this doctrine may vary from teacher to teacher - ranging from moderately aberrant to the outright heretical - the general outline remains the same. In every instance, the "Word-Faith" teaching is guilty of presenting an inflated view of man and a deflated view of God, thereby compromising God's message as revealed in the Bible. This fast-growing movement has disastrous implications and, in fact, reduces Jesus Christ to a means to an end - when in fact he is the end.

 

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The Work of the Holy Spirit in Sanctification

The Holy Spirit has not only a personality of his own, but also a distinctive method of working; and therefore we should distinguish between the work of Christ in meriting salvation and the work of the Holy Spirit in applying it. Christ met the demands of divine justice and merited all the blessings of salvation. But it is through the agency of the Holy Spirit that Christ's work is put in possession of those for whom he laid down his life.

The Holy Spirit originates, maintains, develops, and guides the new life. He overcomes and destroys the power of sin, renews man in the image of God, enables him to render spiritual obedience to God, to be the salt of the earth, and the light of the world. Though this work stands out as the work of the Holy Spirit, it cannot be separated from the work of Christ (John 16:13,14). The Holy Spirit's work is rooted in Christ's work.

 

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Worship in this Age

"With its already-not yet eschatology, Scripture points us to God with us, descending to us and seating us with Christ in heavenly places. It directs us to the in-breaking of the age to come through the preaching that makes a new creation, just as that Word gave birth to the first creation. It shows us God's signs and seals that prop up our weak faith and halting obedience. He is present, but on his terms and in the manner consistent with our time in between the times. And he is present because of his promise, not because of the skill of ministers or musicians."