Author:
ACNR
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Date Posted: 14:38:04 05/06/02 Mon
Sorry it has taken me a while to get back to you here. I've been busy with a project that has limited my net time.
Roy, please understand, that my previous post here to you was not intended to belabor the point, but was meant to draw a distinction between making charges or claims without solid substantiation, and having the substantiation to back up one's claims.
When bringing a charge, it is imperative that we be sure of the charge and have ready evidence that supports that charge, as opposed to making rash, emotionally biased charges, but instead, we are called to make sound, right judgments based in reasoned fact within the parameters of Scripture. Wouldn't you agree?
That is why I quoted your exact words, as opposed to simply "thinking", or relying on a perception alone, that someone said or meant something.
Therefore, it appears that my reponse was perceived as one that was beating you over the head, so to speak, which was not the intention at all, and for which I apologize for failing to make myself expressly clear of the intent. I beg your forgiveness.
On another note, concerning what you call, "Simology"; I understand where you are coming from, Sim does come dangerously close to full blown "antinomianism", but doesn't quite cross over the line.
I have asked Sim directly several times concerning this, and he has confirmed that if one is indeed in Christ, they cannot remain in a state of habitual sin or habitual backsliding, or else they prove they were never genuinely saved in Christ to begin with. However, his teaching on this topic is one that has led many to believe that they can continue in habitual sin, without repentance, and still be saved.
You may want to do a bit of a study on "antinomianism", which is a false doctrine that entered the Church very early, particularly in Rome, and Paul addresses directly in Romans 6.
Below is a short article by AW Tozer on modern "antinomianism", especially among some of the "fundamentalists".
Antinomianism
By
A. W. Tozer
Fundamental Christianity in our times is deeply influenced by that ancient enemy of righteousness, antinomianism. The creed
of the antinomian is easily stated: We are saved by faith alone; works have no place in salvation; conduct is works, and is
therefore of no importance. What we do cannot matter as long as we believe rightly. The divorce between creed and conduct is
absolute and final. The question of sin is settled by the Cross; conduct is outside the circle of faith and cannot come between
the believer and God. Such, in brief, is the teaching of the antinomian. And so fully has it permeated the Fundamental element in
modern Christianity that it is accepted by the religious masses as the very truth of God.
Antinomianism is the doctrine of grace carried by uncorrected logic to the point of absurdity. It takes the teaching of
justification by faith and twists it into deformity. It plagued the Apostle Paul in the early Church and called out some of his most
picturesque denunciations. When the question is asked, "Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound?" he answers no with
that terrific argument in the sixth chapter of Romans.
The advocates of antinomianism in our times deserve our respect for at least one thing: their motive is good. Their error
springs from their very eagerness to magnify grace and exalt the freedom of the gospel. They start right, but allow themselves to
be carried beyond what is written by a slavish adherence to undisciplined logic. It is always dangerous to isolate a truth and
then press it to its limit without regard to other truths. It is not the teaching of the Scriptures that grace makes us free to do evil.
Rather, it sets us free to do good. Between these two conceptions of grace there is a great gulf fixed. It may be stated as an
axiom of the Christian system that whatever makes sin permissible is a foe of God and an enemy of the souls of men.
Right after the first World War there broke out an epidemic of popular evangelism with the emphasis upon what was called
the "positive" gospel. The catch-words were "believe," "program," "vision." The outlook was wholly objective. Men fulminated
against duty, commandments and what they called scornfully "a decalogue of don'ts." They talked about a "big," "lovely" Jesus
who had come to help us poor but well-meaning sinners to get the victory. Christ was presented as a powerful but not too
particular Answerer of Prayer. The message was so presented as to encourage a loaves-and-fishes attitude toward Christ. That
part of the New Testament which acts as an incentive toward holy living was carefully edited out. It was said to be "negative"
and was not tolerated. Thousands sought help who had no desire to leave all and follow the Lord. The will of God was
interpreted as "Come and get it." Christ thus became a useful convenience, but His indisputable claim to Lordship over the
believer was tacitly canceled out.
Much of this is now history. The economic depression of the thirties helped to end it by making the huge meetings which
propagated it unprofitable. But its evil fruits remain. The stream of gospel thought had been fouled, and its waters are still
muddy. One thing that remains as a dangerous hangover from those gala days is the comfortable habit of blaming every-thing on
the devil. No one was supposed to feel any personal guilt; the devil had done it, so why blame the sinner for the devil's
misdeeds? He became the universal scapegoat, to take the blame for every bit of human deviltry from Adam to the present day.
One gathered that we genial and lovable sinners are not really bad; we are merely led astray by the blandishments of that
mischievous old Puck of the heavenly places. Our sins are not the expression of our rebellious wills; they are only bruises where
the devil has been kicking us around. Of course sinners can feel no guilt, seeing they are merely the victims of another's
wickedness.
Under that kind of teaching there can be no self-condemnation, but there can be, and is, plenty of self-pity over the raw deal
we innocent sinners got at the hand of the devil. Now, no Bible student will underestimate the sinister work of Satan, but to
make him responsible for our sins is to practice deadly deception upon ourselves. And the hardest deception to cure is that
which is self-imposed.
Another doctrine which hinders God's work, and one which is heard almost everywhere, is that sinners are not lost because
they have sinned, but because they have not accepted Jesus. "Men are not lost because they murder; they are not sent to hell
because they lie and steal and blaspheme; they are sent to hell because they reject a Saviour." This short-sighted preachment is
thundered at us constantly, and is seldom challenged by the hearers. A parallel argument would be hooted down as silly, but
apparently no one notices it: "That man with a cancer is dying, but it is not the cancer that is killing him; it is his failure to accept
a cure." Is it not plain that the only reason the man would need a cure is that he is already marked for death by the cancer? The
only reason I need a Saviour, in His capacity as Saviour, is that I am already marked for hell by the sins I have committed.
Refusing to believe in Christ is a symptom of deeper evil in the life, of sins unconfessed and wicked ways unforsaken. The guilt
lies in acts of sin; the proof of that guilt is seen in the rejection of the Saviour.
If anyone should feel like brushing this aside as mere verbal sparring, let him first pause: the doctrine that the only damning sin
is the rejection of Jesus is definitely a contributing cause of our present weakness and lack of moral grip. It is nothing but a neat
theological sophism which has become identified with orthodoxy in the mind of the modern Christian and is for that reason very
difficult to correct. It is, for all its harmless seeming, a most injurious belief, for it destroys our sense of responsibility for our
moral conduct. It robs all sin of its frightfulness and makes evil to consist in a mere technicality.
********
This may help you in clarifying the dangers of this false doctrine, and it's affects on the modern church.
I look forward to talking with you again. God bless.
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