19th March 2005: Stuart Olyott breakfasts with Strobert
28th March 2006: Stuart Olyott writes in Strob’s copy of The Gospel as it Really Is to thank him for it.
Stuarty also personally thanked us for being Front Row Loyal. And laughed at Joel for doing accountancy.
(By the way, the title of this post was Stuart’s reaction to reading the section on Adoption in the Westminster Confession of Faith)
“Now you’ll remember the catechism question…” – But if you don’t, you can come and hear the man himself tonight!
Someone better break the news to John ‘No mates’ Blanchard that no-one will be turning up to hear him tonight as the patron saint of SWS, Mr. Stuart Olyott will be speaking at Donaghadee Baptist Church at 8pm.
But if you do decide to go and give John someone to shake hands with, you can listen to Stuart’s sermon on Adoption from the P&R as he’s speaking on the same topic tonight.
The Free Offer: Biblical and Reformed – David Silversides (Marpet Press, 2005), 128 pages
First let me try and explain what this book is about with quotes from the Forward and the Introduction. In the Forward, John J. Murray says
“..Critics accuse Reformed men of not being able to preach the gospel effectively to sinners. A breeze from ‘across the pond’ has not helped the situation in the UK. It was first felt in the 1990s through the literature and conferences of the British Reformed Fellowship. This movement arose in the support given to it by a congregation of the Protestant Reformed Churches in America, which was established in Northern Ireland. A particular teaching of that Church embraced by the BRF was the denial of God’s offer of mercy to sinners as an expression of His loving kindness.”
David Silversides explains more in the Introduction:
“In more recent years another position [other than Arminianism or Hyper-Calvinism] has appeared which could be described as somewhere between orthodox Calvinism and Hyper-Calvinism, though claiming to represent the former. This view is represented by the able Dutch-American theologion Herman Hoeksema (1886-1965) and the denomination he was partly instrumental in founding…Hoeksema held that God’s love is only ever shown to His elect. Hence, he maintained that, whilst the gospel is to be preached to all and all are to be commanded to repent, there is no offer of mercy in Christ expressive of God’s love to all who hear.
Sorry for the quotes, but I didn’t want to wrongly state the position the book is written against. To summarise, people are saying that all we are meant to do is to ‘present the facts of Christ’s redeeming work, accompanied with a bear command to repent and believe’. So basically, a dead gospel. Of course, ‘free offer’ doesn’t mean any form of decisional regeneration such as altar calls, or telling everyone you meet ‘Christ died for you’ or any other sort of Arminian evangelism techniques. Those that deny the Free Offer claim to subscribe to the Westminster Standards and claim that they are following in the footsteps of the Reformers and Purtians etc. Because of this, Mr. S continually quotes from them in the book to show that this claim is nonsense.
Firstly, he shows that God clearly does show love to the non-elect in this life (common grace) by ‘Making His sun rise on the evil and on the good’ (Matt 5:45), restraining sin, delaying judgement, letting them hear the gospel etc. As far as we know, the rich young ruler never came to faith (Calvin says its probably he didn’t) but still we read ‘And Jesus, looking at him, loved him’ (Mark 10:21). Jesus said ‘But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return, and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, for he is kind to the ungrateful and the evil. Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful’ (Luke 6:35, 36). When God commands us to love our enemies, and to love our neighbour as ourselves, is He commanding us to love those whom he doesn’t love?! Of course not! When He was on earth, did Christ completely fulfill God’s Law, or did He only love the elect??!
Mr S then goes on to show how Common Grace is compatible with the true nature of God’s love to sinners, His hatred of the wicked and His unchangeableness before moving on to show (amongst other things) that the Free Offer is indiscriminate, looking at passages such as Ezekiel 33:11, Isaiah 55:1-3 and Matthew 23:37. The Free Offer also contains a conditional promise – that of faith/belief. The author then has to spend a while refuting the belief of those that deny the Free Offer that we are justified from eternity. They are forced to believe such an obviously unbiblical position due to their belief that God doesn’t love any sinners – not even elect sinners. Therefore we are ‘justified’ in God’s sight before we believe on Him in this life. (So no-one needs to flee the wrath of God, because the elect are already justified and the non-elect won’t anyway).
The Non-Free Offer crowd have attempted to redefine what ‘offer’ meant in the 17th Century so they can claim to follow the Westminster Standards. However this is clearly shown to be utter rubbish as Dave quotes loads of Westminster Assembly members to show that they meant by ‘offer’ the same as we mean today. For example, George Gillespie:
“Ministers do, indeed, offer Christ to all upon condition of believing, being commanded to preach the gospel to every creature, and not knowing who are reprobates.” (Aaron’s Rod Blossoming, p. 209)
In a chapter entitled ‘The Warrant of Faith’, the author shows how for assurance we should be looking at whether we have trusted in Christ, not trying to determine if we are elect or not – as doing the opposite is another side-effect of denying the Free Offer.
Mr. Silversides also points out the faulty line of reasoning usually employed by defenders of the Hoeksema view:
(a) Assume that absolute predestination and the free offer are doctrines that are incompatible with each other.
(b) Quote Scripture and the Reformers teaching absolute predestination
(c) Conclude that, therefore, Scripture and the Reformers do not teach the free offer
Throughout, the book is very well argued. The author interacts with many different ‘Protestant Reformed’ authors, but does it with respect and doesn’t just bash them like I would be tempted to do. I don’t see how anyone could read this book and still claim that the Free Offer is unbiblical. There are two appendixes to the book, and the second one quotes from a whole ream of Reformed writers supporting the Free Offer, and this is on top of the ones already quoted from in the book. They include, Calvin (at great length), William Perkins, David Dickson, James Durham, Wilhelmus a Brakel, Richard Cameron, James Renwick, Thomas Boston, Jonathan Edwards, Charles Hodge, William Cunningham, James Begg etc etc. The testimonies of the RPCNA and the RPCI are also included. In 1807 the RPCNA adopted Reformation Principles Exhibited, which includes the following:
…”Preaching the Gospel consists in the offer of salvation through Christ to sinners, accompanied with such an explanation of the various parts of God’s word as may tend to persuade men to receive Christ as a Saviour, and to live and walk in Him (2 Cor 5:20, Matt 28:20, Isa 55:1-3)…The Gospel offer is not a declaration to any individual sinner, that his particular name is in the book of life; it is not immediately founded upon the decree of election, but upon the commandment of God, authorising the ministers of the Gospel to offer Christ and all His benefits to sinners, as such, however aggravated their crimes may have been, accompanied with information that every one who accepts the offer shall be saved. (Deut 29:29, Mark 16:15, Acts 2:22ff, Mark 16:16)…there is no inconsistency between the doctrine of particular Redemption and an unlimited Gospel offer. (John 10:15, 26, 37f., Matt 22:4, 12, 14…
This has been another rambling post but I highly recommend that everyone get this and read it and get the content firmly in your heads. The book is available from the Covenanter Bookshop, Loughbrickland RPC and Worldwide on SermondAudio. And you can get it cheaper if you get it off Gary!
I’ll finish with a quote from Richard Cameron – not so much to show how he agreed with the Free Offer, but just because it’s class. Cameron was preaching in the fields in 1680, the year of his death, on John 5:40 – ‘And ye will not come to me, that ye might have life’ (a version of it is online here)
“But I say, our Lord is here this day, saying, Will ye take me, ye that have had a lie so long in your right hand? What say ye to it? Ye that have been plagued with deadness, hardness of heart, and unbelief, he is now requiring you to give in your answer. What say ye, Yes or No? What think ye of the offer? And what fault find ye in him? There may be some saying, If I get or take him, I will get a cross also. Well, that is true; But ye will get a sweet cross. Thus we offer him to you in the parish of Auchinleck, Douglas, Crawford John, and all ye that live thereabout: And what say ye? Will ye take him? Tell us what ye say for we take instruments before these hills and mountains around us, that we have offered him unto you this day. Ye that are free of cess-paying, will ye take him? Ye that are free of the bond, now tendered by the enemies, will ye accept of him this day, when the old professsors are taking offence at his way and cross? Oh will you cast your eyes upon him? Angels are wondering at this offer; they stand beholding with admiration, that our Lord is giving you such an offer this day…Oh come, come then unto him; and there shall never be more of your by-past sins, they shall be buried. But if ye will not come unto him, it shall be more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrah, than for you. Now what say ye to me? And what shall I say to him that sent me unto you? Shall I say, Lord, there are some yonder saying I am content to give Christ my heart, hand, house, lands and all I have for his cause. Now, if ye can make a better bargain then do it. Look over to the Shawhead, and these hills, and take a look of them, for they are all witnesses now; and when you are dying they shall come before your face. We take every one of you witnesses against another; and will not that aggravate your sorrow when they come into your mind and conscience saying We heard you invited and obtested to take Christ, and we were witnesses; and yet ye would not. And now we come in here as witnesses against you. There is some tenderness amongst you now, and that is favourable like to look upon. But yet that is not all: The angels will go up to report at the throne what is everyone’s choice this day: They will go up to Heaven and report good news, and thus they will say, There were some in the parishes of Auchinleck, Douglas and Crawford John, that were receiving our Lord in the offers of the gospel, and he is become their Lord; and this will be welcome news.”
Last week, Spinnies was played for the first time in 2006, at an undisclosed venue:
Click for full effect
Strobert also met his first famous person of the year, namely Dr. John Blanchard.
Strobert condescends to talk to John Blanchard
The world famous author meets John Blanchard
The greatest honour ever to happen someone from Guernsey (as pictured above) happened at the Crescent Church where John Blanchard was speaking on ‘Is God past His sell-by date?’. He was very good tonight and he’s speaking again next week on something to do with science. The Crescent had a choir ‘performing’ for us, and although I didn’t pay much attention, I’m informed they were singing ‘The Drugs Don’t Work’ by The Verve. Or something.
I may mention the P&R weekend at some stage, but if you’re looking the talks, the first one is already on rpc.org.
Related Links: Strobert and Famous People