MacArthur On The Dangers of Non-Lordship Doctrine

JDale

Hi JDale,

I'm guessing that's what Hope of glory meant.
If I'm right?...then...:thumbs: to da both of ya!
"that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord,
to the glory of God the Father."-Philippians 2:9-11 NIV

 

No actually I haven't read his book. Don't even own a copy of it, although I have heard some good things about it.

You are absolutely right. However that inheritance can be forfeited/lost. Only obedient children will actually obtain the inheritance. Disobedient children will not. Nowhere does Scripture say that all of God's children will receive the inheritance.

If works are not a guarantee then how can you say a person has to prove they are saved or show they are saved or whatever you want to call it by their works? Works are not a guarantee, therefore there are going to be folks whose works don't measure up at the JSOC and will suffer loss at that time. And Scripture tells us that its actually the majority that will experience loss at the JSOC not the other way around.

 

Hi Martin,

I havent' read "The Truth War" yet. Have you read "The Gospel according to Jesus" or "FAITH WORKS, The Gospel according to the Apostles"? Great reads that address this subject. I especially enjoyed "FAITH WORKS".

 

It doesn't surpise me that you don't agree, and what surprises me even less is you have given a Scripture that totally refutes your own theory. Revelation 21:7 says "He who overcomes . . ." it gives zero indication that "all" children overcome. There are a great many Scriptures in the Old and New Testaments alike that show us that not all children receive the inheritance.

See that's just it, rewards or loss is not a different matter at all. The JSOC is all about determining who is worthy to receive the inheritance and who fell short.

Now you are contradicting yourself. Just a few posts back you said works were not guaranteed. Now you are saying that they are guaranteed. Which is it?

And by the way James is not dealing with eternal salvation, so again you point to a Scripture that doesn't back up your statements, and so we are left with just that . . . "your" statements.

 

Yes all believers are overcomers, but can you show me that John is saying that all "believers" is the same thing as all "saved" people. Contextually believers are the ones that are living by faith after eternal salvation has been taken care of. The Bible also speaks of unbelievers not in the sense of eternally damned, but unbelieving in what is supposed to be believed in after eternal salvation is spoken of.

Again contextually this passage simply isn't saying what you want it to say.

That's simply not the case. And I love it that you use passages of Scripture that refute your own theories. Ephesians 2:8-10 is a perfect passage which says that good works may or may not happen. Being saved does not guarantee you are going to live a life of good works. The Bible teaches that actually the majority of Christians will be quite opposite and will be ones that cry out Lord, Lord and then list all the "good" works they did and He will tell them to depart because they were actually working lawlessness.

Well you can think that all your want to put it doesn't make it so Again no offense intended. But James is talking to "saved" individuals. He's not dealing with something that is already settled for them.

Again thank you for proving my point once again. The faith of Abraham that Scripture speaks of is not eternally saving faith, but faith that comes after eternal salvation is already taken care of. It is a faith that works. Faith that works is not the same thing as faith in The Substitute for eternal salvation.

 

I just checked twenty different versions on I cor. 5:11. Only the NASB, among more formal equivalency translations, refers to a "so-called brother". I suggest the majority of translators read this to be one named a brother, not some merely supposed one.

I guess you read a portion of Romans 10 in this manner, then.

Maybe its just me, but the words that I have emboldened seem to be added to the Scripture, or at least the interpretation of the Scripture to support this doctrine known as Lordship Salvation. And adding words, and redefining words in or into Scripture is one of my pet peeves, you know like "irrestible grace", "perseverance of the saints", and "repent of your sins", and "Make Jesus Lord!" The last two are the most annoying peeves, to me. As I have already posted on another thread, Jesus is Lord, God made Him Lord and Christ, and nothing you or I did or can do has any bearing on that, whatsoever. He is King of kings and Lord of lords; He is Lord of all! Amen! and Amen!!

And I'm not even going to get into the discussiuon of why the sins of homosexuality and adultery always seem to arise in these threads about Lordship salvation? I checked the lists in Scripture, They are not on the seven thing the Lord says he hates the most, but talebearing (gossip) and a proud look sure are. Why don't they rate higher with the LS advocates??

Ed

 

Lordship Salvation is as Wrong as Easy-Believism

To All:

Many of those who hold to the Lordship position employ this kind of rationale for their position, “We are trying to answer Easy-Believism.” The motive is certainly noble; few preachers care for the “1, 2, 3 pray with me” kind of evangelism. The Lordship advocates commonly refer to the Easy-Believism or Mental Assent Only positions as "no-lordship." Answering Easy-Believism and the shallow, loose living of some professing Christians does not justify or excuse taking another extreme position, namely, Lordship Salvation.

From his review of The Gospel According To Jesus, Dr. Ernest Pickering observed,

Dr. Charles Bing made a similar observation:

One must always be careful not to bounce off one unbiblical teaching into another. This has sadly been the case of some people (like John MacArthur) who have, with good cause, been frustrated by those who make professions of faith in Christ, but do not live for Christ. I share the distress over those who call themselves Christians, but are weak and seem little interested in the things of the Lord. Certainly there are many Christians who do not live up to what they profess to believe. This frustration, however, does not warrant “changing the terms of the gospel,” which is what John MacArthur and the LS advocates he represents have done.

Lordship Salvation is a false gospel through the addition of conditions and calls for upfront commitments from a lost man to, as JM demands, "Full surrender...a willingness to die for Jesus' sake." These statements are from JM's The Gospel According to Jesus. Lordship Salvation is a man-centered message that frustrates the grace of God (Gal. 2:21).

Lordship Salvation tears at the very heart of the gospel; it corrupts the “simplicity that is in Christ.” (2 Corinthians 11:3) When a man teaches that one must offer anything apart from or in addition to faith, believing and repentance toward his salvation, he has adopted a “works” philosophy and has departed from the “faith which was once delivered” (Jude 3). When you hear a man make the reception of salvation contingent upon promises of cross bearing, submission and commitment, mark it down: he is teaching Lordship Salvation. Lordship Salvation is a deviation from the gospel of the Bible!

LM

Edited excerpt from- In Defense of the Gospel

 

Which is the entire point of Revelation 21:7: It's "he that overcometh"; he that conquers; (works) that shall inherit all things, and shall be a son. (A mature child; not every child is a son; son is position, not relation.)

Use the prodigal son as an example. He had an inheritance. He squandered it. Even so, he was still part of the family, and when he returned to obedience, he was welcomed back with open arms. Not with what he had before (he blew that), but with a robe, a ring, and sandals.

We're all given an inheritance in this life. What are we going to do with it? Are we going to get an increase on it or are we going to blow it?

 

Don't forget covetousness.

One thing that I wonder is what is the magic line above which you've done enough to make him Lord and be saved, and why the Bible doesn't spell it out a little better. (OK, two things that I wonder.) Oh, and I wonder why the Bible includes that little contradiction in Acts 16:31 that simply says "believe" on the Lord Jesus and you will be saved.

 

Well said.

 

Well it has to do with semantics. Semantics are extremely important, because God chose exactly the words that He wanted to use and He wanted us to understand. Unfortunately those words have been drastically redefined by man and has caused mass confusion these days. Well should I say initiated by the enemy and man was the instrument.

You say all saved folks are believers and that all believers are overcomers. If that is a true statement can you show in Scripture where that connection is made and how that corresponds with the very text that you used in Revelation, which in no way says that all are overcomers. The verse in Revelation is a conditional statement. If this then that. The if is not a guarantee as you suggest.

There is only one way to read the verse. The verse says we would or should (depending on which translation you are using). But the Greek tense of the word is such that it's not a certainty but a possibility. Should is actually a better translation of the Greek. We SHOULD walk in the good works, but that doesn't mean we WILL walk in them. You are saying we WILL, but that's not what the verse says. Again there is only one way to read it and that's the way it is written.

Well if John Mac and Charles Ryrie say it is must be true then huh? Sorry just because mans says something doesn't make it so. Good works SHOULD accompany salvation, but there is a chance they won't. Doesn't have anything to do with one's salvation. It has to do with obedience. Obedience is not part of salvation, or it is no longer by grace, but by our works. It's just that plain and simple.

Those that cried Lord, Lord and then listed all their "good" works expecting to be praised by the Lord were indeed saved. There's no way to explain them as unsaved folks. The text just doesn't allow it, nor does context.

I didn't say James couldn't talk about how faith results in works. By the way there isn't a true faith and a false faith. There is just faith and no faith. Well I guess there is three. There is a faith that works. A dead faith and then no faith.

But James is speaking about faith in the present, not in the past. Eternal salvation is a past matter. If he was talking about eternal salvation he would have used past tenses as Paul did in Ephesians 2:8-9.

Again we must let the text tell us what is being talked about not the other way around.

I agree with you. You just haven't shown where Scripture says that this faith was eternally saving faith. Scripture doesn't make that connection. If Scripture doesn't connect those dots, then we must leave them unconnected and only connect the dots that Scripture does.

 

martin,

It's hard to catch up on this thread but I'm trying. :laugh:

OP: ""No-lordship doctrine rose to popularity in the mid-twentieth century and was almost unchallenged as the dominant system of theology in American evangelicalism for several decades. The no-lordship message has filled the church with people lacking spiritual fruit and absent every other vital evidence of living faith - who nonetheless are convinced they are authentic Christians.
In fact, according to no-lordship doctrine, someone who lives an utterly debauched lifestyle should nevertheless be embraced as a true Christian if he or she ever once professed faith in Christ. These so-called "carnal Christians" are regularly given strong reassurances that their salvation is secure no matter how long or how egregiously they rebel against Christ's authority." -pg153 [/quote]

There are soooo many problems here:

1) we church are supposed to separate ourselves from BELIEVERS living in sin IAW 1Cor 5:11.

2) The scripture does NOT tell us to teach "Lordship Salvation" as a doctrine to combat "easy believism."

3) the is NO "no-lordship doctrine."

What is allowed is to draw them through repentance back to communion.

Basically, JM is establishing his doctrine on extrabiblical grounds.

skypair