Introduction

In the church world at large, also in reportedly conservative churches, there is an ongoing, systematic effort to dismantle the truth of the word of God. The words of the apostle Paul in 2 Thessalonians 2:3 ring true: “Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition.” Truly, we see that falling away from the truth and the love of many waxing cold toward God and his truth.

The church of Jesus Christ then is relentlessly assaulted by attacks on almost every doctrine of the sacred scriptures. The list includes, but is not limited to, the doctrines of election and reprobation, the inspiration of scripture, creation, man and the image of God, marriage as a life-long bond, the sufficiency of the cross of Christ, universal atonement, justification by faith alone, the unconditional covenant, sovereign grace, the requirement of church membership, the Christian school as the demand of the covenant, infant baptism, and the doctrine of the end times.

False doctrine more and more is finding a safe haven in many Reformed and Presbyterian churches. And these doctrines have found a place in the hearts of many of these churches’ members. Many believe these false doctrines or, at a minimum, tolerate them in their midst, which is equally as ruinous. And when confronted by the truth of God’s word over against the false doctrine to which they hold, they yelp and snarl like a rabid dog who has been provoked. “It is not a salvation issue!” And by that response they reveal their ignorance of God and his word and manifest their unbelief. They reveal their disinterest in doctrine and refuse to submit to God’s word. Simply, they reveal that they do not have true faith. The burden of this article is to uncover those who cloak themselves in their deceitful dealings and leave them no safe haven for their idolatry.

Faith Generally

To begin we must take hold of the doctrine of faith and work our way to the heart of the matter. Our Reformed confessions teach what true faith is in the well-known and loved seventh Lord’s Day of the Heidelberg Catechism. There we are taught that faith, which is one, has three aspects: it is a bond, it is an activity, and it has objective doctrinal content.

It is hard to fathom that Rev. M. McGeown denies this basic truth of scripture and the Reformed confessions. He writes,

Sometimes the gift of faith or the faculty of faith is called the bond of faith, but neither the Bible nor the confessions explicitly call faith a bond. That we are united to Jesus Christ by the Holy Spirit is certainly a biblical truth, but in the Bible and in the confessions the emphasis is on faith as the activity of believing. The Catechism defines faith not as a bond, and certainly not as a passive, lifeless bond, but as an activity.¹

Unbelievable actually!

McGeown denies that the confessions teach faith as the bond to Jesus Christ but rather puts the emphasis on faith as the activity of believing. He also denies that faith is passive. When we say that faith is passive, we mean what the Catechism teaches in question and answer 20 that faith only receives from Jesus Christ all his benefits. Faith does not give anything to God.

Lord’s Day 7 teaches that faith is the bond of the elect child of God with Jesus Christ. We read that those are saved “who are ingrafted into Him, and receive all His benefits, by a true faith” (Confessions and Church Order, 90). The essence of faith is a bond and union to Jesus Christ.

And the holy scriptures, which Lord’s Day 7 summarizes in the words “ingrafted into him,” teach faith as a bond. In scripture when you read of the elect sinner being “in” Christ, scripture is describing faith as a bond. The bond of faith as being “in” Christ may rightly be said to be the Holy Spirit. The word “in” is faith, the bond, the Holy Spirit, that joins the elect sinner to Christ, the only object of faith. For example, Ephesians 2:10 says, “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works” (emphasis added).

The biblical concept of faith as a bond is comprehended in the idea of faith as a graft. Faith is the graft whereby a dead branch is taken by the horticulturist and placed into a living tree. The triune God takes dead men and women, elected in grace to eternal life, and joins them to Jesus Christ in the Spirit. God takes dead men and plants them into the living tree, Jesus Christ. And all the life and fatness of Christ flows into that dead branch. That dead branch lives and brings forth fruit according to its nature. John 15:5: “I am the vine, ye are the branches: he that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing” (emphasis added).

What does Reverend Hoeksema say about faith as a bond? He does not agree at all with what Reverend McGeown is teaching.

Faith is a bond, a spiritual bond.²

The Catechism…presents it [faith] as the spiritual bond by which the believer is united with Christ.

It is the means whereby we are united with Christ, the spiritual bond whereby we are made one body, one plant with Him, so that by faith we may live from Him, draw our all from Him, and thus receive all His benefits.³

This truth that faith is the bond of the elect sinner to Jesus Christ is basic to the Reformed faith. Reverend McGeown is dealing deceitfully with the truth of God’s word. He does not stop, but continuing his foolish babbling, he writes,

Faith, we read in Belgic Confession, Article 35, “is the hand and mouth of our soul.” Hands and mouths in healthy people are active, unlike the sluggard.

According to LD 7 we receive all of Christ’s benefits by a true faith, which the Catechism defines as an activity (the German word is annehmen, which has an active idea—it actually means “accept,” although we typically avoid that word lest it should sound like such acceptance depended on man’s freewill, which it does not).⁴

I am going to let Reverend Hoeksema answer McGeown. Although the quote is lengthy, it is instructive.

“Yes,” you say, “but I must believe.” Well, let us see. Perhaps there is still an element of boasting. You say, “There is a righteousness that God has prepared, but if I am to have this righteousness, I must believe.” Well, then, let us persuade men to believe. Let us tell them that they are justified because they believe. This is the way it is generally put: “Because you believe in Christ, you shall become righteous before God.” But this is not true. Your faith does not add to your righteousness. You do not become righteous on account of your faith.

Shall we put it this way then? “Faith is the principle from which we live. Because of this, we become religious, we become pious, we repent, we pray, and we do good works. Because of these works of faith, we become righteous before God?” Not so! Works of faith do not make us righteous before God.

Shall we put it this way then? “Righteousness is ready, and faith is the hand that takes it.” Then there is still something to boast of. Then righteousness is all ready, but it must be accepted by the hand of faith. This is not faith. Faith is not an act of ours. Faith is that power whereby we receive (do not change this into “accept”!) the righteousness of God in Christ. By faith, we do not “accept.” By faith we receive. But it is nothing to boast of that we receive something.⁵

Heretics always carry their false doctrine through to its logical end with rigor. McGeown is hell-bent on making faith something man is doing. He stated as much when he said that faith is not God’s act.⁶ And to push this further, he tosses out faith as a bond because faith as a bond makes man utterly dependent on God. God must take a dead branch and place it into Christ, which is something completely outside the control of that branch. And the branch then has life and bears fruit. How dare anyone then say, “Well, the branch had to actually draw the nutrients into itself to live! The branch needed to reach out to get life from the tree!” What folly. What pride. What arrogance.

The second aspect of faith that our Reformed confessions teach is faith as to its activity: it is a certain knowledge and an assured confidence. Faith comes to conscious expression when the gospel is preached. You could say that faith consciously possesses and experiences the salvation that Christ merited and earned by the Holy Spirit when Christ comes speaking to his elect people. The Holy Spirit is not only the bond, but the Holy Spirit is also the agent or worker of all that salvation as that comes into your conscious enjoyment or possession. The activity of saving faith is the fruit of the work of the Holy Spirit.

The certain knowledge of faith is that I know God as my God. I do not merely know about God, but I know him. Like a child does not merely know about his father but really knows him, the elect child knows his Father’s love toward him in Christ Jesus as a child who knows his Father intimately. Springing forth from that certain knowledge is an assured confidence. In Lord’s Day 7 faith is assurance. That assurance is not by good works, obedience, or repentance. The child of God draws near unto God with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having his heart sprinkled from an evil conscience and his body washed with pure water. And with boldness the sinner can come before the throne of God asking for enormous things from his Father. Having that certain knowledge that God is my God, I rely and trust upon him entirely for all time and eternity for all things necessary for body and soul.

This knowledge of faith as well as its confidence are worked by the holy gospel in my heart and are the assurance that my sins are forgiven. It is the confidence that the remission of sins, everlasting righteousness, and salvation are mine. In the realm of my conscious experience, my sins are forgiven, and I have the everlasting righteousness of Christ imputed to me. And that is freely given to me by God, merely of grace, only for the sake of Christ’s merits. Even that conscious activity of believing, resting, trusting, and relying is a gift of God according to election.

Third, our Reformed confessions also teach what faith is as to its objective doctrinal content. And this is the point that I want to drive home in this article. True faith believes certain things about the triune God: God the Father is my creator, God the Son is my redeemer, and God the Holy Spirit is my sanctifier. True faith believes right doctrine. True faith believes doctrine as that doctrine reveals the triune God in all his wonderful works.

True faith certainly does not believe false doctrine, nor does true faith tolerate false doctrine. And yet many will push the words across their lips that something “is not a salvation issue” and promptly follow it up with “but I believe in Jesus!” That is dealing deceitfully! One plays fast and loose with God’s word and picks and chooses what he wants to believe.

To the one who claims to believe in Jesus but denies basic truths of scripture, I ask, do you? If true faith believes true doctrine, and you believe false doctrine, can I say that you have true faith? Do you actually believe in the triune God, or have you only fashioned an idol after your own image? And that is not my question; that is the question of our Reformed fathers in Lord’s Day 11:

Q. 30. Do such then believe in Jesus the only Savior, who seek their salvation and welfare of saints, of themselves, or anywhere else?

A. They do not; for though they boast of Him in words, yet in deeds deny Jesus the only deliverer and Savior. (Confessions and Church Order, 95)

That is not my being judgmental or harsh or unloving. You may question, and you do question whether someone has true faith by examining what he or she believes. The reason for this is twofold. The first reason is so you can determine whether you are one in the truth with someone. Believers seek unity in the truth with fellow believers, and we desire to manifest that unity. Also, as Amos 3:3 states, “Can two walk together, except they be agreed?” The second reason is to admonish one who is found to be unbelieving of the truth that by our godly conversation he may be gained to Christ. And if that one persists in unbelief, your word to that one is to repent. You may inspect someone’s doctrine and ask, “Do you actually believe in Jesus?”

The Faith

What does true faith believe? Or in the language of our Catechism,

Q. 22. What is then necessary for the Christian to believe?

A. All things promised us in the gospel, which the articles of our catholic undoubted Christian faith briefly teach us. (Confessions and Church Order, 91)

True faith believes “all things promised us in the gospel.” True faith believes the entire word of God. True faith does not pick and choose what it wants to believe, but true faith believes the entire revelation of God as he reveals Jesus Christ. True faith is assured of and relies on the entire word of God as revealed in the scriptures. We take the statement “all things promised us in the gospel” in the broadest possible sense to include all the knowledge of God, his will and his law, the whole counsel of God concerning our salvation in Christ, and all things revealed by God to us in the entirety of the scriptures.

All that the scriptures teach concerning God and creation, man and sin, Christ and salvation, the Holy Spirit and sanctification, the church and the means of grace, and the coming of Christ and the eternal things of the kingdom of heaven are all included in what is necessary for a Christian to believe. In short, true faith believes all the doctrine of the sacred scriptures. Faith has for its object the one and entire word of God, of which the one content and message is Jesus Christ.

Scripture teaches this about faith when it puts a definite article before the word “faith.” A definite article makes a noun particular, and it is a reference to something specific. So instead of a faith, it is the faith. And when scripture makes faith definite, then it is teaching the content of faith as all the doctrine that God has revealed in his word, which our Reformed confessions then faithfully summarize, which we believe do fully agree with the word of God.

The faith is the substance of the Christian faith and what is believed by Christians. Scripture often speaks about faith in this way. “Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints” (Jude 1:3). There is no sense in Jude 1:3 if it is not understood this way. Faith here is referred to as that doctrine for which the saints are earnestly contending. God delivered his word to his church containing true doctrine, and the saints of the church of all ages fought for that doctrine of the word of God over against the vain babblings of man, his junk science, novel ideas, and unprofitable questions about the law.

Sometimes scripture does not put a definite article before faith, but it still refers to the objective, doctrinal content of faith. The books of Timothy and Titus use the noun “faith” this way often. It is a bit of a key for unlocking the instruction of Paul in these epistles. Each of the books are concerned with sound doctrine: godly edifying, which is the faith; holding the mystery of the faith; boldness in the faith; not departing from the faith; nourished up in the words of faith and good doctrine; not denying the faith; having damnation because they have cast off their first faith; erring from the faith; following after faith; keeping the faith; being a son in the common faith; rebuking those so that they may be sound in the faith; and loving those who are in the faith. This is not to mention either the repeated times that the word “doctrine” is explicitly mentioned in Titus and Timothy. That which was committed to Timothy was the faith, and the faith is doctrine. The doctrine is the food of the church’s soul. And committed to the charge of the minister is that he continue in sound doctrine and put the brethren in remembrance of these things. There is a doctrine that is according to godliness. There is a doctrine that leads to godliness. There is a real connection between true doctrine and the godliness of the people in the church. And negatively, therefore, false doctrine leads to ungodliness.

The faith is all the truth of the sacred scriptures and the Reformed faith. The faith is what true faith believes. The faith is faith’s objective content, the doctrine that God has revealed in his word.

The church world is busy trying to dismantle this third aspect of faith. A recent Bible study discussion paper from Byron Center Protestant Reformed Church teaches that there are three different levels of doctrine: absolute doctrines, conviction doctrines, and opinion doctrines. Absolute truths are those doctrines necessary for salvation—“salvation issues,” if you will. Conviction truths are doctrines that cause division between denominations but are not so great that we cannot call those denominations Christian. Opinion truths are all those differences that can coexist within the same denomination. These are certainly not scriptural distinctions, but they serve the purpose of bridging the gap between other denominations and finding a false peace amidst doctrinal differences even in the same church. The idea is that you can have unity with people as long as they confess that salvation is by grace alone, but it does not matter what they say or believe about who God is or what he reveals in his word. But the members of Byron Center church sucked this idea out of their own thumbs. Faith’s objective content is all the doctrine that God revealed in his word, all that is confessional and scriptural. They simply assert their distinctions without proving them.

Toward the end of the discussion paper, there is a section listing various errors with instructions to label which ones are absolute doctrines. The errors included theistic evolution, rejecting predestination/reprobation, common grace, adult vs. infant baptism, divorce and remarriage, and pre/post-millennialism. I assume some of these are included to be labeled as conviction or opinion doctrines. Whatever may have been the label of each error, God very clearly reveals in his word the truth about these errors. God is not unclear in his revelation of any of these doctrines.

This discussion paper, along with the retort to a doctrinal difference that “it is not a salvation issue,” completely misses the point. You get these types of discussions and questions when man thinks that he is the main point and center of everything. It reveals a carnal spirit in the realm of religious piety in that man thinks his salvation is the only reason God did anything!

The salvation of sinners is not God’s first purpose with everything. God’s purpose is his own eternal will to glorify himself in the face of Jesus Christ, and salvation for elect sinners is intimately connected with that purpose. God’s purpose is about what God wills and what God reveals. If God did not will salvation but determined to wipe the slate clean and start over when man fell, God would have been absolutely righteous in doing so, and not one thing would have been taken away from him. It is not about man and what man gets out of God. Man does not get to determine which truths that God reveals matter. Man does not get to say that one doctrine that is revealed about God in his word is more important than the rest of God’s word. To take God’s word and the doctrine revealed therein and to bring it down into the judgment seat of man is to take God himself and bring him into the judgment seat of man. “God, this doctrine is important enough for me to believe, but I will continue to fellowship with one who denies the truth and deems this doctrine inconsequential, even though it dishonors you as the creator, redeemer, and sanctifier.” No! God reveals the truth about himself in his word, and true faith holds for truth all that God reveals to us in his word. The unbelieving religious man chooses what doctrines of God are palatable for him like he might choose a piece of fruit from the produce section at the supermarket. This one is too hard; this one is bruised; this one is too large or too small; this has the wrong color; or this one is too smelly. This doctrine is too divisive, makes us too isolated, hinders relations with others too much, makes us seem too judgmental, is too cruel and not nice enough. That is dealing deceitfully with God’s word.

Today, doctrine is labelled as cold and divisive. Doctrine is charged as being an idol. Doctrine is considered to be lifeless and bordering on dead orthodoxy. What is more important is the Christian life. The charge comes, “You might have all your doctrine right, but you are unloving and full of pride.” But that reveals an ignorance of the Reformed faith, which is consumed with doctrine. If one is ignorant of doctrine, then one is ignorant of the triune God. And what one says that he believes is the manifestation of whether or not that one has true faith. False faith or imitation faith may boast of Christ in word. False faith might put Christ’s name on the lips. But that false faith has a different content. Its expression of the truth is different than what God has revealed in his word.

When we are talking about the faith, we are speaking about what a man or woman confesses to be the truth about the triune God, Jesus Christ, salvation, man and his sin, and the world. If the doctrinal content of what one believes does not comport with the scriptures or the Reformed creeds, then one does not have true faith.

Triune God

Faith believes doctrine as that doctrine reveals the triune God. The doctrine that one believes reveals whom one worships. Do you worship the one, living, triune God as he has revealed himself in his word? What kind of God do you believe in? Who is he to you? In whom do you trust and rely?

That is the critical importance of Lord’s Day 8, where there is inserted an article in the Heidelberg Catechism on the Trinity before the Catechism’s treatment of the Apostles’ Creed. The three subjects of Lord’s Days 9 through 24 are of God the Father, of God the Son, and of God the Holy Ghost. Therefore, the Catechism is teaching that the knowledge and belief of the Christian faith is the knowledge and belief of God himself in the Trinity.

The Christian faith in its entirety is nothing else than the truth of the triune God. When studying the truths of the Christian faith, we are taught about creation, providence, Christ, salvation, the Spirit, and the resurrection. We are studying nothing else than the doctrine of the triune God. All of these truths reveal something about the triune God.

The corruption of the Christian faith in any respect is a corruption of the doctrine of the triune God himself. That is the seriousness of false doctrine. If a man corrupts the Christian faith in some respect, then in essence that man denies the doctrine of the Trinity.

To corrupt the doctrine of creation is to corrupt the knowledge of God the Father and our creation. Theistic evolution teaches that the world did not come into existence by God the Father as our creator. Theistic evolution denies God’s six-literal-day creation week and asserts that all things came about by chance and evolutionary process. The god of theistic evolution is an idol. That god is routinely taught in Christian colleges and off most pulpits in churches today. God the Father created in six, literal, 24-hour days; and in his providence he governs and upholds all things, including the actions of ungodly man. The triune God framed all things by the breath of his word, and faith believes that. To deny creation is to deny the triune God.

What of the god of the well-meant offer, which teaches that God desires the salvation of all men but that salvation is dependent upon the condition of faith and man’s believing? In the well-meant offer, God has two conflicting wills. He has one will for all men, and he has one will for only the elect. That god of the well-meant offer is not the one, simple, harmonious being—God— but that god is an idol god as dead as Baal. You might as well make a golden calf and set it on the mantle in your living room and prostrate yourself before it if you believe in the well-meant offer. There is no difference between the two gods. The Father eternally decreed to send his Son to die for his elect people, and the Spirit infallibly, irresistibly, efficaciously realizes God’s promise to deliver his people from their sins. To hold to the well-meant offer is to deny the triune God.

Or what of the god who depends in some sense on what man does? The god that must first wait upon man before he can save man. Man must first believe or repent, and then that god saves him. That god is an idol god. That doctrine ungods the triune God. It makes man sovereign in salvation and not God. That is the reason the Reformed Protestant Churches (RPC) can state in no uncertain terms that the god of the Protestant Reformed Churches (PRC) is an idol. The God of the Christian faith is the God of redemption and sanctification. God the Son is our redeemer, and God the Holy Spirit is our sanctifier. God depends upon no man. To deny sovereign grace is to deny the triune God.

All doctrine says something about the God in whom you believe. If you teach and believe conditions and prerequisites and blessings in the way of obedience in the covenant, that says something about the God you worship. The covenant of grace in Christ with his elect people is God’s eternal will to reveal a covenant outside himself. If the covenant in its experience depends upon man, so also God in his own triune life must depend upon something God is doing to have and experience fellowship in himself. That false doctrine teaches that God is a God who has stipulations in his own triune life. God’s covenant life with us must follow his own covenant life. So to teach that a child of God must do something before he experiences God’s covenant is to teach that the Father presses himself into the Son, and the Son presses himself into the Father’s bosom, and the Son only experiences and enjoys that fellowship in the way of his pressing himself into the Father. The Son has to fulfill a condition or a prerequisite before he can enjoy or have possession of the Father’s love.

Blasphemy!

The true, living, triune God reveals himself as the God of unconditional covenant fellowship and warm, intimate communion within himself. He reveals his covenant in Jesus Christ to be of warm, unconditional love that is not in any way dependent on the sinner and his activities. We have and experience the covenant by faith alone, which is not a working. We teach that as the covenant is patterned after God’s own triune, covenant life. To deny unconditional covenant fellowship is to deny the triune God.

And we ought to say a few words about ecumenical relationships apart from unity in doctrine. That also reveals something about the God one worships. God in his being is the one who has complete harmony without conflict. We use the term that he is the simple God, meaning that God is his perfections and that all his perfections are one in him. God does not merely possess his perfections, but he is his perfections. He is love. He is righteousness. He is grace. He is mercy. And all those perfections are one in him without conflict. The ecumenical movement makes the virtues of God conflict. False ecumenism highlights one of God’s virtues—love—over against the others. God is love; that is true. But promoters of this movement elevate that virtue above God’s more strict virtues, such as his righteousness. When churches do that, they are revealing that they do not worship a righteous God who has eyes purer than to behold iniquity. By linking arms with a church that holds to, teaches, or tolerates theistic evolution, the well-meant offer, or the conditional covenant, a church says, “My God is a God who tolerates sin and false doctrine.”

Within God’s one being the three persons of the Trinity live an eternally complete and infinitely blessed life. All three persons possess that one being and all of God’s perfections. And to deny God’s righteousness and to extol only his love is to deny the oneness of God in his own triune life. And then all you have is an idol god that you worship. All the doctrine that we confess reveals in what God we believe. Do you believe in the triune and living God, or do you believe in a dead idol?

One Faith

There is one doctrine or one faith of the church of all ages. And the implication is that a church either has the truth or a church does not have the truth. That is the teaching of Ephesians 4:4–6:

4. There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling;

5. One Lord, one faith, one baptism,

6. One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.

There is one universal body of Jesus Christ from all ages and from all tribes, tongues, nations, and people. There is one Spirit of Jesus who fills that one body with all of Christ’s blessedness. There is only one hope of your calling. There is one Jesus Christ. There is one doctrine of the church of Jesus Christ. There is one baptism by which we are buried with Christ and raised to newness of life. There is one triune God who is above all and through all and in you all.

The faith is called the “one” faith. There are not multiple faiths or multiple beliefs or multiple doctrines of the one God. There is not pluriformity of faith, but faith’s doctrinal content has always been the same since the beginning of the world in the garden of Eden.

Yet it is often presented that every church has varying degrees of the truth. This church has only a little corruption of the truth, and that one has a lot of corruption. Rome is very bad, of course; but the Orthodox Presbyterian Church, the Christian Reformed Church, and the Protestant Reformed Churches are not so bad and maybe even are pretty good still. One says, “There is no perfect church!” But the question is not whether a church is perfect or not. I can tell you that there are sinners in the church and that every sin under the sun can be found in the church because we all have a stinking, rotten flesh that hates God and the neighbor.

But the one truth is that which God in principle revealed in Genesis 3:15, which promise God published to the patriarchs and the prophets, represented by the sacrifices and ceremonies of the law, and lastly fulfilled in his only-begotten Son. Does the church to which you are joined confess that one truth that God revealed? I believe that the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of truth. He leads his church into all truth, and to say that there is no perfect church denies that the Holy Spirit is the power of God. The Lord Jesus Christ, who rules over his church in grace, pours out his Spirit into and on his church that we might understand the doctrine of the word of God and the one message of scripture. And that one body of Christ, chosen to everlasting life, agrees in true faith. The church of all ages agrees in the one faith and doctrine of the word.

The universal church serves one God. There is one truth and doctrine that the church believes. If one does not serve that one living God as God is revealed, then he worships an idol. It does not matter how nice of a person, how good, and how loving someone might be. What does one believe about God? To what doctrine does one hold? I may examine someone’s doctrine to see if I am one with him.

Conclusion

Now let us finish off and put in the grave for good that sinister response to being confronted with the truth: “It is not a salvation issue.” It is this retreat that unbelief tries to find refuge in after being confronted with the truth of God’s word and after being admonished in the doctrine of the word and of the Reformed confessions. Do you see what a foolish response this is? Do you see the ignorance that oozes from this response? When someone says, “It is not a salvation issue,” he means, “Doctrine does not matter. It never has mattered, and it does not matter now. Now leave me alone to serve my idol that I have fashioned according to my own flesh.” That is dealing deceitfully with God and his word. What that response reveals is a complete ignorance of the Reformed faith and ignorance about God revealed in Jesus Christ. It is a manifestation of unbelief and that one does not have true faith, because faith believes the one doctrine contained in the word of God. One who truly loves the Lord Jesus Christ believes his word, receives that word unconditionally, and submits to the rule of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Faith does not ask whether I can know God. Over against doubt—doubt is not a pious virtue—true faith says, “I know my God!” That knowledge is seated in the heart of the regenerated believer. A regenerated, elect child of God, filled with the one Spirit of truth will not persist in the lie about God unto destruction. Therefore, if you cleave to the lie, I can and will tell you that you do not have true faith. Repent for your unbelief. Believe in God as he has revealed himself in his word. He is the God of unconditional election, limited atonement, irresistible grace. He saves totally depraved sinners by the power of his grace alone at the cross of Jesus Christ. By the power of the Spirit, God brings into his elect child’s consciousness the possession of all the salvation God has eternally determined. God certainly preserves his people to the end in spite of themselves. Believe the whole and entire word of God as the revelation of the triune God, who has willed to glorify himself in all things. That God is my God, and that God is the God of the Reformed Protestant Churches. “For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory forever. Amen.”