Rev. Lanning,

As I am reading the Q / A edition of the Sword and Shield the two questions I have been asking my wife keep coming to mind. They are 2 simple questions that I hope you would be willing to share and answer for the audience of the Sword and Shield.

This whole controversy is over the how we gain the assurance of our salvation and experience fellowship with God.

What is the definition of the Covenant of Grace?

The answer is simple “Friendship and FELLOWSHIP with God”

My second question is: how can it be then if we believe in an unconditional covenant of grace, then how is it possible that we do not merit anything in our salvation, but we can merit our assurance and fellowship with God?

This answer is also simple. These 2 cannot exist together.

This is where I draw my line in this controversy. It is that simple. The assurance of salvation and fellowship with God is by Grace and nothing but Grace!!

However I would appreciate if you could expound on these 2 questions for the audience of the Sword and Shield.

In Christ,

Matt Hanko

REPLY

In your two questions and answers, you have distilled the controversy down to its simplest essence. In your two questions and answers, you have also shown the blessed simplicity of the doctrine of the unconditional covenant. Your two questions and answers are compelling. If we would take them to heart without qualification, the controversy would be settled: The doctrine of the unconditional covenant is the doctrine of unconditional fellowship with God and unconditional assurance.

I agree with what you have written in your letter, and I cannot improve upon it. However, since you ask for me to expound on these two questions, let me only add a few quotations to demonstrate that your doctrine of unconditional fellowship is Protestant Reformed. Let me also add an observation about a sermon coming to Classis East that is not Protestant Reformed. 

Question One

Q: What is the definition of the Covenant of Grace?

A: Friendship and FELLOWSHIP with God.

What is the covenant?

It is the gracious relation of living fellowship and friendship between God and His people in Christ, wherein He is their God and they are His people. Genesis 17:7; Psalm 16:5; 33:22. (Essentials of Reformed Doctrine, lesson 18)

The covenant is the relation of the most intimate communion of friendship, in which God reflects his own covenant life in his relation to the creature, gives to that creature life, and causes him to taste and acknowledge the highest good and the overflowing fountain of all good. (Herman Hoeksema, Reformed Dogmatics [Grandville, MI: Reformed Free Publishing Association, 2004], 459–60)

Wilt Thou also bless them as Thou hast blessed the believing fathers, Thy friends and faithful servants, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; in order that they, as co-heirs of the covenant which Thou hast established with these fathers, may bring up their children which Thou wilt be pleased to give them, in the fear of the Lord, to the honor of Thy holy name, to the edification of Thy church, and to the extension of the holy gospel. (Form for the Confirmation of Marriage before the Church, in Confessions and Church Order, 309)

 

Question Two

Q: How can it be then if we believe in an unconditional covenant of grace, then how is it possible that we do not merit anything in our salvation, but we can merit our assurance and fellowship with God?

A: These two cannot exist together. This is where I draw my line in this controversy. It is that simple. The assurance of salvation and fellowship with God is by Grace and nothing but Grace!!

How does God establish His covenant?

God establishes His covenant by His own work of grace, whereby He takes His people into His own covenant fellowship. Ephesians 2:8. (Essentials of Reformed Doctrine, lesson 18)

[The Protestant Reformed Churches] teach on the basis of the same confessions:

1. That election, which is the unconditional and unchangeable decree of God to redeem in Christ a certain number of persons, is the sole cause and fountain of all our salvation, whence flow all the gifts of grace, including faith…
2. That faith is not a prerequisite or condition unto salvation, but a gift of God, and a God-given instrument whereby we appropriate the salvation in Christ. (Declaration of Principles, in Confessions and Church Order, 416–17, 423)

The true doctrine concerning Election and Rejection having been explained, the Synod rejects the errors of those…

Who teach that there is in this life no fruit and no consciousness of the unchangeable election to glory, nor any certainty, except that which depends on a changeable and uncertain condition.

Rejection: For not only is it absurd to speak of an uncertain certainty, but also contrary to the experience of the saints, who by virtue of the consciousness of their election rejoice with the apostle and praise this favor of God (Eph. 1); who according to Christ’s admonition rejoice with His disciples that their names are written in heaven (Luke 10:20); who also place the consciousness of their election over against the fiery darts of the devil, asking: Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God’s elect? (Rom. 8:33). (Canons of Dordt 1, error and rejection 7, in Confessions and Church Order, 159–62)

 

Observation

You have drawn your line in this controversy according to the truth. It is a good line. It is the old line of the old paths. It is the Reformed line. It is the Protestant Reformed line. You were right to draw your line there. Now stand fast on that line, because that line is under assault within the Protestant Reformed Churches themselves.

At the time of this writing, there is an appeal against a sermon coming to Classis East in January. The sermon was preached in a Protestant Reformed pulpit, but it was not a Protestant Reformed sermon. The sermon taught:

“If any man will hear my voice”…he is talking about not the condition to establish a union, but he is establishing a condition that deals with communion. Not union, that’s grace, it’s all grace, only grace, but communion, fellowship…In the way of that repentance and daily turning conversion, that’s when we enjoy or are aware of that blessed fellowship, that consciousness that God is with us and will never forsake us. (Agenda for Classis East, January 13, 2021, 13)

Your line is unconditional fellowship.

The sermon’s line is conditional fellowship.

Only one of those lines is Protestant Reformed. We shall see what Classis East judges regarding the sermon. Classis East’s judgment will reveal which line the churches of classis shall follow. Will classis follow the Protestant Reformed line of unconditional fellowship? Or will classis find room for the heretical line of conditional fellowship? If classis does anything less than declare the sermon to be heretical, then classis will have found room for the unreformed line of conditional fellowship. And then you can be sure that it will not be long before the line of conditions pushes out the line of grace.

These are interesting days in the PRC. These are days when the denomination is deciding whether it will be Reformed or not. Let us pay attention, and let us try the spirits. 

You have drawn the Protestant Reformed line. God be praised!

Now, will the Protestant Reformed Churches draw the Protestant Reformed line with you?