Dear Editor Rev. Lanning,

Having recently listened to a sermon by Rev. Andrew Lanning and reading articles from the Sword and Shield (9-15-20), may I humbly offer my thoughts as a Christian brother. I have not been raised in the PRC, but am closely affiliated with it in my background as part of a larger family of relatives whose roots go back to its very beginning. We enjoy good relationships!

I am finding it hard to wrap my mind around the issue that is being discussed in the PRC. So much of what I read and heard from the above writers and speaker, I can agree with. This just doesn’t seem to me to be a definitive enough issue to cause a division in the PRC. All true Christ followers hold as truth Ephesians 2:8–10. “For it is by grace you have been saved through faith and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God, not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s workmanship created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” Salvation is in Christ—Alone! Our involvement in accepting Christ as our Savior is something that can be compared to the obedience of Noah in building of the Ark. Both acts of obedience were responses done by faith which are gifts of God. To God belongs all the glory!

Ultimately, Noah didn’t build the Ark. God did. Ultimately, I didn’t choose to follow Christ. God chose me. As God had to give Noah life, a mind and physical strength, material and other helpers to build the Ark, so God also gives His children the gift of a heart of flesh after which we respond in thankfulness resulting in good works. In human terms, however, Noah built the Ark. In human terms, as a builder, I built my house. In human terms, mankind has built an amazing world of things. In reality, unless God gave man life, materials and the ability to create new things, needless to say, we would have done nothing. In fact, we wouldn’t have even existed. We didn’t accept Christ as our Savior, it also was all of God. But God speaks to us in human terms, terms that we can understand, terms that motivated Noah to build the Ark and terms that motivates the body of Jesus Christ to build His Kingdom. That is why He calls us to “Go into the world and preach the Gospel, teaching them to observe all the things He has commanded us”. Noah built the Ark by the power of the Spirit and we are called to build the Kingdom of God by that same Spirit.

Until the Covid Virus, my brother and I had the privilege of teaching a couple of Bible classes in the Cook County Jail, Division 10 Maximum Security. Many of these inmates have limited knowledge of the Bible. So we start in Genesis with Creation, The Fall of Adam and Eve resulting in death, death in body and in Spirit. This caused separation from each other and ultimately from God. We ask the men, “Can a dead man do anything to come alive?” They will immediately say, “No.” From the communities that they mainly come from and the reasons that they are incarcerated, they know what death is all about. We then, using this illustration, explain to them that this is exactly the way it is Spiritually as well. We usually ask them what brings them to our Bible study and they give a variety of reasons. We point out to them that this desire, to know more about the Bible having the central focus of the coming of Jesus Christ, is from God. He is changing a “Dead Heart of Stone” into a “Heart of Flesh,” creating a new man who is born again. We explain, that when this New Creation is born and this New Man recognizes himself as a sinner and in Christ Jesus finds that all his sins are forgiven, this New Man with his new heart of Flesh is going to be so grateful for such an undeserved gift that his mouth will not able to hold back the transforming power of his Savior, Jesus Christ! His life as well will begin to radiate the love and lifestyle of his Great Savior. This is exactly what the Heidelberg Catechism teaches by asking, “What three things must we know to enjoy this comfort?” (A close relationship with Jesus). The acceptance of this Good News by men whose eyes are being opened, is beautiful to behold. To see the light and joy radiate in the inmates’ eyes when they come to faith in Jesus Christ, brings us great joy! Did Noah build the Ark to save mankind? Yes. Did we bring these men to Christ to save them? Yes. But only as obedient (tools) being wielded and used by our Gracious and Loving Heavenly Father, doing what He created us to do!

May I, as an outsider of the PRC, strongly encourage you to get on with the work of Christ and get out and into a dark world bringing the Gospel to the “least of these,” many who are part of the Eternal Covenant Elect of God. Please—don’t “fiddle,” with endless arguments that benefit very few—“as Rome is burning.” I’m reminded of the Apostle Paul’s passion when he said, “I’ll be all things to all men in order to gain some.” Did Paul claim any credit for himself? No. He was just doing what his heart of flesh was burning to do—to tell the world of his Great Savior, Jesus Christ! May our hearts be hearts of flesh and may you as leaders and all of us in God’s Holy Catholic Church identify with Paul’s heart of flesh for those yet in darkness. Christ’s coming again is near!

Humbly Submitted,

Carl R. Smits

REPLY

Welcome to the pages of Sword and Shield. It is always interesting and instructive to see how an “outsider of the PRC,” as you identify yourself, views the controversy within the Protestant Reformed Churches (PRC). We are glad to have your perspective on these pages.

Before getting to the main point of your letter, let me comment on your reference to a recent sermon by the undersigned. Since you also refer in your letter to Noah building or not building the ark, I am assuming that you are referring to my sermon on Hebrews 11:7, “By Faith Noah Prepared an Ark.” That sermon was part of a larger debate in the PRC about who built the ark. Because that material has not appeared in the pages of Sword and Shield, readers may be unfamiliar with it. The debate was over the meaning of “by faith” in Hebrews 11:7. “By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house; by the which he condemned the world, and became heir of the righteousness which is by faith.” Does “by faith” mean that the building of the ark was God’s work or man’s work? Is it appropriate to say, “Inasmuch as Noah built the ark by faith, man did not build the ark; God built the ark”? Or even, “Inasmuch as Noah built the ark by faith, Noah did not build the ark; God built the ark”? Interested readers can pursue this debate further as it unfolded in the following places:

1. Protestant Reformed young people’s convention speech by Rev. Nathan Langerak, printed in the November 2019 Beacon Lights

2. Letters regarding that speech in the February 2020 and April 2020 Beacon Lights

3. Sermon by Rev. A. Lanning: https://www.sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?SID=920201526251139

4. Unpublished email article by Prof. David J. Engelsma

That aside, the main controversy in the PRC is whether fellowship with God is by grace or by works. That controversy featured prominently in the issue of Sword and Shield that you also referred to in your letter: the September 15, 2020, Letters Edition of Sword and Shield.

I take the main point of your letter to be that the present controversy in the PRC “just doesn’t seem to me to be a definitive enough issue to cause a division in the PRC.” You exhort the churches: “May I, as an outsider of the PRC, strongly encourage you to get on with the work of Christ and get out and into a dark world bringing the Gospel to the ‘least of these,’ many who are part of the Eternal Covenant Elect of God. Please—don’t ‘fiddle,’ with endless arguments that benefit very few—‘as Rome is burning.’”

Your letter confronts members of the Protestant Reformed Churches with an important question: Is our present controversy truly necessary? Or is our present controversy much ado about nothing, so that it is distracting us from the real work of Christ of bringing the gospel to the world?

Our present controversy in the PRC is whether covenant fellowship with God is by works or by grace. Our controversy is whether the child of God obtains the conscious experience of salvation by his works of obedience to God’s law or whether he obtains it by faith as a free gift of God’s grace in Christ. Therefore, the controversy is over the gospel, the perfect work of Christ, justification by faith alone, and the unconditional covenant of grace. The controversy is over the place and function of good works as that place and function are defined in the Reformed confessions. The controversy is over an error out of hell on the one hand and God’s revealed truth on the other.

Yes, our present controversy is truly necessary. It is not much ado about nothing. It is not fiddling with endless and profitless arguments. In this controversy the PRC are deciding whether they will be Reformed according to the Reformed confessions or not. In this controversy the PRC are deciding whether they will be a denomination of true churches or a denomination of false churches. This controversy must be pressed and pursued. And it is “a definitive enough issue to cause a division in the PRC.” If the PRC do not take the doctrinal decisions of Synod 2018 and run with them, but if they instead drive out those who do, then the PRC will have divided its own denomination over nothing less than the gospel of grace.

Pursuing this controversy is not a distraction. In fact, pursuing this controversy does not even distract the church from bringing the gospel of Christ to the world. The gospel of Christ is always antithetical. The truth always stands opposed to the lie. When the church contends for the faith over against the lie, that is a positive witness to the world that the truth is light and the lie is darkness.

The believers who publish Sword and Shield and who pursue the controversy in this magazine can witness to anyone and everyone through this magazine. As you have encouraged me to get on with the work of Christ, let me so encourage you. In these days of lockdown, you are not able personally to get into the Cook County Jail to teach Bible classes. But a magazine may be able to get into the jail. If you would provide me with an address and the names of the men you have worked with in your Bible classes, Reformed Believers Publishing would be happy to provide each of them with a subscription to the magazine free of charge. I believe I speak for the other members of Reformed Believers Publishing when I say that we are eager through this magazine “to get on with the work of Christ and get out and into a dark world bringing the Gospel to the ‘least of these.’” Indeed, this is part of our stated purpose in our constitution: “To give a theological and antithetical witness to the Reformed church world and beyond by broadcasting this distinctive Reformed truth to the people of God wherever they are found.”