A Badge of Honor

I have been treating Professor Cammenga’s shabby screed against the officebearers of Cornerstone Reformed Protestant Church, formerly officebearers of Wingham Protestant Reformed Church, who in obedience to Christ led the congregation of Wingham out of the apostatizing Protestant Reformed Churches (PRC). That act of obedience to Christ, and thus the Christ who gave that command, Professor Cammenga savages in his public and nasty email.

The email is so full of shameless and un-Christian gloating, self-promotion, and self-justification that it would be unworthy of a response if it were not also so full of falsehoods about the church, the truth, and plain historical fact. In this he reveals that he belongs to the pack of slanderers against the truth against whom the apostle Paul contended and with whom the faithful church of Christ in every age has had to contend.

To those evils the professor adds the iniquitous charge of schism. He casts a wide net in his charge. So he writes,

Once again, this group and its supporters make themselves guilty of schism, which is public, gross sin. What aggravates their sin of schism is the mischaracterization, misrepresentation, and slander that have become a hallmark of this group and its leaders in their magazine, blogs, and other forms of propaganda.¹

I do not so much mind his charge of schism. Coming from Professor Cammenga with his theology, the charge of schism is a badge of honor that ought to be worn with distinction by all who come under his censure. No one in “this group and its supporters…and its leaders” should be bothered in the least that Professor Cammenga charges them with schism, false doctrine, or antinomianism. They should find in his charge confirmation that they believe the truth.

However, he—more than any other minister in the PRC—is being consistent.

If the charge of schism by Professor Cammenga and the PRC against me, Rev. A. Lanning, and others is true, then, of course, we are very wicked indeed. We are not ministers. The Reformed Protestant denomination is not made up of churches in the acceptable sense of the term. If the charge of schism is true, then I would join with Professor Cammenga in heartily condemning us. I would say it harsher, but I would agree with the basic assessment.

I would only remind him and his churches that their argument against us must also be used against themselves. For the origins of the PRC and of the Afscheiding churches were in discipline. Hendrik De Cock was deposed for his supposedly un-Christian and unloving slander of two brothers in the church. The Christian Reformed Church (CRC) called Rev. Herman Hoeksema and Rev. Henry Danhof “Mr. Hoeksema” and “Mr. Danhof” in the church’s depositions of those ministers and slanderously dismissed them. I would remind Professor Cammenga and his churches that in light of those decisions of the Christian Reformed classes, the Protestant Reformed denomination is not made up of true churches of Christ either. If that argument of schism is going to be the defense of Professor Cammenga and his churches, they should apologize to the CRC for their unruly behavior over the course of many years.

I bring this up to show that simply repeating over and over that “this group and its supporters…and its leaders” are schismatics is not a sound argument. Professor Cammenga and his churches must prove the charge based on truth and righteousness. But no one is going to do that. They are righteous, and their cause is righteous. They have said so, so it must be true. Their righteousness does not need proof but only loud and repetitive assertions.

This is nothing new. It has been done before in the history of the church. And we in “this group” suffer the charge gladly for Christ’s sake.

Although I would warn Professor Cammenga and his churches that either we are very wicked, or they are very wicked. That is the whole point in bringing up the decisions of the Christian Reformed classes. Either the CRC was very wicked, or in 1924 Rev. H. Hoeksema and Rev. H. Danhof and the forming of the PRC were very wicked.

And we maintain the same thing in this case. I maintain that Professor Cammenga’s charge of schism is very wicked, and in that light his email is indescribably wicked; for in it he lies against the cause of Christ and the truth.

I will grant him that there surely is schism involved, as I granted to him that there is antinomianism involved. He charges antinomianism but is himself the antinomian. I have established that in a previous article. ² He also charges schism. But the opposite is, in fact, true. He himself, all those who agree with him, and all those who will not put him out of the ministry as a false teacher are the schismatics.

If only he will see what the proper definition of schism is. Leave all other considerations aside.

Schism at its most basic means departure from the truth. The truth is over all. The truth is everything in the church, and everything in the church must be regulated by truth. So when the church departs from the truth, there is the work of Christ either to root out the lie to preserve his truth in the church against that departure, or there is the work of Christ to reform the church in order to preserve his truth. Preservation and reformation are alike the work of Christ for his truth’s sake.

Schism is the work of the devil. Whoever is the schismatic in this case is doing the work of the devil. Whoever is doing the work of preservation and reformation is doing the work of Christ.

Many will object to my saying that Professor Cammenga’s charge of schism is wicked. But I maintain that analysis in light of the definition of schism as departure from the truth and the events that have transpired in recent months.

To call the work of Christ the work of the devil is extremely serious: there is nothing more serious. Schism was precisely the charge of the opponents of Christ in his own day, and the opponents of Christ charge the same to this day. So this matter of who is an antinomian, who is a schismatic, who has the truth, and who is lying is all very serious. It is not a rhetorical game to score points but is a matter of eternal consequence. We are locked in a life-and-death struggle. There are those, also of our own number, who believe that they can play nice and get along. But that is not possible.

There are two possibilities and only two: reformation or schism.

Departure from Christ

It is a hallmark of the lie that it charges the truth with schism. That is part of the lie of the lie. The lie presents itself as truth, and the lie charges the truth with being the lie—in this case with schism. The opposite is, in fact, true: the lie is schismatic, and the truth unites. Yet the lie always charges the truth with schism. Usually, that is because those in the church of Christ who hold to the truth are the minority. They are a troublesome minority for the church that is hell-bent on apostasy. And I maintain that Professor Cammenga stands in that line of opponents of the truth that calls the truth schismatic.

When he speaks of schism, he should understand that schism is not division from the Reverend Professor Cammenga and his colleagues. Neither is schism separation from the PRC. Schism is the sin of dividing the church from Christ, her only head, and departure from the truth. If the Protestant Reformed denomination maintains the truth, let Professor Cammenga and his churches answer our charges that the denomination is now departing and has departed from the truth. Let the churches show how the preaching of Prof. R. Cammenga, Rev. K. Koole, Rev. W. Bruinsma, Rev. R. Van Overloop, and the rest is true and faithful Reformed preaching of the gospel of Jesus Christ. It is not. They know this.

Reverend Koole’s preaching about available grace that is different from regenerating grace and his teaching that if a man would be saved there is that which he must do are Arminian false doctrine as blatant and bold as ever has appeared in a Reformed church, let alone a Protestant Reformed pulpit. He was involved in the stout defense of Reverend Overway’s preaching and in the deposition of Neil Meyer; he publicly militated against Synod 2018 by writing, and thus he militated against the creeds interpreted by that synod; and he preaches false doctrine repeatedly. The blame for schism is his and his colleagues’. He will get away with a weak mea culpa, if even that. There will be no suspension or deposition for that false teacher, and he will go on preaching his false doctrine in Protestant Reformed pulpits and corrupting a generation and more.

Let Professor Cammenga and his churches answer the charges of wickedness and malfeasance on the part of the assemblies, in which they departed from the law of Christ to do justice and mercy. They may scream, holler, and shout about schism; but they must prove the charge, not merely repeat it again and again and again and again—lecture after lecture, sermon after sermon, article after article, and email after email.

Professor Cammenga should also know that schism has always been the charge of the false church—the last refuge of scoundrels, as someone put it somewhere—against the faithful. What he must understand is that in order to charge schism, he must prove that “this group and its supporters…and its leaders” have left Christ, chiefly in doctrine. Did they leave Christ doctrinally? It is enough for the Reverend Professor Cammenga to state it, but he does not feel the need to prove it.

Rev. D. Overway departed from Christ in doctrine. Hope Protestant Reformed Church departed from Christ in doctrine and continues to do so with its current minister and consistory.³ Rev. K. Koole departed from Christ in doctrine. Rev. R. Van Overloop grossly, repeatedly, and impenitently departed from Christ in doctrine. The list can go on. The rest of the Protestant Reformed ministers by silence and connivance are partakers of these sins.

Prof. R. Cammenga departs from Christ in doctrine. He departs from the truth of the Reformed faith as that is contained in the Heidelberg Catechism that he purports to preach but that he repeatedly mangles beyond recognition, and so also lawlessly—antinomian—violates his own oath and profanes the name of God.

He writes that the former officebearers of Wingham aggravate their sin of schism by their mischaracterizations, and for proof of their mischaracterizations, the professor points to his sermons on Lord’s Day 7 and Lord’s Day 11. He defends these sermons as wonderfully orthodox. But the sermons are the proof that he departs from Christ in doctrine.

Indeed, if you want to know what is wrong with preaching in the PRC and what kind of pulpit failure the denomination is going to die with, you must examine these two sermons. They are really bad sermons, especially for a professor of theology. No Reformed man could say what Professor Cammenga says in these sermons.

In an attempt to defend his sermons, he rooted around like a pig in the writings and sermons of John Calvin and Herman Hoeksema and other Protestant Reformed ministers to search for statements to support his doctrine, and then he snorted contentedly when he happened upon something that pleased him.

However, their theology of God’s absolute sovereignty in salvation completely passed the professor by.

The points he makes in the sermons solidify in my mind the direction that Professor Cammenga, the Protestant Reformed seminary, and with it the Protestant Reformed denomination are going in their rapid departure from the Reformed faith. Besides not being historically Protestant Reformed, Professor Cammenga’s sermons on Lord’s Days 7 and 11 are not Reformed at all. If you want to know the state of the orthodoxy of Protestant Reformed consistories, then know that after he preached those sermons, they were stoutly defended by consistories against protests.

New Doctrine of Faith

Let us take the sermon on Lord’s Day 7 first.⁴ Although I never made it my business to listen to recorded sermons of other ministers, I listened to that sermon because I was asked whether what Professor Cammenga said was correct. As I was listening to the sermon, I threw my phone and could not finish because the sermon was so bad. Later I finished listening to the message—I hardly dare call it a sermon.

He can say all he wants that he preached only what Herman Hoeksema preached on 2 Peter 1:10, but any thinking individual can examine and compare Professor Cammenga’s exegesis with the exegesis of Reverend Hoeksema and see that they are different. Furthermore, Herman Hoeksema preached nothing more and nothing less on 2 Peter 1:10 than what Lord’s Day 32 teaches. Professor Cammenga brought a new doctrine of faith, justification, and assurance into Lord’s Day 7.

First, he tells us what assurance is and describes it in glowing, even seductive, terms. Then he continues by telling us that assurance is God’s will for us: “This is the assurance of the people of God according to God’s own will. God wills that his people enjoy the assurance of their salvation.”

He remembers shortly thereafter that he is preaching on faith, and so he makes sure to include the note that faith is God’s gift:

It belongs to the distinctively Reformed view of faith that faith is the gift of God, that faith is worked in us by God and by God alone and that is not due to the work of God in cooperation with our free will. Not that, [but it is] exclusively the gift and the work of God.

And shortly afterward he tells us that faith is also assurance:

It is also the distinctively Reformed doctrine of faith that faith is assurance. Jesus Christ did not only die so that I might have faith. He did…

But that faith is assurance. Assurance distinguishes true faith from every form of false faith—hypocritical faith.

There are always unbelievers mixed in with the church. They claim to be believers, they claim to have faith. Probably for a little while, maybe even for quite a while, they are able to fool us. The hypocrite can’t fool two people though. He can’t fool himself, and he can’t fool God. But what the hypocrite does not enjoy, in distinction from the true believer, is the assurance of faith, the assurance of faith.

Here is the transition.

It is not true that assurance alone is what distinguishes faith from hypocritical faith. Faith is two things: knowledge and confidence, or assurance. True faith is distinguished from false faith also in faith’s knowledge. But in this sermon assurance alone is set up as that which distinguishes true faith from false faith, as though the hypocrite can have the knowledge of faith, but he cannot have the assurance of faith. Assurance is the issue in the sermon as that which distinguishes true faith from false faith.

Rightly, Professor Cammenga says that the Catechism emphasizes assurance. He points out that faith is assurance. He also says that God assures:

Not just that God chose some people unto eternal salvation, but that God assures those whom he has chosen, assures them here and now, assures them in this life, assures personally and individually. As much as if your names were written in the pages of holy scripture, he identifies you as one of his elect. That is the personal assurance of faith.

And he points out that assurance has its source in election, is grounded in the cross, and is the work of the Holy Spirit.

From a certain, formal viewpoint, he describes assurance accurately. And everything is well in the sermon until the question, “Are you living in that assurance?” Then the train wreck begins.

I quote in full from the sermon so everyone can read it:

Scripture and the Reformed confessions teach that, though faith assures of salvation, that faith is confirmed by a life of good works.

The fruits of faith and the fruits of grace, these evidences of God’s grace in our lives, are not the basis or cause of our assurance. Faith is assured of salvation.

The problem is my faith is weak. My faith often falters, especially in the storms of life, my own falls into sin, or the distressing circumstances that God may bring into my life. My faith is weak. The doubts and fears rise up, and the devil whispers in my ear, “You’re not a child of God, not really. It is all a show.”

Then, of course, the answer is faith in Jesus Christ, believing in Jesus Christ. But in his goodness God stoops to the weakness of our faith, and God himself uses the fruits and evidences of faith and of election in order to confirm our assurance.

Where are these doctrines—faith confirmed by works, weak faith, God uses works to confirm assurance—found in any of the Reformed creeds? I know that the professor points to 2 Peter 1:10, but he mangles that text, and when criticized he shields himself by saying that this is the exegesis of Rev. H. Hoeksema. But Hoeksema did not say what Professor Cammenga says. In the quote above, Cammenga denies everything that Lord’s Day 7 teaches about faith; indeed, in the quote above, he denies the whole Reformed faith and overthrows the Reformation’s sola fide. I repeat what he says: “Though faith assures of salvation, that faith is confirmed by a life of good works.” That is not Reformed doctrine at all. That is contrary to his own synod’s condemnation of a similar statement from Rev. D. Overway and Hope church:

We look at our good works in the same way. Never of any value to make me be declared righteous before God, but always of help in finding and maintaining assurance that God has justified me through Christ and Christ alone.⁵

Professor Cammenga’s own synod condemned his doctrine as contrary to the Reformed creeds, but he goes right on lawlessly teaching it.

He teaches the people that faith is a weak and pitiful thing that needs to be propped up by works. I have heard of little faith. I have heard of faithlessness. I have heard of imperfect faith. But weak faith that needs works to confirm it, I have never heard of.

Further, he casts his hearers into doubt of their salvation: “The doubts and fears rise up, and the devil whispers in my ear, ‘You’re not a child of God, not really. It is all a show.’”

If the devil is whispering doubt in my ear, then I want the Christ who said, “Get thee behind me, Satan!” And Satan listened.

But not Professor Cammenga! His awful pastoral counsel to doubting, troubled believers is to point them away from Christ to look at their own works. Listen to him:

Then, of course, the answer is faith in Jesus Christ, believing in Jesus Christ. But in his goodness God stoops to the weakness of our faith, and God himself uses the fruits and evidences of faith and of election in order to confirm our assurance.

The answer to doubt is faith in Christ, except that that is not the answer for Professor Cammenga. His answer is works to confirm one’s assurance. Such a faith as looks away from Christ to works is not faith at all but unbelief.

New Doctrine of Justification

Then, if faith is knowledge of and confidence of my justification before God, as Lord’s Day 7 teaches, Professor Cammenga’s version of faith does not justify alone, but it only justifies when it has works.

Remember, Professor Cammenga has the devil whispering in his hearers’ ears that they are not the children of God.

The answer of scripture and of the Reformed creeds to this attack of the devil is Christ and his righteousness, so that being justified by faith alone without works we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we stand without fear as children before the living God (Rom. 5:1–2). Justified by faith alone is the answer to all doubt!

But Professor Cammenga directs the people to their works, and then he graces this works-preaching with the name and grace of God. That is a cruel God who directs his children away from Christ, their only hope, when the devil is whispering in their ears and directs them to their own works. That is a comfortless doctrine. It is sheer federal vision theology. And it is not even very cleverly disguised. The professor just throws it out there. And who among his hearers said anything in opposition to that false doctrine by which he robbed the people of God of their comfort and caused schism in the churches from Christ?

The faith that Professor Cammenga teaches is a pitiful thing.

But Christ said that if you have faith as a grain of mustard seed, you can remove a mountain and cast it into the sea. That is because faith puts the believer in connection with Christ and the word of Christ and thus with the triune God and the Holy Spirit, so that, forgiving all the believer’s sins, the triune God is for him and nothing can be against him. Faith does. Faith alone does. Faith alone justifies.

Faith is nothing in Professor Cammenga’s sermon besides works. Faith does nothing in his sermon without works. All the grand things that he said about assurance in the first part of the sermon are nothing, they mean nothing, and you do not receive them until you work. That is not Reformed at all.

Article 24 of the Belgic Confession says, “It is by faith in Christ that we are justified, even before we do good works” (Confessions and Church Order, 53). I am justified before I ever do one work. That justification gives the absolute assurance of my salvation—that I am Christ’s, that Christ is mine, that I am elect, and that I have righteousness before God and eternal life from him. That justification is absolutely by faith without any works at all, even before I do any works. That justification and thus the absolute assurance of salvation that justification gives, faith gives to the ungodly and to those who do not work! This is the truth of Romans 4:5: “To him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.”

And do not forget that justification gives assurance of salvation. You cannot separate faith, justification, and assurance. Romans 5:1 says, “Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” Now what is peace with God except assurance of God’s grace, of his love and favor, and of the promise of eternal life?

Then, having mangled Lord’s Day 7, Professor Cammenga proceeds to mangle Canons 5.10. He says,

The Canons of Dordt refer to these confirming fruits of election, of faith, and of salvation in several places.

If you are reading the Standard Bearer, as I hope you all are and do, you will notice that I have begun a series of articles on assurance and good works, relating them—just a beginning.

There are numerous references in our creeds. One of the most outstanding is Canons 5.10:

This assurance [the assurance of preservation in our salvation to the end, the assurance of our election, the assurance that we are the children of God—all those aspects of assurance], however, is not produced by any peculiar revelation contrary to, or independent of the Word of God, but springs from faith in God’s promises [faith], which He has most abundantly revealed in His Word for our comfort; from the testimony of the Holy Spirit, witnessing with our spirit [working within us], that we are children and heirs of God (Rom. 8:16 [among other passages]); and lastly, from a serious and holy desire to preserve a good conscience and to perform good works. And if the elect of God were deprived of this solid comfort, that they shall finally obtain the victory, and of this infallible pledge or earnest of eternal glory, they would be of all men the most miserable.

Canons 5.10 does not teach what Professor Cammenga is teaching. Where in the whole article is there any reference to “confirming fruits…of faith”? It is not there at all. The article speaks of “a serious and holy desire to preserve a good conscience and to perform good works” (Confessions and Church Order, 175). But that is not the good work. That is the guilelessness of faith of which David speaks in Psalm 32:2: “Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no guile.” Faith is not feigned, but faith wants to live rightly. That is a whole different matter than confirming faith by works.

Then there is the fact that not only does that article not speak of “confirming fruits,” but also “confirming fruits” are not found anywhere in the Canons, as he alleges, or anywhere in all the Reformed creeds, for that matter.

Still more, the doctrine of Professor Cammenga about works’ confirming weak faith is nowhere to be found in the creeds either. Weak faith confirmed by works is his own false doctrine to overthrow the Reformed doctrine of salvation by grace alone through faith alone.

And he continues in this vein of weak faith confirmed by works for nearly three-quarters of the entire sermon. The actual explanation of Lord’s Day 7 simply disappears in a deluge of works and morbid introspection like that of the Nadere Reformatie and the Puritans. Just listen to him. He goes on and on directing the people to look at themselves.

Do the fruits of the death of Christ manifest themselves in my life? Do I trust in him and in him alone—not at all in my own work or works—for my standing before God? Do I repent of my sins? Sincerely repent of my sins? Do I hate them? And do I flee from them? And do I fight against them? If you do, be assured with the assurance of a true faith that you are an elect child of God and that Christ the savior has died for you, even for you.

Are you living with the fruits of the Spirit manifest in your life—observable by others around you, at school, on the job, in the congregation, in your family life? Are spiritual things your meat and your drink? Is your attitude toward spiritual things such that they take preeminence over your own pleasure—sports, entertainment? Is your attitude that you love the things of the kingdom of God? Then know, know with the assurance of a true faith, that you are a child of God.

Ask yourself, are the fruits of preserving grace evident in my life? Do I pray to God for my preservation in the faith? Do I make that prayer to God for my children and for my grandchildren? And do I make use of the means of grace for the preservation of faith? Then be assured, live in the assurance, that you are an elect child of God.

That all can be summarized this way: are you holy enough, do you repent enough, and are you spiritual enough? Then you too can be assured. The gospel of Professor Cammenga!

I remind the reader that the professor is still in point one of the sermon, and he is still defining what assurance is. It belongs to his very definition of assurance that to be assured, you have to have faith, but faith is not enough. Besides, faith is pitifully weak; so in addition to faith, you also have to be holy enough, be spiritual enough, and repent enough. Then you can have the assurance of faith, which in the end is not the truth that faith is assurance at all but the false doctrine of assurance and justification by works. It is an open question in the sermon whether that weak faith also needs to be exercised by anyone, thus making faith a work too.

Professor Cammenga’s doctrine is not Reformed doctrine. It is a corruption of Lord’s Day 7. That Lord’s Day teaches plainly that faith is assurance that righteousness and eternal life are the believer’s. There is not a work to be found in the Lord’s Day, except Christ’s work. Professor Cammenga quickly breezes over Christ and gets to the believer. That is what a Christless, faithless sermon sounds like. Make an obligatory and cursory reference to Christ, explain what Christ did, but hold it from the people until they are holy enough, are spiritual enough, and repent enough.

It does not matter if he preached ninety orthodox sermons on Lord’s Day 7 because this one sermon overthrows and undoes them all. If you have a delicious plate of food set in front of you and someone puts a big piece of dung on the plate, the whole meal is ruined. This sermon is Professor Cammenga’s dung to ruin the beautiful Reformed theology of Lord’s Day 7 and the whole Catechism and in the process to rob the people of God of their hope and comfort in the truth of faith in Christ. Instead he sends them on a fruitless, hopeless, and damning quest inside themselves for peace, for joy, and for fruits in order to know their salvation. The intolerable thing about that is they are not directed to Christ; indeed, they are directed away from Christ. So Professor Cammenga can write all he wants that this is classic Protestant Reformed preaching, but his sermon is Puritan, Nadere Reformatie, introspective, and a denial of the gospel.

New Doctrine of Assurance by Works

We have not even come to his second point: how assurance is worked. Then he really gets going in his separation of faith and assurance.

In the first point he said that assurance is of the essence of faith; but by halfway through the first point, he has added works to assurance.

By the second point he separates faith and assurance. Listen:

The question is, how, then, how do I enjoy the full assurance of faith?

What must be emphasized at the outset is that assurance is the work of grace—God’s grace. We must not suppose that God gives us the gift of faith and that somehow we manufacture thereafter on our own the assurance of faith—maybe follow some steps, push some buttons, and there you have it. Presto! We have the assurance of faith, and now we will live out the rest of our days in that assurance. Not so.

God is a God of means. The God who graciously gives us and works in us faith and faith’s assurance is a God of means.

Now we have “faith” and “faith’s assurance.” They are separated. The Lord’s Day says faith is assurance. Professor Cammenga has “faith” and “faith’s assurance,” and he even has a “full assurance.” So there is faith, faith’s assurance, and a third level for the really holy and hardworking of faith’s full assurance.

To make sure no one misunderstands that he is teaching now that you work for assurance, he says,

Although God works the assurance of faith under the preaching of his word, we are active in this whole matter of the assurance of faith.

God does not drop assurance out of the sky on us and now we have it forever and it can never be taken away from us and we have nothing to worry about as regards this matter of the assurance of our faith.

But God’s people are active, busy, in this whole matter of the assurance of their faith. That is 2 Peter 1:10: “Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence [give diligence] to make your calling and election sure: for if ye do these things, ye shall never fall.” Make our calling and election sure. Give diligence to make your calling and election sure. If ye do these things, ye shall never fall…

That’s how we make our calling and election sure. What he is describing is the Christian life—the living of the Christian life. What he is describing is a life lived out of love for God and love for the neighbor. What he is describing is a life lived in obedience to God’s ten commandments. God uses that in order to confirm in us the assurance of our election and salvation.

So how is assurance worked?

If you work, God will use your works to confirm assurance in you. Now Professor Cammenga is so far gone from the doctrine of Lord’s Day 7 that he is not even making a pretense at this point of preaching the Lord’s Day. He simply hangs his sermon about working for assurance on Lord’s Day 7, and he is teaching entirely contrary to what Lord’s Day 7 teaches.

Then he gets going on his third point.

Let’s review the doctrine of this sermon that is supposed to be about faith as assurance. What is assurance? It is what you work for. How is assurance worked? You work some more. Then what is the fruit of the assurance that you work for? You work some more.

This assurance in the life of the child of God produces a good fruit.

It is really the assurance of salvation that establishes the whole Christian life. What is the Christian life?

The Heidelberg Catechism puts its finger on it. One of the greatest aspects of the instruction in the Heidelberg Catechism—you children know it.

What is the Christian life? It is gratitude. It is thankfulness.

But how can you be thankful, truly thankful, if you don’t know that for which you should be thankful? Don’t know the one who has bestowed these abundant gifts upon you, so that you can thank him? Gratitude, a whole life lived in obedience to God and in the service of our brothers and sisters in the church, is grounded in the assurance of our election and our salvation.

So you work for assurance so you can work some more.

There is nothing Reformed about this sermon. All of the professor’s use of orthodox-sounding language is nothing more than deceptive banter. It surely is not an interpretation of Lord’s Day 7. It is not the Reformed doctrine of faith at all. It is faith and works as the only way of salvation, to the denial of Christ as the only way of salvation.

He Does Not!

Now, if it were possible, Professor Cammenga’s sermon on Lord’s Day 11 is worse!⁶

He defends this sermon in his email as a paragon of orthodoxy, but the sermon that is supposed to exalt the name of Jesus denigrates the name of Jesus. Professor Cammenga says in the sermon,

The Catechism is not teaching here that Jesus accomplishes himself personally every aspect of the work of our salvation. He does not! There are other works alongside the work of Jesus.

I am quoting accurately. I have checked and rechecked the sermon. That is what he actually says.

Years ago he got the words across his lips that “it is not enough for salvation…that Jesus suffered under the wrath of God an atoning death.”⁷ Now he just comes out and says that the Catechism is “not teaching here that Jesus accomplishes himself personally every aspect of the work of our salvation.”

I will grant him that, being a human, he could err. But when the officebearers of Wingham pointed out his error in their “History of the Controversy,” he does not retract in holy horror what he said, but in his shabby screed he defends his sermon as perfectly orthodox.

Since we have been taught and the whole world has been taught from time immemorial that Christ did accomplish all of our salvation, the question on the minds of all who are not completely ignorant of the truth is, what are these “other works”?

Professor Cammenga answers the question:

And those other works on behalf of our salvation are the works of the Holy Spirit, the work of sanctification…

It is a slander, therefore, to allege that because someone teaches that besides the saving work of Jesus the work of the Holy Spirit, not the work of man but the work of the Holy Spirit, is necessary unto his salvation. That is the Reformed faith. That has always been the Reformed faith. 

John Calvin…introduces that part of his Institutes of the Christian Religion that begins the work of the Holy Spirit with these words: “We must understand that as long as Christ remains outside of us, and we are separated from him, all that he has suffered and done for the salvation of the human race remains useless and of no value for us.” That is found in Calvin’s Institutes, book 3, chapter 1, paragraph 1. Calvin is emphasizing the fundamental truth that our salvation consists of the work of Christ on his cross, justification, and also the work of the Holy Spirit in us—for us and in us—that work that we call and that the scriptures call sanctification.

But in this Lord’s Day the Heidelberg Catechism is not contrasting the work of Jesus Christ on behalf of our salvation and the work of the Holy Spirit on behalf of our salvation. What it is contrasting is the work of Jesus Christ on behalf of our salvation and the works of man—the works of man apart from the grace of Jesus Christ as the fruit of our salvation in him. What it is denying is that our works, in any way, shape, or form, contribute to our salvation. That is the teaching of Lord’s Day 11.

There is so much wrong with that quotation, it is hard to know where to begin.

It is certainly true that the Catechism is not contrasting the work of the Holy Spirit and the work of Christ. Only Professor Cammenga is doing that, contrary to all truth. In his quotation of John Calvin, the professor does not have a clue what Calvin is actually saying. Calvin says that Christ accomplished all our salvation. It is all in Christ: salvation and every benefit of salvation are in him. He personally accomplished it all. And now we must be made part of Christ and have Christ in us. Christ received the Spirit to take up his abode with us. As Calvin says,

Therefore, to share with us what he [Christ] has received from the Father, he had to become ours and to dwell within us…we grow into one body with him.

To sum up, the Holy Spirit is the bond by which Christ effectually unites us to himself.⁸

And Calvin goes on in this vein for some time. The work of the Spirit is the work of Christ by which Christ unites us to himself as our head, and we as his body are made partakers of his blessings.

But Professor Cammenga, against all sense, presses his quote of Calvin into the service of his false doctrine that Christ does not personally accomplish every aspect of our salvation, as though Calvin were agreeing with him.

Now from the viewpoint of accurate theology—being a professor of dogmatics, one would think he would be interested in that—to say that Jesus Christ does not personally accomplish every aspect of our salvation is patently false. There are few false teachers bold enough—or foolish enough—to say that and still insist on being taken seriously. He knows full well that the accomplishment of salvation was at the cross and that Jesus did accomplish all our salvation.

But let us suppose that the professor was speaking imprecisely and that by “accomplish” he meant apply. Jesus does not personally apply every aspect of our salvation. This too is false and grossly so.

Separating Christ and His Spirit

Then he gets worse and separates Jesus Christ and his Spirit. The professor separates the work of Jesus Christ personally from the work of the Spirit personally. Notice: that is his contrast: Jesus did not personally accomplish every aspect of our salvation. And he adds emphatically, “He does not!” That is to make sure that no one leaves the sermon thinking too much of Jesus Christ. And then, defining what he means by “accomplish,” he speaks about sanctification and ascribes that work to the Spirit, so what he is talking about is the application of salvation. And in that application of salvation, he distinguishes between the work of Christ personally and the work of the Spirit.

This is shocking.

Does he not know that the Spirit is the Spirit of Jesus Christ and that “the Lord is that Spirit” (2 Cor. 3:17)? Does he not know that the Spirit himself brings Christ and testifies of Christ? Does he not know that Jesus Christ, having accomplished our salvation at the cross, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high and received of God the Father the promise of the Spirit that he—Christ—shed abroad on his church and by which Spirit Jesus Christ unites us to himself and makes us partakers of his blessings? The application of salvation is Christ’s work. The application of salvation to Christ’s church is specifically stated in Lord’s Day 17 of the Heidelberg Catechism to be the work
of Christ:

Q45. What doth the resurrection of Christ profit us?

A.First, by His resurrection He has overcome death, that He might make us partakers of that righteousness which He had purchased for us by His death; secondly, we are also by His power raised up to a new life; and lastly, the resurrection of Christ is a sure pledge of our blessed resurrection. (Confessions and Church Order, 100; emphasis added)

The question is, why does the professor separate Jesus Christ and his Spirit? What purpose does that distinction serve? He says that Jesus does not accomplish—or apply—every aspect of our salvation personally, which, of course, is a plain lie. Jesus does. That is why his name is Savior. That Jesus Christ does it through the Holy Spirit is not a denial of that truth but an explanation of the fact that Jesus personally accomplishes every aspect of our salvation and personally applies all of it too. But why does Professor Cammenga feel it necessary to make that distinction? Does he want the Spirit working in man so that man can do what is necessary for salvation, which he cleverly disguises as the work of the Spirit? Then he is not only guilty of denigrating the name of Christ, which he most certainly does in that sermon, but he is also guilty of robbing the Spirit of Christ of his honor.

If anyone is wondering why the Protestant Reformed Churches will die of pulpit failure, then examine these two sermons. There are, of course, other sermons that I can point to, but remember Professor Cammenga taught dogmatics to a generation of Protestant Reformed ministers, and he taught them this theology, and it is in the pulpits already. His students do not know what the gospel is; and if they do know, they are petrified that it will make men careless and profane. Examples can be multiplied. That false theology is there in Protestant Reformed pulpits every Sunday, and it is working every Sunday to turn hearts from the truth.

Do you want proof? He preached these sermons in Hudsonville Protestant Reformed Church, and there was hardly a ripple. The consistory, with the input of prominent ministers of Classis East, stoutly defended the sermon on Lord’s Day 7 against a protest that was filed with the consistory against it. Professor Cammenga completely denied the truth of Lord’s Day 7, and he publicly denigrated the name of Jesus. The consistory of Hudsonville, to its shame, defended the sermons.

That is why reformation was necessary: this kind of preaching and these kinds of consistories.

It was reformation, Professor Cammenga, not schism.

You are the schismatic who, along with your colleagues, destroyed the peace of the PRC by your false doctrine.