June 26, 2011

• "The Christian should not just believe the truth, and know it..." | the Father's assurance

  In yesterday's post, "Fear not, little flock," I encouraged those of you who are Christians to ask God to grant you a real and living sense of His love for you in Jesus Christ. Today's post is a follow-up to that post.

  In the Introduction to Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones' book "Joy Unspeakable: Power and Renewal in the Holy Spirit" (Harold Shaw: Wheaton, 1984), Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones' grandson Christopher Catherwood writes (pp. 12-13):

  In his [Lloyd-Jones'] booklet 'Christ our Sanctification', designed to confute the false perfectionist tendencies still present in many evangelical circles, he put forward the view that the sealing of the Spirit which Paul refers to in Ephesians took place simultaneously with conversion––a stand taken today by men such as John Stott. By the time in the mid-1950s that he himself came to preach on Ephesians, he had changed his mind. He still rejected perfectionism––indeed continued to do so till his death––but now felt that it was evident from Scripture that the sealing of the Spirit was indisputably separate from conversion. He read many of the Puritans, and discovered that they too testified both from Scripture and from their own experience that two events were not necessarily simultaneous in the Christian's life. The Christian should not just believe the truth, and know it, the Puritans felt, but have a day-to-day living experience of it––what they call 'experimental' truth.

  So the conviction as to what Scripture taught, and the concern that he had about the increasing aridity in the lives of many Christians around him, caused him to change both his views and his emphasis. He became increasingly burdened to pray for revival–-indeed the desire for a revival was to dominate the rest of his ministry. He saw that this was a theme upon which it was vital to preach...

  With that background in mind, I'd like to present to you more about the wonderful experiential (or experimental), felt assurance of the Father's love which is available to the children of God.

  In Chapter 5 (The Sense of His Presence) of "Joy Unspeakable," ML-J describes the three types of assurance which are available to the believer. (In case this sounds familiar to you, I recently posted the same excerpt here.)

  There are in the word of God three types of assurance possible to the Christian. The first type of assurance is the assurance that we get by deduction from the Scriptures. This is the commonly recognized form of assurance. . . .

  The second form of assurance is the kind that is dealt with in the first epistle of John. John tells us there in chapter 5:13 that his whole object in writing to those people was 'That ye [who believe in the Son of God] might know that ye have eternal life'––assurance.

  How, then, does he give it to them? Well, he says there are various tests which you can apply to yourselves. . . .

  But there is a third type of assurance, which is the highest, the most absolute and glorious, and which differs essentially from the other two. How? Like this. You notice, in the first two types of assurance, that what we are doing is to draw deductions, as we read the Scriptures, perhaps. We arrive at the assurance by a process of reading, understanding, self-examination or self-analysis. It is a deduction that we draw from the premises given; and it is right and true. But the glory of this third and highest form of assurance is that it is neither anything we do, nor any deduction that we draw, but an assurance that is given to us by the blessed Spirit himself.

  Now if you like, it is again the whole difference between Romans 8:15 and Romans 8:16. Romans 8:15 reads like this: 'For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption whereby we cry, Abba, Father.' Then verse 16: 'The Spirit himself beareth witness with or spirit' (RV). Our spirit has been crying 'Abba, Father', but over and above that the Spirit now bears witness with our spirit––he confirms our saying to us: 'You are right.' The Spirit does it. Now this is neither our action, nor our deduction, but the immediate witness of the Spirit, and that is why it is both so absolute and certain. What the Spirit does is this: he tells us in the most unmistakable manner that we are the children of God, that God loves us with an everlasting love, and that is was because he so loved us that Christ gave himself for us.

  The Spirit does this in many ways. Sometimes he will do it through a verse of Scripture, a verse you may have read a thousand times before but which suddenly seems to stand out––it is for you, he is speaking to you. Sometimes it is without a verse of Scripture; it is an impression upon the mind and in the heart. You do not hear an audible voice, or see anything, but you just know with an absolute certainty. That is the Spirit bearing witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God.

  At this point in the book, ML-J gives teaching and examples from the Scripture as well as examples of men throughout Church history who witnessed to having that third type of assurance. These men included Howell Harris, Christmas Evans, Charles Finney, Jonathan Edwards, George Whitefield, Blaise Pascal and D.L. Moody, as well as two Puritans, Edward Elton and Thomas Goodwin. We can't help but notice the wide range of theological backgrounds of these men.

  Given that we celebrated Father's Day last week, I would like to bring you Elton's and Goodwin's accounts because they demonstrate how wonderfully our heavenly Father sovereignly bestows the knowledge of His love to His children in such an experiential manner through the Holy Spirit, i.e. - that third type of assurance of which Lloyd-Jones wrote (boldface, mine).

  Here ML-J is quoting from Edward Elton (p. 94):

  "I take it therefore that the witness and testimony of the Spirit he has spoken of is an inward secret and unspeakable inspiration of the Spirit; the Holy Spirit of God inwardly, secretly, and in an unspeakable manner informing our hearts and inwardly persuading us that God is our Father, and pouring into our heart a secretly, wonderful and unspeakable sweet sense and feeling of God's love to us. Not of God's ordinary or common love, but of His special and Fatherly love, that God loves us with such love as He bears to His only begotten Son Christ Jesus, in Whom we are adopted to be His children. As the Lord Jesus Himself speaks in that excellent prayer of his [John 17:23] that God loves us, we believing in Christ as He hath loved us. And to this purpose the Apostle speaks plainly [Romans 5:5] the Holy Spirit of God given to us doth infuse and pour into our hearts a sense and feeling of God's love to us in Christ."

  ML-J concludes the chapter describing Thomas Goodwin's experience of assurance, followed by some questions we should be asking ourselves (pp. 95-96):

  Let me finally tell you again what I regard as one of the most beautiful ways in which this matter has ever been put. It is by Thomas Goodwin, one of those great Puritans again of three hundred years ago, the President of Magdalen College at Oxford during the commonwealth, and a brilliant scholar and preacher. That is the difference between what I call, the customary assurance of the child of God, and this extraordinary assurance. He describes a man and his little child, his son, walking down the road and they are walking hand in hand, and the child knows that he is the child of his father, and he knows that his father loves him, and he rejoices in that, and he is happy in it. There is no uncertainty about it all, but suddenly the father, moved by some impulse, takes hold of that child and picks him up, fondles him in his arms, kisses him, embraces him, showers his love upon him, and then he puts him down again and they go on walking together.

  That is it! The child knew before that his father loved him, and he knew that he was his child. But oh! this loving embrace, this extra outpouring of love, this unusual manifestation of it––that is the kind of thing. The Spirit bearing witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God.

  This is the outstanding characteristic of the baptism with the Spirit. God gives us grace to examine ourselves in the light of these things. I take it you have all got the first and the second types of assurance: do you know anything about the third? Do you know anything of the glory of God, this immediacy, this certainty, this absolute assurance given by the Spirit that banishes all doubt and uncertainty and you know that God loves you in particular with an everlasting love in Jesus Christ?

  "The Christian should not just believe the truth, and know it, the Puritans felt, but have a day-to-day living experience of it––what they call 'experimental' truth."

  Do you have a day-to-day living experience of the truth, that experimental truth?

  I take it you have all got the first and the second types of assurance: do you know anything about the third?

  Do you know anything of the glory of God, this immediacy, this certainty, this absolute assurance given by the Spirit that banishes all doubt and uncertainty and you know that God loves you in particular with an everlasting love in Jesus Christ?

  ---

  Related:

  • Martyn Lloyd-Jones message "William Williams and Welsh Calvinistic Methodism"

  • The flags unfurled ... Christ's eternal banner | Lloyd-Jones ~ a third type of assurance
  • Letter 18 on assurance and fighting for joy (my testimony of joy) ~ includes some of Jonathan Edwards' account
  • "I thirst! I thirst!" Whitefield's experience of joy (letter 51 on assurance & fighting for joy)
  • Blaise Pascal: This day of Grace (November 23, 1654) "Fire...Joy, joy, joy, tears of joy."
  • The Father's Inheritance (Eleven days' journey ~ A lamentation & an exhortation)
  • Fear not, little flock (Luke 12:32) | letter 123 on assurance & fighting for joy
  • Happy Father's Day: "Only the child cries, 'Abba, Father'"
  • "A Father at the Helm"
  • "Abba Father!"
  • the pilgrim's Assurance ~ His Sovereign pouring | letter 110 on assurance & fighting for joy
  • a word in doubt
  • Reflections on my Dad on his 107th birthday* (Letter 33 on assurance & fighting for joy)
  • my posts on assurance & fighting for joy
  • Posts on the Holy Spirit

   

  • 4:47 PM
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