Dear Readers, This is the fifth answer to Ditzel’s fifth rebuttal but I now find that with a new publication on his site of his rebuttals, he has attached his sixth essay to the fifth which contains his criticisms of my dealing with John Murray. I have thus dealt with both essays together and there is thus no sixth coming up. God bless, George Ditzel’s culinary criticism Under the heading ‘Making Hash’, Ditzel starts by agreeing with Calvin, Gill and myself that faith is not the cause of our justification but the instrument by which we receive justification. He then asks the question, ‘How do we receive justification?’, though we have already been told correctly that it is by faith. Indeed, Gill uses the very… Full Article
Doctrine
Ditzel’s Rebuttal Part Five
Dec 19
Accusing Gill of ‘blunders’ Peter Ditzel’s third essay of ‘rebuttals’ on his website takes a most astonishing turn. Not content with aiming his Don Quixote lance at George Melvyn Ella, whom he takes to be a veritable wind mill (pun intentional) he now rides on to combat that great edifice John Gill under the titles John Gill’s Blunder #1 and John Gill’s Blunder #2. Needless to say, it is no difficult task to point out that the blunders are all Ditzel’s. Talk of a midge attacking an elephant! Ditzel mainly strives to outwit Gill on the grounds of logic rather than Scriptural exegesis. Ditzel thus claims, ‘Much of John Gill’s argument for eternal justification (he means justification from eternity, I take it)… Full Article
Ditzel’s disagreement on Scriptural and Church History In his first website essay allegedly rebutting my doctrine of justification, Peter Ditzel promised to challenge my view of Scripture in a following article which he subsequently entitled ‘The Debate as Based on Scripture’. However, now in his second part, he ignores my Scriptural evidence on justification from eternity, centering rather on my Scriptural evidence given to show that God justifies those at enmity with Him and begins by also rejecting my evidence concerning Biblical scholars and Reformers of the past. Once again, in his second paper, I find that Ditzel has fully misunderstood my position and chastises me quite unfoundedly for advocating beliefs… Full Article
How things began Starting around 1996 and continuing for some ten years, I wrote several books and a number of articles on the question of the timing of justification in its relation to faith, conversion, adoption, reconciliation, the forgiveness of sins and indeed all the blessings that God gives to His own in Christ which is our Heavenly inheritance and our lot for all eternity. There was no great reaction to my writings as the topic did not appear to have been of great interest and, anyway, I was hardly known at the time. Indeed one of the few leading evangelical writers who thought it worthwhile to disagree with me, a man of little learning but with quite a large following, quite misrepresented my views and told his… Full Article
Receiving the antitype before the type Most Baptists accuse believers in covenant baptism of confusing type with antitype. Actually, the boot is on the other foot in the special case of Carson who argues: “Sins are washed away by faith in the blood of Christ, but they are symbolically washed away in baptism. Just as we become partakers in the death of Christ the moment we believe; in baptism, this participation is exhibited by a symbol.” There are several problems of interpretation attached to this very Arminian statement. It is not our faith in Christ that washes away sin but the objective fact that Christ has washed away our sins independent of our prior faith and He has given us faith to accept… Full Article
Part One: The scriptures conclude all under sin Sin refers to God’s law alone The word ‘sin’ is a rarity nowadays and like the gospel words ‘holiness’ and ‘righteousness’, might soon disappear from our vocabulary. The reasons is two-fold: ‘sin’ in its traditional meaning is the opposite of holiness and righteousness, theological terms which relate to the Person of God. Thus, there can be no awareness of sin where there is no awareness of our sovereign, absolute and holy God. Where there is no sense of sin, there can be no sense of righteousness. The second reason follows from the first. Our holy God has given us a clear definition of sin in His Word. God’s eternal nature is revealed to us in His… Full Article
Following theological fashions Our modern theology has apparently become a matter of fashions. In my youth, Christians kept to their theological opinions closely. Whether a Plymouth Brother, Particular Baptist, Wesleyan Methodist or an Evangelical Anglican, they remained true to their affiliations all their Christian lives. Nowadays, Christians seem to be changing their theological bent regularly. I have friends who have adopted one supposedly modern fad after another, going through Hyper-Fullerism, Hyper-Calvinism, New Covenant Theology, New Perspectives, Dispensationalism and other old warmed up errors within a few years. I have even received letters from irate brethren scolding me for not keeping up to date… Full Article
Irresistible Grace
Sep 21
A lecture given at the Protestant Reformation Society, August 27th, 2009, Wycliffe Hall, Oxford, England Irresistible grace represents the traditional ‘I’ in the acronym ‘TULIP’. So now I shall tease you a little. The name ‘Tulip’ comes from the same Turkish root as ‘turban’ and the flower of that name was introduced by the Turks to Europe as a symbol of the spreading Ottoman Empire, or the TULIP ERA as the Islamising of Europe was called. The popular strains Tulipa turkestanica and Tulipa kurdica point to this. Why the Turkestan turban-shaped talismanic Tulip and Turkoman black merchants robes were chosen as Christian symbols of faith and ministry by post-Reformation parties, must be the subject of… Full Article
The Atonement
Aug 17
The Atonement in Evangelical Thought: Part I The New-Look in Neo-Evangelicalism Enemies of the Word of God tend to develop their theories along lines of general fashion. One generation chooses to challenge the Sonship of Christ whereas another generation fixes its doubting gaze on the work of the Spirit. In one age it is fashionable to be social-minded, another age chooses to be ascetic and turn its back on the world with all its responsibilities. Modern critics have become more sophisticated and analytical and, professing to be within the church rather than without, they are focusing their gaze on the very centre of our faith and salvation. This is the Work of the Lord Jesus Christ on the cross, otherwise known as the… Full Article
