Several weeks ago, I received a surprising letter from the NCT website The Word of His Grace, signed by Peter Ditzel. We had last corresponded personally, Peter informed me, in 2007 when I was very ill. So now, in April 2012, five years later Peter was writing to hear if I were now, once again, on my feet. That was the nicest bit about the letter. Then Peter mentioned that he had written some six essays a number of years ago on his site attacking my doctrine of Justification and he had since been informed by a third party that I had responded, though I only discovered the essays some time later when surfing the web for information on Justification. It appears that Peter now wanted a larger public than a mere… Full Article
Posts Tagged Justification
Ditzel’s Last Stand
Apr 26
Recently, I came across a long essay in six parts entitled, ‘A Rebuttal to George M. Ella’s ‘John Gill and Justification from Eternity’ on a website named Word of His Grace. The writer, Peter Ditzel, had obtained a part-copy of an armchair talk I gave to my host and friends on justification in Minnesota some years ago. The author claims that in rebutting me, he is also rebutting Peter Meney’s New Focus article ‘Ten Arguments for Justification from Eternity’. I commenced my talk by referring to Romans 4:5 on God’s justification of the ungodly, thus opening a discussion on the timing of justification. Ditzel claims that before rebutting my Scriptural application, he must… Full Article
Sir: Strictures against those who disagree with the Reformation Day Declaration outlined in Issue 7650 lose their force because the doctrine of forensic, declarative justification outlined therein is not that of our Reformers. It reflects the Humanism taught by Philip Melanchthon, often called Germany’s Erasmus. Unlike the bulk of Reformers including Bucer, Bullinger, Calvin and the English compilers of the 39 Articles and Homilies, the Melanchthon school taught a mere passive, non-causative, forensic justification turned into actual justification through obedience to natural law and the gospel. Because it was humanistic, it was man-centred. Sadly, the corrupt view of Reformation doctrine promoted in the declaration has… Full Article
Robert Williams on Wycliffe
Dec 19
Letter to the Evangelical Times on reading articles critical of John Wycliffe in the Christian Newspaper Sir: Robert Williams (41:11) believes that Wycliffe was not in tune with later mainstream Reformers. He cannot mean the 16th century Reformers as they obviously built on Wycliffe. So he is probably thinking of the many evangelical scholars of today who have sadly little in common with either Wycliffe or the Reformation. Williams appears to have taken over the Lechler/Green, late nineteenth century, critical interpretation of Wycliffe which was excellent in reviving Wycliffe studies but extremely weak in understanding Wycliffe’s doctrines. Like modern Reformed systematic theological appreciation, it was too… Full Article
Clifford’s New Reformation
Dec 11
Sir: Dr Allan Clifford (Issue 7780) wants a New Reformation, built on his own mixture of Amyraldism, legal, fictive justification and works-righteousness, arguing that the old Biblical Reformation was wrong. I am suspicious of Clifford’s lip-rejection of Rome and denounce his false Protestantism. Clifford’s atonement is not the Biblical-Reformed doctrine on which our reconciliation, redemption, justification and sanctification are built. The Bride for whom Christ died is redeemed, justified and sanctified in one synergistic action, impossible to be divided. The corollary to Clifford’s Hyper-Amyraldian idea of atonement is thus his faulty view of justification and sanctification. Clifford rejects our Reformers’ doctrine of… Full Article
The March/April, 1999 number of Reformation Today features four articles on John Gill. The first, entitled John Gill – a Sketch of his Life, is a succinctly written biography of Gill’s faithful and productive life in the service of the gospel. Next, Editor Errol Hulse continues with John Gill – An Appreciation, presented as a review of The Life and Thought of John Gill (1697-1771), (ed. Michael Haykin). Here, Hulse ignores the facts of Gill’s own testimony to make what he calls ‘a fair assessment of the damage which emanated from his errors.’ Thus, though the book Hulse reviews chiefly depicts Gill as a great evangelist and soul-winner, his one-sided critique is centred on Gill’s supposed Hyper-Calvinism and lack of… Full Article
This year’s Siegwinden Conference (Germany), held from 24th-26th February, experienced a great drop in the standards of teaching which it has come to appreciate over the years. The main speaker, Philip Eveson, a Bible College Principal and reputed to be a Reformed man, proved a wolf in sheep’s clothing and openly declared himself to be a contender against the reformed faith. Radically denying the experimental, new-life-giving work of God in Justification so much emphasised by the New Testament writers and our Reformers, Eveson proclaimed that it was merely a legal, ‘as if’ act with no actual transforming of the sinner into a saint. Using the most inappropriate illustration of North and South Korea to describe… Full Article
A Review Article The news that Carey Publications were to publish the lives of these three 17th century Baptists filled me with a feeling of hopeful expectancy. The three Ks have aided my own understanding of the ways of God immensely and I know from my correspondents that there is an awakened, wide-spread interest in them. Michael Haykin’s book thus comes at a most appropriate time. My expectancy was dampened by Robert Oliver’s foreword in which he takes up his pet theme, Hyper-Calvinism, and back-projects it onto the teaching of Kiffin and Co., arguing that they were against it, whereas they had nothing to do with it, or rather, nothing to do with this modern controversy which is forced onto the churches,… Full Article
E. T. Clifford on Doddridge
Aug 22
Sir: In his recent ET article defending saintly Doddridge against adverse criticism, Dr. Clifford ended by stating, “Even more at odds with the facts, Dr George Ella asserts that Doddridge’s Calvinism was ‘higher’ than Dr John Gill’s!” This is incorrect. My original ET article (Feb. 1995), including Doddridge’s balanced analysis of Calvinism, which I share, was radically shortened in the American version. Nevertheless, this version still shows clearly that I look upon Doddridge as being ‘higher’ in his Calvinism than Gill on one of the Five Points only, namely election and reprobation. Concerning allied points, I affirmed that Doddridge disagreed with Gill on justification, but not radically so, and that he… Full Article
