Skinner and Walden Pond Two … The Elites Vision Of Control

B. F. Skinner was a psychologist who had monumental influence over Government schools. Skinner followed in the footsteps of W. Wundt, G. Stanley, Hall, E. L. Thorndyke, John Dewey, and many others by helping to psychologize American education in a humanist direction, thus helping to construct our current Psychological culture.

Here are some excerpts from “Skinner’s, “Walden Pond Two.” These excerpts give us insight in what kind of culture Skinner envisioned.

245 — “We not only can control human behavior, we MUST.”
219 — “The New Order”
189 — “Psychologists are our Priests”
286 — “What is love except the use of positive reinforcement?”
278 — “Let us control the lives of our children and see what we can make of them.”

186 — “We can make men adequate for group living … That was our faith.”

134 — “Our goal is to have every adult member of Walden II regard our children as his own, and to have every child think of every adult as his parent.”

135 — “No sensible person will suppose that love or affection has anything to do with blood.”

108 — “History is honored in Walden Two only as entertainment.”
105 — “We are always thinking of the whole group.”
160 — “We are opposed to competition.”
139 — “The community, as a revised family.”

Conclusion?

This fictional account of Skinner’s ideal community is much like the language and laws in use today by the behavioral elite — describing their plans for your children, your schools, your country, your family, and yourself. How do you like your life and behavior managed and chosen for you by an elite who are intellectual pygmies, moral buffoons, above all else Christ haters?

Another New Anti-R2K Hymn

To The Tune Of, “I Heard The Bells On Christmas Day.”

I heard the calls each passing day
For a heterodox thing called R2K
So rare a treat to embrace defeat
For peace for the Church and good will to gays

They thought now as a new era had come
“Thank God we’re done with Christendom”
Now raised their voice, and did rejoice
For peace for the Church, and good will to gays

Still niggling, wiggling in my mind
Dualism’s hold now on mankind
A care, a pause, for God’s cause
For truth in the Church, and good will to gays

And with resolve, I raised my head
“There will be no peace for the Church,” I said
“This 2K is weak, and mocks those who seek
Peace for the Church, good will to gays.”

Then shouted louder the Escondido peeps
“We are not dead, nor do we sleep;
We’ll weep and wail, we will not fail
In our Peace for the Church, good will to gays.”

And so now the Church has a choice
Will the Church yet now raise her voice
Or will she sleep, no regard for sheep
For false Peace for the Church, good will for gays

Contentment … A Cure To Coveting

“Thou Shalt Not Covet”

We spent last week looking at the prohibition against coveting. We noted that coveting was to have inordinate (sinful) desires … desires that are not in keeping with God’s revelation. We made a point to teach that God has made us as humans, to be a people with passions, and so it is not the passion itself that is sinful but rather it is the twistedness of the passion that is sinful. We want things that are not ours to be had such as another man’s wife, property, life, position. We cited some examples of coveting in Scripture. We talked about the idea that coveting may very well be the sin behind all sin. We learned together that coveting goes from simple inordinate desire to the next level when the simple sinful inordinate desire becomes a plan to fulfill that sinful desire as engage our reason and will to follow our passion. We considered, in some detail, the relationship between the 1st and 10th commandment. Finally, we spent just a little time talking about cures for coveting, reminding ourselves that the greatest cure for sin is gratitude for the fact that Christ has put to our account His 10th commandment keeping righteousness.

The primary meaning of the tenth commandment is this: Anyone who sets his unwavering desire on his neighbor’s house wife, employees or animals will not be able to keep his hands off. Unwavering desire will give birth to planning premeditation with an intent to strike. Coveting, therefore, lies somewhere between the disposition of desiring something that is not ours to be had and the deed to procure that something. The deed is condemned by the commandments 1-9, but the tenth looks behind those deeds to the passionate heart and to the steps people take to implement the plans. As we have said, coveting is the sin behind the sin. It is the disposition behind the action. It is the root that produces the fruit.

This week we want to look at the “Thou Shalt,” that corresponds to this 10th commandment “Thou Shalt Not.” Remember, we have gone to great lengths to teach that the 10 commandments includes a “Thou Shalt” for every “Thou Shalt not.” And the Thou Shalt for “Thou Shalt Not Covet,” is “Thou Shalt be Content.”

If coveting is the presences of inordinate sinful desires that are followed through on and pursued then contentment is the absence of sinful desire and an ability to find satisfaction and sufficiency in where God has placed us at any given moment. Contentment does not mean that we do not seek to better our situation, or to improve upon our lot, but it does mean that in any given situation in which divine providence has brought us into at any given moment we are able to find a certain tranquility.

Before we get into this sermon much further, I must tell you, that I am not a master at this matter of contentment. When it comes to this matter I see my sin. I am too often anxious about the future. I saw that in myself again with all that happened with Ella’s birth. I too often covet, because of my pride and self-centeredness, a more prominent place and more influence and more possessions. So, if any of you come underneath the conviction of the word, you come underneath the conviction of the word this morning along with me.

Of course contentment, as we shall learn, is not something that one can merely switch on a button in order to achieve. Contentment is something that we learn throughout our Christian life and walk. We wee that in the passage in Philippians that we read this morning.

Phil. 4:10 But I rejoiced in the Lord greatly that now at last your care for me has flourished again; though you surely did care, but you lacked opportunity. 11 Not that I speak in regard to need, for I have learned in whatever state I am, to be content: 12 I know how to be abased, and I know how to abound. Everywhere and in all things I have learned both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need. 13 I can do all things through Christ[b] who strengthens me.

This then brings us to our first point in contentment. Like all Christian virtue, contentment is a learned trait.

Being Redeemed sinful beings we spend our lives, if we are honest with ourselves, seeking to master our lusts so that we control them and they do not control us. This ability to master our lusts is something that is learned over time by God’s grace.

Even the great Apostle, St. Paul, admitted that this contentment was something that he had to learn. And we are given a glimpse into his learning process in II Corinthians

7 And lest I should be exalted above measure by the abundance of the revelations, a thorn in the flesh was given to me, a messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I be exalted above measure. 8 Concerning this thing I pleaded with the Lord three times that it might depart from me. 9 And He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. 10 Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in needs, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ’s sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

We don’t know for sure what Paul’s thorn in the flesh was. Some have humorously quipped that it was his Mother-in-law. Others have more seriously suggested that it was something physical, perhaps vision problems. This could be consistent with his speaking about “his infirmities,” and with other hints that we get in Scripture about his vision problems. With the reference to a “messenger of Satan” some see it as some kind of spiritual turmoil. Whatever it was we know that the Apostle struggled with a lack of contentment concerning it. He coveted relief. And who wouldn’t covet relief? If it was eyesight problems who wouldn’t be discontent over creeping blindness.

And yet we see in this passage that Paul learns to be satisfied with God’s grace. St. Paul speaks that way again to the Philippians. He tells them that “he has learned in whatever state he is in to be content.”

And we remember that St. Paul is saying this, likely in prison, chained to a Roman guard on each side of him.

So, we see here that contentment is a state of mind, arrived at by confidence in the Lord Christ, in which one’s desires are confined to one’s lot whatever it may be at any given time. (1 Tim. 6:6; 2 Cor. 9:8). In this situation in which St. Paul is in we find a man who has found the sufficiency for the situation in Christ. Because of divine grace St. Paul is nonplussed about the his circumstance. He has learned, because of his confidence in God’s providence, to be the master of his situation and circumstances and has learned how to not let his circumstance and situation be his master.

Would that we all would pray God that we would be given this ability. Just imagine how God would be glorified and how our stress levels and anxiety would be reduced.

Scripture even marries the idea of God like character with this ability to be content,

6 Now godliness with contentment is great gain. 7 For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out. 8 And having food and clothing, with these we shall be content. 9 But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and harmful lusts which drown men in destruction and perdition. 10 For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, for which some have strayed from the faith in their greediness, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.

Many saints have made shipwreck of their faith because of their inability to be content.

We see other examples of this contentment in the Apostle’s life.

22 Then the multitude rose up together against them; and the magistrates tore off their clothes and commanded them to be beaten with rods. 23 And when they had laid many stripes on them, they threw them into prison, commanding the jailer to keep them securely. 24 Having received such a charge, he put them into the inner prison and fastened their feet in the stocks.

25 But at midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them.

St. Paul, along with Silas, had learned to not let their circumstances dictate their behavior. Because of God’s grace they were masters of their circumstances and so could sing and pray to God.

And yet having said all this, we are not teaching some kind of fatalistic resignation to what transpires in our lives. We are not teaching, and we do not find in Scripture that our Christian religion is to be some kind of opium that makes us pleased with injustice.

Christianity, is not, even in the doctrine of contentment, intended to make people resigned to being ill used or to work in them a “whatever will be, will be” attitude. Contentment does not say, “be satisfied with wickedness and so work not to advance the Kingdom of God in the face of opposition,” but rather it says that wherever we are in the immediate moment of working to advance God’s Kingdom, we have needs to be content with God’s providence.

God’s providence dictates the immediate moment, but obedience to God’s revealed word dictates our action for the next moment. So we can, at one and the same time, be content with what God has for us in the existential moment while still seeking to improve our situation by God honoring means.

It is a delicate balance but one that we find in Scripture.

For example, We read in Acts 16 where Paul and Silas were unjustly beaten with rods and placed in a filthy prison. And yet they sang and praised God. We know the story of how God released them via a earthquake and their bringing the Gospel to the jailer.

So, early in the account we see their contentment, yet later in the account we see them demanding justice. Their sense of contentment did make them fatalistically resigned to what others had unjustly done to them.

35 And when it was day, the magistrates sent the officers, saying, “Let those men go.”

36 So the keeper of the prison reported these words to Paul, saying, “The magistrates have sent to let you go. Now therefore depart, and go in peace.”

37 But Paul said to them, “They have beaten us openly, uncondemned Romans, and have thrown us into prison. And now do they put us out secretly? No indeed! Let them come themselves and get us out.”

38 And the officers told these words to the magistrates, and they were afraid when they heard that they were Romans. 39 Then they came and pleaded with them and brought them out, and asked them to depart from the city. 40 So they went out of the prison and entered the house of Lydia; and when they had seen the brethren, they encouraged them and departed.

So, being content, did not mean for St. Paul, not holding people accountable for their wicked actions. It did not mean not insisting on justice. Their Christian contentment was not a opium for the people. Christian contentment is not the same as pagan stoicism. The Christian at one and the same time can be content, thus putting off the vices of greed, avarice, envy, anxiety, and covetousness while at the same time pursuing the virtue of God’s justice, and contending for the overthrow of those Kingdoms that oppose God’s Kingdom. They can at the same time be content without being passive, mealy mouthed, and ineffective.

Contentment has the ability to navigate to a place where one can say that one is not mastered by a difficult circumstance that one might find oneself in. This is what St. Paul is saying in vs. 11-12,

12 I know how to be abased, and I know how to abound. Everywhere and in all things I have learned both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need. 13 I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.

The gift of contentment had him managing the highs and lows, the lack and surfeit of life. Whether in abundance or in lack the Apostle was content w/ God’s sufficiency.

Our instinct is to think that the virtue of contentment is only difficult in times of lack. Can we be content when we are set aside and even mocked, or will we become bitter and plot sinful vengeance? Can we be content when we our shoved aside and insulted while the wicked flex their influence and authority without building sinful resentment. Contentment is difficult during times of lack and during times of being set aside.

But St. Paul gives some indication that contentment is something that is needed also in times of abundance. Are we independent and satisfied with God and His providence when our circumstances are positive or abundant or do we suddenly find ourselves at that point forgetting God and thinking that “it is by our hand we have gained this position?”

St. Paul says it is the gift of contentment that gives him ballast against poverty and insult but also against being swept away by abundance and surfeit into abandoning a right estimation of God’s providence.

We should be content in all things and remember our Proverbs,

8 Remove falsehood and lies far from me;
Give me neither poverty nor riches—
Feed me with the food allotted to me;
9 Lest I be full and deny You,
And say, “Who is the Lord?”
Or lest I be poor and steal,
And profane the name of my God.

Tips to Contentment

1.) Mindful of and confident in God’s providential ordering of all things (Ps. 96:1, 2; 145),

2.) Finding our satisfaction in Christ and the greatness of the divine promises (2 Pet. 1:4),

Whatever may come our way in terms of everyday life, nothing can separate us from the Love of God in Christ. If we keep our minds saturated in that truth, discontentment and covetousness will be far harder to get a grip on us.

3.) The ability to practice gratitude.

No matter how difficult matters are, we must remind ourselves of the many ways that God has blessed us.

4.) A knowledge and confidence that God will one day right all wrongs

II Thess. 1:6 since it is a righteous thing with God to repay with tribulation those who trouble you, 7 and to give you who are troubled rest with us when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with His mighty angels, 8 in flaming fire taking vengeance on those who do not know God, and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.

5.) Reminding ourselves that we are not deserving of any that we think we are deserving of.

Peeking At Romney’s Acceptance Speech

I have come to the point in life where I believe those elected as President are merely empty suits doing the bidding of the international banking interest that operates behind the scenes pulling the strings of policy that emanates from every White House administration. As such, I have for some time not really taken these elections seriously since I believe the fix is in no matter which major party candidate wins.

If people want to understand the reasoning behind this conviction I would encourage them to consider the truth in this video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jAdu0N1-tvU&feature=related

Still, having admitted that, I want to take a peek at just a few excerpts from Mitt Romney’s acceptance speech.

“We are a nation of immigrants.”

And again later,

“When every new wave of immigrants looked up and saw the Statue of Liberty, or knelt down and kissed the shores of freedom just ninety miles from Castro’s tyranny, these new Americans surely had many questions.”

The is the official myth that Americans have been propagandized into believing since the Immigration Act of 1965. This unofficial American creed supports both the ridiculous assertion that “diversity is our strength,” and the attempt to officially codify multiculturalism as the basis of our social order.

First of all, the statement is just not true. Despite thirty-plus years of mass immigration set off by the Immigration Reform Act of 1965 — an act dedicated to overturning the White, Anglo, Saxon, and marginally Christian essence of the American nation — the vast majority of Americans are still American-born children of American-born parents. The idea that “we are a nation of immigrants” is also historically false as scores of millions of Americans are neither immigrants nor had parents who were immigrants.

Also the idea that, “we are a nation of immigrants” flounders on the reality that a nation of immigrants would not and could not be a nation. Were we literally a nation of immigrants we would be a Hodge-Podge of heterogeneous peoples having nothing in common except living in the same geographic area. A nation of immigrants would mean a nation with nothing to unify the varied religions, ethnicity, and people group history of the multitudinous immigrant groupings inhabiting the nation. Of course, such a irregularity of a nation of immigrants, would give us not a nation, but a anti-nation. Such a anti-nation would be characterized by balkanization, tensions, and distrust between the various immigrant groups.

This is not to deny that immigration has been important to our country. It has. However, originally most of that immigration came from people groups that were already homogenous in significant ways with the host culture they would eventually be assimilated with. However, the kind of immigration that we have been looking at since 1965 promises to overthrow the essentially British culture and largely Christian underpinnings that have informed this nation. (See David Hackett Fisher’s “Albion’s Seed.”) What the mantra of “we are a nation of immigrants” is effectuating now is the work on the part of the State to dissolve the historic faith and culture by electing a new people. It shouldn’t be surprising that those who identify with the historic faith and culture do not like hearing the multicultural mantra that “we are a nation of immigrants.”

With that statement, Romney might also be signaling not only an appeal to the Hispanic vote that Republicans believe they so desperately need, but it also may be communicating that a President Romney would support some kind of amnesty program for the current 15 million illegal aliens currently present in these united States. That the Republican establishment desperately desires some kind of amnesty program is a certainty.

Elsewhere in his acceptance speech Romney said,

“I wish President Obama had succeeded because I want America to succeed.”

I am fairly sure that this was placed in the text in order to counter Rush Limbaugh’s now famous statement, spoken shortly after Obama’s inauguration, “I hope he (Obama) fails.”

Limbaugh took incredible heat for that statement. I think we can agree with both Limbaugh and Romney here. Because Obama is a Marxist it was necessary for any Patriot to hope he failed. Who would want a Marxist leader to succeed in his plan to implement Marxism? We could also say that we wished Obama had succeeded in the sense that it would have been nice if his policies had been a success, even though everyone knew it advance that Marxism never succeeds except for the elite ruling class.

Romney went on speaking of his wife, Ann,

“I knew that her job as a mom was harder than mine. And I knew without question, that her job as a mom was a lot more important than mine.”

This is a bone thrown to counter the Democrat accusation that Republicans are waging war on women. However, it is a falsity. A Mom’s job is not more important than a Dad’s job, just as a Dad’s job is not more important than a Mom’s job.

Romney went on and on supporting the idea of Feminism. He said he chose a female as his Lt. Governor. He said he chose a female chief of staff. He talked about all the female Republican governors. God speaks in Scripture that ruling women are a sign of being cursed (Isaiah 3:12).

Elsewhere Romney soft-pedaled his Mormonism,

“We were Mormons and growing up in Michigan; that might have seemed unusual or out of place but I really don’t remember it that way. My friends cared more about what sports teams we followed than what church we went to.”

This is Romney’s way of saying that his Mormonism is nothing to be concerned about by Evangelicals and Catholics. Clarity requires me to insist that attending a Mormon Church is not the same as attending a Christian Church since Mormonism is a different religion.

Romney revealed what may very likely become a theme in the campaign,

T”he President hasn’t disappointed you because he wanted to. The President has disappointed America because he hasn’t led America in the right direction. He took office without the basic qualification that most Americans have and one that was essential to his task. He had almost no experience working in a business. Jobs to him are about government.”

This is the whole, “Obama is a nice guy but he was inexperienced and ill equipped to do the job as President” routine. I don’t buy that Obama is a nice guy. I don’t consider Marxists of any stripe in any position to be nice people. Obama has already revealed his fangs in the campaign by approving the add that connected Romney’s work at Bain Capital with the death of a man’s wife. Obama is more than incompetent. Obama is malevolent.

Now, I believe Romney to be every bit as malevolent but I believe he believes that he can’t win by attacking Obama as a socialist.

Romney said,

“And it means that we must rein in the skyrocketing cost of healthcare by repealing and replacing Obamacare.”

I’m all for repealing Obama-care. I get nervous when I hear Romney (the author of socialist Romney-care in Massachusetts) talks about replacing Obama-care. Replacing with what? A better “more efficient” socialist health care?

Finally we look at Romney saying,

“Every American is less secure today because he has failed to slow Iran’s nuclear threat.

I get nervous at the thought of Romney and saber rattling with Iran. Why would I want to vote for someone who may very well get us even further in the slough of the Middle East?

Caleb’s Baptism — Those Who Are Saved (Heidelberg Catechism Q. 20)

Question 20. Are all men then, as they perished in Adam, saved by Christ?

Answer: No; only those who are in-grafted into him, and, receive all his benefits, by a true faith.

Let’s briefly remind ourselves of the flow of the catechism’s flow of thought. In the last few questions and answers the catechism has been teaching us the character qualities and attributes that are required of any mediator who would rescue us from God’s just wrath and our sins. They have taught us that the Lord Jesus Christ is the only one who has these character qualities and attributes thus teaching us that there is no salvation in any other name but that of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Now, the Catechizers ask, in question 20, the very sensible question’ “Whether all men are saved by Christ.” It is sensible because it might be reasonable to assume that as all perished in Adam, so all would be saved by Christ. But the answer they give, following Scripture, is that relief from perishing is only had by those who have a true faith in Christ.

Notice several obvious matters here.

1.) The question presumes that all men are lost, or if you prefer, are in the way of perishing. If the descendants of Adam are to be released from the state of perishing that they are born under then they must have a true faith. If they do not have a true faith in Jesus Christ they will eternally perish.

That man outside of Christ is in the way of perishing is everywhere assumed by Scripture. Here are just a few verses,

John 3:16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

John 3:18 He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.

John 3:36 He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him.

Notice in all those verses from John 3 that the presupposition of Scripture regarding man without Christ is that he is in the way of perishing, underneath the penalty of God’s just wrath. As we have noted earlier, the reason that man without Christ, is in the way of perishing, is that man without Christ has a sin nature and consequently sins and so is in high rebellion to God.

2.) The catechism negates any notion of Universalism. Universalism is the doctrine that teaches that all men through all time will go to heaven no matter their relation to Jesus Christ while on earth. To the contrary the catechism, following Scripture, teaches that not all men are saved. Jesus speaking could say,

Matthew 25:45 Then He will answer them, saying, ‘Assuredly, I say to you, inasmuch as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me.’ 46 And these will go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”

Of course the corollary of this denial of Universalism is the truth that God does not love everybody. If God loved everybody, with redemptive love, then everyone would be saved. However, as it is the case that not all people are saved, this means that God does not and did not love, with a redemptive love, those who are not saved and who are not in-grafted into Christ.

Now, being postmillennialists we believe that a vast majority of mankind will be saved because we believe Scripture when in Revelation John sees in heaven

Revelation 7:9 … a great multitude which no one could number, of all nations, tribes, peoples, and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, with palm branches in their hands, 10 and crying out with a loud voice, saying, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!”

That great multitude is in keeping with God’s promise to Abraham that his descendants would be as the stars in the sky and the sand on the seashore. So, we assert, with the catechism and with Scripture, that not all men will be saved, but also that the number of men that will be saved will testify to the greatness of God’s grace to save and the vast reach of God’s saving power in Christ.

3.) As the catechism, following Scripture, negates Universalism, that means by necessity it teaches particularism. This is only to say that the Scripture teaches that God saves only who He intends to save. God is particular in His choosing. All people who believe that there are those who go to Hell believe that there is a particularity in God’s grace. The difference is that some locate the reason for that particularity in the individual human’s sovereign choice while others locate the reason for the particularity that Scripture teaches in God’s sovereign choice. Biblical Christians, believing in God’s exhaustive sovereignty, follow the Scripture when it insists that God is the reason that Universalism isn’t true and God is the one who makes the decision as to who and who will not be saved (particularism). Either man is sovereign over salvation or God is. We see this particularism in action in Acts,

16:13 And on the Sabbath day we went out of the city to the riverside, where prayer was customarily made; and we sat down and spoke to the women who met there. 14 Now a certain woman named Lydia heard us. She was a seller of purple from the city of Thyatira, who worshiped God. The Lord opened her heart to heed the things spoken by Paul.

God opened Lydia’s heart while not opening the hearts of the other women who met there.

This particularity of God’s was even recognized by the Lord Jesus Christ,

25 At that time Jesus answered and said, “I thank You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hidden these things from the wise and prudent and have revealed them to babes. 26 Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in Your sight. 27 All things have been delivered to Me by My Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father. Nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and the one to whom the Son wills to reveal Him.

So, Universalism is not true. Not all men will be saved. And, those who will be saved are saved by God’s sovereign Particularism. Finally, God’s particularism is so vast that no man can number all those God intends to save via His sovereign particular choice.

4.) Heidelberg question 20 puts an end to the old liberal canard of “the Fatherhood of God over all men” and the “Brotherhood of all men under God.” Since Universalism isn’t true therefore it follows that God is not the Father of all men. God is nothing but an avenging Judge to those outside of Christ. The idea of the God’s Fatherhood of all men and so the Brotherhood of all men has often been used as a anti-Christ liberal ploy to force Christians to embrace people of other faiths as those who are our Brothers because God is the Father of us all. The nonsense of this idea has even made it into some of our hymnody.

Let there be peace on earth,
And let it begin with me.
Let there be peace on earth
The peace that was meant to be.
With God as our father
We are family.
Let us walk with each other
In perfect harmony.

When we embrace the idea of God’s universal Fatherhood and man’s universal Brotherhood the temptation for us is to compromise our Christian beliefs in order that we can all get along with all our putative Brother’s on the earth. It is precisely because God is not the Father of all, redemptively speaking, that we must not yield our beliefs to the siren song of a compromise that would promise a compromised peace. Also, such thinking of the Fatherhood of God over all and the Brotherhood of all cuts the heart out of evangelism. If we are all Brothers then what is the need to evangelize? In point of fact if God is Father of all and we are all Brothers than it would be insensitive and insulting to others to suggest that their faiths are sub-optimal by seeking to evangelize them.

5.) Notice the language about being in-grafted Caleb. The phrase, “only those who are in-grafted into Christ,” linguistically supports God’s sovereignty. We are passive until we are in-grafted. God does all the in-grafting and only after we are in-grafted do we have a true faith. This is just to say that in salvation God does all the saving and we only do our required all (repentance, faith, obedience) after God has done all, but God having done all we always respond by working out our salvation with fear and trembling. God initiates and we respond and when God initiates with saving intent the elect never fail to respond.

The language of grafting communicates the idea of being taken out of one place and put into another. In the way that the language is used here it communicates being taken out of our Covenant head Adam where there is nothing but death and being placed in Christ where there is abundant life. To be in-grated into Christ is to be united with Christ. Christ is our covenant head and represents us before the Father so that the Father has the disposition towards us that He has towards His Son. Further to be in-grafted into Christ means to be given the Holy Spirit so that we increasingly become what we have been freely declared to because we are in-grafted into Christ. Romans 11 speaks a little regarding this being grafted into Christ,

Rom.11:17 And if some of the branches be broken off, and thou, being a wild olive tree, wert graffed in among them, and with them partakest of the root and fatness of the olive tree; Rom.11:19 Thou wilt say then, The branches were broken off, that I might be graffed in. Rom.11:20 Well; because of unbelief they were broken off, and thou standest by faith. Be not highminded, but fear:

Being in-grafted into Christ we thus begin to desire what Christ desires, and we begin to conform to the likeness of Christ. In being in-grafted into Christ we receive the life of Christ and are sustained by that life, and over the course of time the graft begins to take on the characteristics of divine olive tree.

6.) The catechism speaks of receiving all of Christ’s benefits. The consequence of being in-grafted into Christ is that we receive all the spiritual blessings of Christ. This means that we have peace with God, which means not only the cessation of God’s just hostility towards us but also all the blessings that come by being favored of God. We no longer have reason to cower in fear before God. Receiving all Christ’s benefits means we no longer have to live with the guilt of sin and the misery of being without God and without hope. Receiving all Christ’s benefits means a boldness and confidence coming from knowing that the Sovereign God of the whole universe is ordaining all that comes into our lives for His advance and our profit. Receiving all Christ’s benefits means the end of temporal and earthly fear, for if God be for us, who or what can be against us? Receiving all Christ’s benefits means a profound sense of security and comfort because I know that I am not my own but belong to my faithful savior Jesus Christ. There are so many other benefits we could speak of that we receive. Death is no longer an enemy to us because we have the benefit of knowing to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. We are increasingly given the ability to think God’s thoughts after him so that we confound God’s enemies. We are given the benefit of belonging to Christ’s body the Church so that we have precious fellowship with the Saints of God. We know that our Elder Brother, the Lord Christ, continues to plead our cause before the Father. We know that we shall finish our race here well because God who won us is able to keep us until the very end. We are given the benefit of having a continued affection for our High Captain the Lord Christ and a desire to defend His honor at every turn.

As we move through the catechism we will see many of these benefits up close in more detail.

The fact that we receive all Christ’s benefits in light of being united to Christ is seen in Ephesians,

3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ,

7.) Answer 20 ends by noting the necessity of true faith. The idea that we must have a “true faith” implies that such a thing as false faith exists. We will talk more about that in the next question and answer that provides a biblical definition of faith. Suffice it to say here that not all professions of faith qualify as true faith.

I would like to end though by observing that a true faith in Christ can not be held apart from knowing the true Christ. I only bring this up because there are those who say that people can be saved by Christ even though they have never heard of him. These people will argue that if people who have never heard of Christ will just follow the good that they know then they will be saved by Christ. Some will even contend that well intentioned practitioners of other gods will have their well intentioned but misguided worship accepted as worship of Christ precisely because they were well intentioned. C. S. Lewis makes such a argument in his novel, “The Last Battle.” Such types of doctrine (and there are many nuances to this teaching I have not brought forth here) are nowhere found in Scripture. Only those who have had Christ placarded before them and so have embraced Christ in faith, in this life, will have the Lord Christ as their mediator. Scripture not only looks for a general faith in a known Christ but it also expects a intimate faith in a known Christ. We must not only believe in the Son but we must pay Him homage,

Ps.2:12 Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and ye perish from the way, when his wrath is kindled but a little. Blessed are all they that put their trust in him.

If there are exceptions to the necessity to have faith in a known Lord Jesus Christ those exceptions would be the unborn, the newly born, and the mentally impaired. In such cases it is best for us to simply say, “Will not the Lord of all the earth do right,” though we can have complete confidence of their salvation if they were Baptized members of the covenant community.

Scripture clearly teaches that eternal life is pinned upon knowing the Christ of Scripture,

John 17:3 And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.

The fact that Jesus Christ requires the knowledge of Himself along with the Father, for eternal life, is a strong testimony to the deity of Jesus Christ.

Now couple that scripture with Jesus’ statement,

John 14:6 Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.

And you have the clear teaching that one can not be saved (have fellowship with the Father) except by a true faith in a known Christ.

Don’t let your faith be shipwrecked by those who insist on Universalism by appealing to a few texts in Scripture not properly read against God’s complete revelation.

I sign off by citing a few more Scripture that convey how important faith in Christ is,

Mark 16:16 He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned.

John 1:12 But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name:

Rom.3:22 Even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe: for there is no difference:

Heb.4:2 For unto us was the gospel preached, as well as unto them: but the word preached did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard it. Heb.4:3 For we which have believed do enter into rest, as he said, As I have sworn in my wrath, if they shall enter into my rest: although the works were finished from the foundation of the world.

Heb.10:39 But we are not of them who draw back unto perdition; but of them that believe to the saving of the soul.

Heb.11:6 But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.