Getting the Gospel Right
R. C. Sproul
Grand Rapids, Baker, 1999.
How can we know if a doctrine or issue is worth splitting a church or denomination over? R.C. Sproul claims to address this very issue, by expounding the essentials of the gospel in which evangelicals are to find unity.
The context of Sproul’s work is the second public statement of ‘Evangelicals and Catholics Together’, often referred to as ECT II ECT II was a self-conscious attempt to clarify the original ECT statement, which had received a mixed response.
The marks of the true church
Sproul starts his book by defining the Reformation understanding of the church. I was left with some doubts in this section of the book. Sproul believes the three marks that define the true visible church are the preaching of the gospel, the administration of the sacraments, and church discipline. This, he claims, is the ‘historic Protestant’ position. Such a conclusion is questionable given that the two foundational Protestant reformers—Martin Luther and John Calvin—both defined the visible church with only two marks, gospel word and sacrament. Indeed, both Luther and Calvin believed that one could compress these into one mark, the gospel word (Jn 10:16). This was because they both believed the sacraments to be another form of the gospel word. To put it simply, baptism and the Lord’s Supper were illustrations of the gospel. Church discipline was not to be a mark of the church, for it was not of the essence, but the well-being, of the visible church.
Sproul also argues that one mark of the visible church, the gospel word, must include justification by ‘faith alone’. Without this, there can be no true visible church. But such a position leads to a problem. If ‘faith alone’ defines the visible church, then there was no true church before Martin Luther, for he was the first to teach ‘faith alone’ since New Testament times (as is generally recognised by scholars). Certainly theologians before Luther, like John Chrysostom and Thomas Aquinas, used the words ‘faith alone’ in their writings, but what they meant by this phrase was something very different from what Lutherpropounded. To say that ‘faith alone’ defines the visible church throughout history would also exclude great Christians like St. Augustine.
The sixteenth-century Anglican Richard Hooker paved the way for a solution to this problem. Hooker argued that the foundation of the visible church is the belief that Christ alone is saviour (Lk 2:11; 1 Cor 1:13; 1 Tim 1:15). He then argued that ‘faith alone’ is used to guard the foundational ‘Christ alone’ (Gal 5:2). In short, ‘faith alone’ is a logical implication of ‘Christ alone’, but is not itself a foundational statement. Hooker believed that there had been many Christians throughout the years who held to ‘Christ alone’, but not necessarily ‘faith alone’ (Augustine, for example). Many people before Luther lived in ignorance of such teaching and had no way of discovering it for themselves, not least because they would not have had access to the Scriptures in the common tongue. Furthermore, people could hold to ‘Christ alone’ and not ‘faith alone’ without it dawning on them there was a contradiction. A person is not justified by their clear thinking, but by faith in Christ. It took Luther much thinking before this dawned on him.
To see ‘Christ alone’ as the foundational doctrine on which the visible church is defined, allows one to hold that there was a visible church before Luther. It also allows one to understand the important place of ‘faith alone’ now that it has come to light in the Reformation. Where ‘faith alone’ is discarded, the sufficiency of Christ’s work is placed in jeopardy.
Evangelicals and Catholics
Having dealt with the preliminary issues, Sproul launches into the central thesis of the book. Sproul first criticizes ECT II He argues that the statement does not at all bring Roman Catholics and Evangelicals together, but that it rather ignores the crucial differences between the two camps. Moreover, Sproul believes that ECT II will do the evangelical community a disservice, because it will divide how evangelicals believe they ought to view Rome.
Sproul is also constructive. He seeks to expound what he believes are the gospel essentials or non-negotiables. He does this by using the evangelical statement The Gospel of Jesus Christ: An Evangelical Celebration (GJC). GJC was the work of a group of evangelicals made up of some who opposed ECT II, and some who actually signed ECT II
First let us focus on the criticisms of ECT II Sproul succeeds, in my mind, in showing that ECT II actually bypasses the real issues over which Roman Catholics and Evangelicals disagree. He rightly and convincingly argues that the major difference is to be found in the doctrine of justification by faith alone, in particular what evangelicals mean by ‘faith alone’. It is this that Roman Catholics deny.
What do evangelicals mean by ‘faith alone’? They do not mean that Christians are not to live lives full of good works! Rather the statement shows Christians how they should rightly view their good works. Luther’s complaint against Rome was that she denied that a believer is declared not guilty (or justified) before God on the basis of Christ’s work and nothing else. That is, the righteousness that makes one right before God is extrinsic (because it is Christ’s), and not intrinsic to the believer. This is the Reformation doctrine of salvation by ‘Christ alone’.
The doctrine of ‘faith alone’, rightly understood, preserves ‘Christ alone’. It means that the way a believer receives the gift of Christ’s extrinsic righteousness is by faith (or trust) alone in Christ alone. Hence all works in the Christian life are the outcome but not the cause of justification. Furthermore, faith cannot be seen as a meritorious work, because it simply receives the extrinsic righteousness of Christ as the entire basis of one being declared not guilty (or justified) by God.
Martin Luther saw rightly that the righteousness which justifies has to be extrinsic (or in his words ‘alien’) to the believer, to preserve ‘Christ alone’. If the righteousness that justifies ceases to be alien, the sufficiency of Christ’s work is lost. Official Roman Catholic doctrine does just that. According to classic Roman Catholic teaching, the righteousness that makes one right before God is intrinsic to the believer—it is the believer’s own righteousness. It is true, Roman Catholics would say, that their own internal righteousness is wholly a work of God, and so officially Roman Catholics adhere to ‘grace alone’. But by making the righteousness by which we are right before God internal to the believer, the basis of justification (and salvation) has shifted from Christ alone to the believer. Thus Christ’s all-sufficient work on the cross is denied. Hence the divide between Roman Catholics and Evangelicals is over no small issue!
ECT II does use the words ‘faith alone’, and it was these two words that the evangelical signatories of ECT II claimed was the major breakthrough. But Sproul argues cogently that in context the ECT II words ‘faith alone’ have little bearing on what classical evangelicalism means by ‘faith alone’. Here is where Sproul is at his best in the book.
So what is essential?
In the second half of the book, Sproul competently expounds the GJC statement, and supplements it with classic evangelical doctrine. Yet I remained a little disappointed by this section of the book for two reasons.
Firstly, what I felt was lacking was a discussion of the notion of essentials in the Christian faith, in particular what makes a truth essential. Sproul elucidates all sorts of theological truths, but one is not shown how to judge whether these truths are necessary.
For example, the GJC statement is somewhat vague about the supreme authority of the Bible, or what the Reformers called ‘Scripture alone’. Of course one can be saved without adhering to the doctrine of ‘Scripture alone’. So from this perspective ‘Scripture alone’ is not essential. But if Christians do not hold to ‘Scripture alone’, it puts the health of their Christian lives at risk. From this perspective it is essential. The book could have been more useful if there had been a discussion of what are the essentials of belief for salvation, and what are the essentials of belief for Christian growth and maturity, and if indeed this is a wise and useful distinction.
A great peril for the evangelical is not so much believing something patently wrong, but not giving a truth its correct emphasis. All sorts of havoc can be wrought when right and good inessentials become essential and vice versa. This leads me to the second disappointment.
Where is the end?
The evangelical statement GJC purportedly expounds the gospel as evangelicals believe it. Its theses are indeed true, and on some points helpful. But what is extraordinary was what GJC left out. That is, none of the 18 theses in GJC speak of the ‘last things’ (or eschatology). Paul certainly believed that the future judgement was a part of his gospel message. One only has to look at Paul’s sermon to the Athenians in Acts 17, or his exposition of the gospel in Romans 2, to see his emphasis on the ‘last things’, particularly the final judgement.
Much confusion between Roman Catholics and Evangelicals would be eliminated if eschatology were included in discussion about the gospel. This is because justification concerns the verdict that God will pronounce upon believers on the final day. Roman Catholicism understands justification as a process that ends on the last day, whereas evangelicalism understands it is a present event that anticipates the last day. That is, for the evangelical, justification is the present anticipation of God’s positive verdict on judgement day. By placing justification in its correct context both parties would be able to see their differences in a clearer light and avoid potential confusion.
Such neglect of the last things in the gospel is one of the classic problems of polemics. The issues of controversy become so debated that other crucial doctrines are neglected, and hence doctrinal formulations are not commensurate with the biblical balance.
Sproul rightly and clearly shows the theological faultline in ECT II But he does not leave the reader with an approach to think about essential doctrines.
