Assurance of Salvation with R. C. Sproul, “Salvation Guaranteed” (part 1), 1

The Folly of Human Lying and the Need for Truth

When I was a little boy two or three years ago, I remember that I lived in a world of enchantment and fascination, particularly in grade school. And one of the things that I enjoyed most about attending grade school in the little school where we lived was that our teachers were always careful to decorate the walls and the bulletin boards with ornaments and pictures that were relevant to whatever season we were going through during the school year.

You know, at Easter time, they would have cutouts of Easter bunnies and eggs and that sort of thing. And during Thanksgiving and November, there'd be turkeys and Indians and pilgrims. And at Christmas, all kinds of Christmas decorations.

But my favorite time in the grade school decor was during the month of February, because that was the month not only of Valentine's Day and of my birthday, but it was the time that we honored two of the great presidents of American history, Abraham Lincoln and George Washington.

And I remember as a small boy being mesmerized by the legends that were told about these great men. And I wondered how it was possible that George Washington could have enough strength to take a silver dollar and throw it all the way across the Potomac River.

And since I've grown up and become an adult, I don't believe that anymore, nor do I really believe to this day that he ever stood up in the front of a boat in the dead of winter being the only general in history to stand in the front of a rowboat with his hand in his coat while he was getting his portrait painted in the middle of a war.

But the story, of course, that we heard most often when I was a youngster about George Washington was a story with a moral. And you've all heard that story where the allegation goes that when he was a boy, he chopped down a cherry tree with his little hatchet, and when his father came home and saw his prized cherry tree cut down and destroyed, he asked the question, who cut down this cherry tree?

And George Washington stepped forward and said, Father, I cannot tell a lie. I cut down the cherry tree. Do you remember that anecdote? Every American learns that story. Well, ladies and gentlemen, I call that a legend, where for whatever moral value it has to us, at the very heart of that story is a fundamental distortion of truth.

There is something false about that anecdote. And if you listen carefully to the words of George Washington, I think you will perceive immediately what the error is. Little George Washington said, I cannot tell a lie.

Beloved, there are lots of things that George Washington couldn't do, but one of those things that he couldn't do was not tell a lie. George Washington is a fallen, was a fallen human being. And one thing that every fallen human being is eminently capable of doing is telling a lie.

The Scriptures tell us, in fact, that all men are liars. It's not the same thing as saying that all men lie every time they open their mouths. But lying is one of those shortcomings, one of those sins that every one of us has committed during our lifetime.

I mean, has there ever been a time that you can recall that you told a lie? And if you answer that question by saying no, then let me suggest that you've just done your first one. No, at least your second one.

Because we have all lied at some point and another. Now, as I grew up and didn't think a whole lot more about Abraham Lincoln and George Washington, was introduced to the magic realm of television, and I began to see all of the mystery dramas that were set forth in TV and saw Perry Mason and other similar dramas like that.

And as I grew up, we saw a familiar motif of crime and punishment, where the television camera would take us into the courtroom, if not to Judge Wapner, to somebody else. And as the witnesses were sworn in, the witness box for their testimony, the bailiff or whoever it is in the courtroom would step forward, and he would hold out a Bible.

And he would ask the witness to put his hand upon the Bible, his left hand on the Bible, and raise his right hand. And you know how the words go. Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help me God.

And the person would say, I do. Now, from a sociological perspective, maybe a Martian coming to our planet and looking at the customs of our culture might think that this is a strange procedure indeed.

But why do we find it necessary to begin courtroom proceedings where the witnesses take a solemn vow, a sacred oath to tell the truth? Well, it's obvious, isn't it, that in court trials it's the truth that people are seeking to discern.

It is the truth that matters the most in a court situation. And the reason why we circumspect the or ascribe the drama of the proceedings of the courtroom is that we want to do everything humanly possible to ensure that the testimony of the witnesses is true.

And so we invoke the sanctity of the oath. We ask a person, ladies and gentlemen, to make a promise before God, the breaking of which promise we understand is punishable by law in the event of perjury.

Have you ever stopped to wonder how important promises are to your life? So much of our human relationships depend on trust. And when I get to know you as a friend or if I want to marry a woman and take her as my wife and she takes me as my husband and we commit ourselves to each other, we are entering into a personal relationship where trust is everything.

And nothing breaks trust faster than when we play loose with the truth. And everybody in this room, everyone who is hearing my voice right now, knows what it means to have been lied to. Now the question is, is there anyone who cannot tell a lie?

The Bible as the Book of Truth and the Book of Hebrews

The very foundation of the Christian faith is based on truth, on promises, and on vows that are certified by one who cannot tell a lie. Now I've often said that if I were cast into prison and was only allowed to have one book at my disposal while I was incarcerated, the book that I would obviously request would be the Bible.

I could spend the rest of my life in solitary confinement studying with all of my might and all of my mind that particular book, and I wouldn't begin to exhaust the depths and the riches that are in that.

But if my requests were made even more narrow and I were told that I could not have the whole Bible but only one book of the Bible, I've always said that the one book of the Bible I'd want would be the book of Hebrews, because in a sense it's a synopsis of the whole Bible.

All of the Old Testament message is contained in summary in the book of Hebrews, plus its New Testament fulfillment of it. Some people who know me and know my teaching might be surprised by that. They say, Sproul, you're always speaking out of the book of Romans.

Wouldn't you want the book of Romans in the jail with you? I say, no, I already know the book of Romans. It's in my head. You know, I need to have the text of Hebrews in front of me. But if my options were even more narrowly restricted and I could only have one chapter of the Bible as I languished in prison, that chapter would be the fifteenth chapter of the book of Genesis.

God’s Promise to Abram in Genesis 15

Now, when I've said that in the past, people have looked at me somewhat askance and say, what in the world is so great about the fifteenth chapter of Genesis that you would want that if that were the only chapter that you could have?

Well, to answer that question, I'd like to direct your attention to a brief summary of Genesis 15, and let me begin by reading the opening portion of it. Genesis 15 begins with these words,. After these things the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision, saying, Do not fear, Abram.

I am a shield to you, and your reward shall be very great. Now, before I press beyond that, let's just do a moment's worth of recapitulation. You remember that Abraham, as a historical person, is introduced by way of his ancestors and so on at the end of the eleventh chapter of the book of Genesis.

And then chapter 12 of Genesis records for us the circumstances of Abraham's call, where God came to Abram in a pagan nation in Mesopotamia, in Ur of the Chaldeans, when Abraham was already an old man.

And God spoke to him and uttered a command from heaven, saying, Abraham, get up and go forth from your country, from your relatives, from your father's house, and go to a land which I will show you, and I will make you a great nation, and I will bless you, and I will make your name great, so that you will be a blessing, and I will bless those who bless you, and the ones who curse you I will curse.

And in you, Abraham, all of the families of the earth shall be blessed. But first, Abraham, get up and get out of here. Do you know how frightening it would have been for somebody frail in age to leave at a moment's notice the environment that was completely familiar to him?

Leave your family, leave your friends, leave your doctor, leave your dentist, leave your religious chiefs, or whatever, and get out of here and go to a land that I will show you, and the land that God was asking him to visit was one thousand miles away.

God didn't give him an airplane ticket so that in just a few hours he would arrive at his destination. This is in the ancient world where journey even of young and strong people was a perilous matter.

God said, you do that, Abraham, and I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and I will make sure that everyone who blesses you, I will bless them, and anyone that curses you, I will curse them.

And in you, Abraham, will all of the nations of the world be blessed. Centuries and centuries ago, this message was given to a semi-nomadic pagan, and if it hadn't taken place, we wouldn't be standing here today in the twentieth century ruminating about it.

And the Scriptures tell us that Abraham did exactly as he was commanded, and he got up and he left, and he journeyed to the land of Canaan. And after some adventures and misadventures along the way, then God came to him and said, Abraham, don't be afraid.

I am a shield to you, and I am your reward, and your reward shall be great. And if ever Abraham were a bit cynical in his old age, he was at this point, for he responded to God by saying, oh, Lord God, what will you give me since I am childless, and my heir, the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?

Now, where's the cynicism implied in this question? It's like the old man says, look, God, I have journeyed. I did everything that you said. You promised that I was going to be the father of a great nation, that I was going to be a blessing to everybody, and that all the nations of the world were going to be blessed.

And now you come to me and you say to me that you are going to give me a great reward. What great reward? Let's pause for a second. If we reconstruct the life of Abraham and his circumstances, I don't think it would be much of an exaggeration to say that Abraham was one of the wealthiest men of the ancient world.

Scholars have looked at the numerous examples of his private wealth in terms of his herds, his camels, and all of the rest, and they say that this indicates extraordinary wealth of somebody at that time and at that place in antiquity.

And it's like this question, what do you give the man who has everything? And Abraham's asking, you're going to give me a reward? It's a little late, God. What are you going to give me that I don't already have?

Or to say it another way, as some people say as they get older in this world today, what do I have to look forward to? Because, no matter what you give me, God, the greatest ache and pain in my soul is that with all the material goods your providence has bestowed upon me, I have no children.

My wife is barren. We're childless. I can't take it with me, and I can't leave it to my family. My heir is Eliezer of Damascus, a servant who lives in my house. So, what reward are you going to give me?

Then, behold, the word of the Lord came to him, saying, This man shall not be your heir, but one who shall come forth from your own body, he shall be your heir. Abraham, you have it wrong. Your inheritance is not going to your hired hands.

Your inheritance, Abraham, is going to your son, somebody who's going to come forth from your own body, flesh of your flesh, bone of your bone, blood of your blood. Then we read that God took him outside.

He said, Abraham, look toward the heavens. Count the stars, if you are able to count them. Have you ever been outside on a dark summer night that was clear, not where it was hazy and smoggy? Or if you've ever been to Palestine, one of the most striking dimensions of the geography and of the situation there in Palestine is the clarity of the atmosphere.

And on a night which is almost always a clear night in the desert in Palestine, you look up and really you see a star-spangled heaven. The Milky Way, if you can see the Milky Way from there, I don't know, but it would look like almost a solid sheet of white.

Myriads upon myriads of stars are visible to the naked eye. And God takes Abraham outside and He says, look up there. He said, count them, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14. Count them if you're able.

Abraham could have stood outside of his tent and counted without counting the same star twice to this day and not have been able to number the stars of the sky. And He said to him, so shall your descendants be.

Abraham, as many as there are stars in that sky, so shall your descendants be. You're not just going to have one child to live after you. I said I was going to make you the father of a great nation, and your descendants will be as plenteous as the stars in the sky.

Verse 6 is one of the reasons why I'd like to have Genesis chapter 15 in my prison cell, because verse 6 makes this declaration, Then he believed in the Lord, and He, that is God, reckoned it to him as righteousness.

Justification by Faith Alone in Abraham

Here is the gospel, ladies and gentlemen. Here in the 15th chapter of Genesis is the most succinct capsule summation of the doctrine of justification by faith alone. Abraham believed God, and there's no merit in that.

Abraham should believe God because God is eminently believable. Abraham should trust God because God is altogether trustworthy. But Abraham believed God, and God counted him. He reckoned him as righteous, not on the basis of any works that Abraham had performed, but on the basis of his faith and of his faith alone in the promise of God.

Abraham believed God. And I think it's important that we understand that what it was that pleased God was not that Abraham believed in God. James tells us that, you know, that the demons believe that there is a God, and they tremble.

They at least have the sense to be afraid of God. But if you're sure that there's a God, and if you're scared of God, all that does is qualify you to be a demon. They don't trust God. They don't believe God.

Abraham said, I will put my life on the line by trusting you. I believe you. Do you see why it is that the Scriptures go back to this account and tell us later on that Abraham is the father of the faithful, that he is the supreme example in the Scriptures of faith in a human being?

By faith, Abraham trusted the promise of God.