Questions on Inability — John Murray

Human Impotence and the Sufficiency of Christ

Let us pray. O Lord, our God, we acknowledge our impotence and our complete destitution, and we implore the supply of our needs out of the riches which are in Christ Jesus. May we bless Thy great name, that Jesus came into the world to save sinners.

May His grace be sufficient for us, and His strength be perfect in weakness. All for the glory of Thy name through Him, as the one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus. Amen. Well, let's begin with the question of the closing meal yesterday.

Was there a man who came with any satisfaction or not? No, he's not here today, is he? Is he well? I think so. He's probably drunk, of course.

Has a problem with your cooking? Pardon? He went to New York. Oh, he went to New York. Maybe he knew you.

He regarded the answer I gave as the last straw. He's not here. I don't give very much opportunity, I guess, for questions and discussion. Maybe my fault, but still, to a certain extent, it's the fault of the structure of systematic theology.

We have to cover so much ground. I just can't forge ahead. I'm always keeping in mind that ultimate goal of covering all the loci. Well, it's a good point to ask some questions. I don't say I can answer those questions, but I'm inclined today to a discussion of the question of sin.

Repentance Requires True Conviction of Sin

I'll be answering the questions, or at least the attempt to answer questions. If you have a question you want to get to ask, you can. Sir, in connection with this discussion of sin, do you think it's a safe statement to make that true repentance is impossible without an adequate understanding of the nature of God?

According to what you mean by adequate, you see, that word adequate is a very ambiguous term in our English usage. And sometimes it means a very thorough understanding of the nature and consequences of sin.

And it might mean just, well, what you would call a basically true knowledge of the nature and consequences of sin. So you see, there's a certain ambiguity about that word adequate. If you mean it in the sense of sufficient, yes, I would accede to your proposition.

You mean by adequate, sufficient. You see, we must always remember that although the conviction of sin is absolutely indispensable to repentance, because repentance is basically turning from sin unto God.

And there cannot be turning from sin unto God unless there is a conviction of the sinfulness and evil of sin. So there must be some conviction. There must be a true conviction, not the type of conviction which simply a natural man may have, which a man who is still in his natural state may have, but a conviction that is consonant with the evangelical character of repentance.

And if he is to have that conviction, there must be therefore a true conviction, consonant with the nature of sin and with the consequences thereof, but we may never dogmatize as to the depth of that conviction.

See, faith itself may be as a grain of mustard seed, and in some the conviction isn't what you might call a very overpowering conviction. It's just maybe what you would call a very germ of conviction, but sufficient, you see, to be a true conviction, and therefore consonant with the nature of evangelical repentance.

And we must always beware of laying down standards as to the degree of conviction or as to the degree of faith. In some cases these things are very, very germinal, very germinal indeed, but nevertheless they are due to the work of the Spirit of God.

And they supply, these convictions are germinal, but they supply sufficient conviction to make faith meaningful. And faith comes into that conviction, which is basically or essentially or germinally a true conviction.

That, of course, will be done. Some people, when they are converted, have what you might call a very inadequate, if I may use the word in the sense of lack of thoroughness, a very inadequate conviction.

It's very inadequate in that sense of being thorough, well-developed. Very inadequate. And it is only afterwards that the realization of the heinousness of sin, of its bitter consequence, comes to expression in their consciousness.

And sometimes you find that to be the very case in religion, in Christian experience, that very often you find that people who have begun, as it were, their Christian course with what you might call rather superficial convictions, later on have a very, very marked sense of the heinousness.

It often works that way. And sometimes with people whose Christian life has begun with a very intense, very, very intense conviction, may not later on be characterized by the same degree of conviction respecting the heinousness and the evil of sin as the person who began on a very different life.

So you have to make allowances for all sorts of varieties of Christian experience, if I may use the word in the sense of lack of religiousness. You have to make allowances. And it's not proper for us to prescribe the minimum or the maximum of conviction in these matters.

Not at all. There was a man, for example, in my home parish in Scotland, a way back, he died in 1865, I believe, a very old man of the age of 90. So I never saw him. In fact, he was related to my father.

I think he was a grand-nephew of my father. And he was a very godly man, a very, very godly man. And a very able man. Also, he couldn't read one word of the Bible. He knew the Bible almost by heart. I hear him read, but he couldn't read one word itself.

There's never any indication. But he was an able genius in that respect. Well, he was a man of 30 before he had been awakened to a sense of his sinful nature. But having been awakened, he was so deeply convicted of sin that for a whole year and a half he was in torment.

He did not come to the light of the gospel. It was simply conviction of sin. He was still a natural man, but he had a tremendous, overwhelming conviction of sin. And it was a year and a half before he would leave by the light of the gospel.

And the only comfort he ever had during that whole year and a half was when he would go up in the early morning and hear the birds singing in the tree. Well, you see, there is an instance, perhaps the most striking instance I ever heard of of a man being for such a long period of time having an intense conviction of sin and a realisation of intending to go in the light of the gospel later on and became a very eminent saint.

Now, I'm not saying that in his case at all the conviction of sin later on in his regenerate state was not also very acute. So it would have been. But in any case, what I am saying is that you may never gauge the subsequent portion of the believer's life by the beginnings.

Have I answered your question? Very well, and the only thing that I would like to add to that is that the reason I asked it is that I think this is a problem. Time and again, as a pastor, how much I used to express sin to what degree to make it apparent to the people and so on.

Preaching the Full Heinousness and Misery of Sin

This is sort of what I had in mind when I asked the question. Oh, well, well, now that's a difficult question, Mr. Egan. What is to be our emphasis? That's to be maximum. We're not going to tone down the proclamation of the heinousness and guilt and evil consequence of sin to the measure of what may be a person's consciousness.

That's never to be outstanding. But it's the word of God. Now, we have to make allowance for the fact that our proclamation of the heinousness, the guilt, and the evil of sin may be reflected in the consciousness of a truly penitent person only to a very limited extent.

But it isn't that limited extent that is to be the gauge of our preaching. But we are to preach the standard that God has given us in His word. And our preaching must always be maximum, so that the conviction in a true believer may be what we call, as it were, minimum.

The conviction may be minimum. It is not because our preaching should ever be minimum. Teaching the scripture with respect to the heinousness of sin, with respect to its guiltiness, with respect to its misery, with respect to its...

Well, let's go on.

Total Inability and the Free Offer of the Gospel

Yes, sir. I have a question here. You said yesterday, addressing number four, that the doctrine is incompatible with pre-ultra or pre-in the gospel. And then you said your answer is, as you turned down, that they are predicated on the fact that there is total inability.

I was wondering if you could enlarge on this.

Yes, but the pre-ultra of the gospel is predicated on the doctrine of trans-total inability. Well, the reason for my saying that is simply this, that this is the doctrine of scripture, and therefore it must be predicated on what is true.

The pre-ultra of the gospel is not predicated on any other doctrine with respect to sin, but this doctrine of total inability. I have also a course of disparity in Gita-moha-sastra, but we are dealing then specifically with inability.

And since this is the doctrine of scripture, the pre-ultra of grace in the gospel is predicated on it, and therefore must be compatible with it. That's my point there. And, of course, we might go a step further, that the very nature of the gospel, as a gospel of grace, has no other presupposition than that.

Because the very doctrine of grace, the grace of God, has no other presupposition than the complete bankruptcy of man. If you don't presuppose the complete bankruptcy of man, then that is just another way of saying he's totally inability.

You impinge upon the very doctrine of grace, because the very doctrine of grace is the grace of God from beginning to end. And there is no point at which the sovereign grace of God is just now with respect to the pre-origin.

What is offered in the doctrine of grace is, of course, Christ-specific. But Christ has to embody that. Well, any other questions? Yes? With regard to the clarification of the point of comparison between imputed sin and original sin, you said, with regard to original sin, that we possess the macula, culpa, and pena of original sin, not by an act of voluntary decision or personal choice, but through solidarity with heaven.

Yes. Is this also true of imputed sin? That it's not, we don't possess this sin because of voluntary decision or personal choice? Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. The same holds true of the imputation of the guilt of that in sin.

The imputation of the guilt. Oh, yes. The same holds true. Absolutely. Absolutely. Of course, you see, my point, Mr. Corfair, is the point that not very many make. The man that analyzed it more thoroughly than anybody else in revealing, developed the point magnificently, was Jonathan Edwards.

And that's why Jonathan Edwards is often misunderstood. But, you see, I was making the point, Mr. Corfair, which not very many Reformed theologians make, outside of a few lines of Jonathan Edwards, that our being involved in original sin, our being involved in original sin in the present, is an implication of that sin that is imputing to us.

It's the implication of that we become depraved because of our solidarity with that. Or, putting that another term, we become depraved because of the implication to us of other sin. And, of course, what you say is perfectly correct.

Perfectly correct when you're focusing attention upon the guilt of that sin. Absolutely. You're quite correct. So I probably didn't sufficiently stress that point. I should have made that remark. But you're perfectly correct in construing the relationship.

That's in respect of all that. Anything else? That's good. What an adequate definition of freedom of will. Beg your pardon? I'm wondering what an adequate definition of the freedom of man's will is. You say it consists of the freedom to act according to his nature.

Yes, that's the topic we're going to deal with next. That's the next lecture. I understand, Mr. Corfair. In regard to point number four, the objections to compatibility with the free will to show grace, I concur partly in everything you have said.

And I think your answer to Mr. Turner's question followed up some of that. But the thing that is forefront of my mind right now is, I believe the objection here is an issue of compatibility with our being able to offer the gospel.

In other words, how can you preach a gospel for someone to respond to when you know that they cannot respond? And I was wondering, in a very practical point here, how you would offer the gospel in this life.

Proclaiming Christ to Those Dead in Sin

Yes, all that's an entirely relevant question, Mr. Edmondson, a very relevant question. And I greatly appreciate the difficulty that some people may entertain. As you say, they might agree with everything that I said respecting the compatibility.

But then we as preachers constantly confront the difficulty. How am I going to preach to dead people? We offer the gospel to dead people. Now, of course, I'll be dealing with that later on, next year, when we come to the whole subject of faith.

But, nevertheless, a remark is appropriate now. You see, when I was a student of recent theological studies, in the course of theology, I was cast for Mr. Hodge, the law grandson of Charles Hodge. And in the junior year, some student would ask a question.

And I think he was very bright in asking this question, Dr. Hodge. And quite clearly, he would say from the rostrum, I should answer that question in the second term of the senior year. And then we pass along the reflection.

Well, but how are you going to do it? Well, there are many aspects to it. But to get to the carnal subject question, I would say that I can't do anything else. I just can't, as a preacher, do anything else than preach the gospel in all its fullness and greenness to man dead in trespasses and sins, because that's what I'm commissioned to do.

That's what I'm commissioned to do. And when I'm faced with the question, what's the sense of it? I may ask that question, but I may have that question deeper in my consciousness. What's the sense of it?

Well, the answer to that is, just on hand, let us say, that I know that that is the means through which God operates saving me in the hearts of dead men. And men who are dead in trespasses and sins, it's just by that very fool-free proclamation that He is sovereignly pleased to work efficaciously in the hearts of men so as to respond to Him.

And, of course, that is demonstrated many a time in the history of the Christian Church. There is a person who is dead in trespasses and sins. He has some degree of conviction which makes the gospel meaningful.

And here he comes to a particular church service or whatever it may be, an evangelistic service, and Christ is presented to him in all his fullness and glory and greenness, and his heart is drawn out, and he joins with Christ.

That's the work of the Holy Spirit, of course. Only the Holy Spirit, working in his heart, glorifying Christ, who enables him thus to respond. But I know that it was just in connection with that fool-free proclamation and overture of Christ that God, the Holy Spirit, is pleased to do.

And that's what gives me courage. I never really have it. Although I may not see any fruit, that's what God has designed. And I know that in His own good time and in His own sovereign pleasure, He blesses that fool-free overture of the gospel, although perhaps it could be that every person in the audience is still dead in trespasses and sins.

But I never know when the Holy Spirit is going to open the heart to such a person. I never know when that fool-free proclamation of the gospel perfectly dovetails into the need of a particular person.

I mean the conscious need of a particular person, because that person is at the point of desperation. He's in that desperation. He's open and he's conscious of it. But here there comes the proclamation of Christ.

And the free offer of the gospel is just to this effect, that Christ, in all the glory of His person, in all the perfection of His finished work, in all the efficacy of His heavenly ministry, is placed in the very lap of the sinner's head in trespasses and sins.

I never know when the Holy Spirit is going to open the heart of this particular individual into whose lap Christ is placed, so that he will receive embracing from the exercise of faith. Let me ask you a question.

How dead is this phrase, dead in trespasses and sins, death in connection with the fact that Christ is placed, so that he will receive embracing from the exercise of faith. Let me ask you a question. How dead is this phrase, dead in trespasses and sins, death in connection with this natural ability to understand what is free, in connection with the remnant of the image of God left in the natural man, in connection with the spirit of death.

The Meaning of Being Dead in Trespasses and Sins

What is the exact nature of that word, dead? Oh well, this word, dead, means simply that the person who serves the unconverted, unregenerate person is totally unable to understand the things of the spirit of God, is totally unable to receive them, is totally unable to live to the glory of God in a way that is well pleasing to him, is totally unable to obey the commandments of God.

That is what we mean by dead in trespasses and sins, that that person does not live to God. He does not live in the world of God's saving grace. He lives in an entirely different world. But your question is a very relevant question, but again, Mr. Charles, you are anticipating something that may develop a very considerable length in senior years in connection with the subject of faith.

Infant Salvation and the Question of Accountability

Well, this has to do with original sin. In Lorraine Beckner's book on pre-estimation, he asks this question of original sin and the death of infants. He seems to conclude that all people, all children who die before they reach an age of accountability are in God's elect, and therefore no one really goes to hell because of original sin or imputed sin.

Now, are you in agreement with this? Well, you see, that has been a position held by a reformed theologian, for example, Charles Hart. Well, I've said so, but Charles Hart took the position that all infants dying in infancy were elect.

Or maybe he wanted to develop that still further. He was even more emphatic in that than Charles Hart was. And that has been more or less what he would call the Princeton tradition. And it's held, this being a reformed theologian, I've walked in, who has an article on the subject, the development of the doctrine of infant salvation.

He traces the history of thought in the reformed church on these questions. And he shows, from a historical point of view, that there has been a very distinct development within reformed theologians in the direction of maintaining that all infants dying in infancy are same.

Well, my position on that is that I cannot say, I cannot say, if it is God's good pleasure to save all infants dying in infancy, well, surely I shall be profoundly thankful in eternity. But I don't think the scripture gives us a position on the end of which to state that doctrine.

I like the statement of the Westminster Confession to say that infants dying in infancy are regenerated as a matter of the distance we can go. We have more ways to say, however, well, we have no right to say either that infants dying, that some infants dying in infancy are lost.

We just have to be noncommittal. We don't know. And we leave unrevealed things to God Himself. Yes, sir, that's all.

You said one person might just follow that up, but what proof text would these people use?

Oh, well, I really would have to look that up. Oh, well, they would have to, they would have to gain a money. Warranties, of course. Yes, a great deal of that. Matthew 18, the suffering of children comes to me in forgiveness for such is the kingdom of God, that the kingdom of God includes all infants dying in infancy, and that it's for that reason, you see, that it's characterized by such is the kingdom of God.

And that some would appeal to you all by these things, by these certain justifications, you see, from, of emanating from the relationship of Christ to mankind, or delivered from original families, no actual committees by the person concerned.

But beyond that, I can't remember, Mr. Turner, because I would have to go back, I haven't read these men for quite a long time, and I don't remember, I just can't remember what the texts are. But I know that Matthew 19, and the parable of Mark the Jew, are one of the main results of this doctrine.

But I can't remember offhand the evidence they appeal to in addition. Yes, Mr. Goodwin. Are you going to deal with this concept of age and accountability under those periodologies? When the age of accountability starts, you mean?

Well, with the subject in general, are you going to include it in any of your lectures? The age of accountability. Oh, well, I don't know. I can't remember, Mr. Not in this course, Mr. Well, I have nine letters for next year.

You see, it would come in, in connection with baptism. It would come in in connection with that subject of baptism, or definitely there. But I don't any longer lecture on that. I don't start saying the book on baptism, because I have to be considerably tied to the economy of time.

But it does come in there, really, and it's very relevant. I don't think I should let you do that. No? Mr. Goodwin. Does the Western conventional faith, where it's terminated from baptism into salvation here, presents that the elect children are enslaved, with they had in mind there, and the elect children, electing children of believers?

Oh, you can't tell. You can't tell what they had in mind. That is denoted. They were just non-believers. Of course, they certainly, the Westminster divine, in accordance with common reform belief, did hold that the infant seed of believing parents who die in infancy would be saved, at least for a great many of them.

The doctrines, the covenants, were brought to bear from that. That's what we call more or less a common prophecy of reformed thinking. And it's very explicit, if you didn't count, that the infant seed of believing parents dying in infancy would be saved.

But of course, if you ask my question on that, my view on that, again, I would have to dig that up. And it would be implied in the believing parent's partnership to think that just because the parent happens to be professing about the meaning of members of the church that their children are automatically saved.

That's very permissive. So I would have to answer by associating it with believing parents. With that, again, I'm going to thank you. And with that, I'm going to close the event. Any more questions? So, in a moment, slide 18, the comparison between having, between the sin of one man and the righteousness of one man.

Romans 5 and the Comparison Between Adam and Christ

With regard to sin,.

There's a term used, which we can accept. So here it says, through one righteousness,.

And a concoction, through the righteousness of one, a righteousness unto all the man. In verse 19, there's a word I use, a colloid, manual, used. It seems to me the concoction is in verse 18, the righteousness of one, a category, a concoction, of social security.

Well, also, in verse 12, it's apparently being not finished. So, in all the indications of the word, in verse 12, it is apparently finished. With that, also, the answer to all man, that is, is, if you finish, if you, to apply the concoction of verse 12, in terms of verse 12, which, of course, is a powerful thought, it would read, so, by one man, righteousness entered into the world, and life by righteousness, and so life passed on to all men, in that all were consecrated.

You would have the same thing that you would have in verse 18. Well, that's the whole question. And, you are familiar with the Arminian, Arminian exegesis, also in 5 .18, that the original thing, the original thing of all mankind is religion.

It is a universal denotation to the all in the apotheosis, as belongs to the all in the process. That, of course, is the Arminian exegesis, well known, and it might seem as if you have to give a broad denotation to the apotheosis, as you have to the process.

But that would therefore be understood in the religion to all men, of original sin, of the guilt of having first sin, and the taking away of the depravity which would prompt having first sin, so that all men are beneficiaries of the justification which Christ has accomplished.

Now, I think that that is not terrible, and that you have to give to the universalistic term in the apotheosis restrictive denotation, you must, because Paul is not dealing simply with the remission of the guilt of having first sin in this passage.

He's dealing with an all-inclusive justification that is unto eternal life. That's the justification he's dealing with, and this is terrible. Not simply the justification from the guilt of having sin, but all-inclusive justification.

And you cannot give it a more limited connotation in this passage, Romans 5, 18. No, you cannot. That was characteristic of Paul to use universalistic expressions, but he does not use them in the sense of the distributive universalism.

You go over to 1 Corinthians 15, verse 2.

As in Adam all died, even so in Christ.

Shall all be made alive. Now, it's quite apparent something demonstrated by Jesus of that passage. Paul is dealing with the resurrection into life. Not with the resurrection of all men in this divine place, but with the resurrection of believers.

With reference to them, we see, in Christ all shall be made alive.

As in Adam all died, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.

Now, the expression is distributive universal, is distributively universal in the Prophets, as in Adam all died. We know that, not simply because Paul fits it in that passage, but from other considerations.

There you have what is distributively universal in the Prophets, distributively universal in the Prophets, but is nevertheless restricted in the Apocalypse. Though in Romans 5, 18,.

We're bound to conclude that the hypothesis.

Is distributively universal. But we are up against the insuperable exegesis of this exodus if we give to the hypothesis the same universally distributive denotation. Because Paul is dealing with the passage of time, infinity, justification, which has its issue in eternal life.

And you can't believe that that applies to all distributively unless you believe in the time of the West. According to Paul's own teaching, which is very explicit in several passages, according to Paul's own teaching, there is no such thing as the universal justification of all mankind.

Some will be finally lost. Therefore it isn't of doctrine that all will be finally saved. Therefore we cannot suppose that it is Paul's intent in Romans 5, 18, to refer to the justification of all men's distributivity.

But Paul is dealing with this in modus operandi,.

In modus operandi, and not at all with the question of the denotation. In modus operandi, this is the point of comparison.

As in Adam all die,.

Even so in Christ shall all be made alive. Comparably to that, I think, all who are in Adam die. All who are in Christ will be have to apply the same limitations to Romans 5, 18b on the basis of exegetical consideration.

Well, that's my answer to that, and so there are a few minutes left. If you want to read some more questions, I have Mr. Knopf. Mr. Knopf.

The Free Offer and the Language of Christ's Death

I wonder if you're familiar with J .R. Typer's book, The Man Who Isn't Involved With God. Yes, I was.

Oh, well, two years ago I looked it up. Now, I was quite satisfied with it. I read it the first time. I thought it was satisfactory. Mr. Knopf, Mr. E .T. was in the world and I sometimes read books and have them all marked up so that I read them very carefully, and a few years later I completely forgot that I ever read them.

I'm amazed when I go back and find them all marked up with my own pencil. I'm impressed. So I must have read them. I know my hand. So it's quite a while since I looked in Mr. Typer's book, but when I did, Mr. Metzger, I thought it was quite a satisfactory treatment of this question.

J .R. Typer is, I believe, a very talented man. He's consistent in thinking. He's the most incisive thinker. He has very excellent literary qualities. I suppose you have read the book, Mr. Metzger. Yes.

Have you been satisfied with it? Yes, sir. I was learning such easy reasons for the approach on this question of when you're preaching, the fact that you never mean to praise a person.

Trying to die before you is a sin. The fact that this person's our father is a sin, so we cannot praise this person because we don't know where we're going. I've never heard the way you've formulated that before, and I thought it was very helpful to me.

And I'm very happy to respond to that. That is eminently proper. Eminently proper. I'll be dealing with that later. There is some time due in connection with the next term. But that's eminently correct, I believe, according to the doctrines of Scripture.

But we just can't say properly to any one particular individual who is still, of course, unremembered, life died for you. You were created with a formula that was used way back in the model of mother divinity which exercised a great influence in the Scottish Church history which was established, as you know, by Thomas Boston.

The model of modern divinity was a book published in 1645. So the title is obsolete. It wasn't obsolete at that time. And that was a challenging document that exercised a tremendous influence, especially in Scotland, in the matter of preaching the gospel or pre-opera of the gospel.

But they had a formula which they used, and that is, they wouldn't say to any man, Christ died for you. But you could say to all men, Christ is dead for you. But I'm not accepting to that. I'm not accepting to that.

But that, nevertheless, is a very interesting field of formula which was used by the model of theologians in the 17th century and particularly in the 18th.