The title of this sermon at the YouTube site R. C. Sproul Online, was:
R.C. Sproul – Depression is very real but God wants to help you overcome it
In the following 42-minute video, R C explains that a couple of Bible doctrines are intended to provide believers [paraphrase] with a shield against forces that oppose us in the world; in particular, depression, but more than that as you will find.
The foundational doctrine of justification is explained, and in the process, how that is achieved by God, Who is Judge of His universe.
This sermon explains more clearly than any post, thus far in this mini-series on Salvation and Eschatology, that the Roman Catholic Church does not have a biblical gospel.
Sermon HIGHLIGHT points [bracketed statements, emboldening and underscoring are mine]:
- RC opened by reading Genesis 15:1-4
- Opening prayer asked for God’s help to understand the concept of ‘imputation’
- Imputation: to ascribe, to attribute, to reckon, to count, to deem, or in legal terms, to transfer something from one person to another
- The biblical term, ‘justification’ uses the term imputation in a legal, or forensic sense
- In TV courtroom scenes, the prosecution presents forensic evidence which contributes to the final decision that the judge renders regarding the defendant’s guilt or innocence
- The doctrine of justification is often referred to as ‘forensic justification’
- There has been some confusion in the history of the church about how justification occurs…
- Sproul noted that there was a movement in the 1990s, called Evangelicals and Catholics Together (ECT); he thought that would never happen because the Protestant church and the Roman Catholic Church (RCC) have different gospels
- That is, they differ on what the biblical gospel is
- Both sides have always agreed that justification is forensic
- The abiding issue is on what grounds is the declaration made [by God, to justify a person]
- [Justification and imputation are made clear in the course of his talk]
- On what basis does God declare anyone ‘just’ in His courtroom?
- Protestantism believes that God does so on the grounds of ‘imputation’ of the righteousness of Christ alone
- Luther’s maxim, [a justified person is] at the same time ‘just’ and a sinner
- The RCC abhorred Luther’s formula
- If God gazed into our souls, then He would see much sin clinging to us
- So, how could one who is a sinner in any way still be just?
- In and of himself, the sinner is still a sinner; but by imputation, he is declared just, because the righteousness of Christ is accredited to him, counted to him, reckoned to him
- The whole sense of justification, biblically, is based on this supreme principle
- God, in His mercy, has counted the righteousness of Christ for us
- The RCC states this cannot be because it would involve God in a legal fiction, declaring someone to be something they are not
- RCC: God would not declare a person just until He actually is just
- If there was a single word causing this disagreement between the Protestant Church and the RCC, is the concept of imputation
- When the apostle Paul is explaining this in Romans 4, he takes his readers back to the beginning, Genesis 15:6
- Gen 15:1 After these things the word of the LORD came to Abram in a vision: “Fear not, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great.” 2 But Abram said, “O Lord GOD, what will you give me, for I continue childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?” 3 And Abram said, “Behold, you have given me no offspring, and a member of my household will be my heir.” 4 And behold, the word of the LORD came to him: “This man shall not be your heir; your very own son shall be your heir.” 5 And he brought him outside and said, “Look toward heaven, and number the stars, if you are able to number them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your offspring be.”
- Gen 15:6 And he believed the LORD, and he counted it to him as righteousness.
- RC explained the matter in terms of Abram’s heir
- God declared Abram ‘just’ before Abram was sanctified [made righteous in a practical sense, which the Holy Spirit does to believers over time, conforming them to the image of Christ]
- In Romans 4, Paul presents Abram’s justification by faith as exhibit ‘A,’ which occurred BEFORE Abram did anything righteous, before he was circumcised, before he did works like obeying the law of God, before he obeyed by taking Isaac to Mount Moriah to sacrifice
- God counted Abram righteous in His sight because he believed God Gen 15:6
- If this was a legal fiction as the RCC believes, then when Adam sinned, it was only a problem for Adam, no one else, as Pelagius maintained; Adam was not the representative of his ancestors, the entire human race
- If you don’t like the concept of imputation, not only do you do away with justification, but also original sin, with the atonement of Christ
- And you do away with the transfer of merit from anybody’s accumulated merit in the treasury of merit; to you or to, e.g., your grandmother
- Because the whole of salvation from start to finish rests on imputation
- It is not a legal fiction
- When God imputes the sin of Adam to you and to me, this is real imputation
- When God imputes my sin to the back of Jesus, the sin bearer, there is nothing fictional about that
- When He transfers to me the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ by faith, this is a real imputation
- It is in the reality of that imputation by which we can ever hope to stand before God
- When RC was justified, it wasn’t by understanding the doctrine of justification; one could get an A+ on an exam about that doctrine and still be far from the kingdom
- The doctrine of justification by faith alone is simply shorthand for the statement: justification by Christ Alone
- The only way one can ever be saved is by works
- God requires that His law be fulfilled, unless you possess perfect righteousness, you will never be justified
- Justification by faith alone means that we are justified by the works of Christ alone
- Luther called this justification by a foreign righteousness, a righteousness that is outside of us, not inherent
- It is not my possession, it is Jesus’ possession
- Saved by the blood of Christ means that we are saved by that blood unto death [He had to die]
- If the only thing that saves us is Jesus’ dying on the cross, why didn’t God the Father send Him directly to the cross?
- Why did He come as an infant in a manger?
- Why did He come under the law?
- Because, for Jesus to save us, He not only had to die for our penalty, BUT He had to live for our righteousness
- We are saved as much by the perfect act of obedience by Jesus as we are by His sacrificial death
- In the Bible, there are several metaphors for the concept of imputation, some are as follows
- Through the analogy of a covering: In Genesis, God covered Adam and Eve
- The two were naked and not ashamed; after they were seduced by the Serpent, Adam and Eve experienced guilt and shame for the first time
- They had an acute awareness of walking with God without clothing on and used tree leaves to cover their own nakedness
- Gen 3:9 But the LORD God called to the man and said to him, “Where are you?” 10 And he said, “I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked, and I hid myself.” 11 He said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?”
- God put His curse on Adam, Eve and the Serpent and expelled them from the Garden of Eden
- That was punishment for sin
- The first divine act of redemption was that God made clothes for his guilt- ridden creatures, and covered their nakedness
- Fast forward to the establishment of the Tabernacle in the wilderness for Israel
- The Day of Atonement: God gave instructions to the high priest to slaughter animals and to sprinkle blood on the mercy seat between the Cherubim, which represented the throne of God Almighty, before whose throne we are guilty
- [See Leviticus 16 to review the Day of Atonement]
- The priest, per God, took the animal blood and covered the mercy seat, symbolizing the covering of our guilt – from a covering of animal skins (Genesis) to a covering of animal blood (Leviticus)
- The other goat went through the ceremony wherein the priest put his hand on its head to transfer the sins of the people to the head of the SCAPE goat
- Imputation of the sins of his people onto the scape goat
- The scape goat was reckoned as the sin bearer and was driven into the wilderness to remove the sin of the people from the presence of God, symbolically
- Fast forward to the New Testament
- We read in the NT that the blood of bulls and goats cannot take away sin [Hebrews 9:11-28]
- That is, the whole drama of the Day of Atonement was a ‘shadow’ or a ‘type’ of the reality that was to come
- In the words of John the Baptist: John 1:29 The next day he saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!
- References to a sermon on Isaiah 53 that was preached earlier in the conference: Isaiah 53:11 Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied; by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities.
- That again, is imputation
- Finally, the NT goes back again to God’s making of the covering in Gen 3, when it describes our salvation and justification as being accomplished through being clothed with the righteousness of Christ – given as a garment that covers
- [The Bible says the following of our righteousness:
- Isaiah 64:6 But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away. [I used KJV because the commentary below used its words]
- Other scriptures that say the same:
- are all: Isa_6:5, Isa_53:6; Job_14:4, Job_15:14-16, Job_25:4, Job_40:4, Job_42:5-6; Psa_51:5; Rom_7:18, Rom_7:24; Eph_2:1-2; Tit_3:3
- all our: Isa_57:12; Zec_3:3; Php_3:9; Rev_3:17-18, Rev_7:13]
- RC referred to the following text in Zechariah:
- Zecariah 3:1 Then he showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the LORD, and Satan standing at his right hand to accuse him. 2 And the LORD said to Satan, “The LORD rebuke you, O Satan! The LORD who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you! Is not this a brand plucked from the fire?” 3 Now Joshua was standing before the angel, clothed with filthy garments. 4 And the angel said to those who were standing before him, “Remove the filthy garments from him.” And to him he said, “Behold, I have taken your iniquity away from you, and I will clothe you with pure vestments.”
- As on the cross, a double transfer, my filthy garments were put on Jesus and the garment of His righteousness was given to me by imputation
- How important is this concept of imputation?
- In the second iteration of the ETC 2, people were excited about having come to an agreement between Protestants and the RCC, but they put off dealing with the doctrine of imputation until a later time
- Sproul stated that there is no middle ground; one has to choose to believe in imputation or NOT to believe in it. Since the RCC did not alter their former stance, an agreement was, in reality, not reached
- We’ve been trying to get the RCC to understand that without sola fide [faith alone], you do not have the gospel
- AND without IMPUTATION, you do not have sola fide
- Without imputation, you do not have the gospel
- He closed with a relevant illustration that simplified the idea of imputation
R.C. Sproul – Depression is very real but God wants to help you overcome it
[On imputation via Gen 15:6; Romans 4….]
YouTube site: R.C. Sproul Online
There are only two playlists on the cite, the following link is to the one labeled, Pastor Robert Charles Sproul. It seems to be about biblical doctrines. Older messages are around 25 minutes in length, latter ones, longer.
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLfrMqUs4oqp9zghZkfCC6Gmz1mlvyzx09