SOME time ago a few remarks were made in the pages of this Magazine on the Scripturalness of the Free Offer of the Gospel which called forth a reply from the editor of the Gospel Standard, couched in language which shows a beautiful Christian spirit. In these days, when creed subscription sits lightly on men who profess to be ministers of Christ, it is refreshing to us to find that Mr. Gosden took up this matter out of loyalty to the Articles of Faith to which he is bound by a solemn subscription, and if we have used the occasion to “mildly assail” these Articles, we hope it was out of a sincere regard for the teaching of God’s Word. We are fully in harmony with our friend when he writes, “Better, immeasurably, violate all tradition and usage, however time-honoured, than knowingly violate the holy Word of God.” There are, however, certain matters in his reply which that attitude to God’s Word on our part constrains us to criticise, we hope, in the spirit of love.
Attention has already been drawn to the fact that while Articles XXVI. and XXIX. of the Gospel Standard Articles of Faith have several passages of Scripture attached to them proving man’s inability to do any good thing and showing how totally depraved he is, yet there is not one single passage given to forbid the free offer of the gospel to such a ruined creature. This is rather strange in view of the fact that these two Articles were expressly framed to forbid the free offer. After carefully reading Mr. Gosden’s reply we have noticed that it shows the same defect on this point as the Articles of Faith. If there are Scripture proofs to support the view of our Strict Baptist friends why are they not given? If no such proofs can be given we are forced to the conclusion that our friends, believing with us in the total depravity and inability of fallen man, concluded that it was inconsistent with the Divine perfections and the condition of man to offer him salvation. Thus they have, unconsciously, we believe, fallen back on the logic of human wisdom which is not a safe guide in religious matters.
From the days of Calvin to the present day we find that men whose orthodoxy could not be questioned, and whose labours in the Church of Christ had been greatly blessed held to the “free offer,” while at the same time they preached against “free will.” Were they contradicting themselves? We deny, emphatically, that they were. They were going strictly in accordance with God’s revelation of His mind in the Scriptures, the Holy Spirit setting before them there, not only what they were to preach, but how they were to preach. Our Gospel Standard friends deny that it is “every man’s duty to spiritually and savingly repent and believe,” but this is manifestly inconsistent with what the Holy Spirit reveals of the Saviour’s preaching during His public ministry on earth. As recorded in Mark i, 15, we find that the substance of that preaching was, “The time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is at hand: repent ye, and believe the Gospel.” All who listened to Him in these large congregations which He addressed were not convinced sinners, yet they were exhorted both to repent and to believe. He who “needed not that any should testify of man: for he knew what was in man” must have known man’s inability to repent and believe, yet by His exhortation He teaches them that it is their duty to do both. Other examples of this kind could be brought forward if space would permit.
To our mind our friends seem to be approaching this question solely from the point of view of man’s inability to repent and believe, forgetting that there is another point of view, and that is, the obligation under which man is to God to repent and believe, and, if we grant that, we must also concede that it is the duty of man to obey that command. If, as Mr. Gosden admits, the inability and unwillingness of the finally impenitent “either to keep the law or to repent and believe the gospel, being not innocent infirmities, but part of their guilt and condemnation,” surely there must be a duty laid on them to repent and believe, for how, otherwise, could it be part of their guilt and condemnation? In the Gospel this duty which is obligatory on all is made known to all to whom it comes, and Christ as the suitable and sufficient remedy for all is offered indiscriminately to all. The elect, as well as the non-elect, are by nature unwilling to receive Him and it is only through the supernatural work of the Holy Spirit that they are made willing. As for the rest, Christ being offered to them serves to show in a clearer light their condemnation, as it is written, “This is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.” John iii. 19. Those who framed the Articles of Faith referred to seemed to have failed to distinguish between the external call and the effectual call of the Gospel. The external call is universal while the effectual call comes only to the elect. Principal Cunningham puts the matter clearly when he says, “Calvinists admit that all to whom the gospel is preached, are called or invited to come to Christ and to embrace Him; but they deny that this flows from, or indicates on God’s part, a design or purpose to save all; and they deny that grace or gracious assistance sufficient to enable them to repent and believe, is communicated to them all. They distinguish between the outward call addressed to all by the word, and the inward or effectual call addressed to some by the Spirit, whereby they are really enabled to accept the offer—to comply with the invitation, and thus to believe in Christ and to turn to God.”—Historical Theology, Vol. II., page 402.
In his reply, Mr. Gosden says, “We do not find that the apostles offered the gospel indiscriminately, but that they first charged sin on the people, showing them their state as lost sinners needing mercy and salvation.” Those of us who hold the “free offer” hope that we endeavour to show sinners “their state as lost sinners needing mercy and salvation,” but we deny that in offering Christ we are going beyond what the apostles did, and deny also that our statements in any way imply creature power. We find the Apostle Peter in Acts, iii., 19, saying to “all the people” who were gathered together in Solomon’s porch, “Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord.” Will our friends charge Peter with words which imply creature power? In his language there is an exhortation to the duty of repenting of their sins and turning to Him who says, “All that the Father giveth me shall come to me: and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.” But did Peter and the rest of the Apostles offer Christ? We hold that they did, and that for the simple reason that they had no other remedy to offer them. The gospel which they proclaimed, was not merely a gospel which required men to forsake sin, but a gospel which also set before sinners a great and glorious Object, even “the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.” Was creature power implied when these Apostles, as Christ’s ambassadors, said, in fulfilling their office, “We pray you in Christ’s stead, be ye reconciled to God.” No, but they were going in accordance with Christ’s commission to them to preach the gospel to every creature, and thus were fully in harmony with such Old Testament passages as Isaiah xlv. 22 and lv. 7, which we have already maintained furnish complete proofs that men in a state of nature are to be invited to come and partake of salvation. We think that Mr. Gosden will find it a very difficult matter to prove that these passages are addressed only to convinced sinners who already give indications of supernatural light and life. Again the same thing can be said of his assertion in connection with Acts xvii. 30, 31. With reference to this passage we may say that we see a great difference between the statement “but now commandeth all men every where to repent” as we have it in verse 30, and Mr. Gosden’s statement explanatory of it—”To this end (that is, that the gospel would be extended to all men, Jew and Gentile) He would have all men warned of their need of repentance.” (italics ours). We fail to see how the “all men” applying to Jew and Gentile, should alter the command to repent to a warning of their need of repentance.
In his reply to our previous article Mr. Gosden has somewhat arbitrarily associated “free grace, free will, and the free offer.” The truth is, and our friends of the Gospel Standard denomination have all along failed to realise it, that the free offer is in complete harmony with free grace and does in no way imply free will. We, who hold the free offer, have as much horror as Mr. Gosden has, of the clap-trap which he instanced of a “popular evangelical” taking out his watch and saying, “It is now half-past seven. By eight o’clock to night, each person here may be a believer if he will.” That is contrary to the Word of God which says of the believer that he is born “not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.” John i. 13. The Word of God clearly sets before us that of God’s free grace some men have been predestinated unto everlasting life, and that their number is so certain and definite, that it cannot be either increased or diminished. It is of the same free grace that these are effectually called, justified, adopted and sanctified, but when Christ sent out His ambassadors He put no distinguishing mark on those who were thus the subjects of free grace, but said, “Go ye into all the world, and preach the Gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptised shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned”—Mark xvi. 15, 16. What was the line of action which these ambassadors were to follow in preaching to every creature? They were to take as their example, not men, but their Divine Master, and would no doubt remember that the substance of His preaching was “Repent ye, and believe the Gospel.” When these ambassadors went forth they were fully conscious of the fact that the Gospel they had to preach was that the Lord Jesus “was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification.” As ambassadors they were fully commissioned to set before their hearers the terms on which sinners could be reconciled to God, and as men who had in view the glory of their Master and the good of souls, they could hardly be expected to be so indifferent as not to exhort men to close in with these terms of reconciliation. “Knowing therefore the terror of the Lord, we persuade men.” II. Cor. v. 11. Nothing more and nothing less than that is meant by a free offer of Christ in the preaching of the Gospel. This has been the stand of the Church of Christ in its best days, in this country and in foreign lands. Men like the Puritans of England and the divines of the First and Second Reformation in Scotland held to the free offer of the Gospel, but where could there be found men who held more tenaciously to the doctrines of free grace, or who denounced more unsparingly any teaching that gave the least place to creature power? Those in the north Highlands whose ministrations were most acknowledged were distinguished for their soundness in the faith, and specially for proclaiming the free, unfettered call of the gospel to lost sinners. Some may profess dubiety as to this, but there is no foundation for dubiety in the matter. One of the most eminent and successful of them could say, when on his deathbed giving his successor a dying charge: “I have at times felt, when proclaiming the free call of the gospel to every sinner in my hearing, as if breathing the very air of heaven.” Dr. MacDonald of Fernintosh, the Apostle of the North, gave the testimony towards the close of his ministry that “from the day he entered a pulpit until then, he was unconscious of having ever left it without giving a free, unfettered call to every sinner in his audience to accept Christ freely offered in the gospel, on the warrant of God’s call.” (Dr. Aird’s address to the F.C. Assembly which met at Inverness in 1888.)
It is true, as Mr. Gosden points out, that the term “offer” is not used in the New Testament in relation to gospel preaching, for which reason he eschews it, but he must also remember that there are other terms which our esteemed friends use very frequently, such as “immersion” and “believer’s baptism” which cannot be found in the New Testament, yet it is not on that ground that we would eschew them.
In the light of the foregoing and the previous article which appeared in these pages our friends would be well advised to reconsider Articles XXIV., XXVI., and XXIX of their Articles of Faith, and to have Scripture proofs annexed to them, showing not only man’s inability, but also, where the mind of the Holy Spirit is given, that men in a state of nature should not be exhorted to believe in or turn to God.” If no such Scripture proofs can be produced we must adhere to our present conviction that these Articles have their foundation elsewhere than in the Word of God. In saying this we have no desire to hurt any of the Lord’s people in the Gospel Standard denomination and if we have anywhere throughout this article been carried away by our feelings into making a statement which might appear to be harsh we regret it very much, for our aim has been more to conserve the truth than to censure.