Considering Antinomianism

The Book at the Center of it All

Here are my notes from the 3rd lecture by Sinclair Ferguson on The Marrow Controversy.

Antinomianism

This controversy enables us to see marks in our hearts and ministry of where we are with relationship to the grace of God.  We must exegete those great passages dealing with law & gospel.  It is one of the hardest notes in all divinity for us to untie.

The Marrow Men were accused of Amyraldianism, Arminianism, antinomianism.  But they held to a particular, not universal, atonement; free grace, not free will; and the law as a rule of life.

The 2^nd part of the Marrow of Modern Divinity is an exposition of the place of the law of God in the life of the believer.  Wherever natural hearts, or gracious hearts bound by a legal spirit, hear of the grace of God they hear “shall we sin that grace may abound?”  We are in danger of legalism in response to this.

Wherever free grace is fully preached, the accusation of antinomianism has ever arisen.  Israel called John the Baptist a legalist and Jesus an antinomian.  The gospel is ever under attack.

Often it is a false conclusion from a true premise.  Grace does abound all the more where sin abounds.  But we do not sin that grace may abound.  We must affirm the true premise that grace is greater than sin.

The Nature(s) of Antinomianism– it wears many faces

The historical use of the term arose in the days of Martin Luther.  He emphasized free grace.  About 1537, one of his friends drove this to unbiblical, but logical, conclusions.  This friend taught we were free from the law as a rule of life.  Luther began to correct his friend.

Antinomianism existed long before the name was given to it.  The WCF teaches that while the law is not a covenant of works to the believer, it remains a rule of life to the believer.  We are bound to the law as a rule of life.  Antinominism denies this in a variety of ways.

We must not dispute about mere words, but instruct with gentleness.  We should not use it as a cuss word, condemning others needlessly.  We often attribute the worst possible theological conclusions to adherents of a particular view point, conclusions they do not hold.  We need the wisdom of Solomon and the meekness of the Son of Man.

It is a pastoral and theological duty for us to distinguish from the forms of antinomianism.

Doctrinal Form- the absolution of the law as a rule of life is the result of a theological premise.  Some Puritans emphasized the free grace of God that any question of law was opposite to the grace of God.  Justification was eternal, and emphasized immediate assurance apart from the Word of God.  Since we are justified, we have no need to know our sin.  It was associated with hyper-Calvinism at times.

They ignore the indicative-imperative pattern of Scripture from beginning to end.  They focus only on the indicative, rending asunder what God had joined.

The Brethren and their concern for the purity of the church, similar to hyper-Calvinism, drew similar concerns.  Darby called the covenant of works as a mischievous fable.  He could see no place for the 10 Commandments in the life of the believer.  In his full-blown dispensationalism, it was confined to the OT.  This has lead many Brethren to fill the void with tradition, looking for decisions instead of obedience as a fruit of grace.  This is like Ryrie’s “unbelieving believer.”  Easy believism rejects the place of the Law in our life as a rule.  When Christianity is more a matter of decision than living, grace becomes an excuse of licentiousness.

Exegetical Form- it is commonplace now for theologians to take a view of the law is like the position adopted by hyper-Calvinists and dispensationalists.  They think Jesus did away with the law.  They think Paul makes no distinction between the end of the ceremonial law and the continuation of the moral law.  This does not mean these men are immoral.  They often affirm all but the Sabbath since they are repeated in Paul.

Experimental Form- this is full-blown antinomianism.  You can sin as you please.

“Those who deny the use of the law to any that are in Christ become patrons of free vice under the mask of free grace.”  Thomas Shepherd

It is the thought that we can see freely since we are under grace.  A form of Roman Catholicism, we merely need to confess it.  We do not show them the fullness of grace, including how it teaches us to obey God.  We make Christianity ordinary, a fiction.  Grace does not permit us to live as we please- he conforms us to the image of his own Son.  They affirm justification, but deny sanctification.  In our day we see the influence of individualism for cheap grace over free grace.

It would be sinful to condemn men for positions that they do not hold.

The Cause of Antinomianism

It springs from an inability to understand the place of the law in the Christian life.  But there is often far more at stake than an intellectual grasp of the place of the law.  We tend to see it as the opposite of legalism.  Antinomianism are not opposites of one another; they are both opposites of the free grace of God.  It is a clear-cut reaction against legalism.  They think they have reach the end of their legalism only to fall into a new legalism.  Only grace is the cure for legalism.  The retain the same legal frame they had as a legalist.

“The greatest antinomian was the legalist.”  Ralph Erskine

Both distort the grace of God.  Both fail to recognize the grace of God in the law.  Antinomians are often men who have fled to it from legalism.  They seek not divorce from the covenant of works, but from the law altogether.

“This antinomian principle that it is needless for a man perfectly justified to endeavor to keep the law and do good works is a glaring evidence that legality is so engrained in man’s corrupt nature that until a man come to Christ by faith the legal disposition will still be reigning in him …”  Thomas Boston

“Whatever form antinomianism may assume, it springs from legalism.  None rush into one extreme but those who have been in the other.”  Thornwell

It is not a controversy we have with others so much as with ourselves.  Our cure is to listen to the Son of God.  We must learn that God is a benevolent Father to us from Christ.

The Apostle never said the law died to the believer.  We die in Christ, the law does not.  Adam the First must die in us thru Adam the Second.

We detect it when the Spirit of Scripture is absent from the text of Scripture.  We detect it when we compare numerous passages when it is less obvious in the exegesis of a particular text.

When we speak to antinomians, we really need to address legalism in the heart since they legalistically avoid the law.  Dogmatic polemic won’t work, pastoral care is what is necessary to slowly unfold the Scriptures.

When Paul speaks to legalism, he says they have never really relied upon the grace of God to free them from their legal heart.  It is a spiritual malady, not an intellectual one.

Doctrinal Issues

There are statements in the NT that do seem to speak harshly about the law, and that the believer is dead to that which held them captive.  The study of the law, it seems, is the root of legalism as a result.

Antinomianism fails to recognize the restrictive vocabulary with which the NT operates. E.B. Cranfield– the Greek language used by Paul did not have words to denote legalism (and related concepts), putting him at a considerable disadvantage with respect to modern theologians.  We must reckon with the possibility that when he speaks harshly of the law he is speaking of legalism, for which we have a word but he had none.  They ignore the times he speak positively of the law.

They accuse us of failing to take account of the history of redemption.  But they come to the texts with tinged and tainted spectacles with a certain exegetical framework that is extraneous to Scripture and therefore cannot explain and understand the texts dealing with the law.

Antinomianism consistently fails to embrace wholeheartedly the grace of God in the giving of the law.  We can often ignore the differences between the Old and the New.  It is equally a mistake to see the consistency of grace of God in the covenants.  Most antinomians would choke rather than affirm the goodness and holiness of the law, and love God’s law.

Antinomianism doesn’t do justice to the relationship of the law to the history of redemption. The goal of salvation is the restoration of the imago dei in man.  Progressive revelation builds upon previous revelation.  God’s revelation calls them back to what had previously been revealed.  The imperatives are always deduced from the indicatives of divine grace.  Natural law grew out of the grace of creation, and written in the heart of Adam.  Adam had as much of the law as Israel did on Sinai only with few words and no thunder.  Redeeming grace gave birth to moral law.  The laws are the same, but the application is deeper and more intensely.  The Jewishness lies in the application of the moral law to their historical circumstance.  The laws predate the Exodus.  The newness is the fullness and application.  The prophets called his people back to the covenant at Sinai, and that God would make a new covenant where the law will be within them.  All progressive revelation echoes prior revelation.

How can you read the prophets and say they know nothing about the distinctions between the moral, ceremonial and civil law?  He required obedience, not sacrifice!

It is only in the light of Christ that we see that civil and ceremonial laws find their fulfillment and abrogation in Christ.  In Romans 8 we see that he has fulfilled the moral law that it might then be fulfilled in us.  In Romans 13, Ephesians & James 2 they speak of the law of God as binding on the believer.  When we gaze into the law, we gaze into the face of Christ (Calvin). [hmmm, in light of 2 Corinthians 4:6…]