Dying Delightfully
For many of our Reformed and Puritan forebears, death spelled victory. For them, death did not extinguish the light, but it merely put out the lamp because the eternal dawn has come. We die to die no more, for in and through Christ, death brings life and perfect and complete victory in its wake—forever!
Our lives are not just a journey to death. They are a journey to one of two eternal places: heaven or hell. In heaven all evil is walled out and all good is walled in. Heaven is an eternal day that knows no sunset. Hell is an eternal night that knows no sunrise. Which destination are you heading for? Are you a true Christian—a follower of Jesus Christ? Do you trust only in the doing and dying of Jesus—in His active and passive obedience—as your ground of acceptance with God? If you were arrested today for being a Christian, would there be enough evidence to convict you? Are you born again, justified by gracious faith alone, and on the narrow path to the Celestial City?
If so, you may have every hope that your death will be victorious; that, despite the discomfort and pain of the misery associated with dying, you may die joyfully and delightfully by looking to Jesus, the author and finisher of your faith, resting in justification by faith alone in Christ alone to the glory of God alone. As Paul put it, “We…rejoice in hope of the glory of God” (Rom. 5:2).
Dear believer, when we die, then “there shall be no more death” (Rev. 21:4). You will ascend triumphantly, gloriously, majestically, peacefully, and joyfully into the heaven of heavens, where you will be a blessed part of one undivided body of Christ and His church (see John 17). There Christ will present you as His bride to His Father without spot or wrinkle in soul or body to be permanently instated into heaven to dwell forever with your precious Lamb: “For the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall feed them, and shall lead them unto living fountains of waters: and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes” (Rev. 7:17).
You will be in tearless glory living with Christ forever, crying out, “Worthy is the Lamb!” You will drink of the fountains of the full enjoyment of God, praising Him for all eternity in the most holy, glorious, and perfect activities: worshipping God, resting in Him, praising Him in song, serving Him forever in His temple, exercising authority with Him, and above all, gazing upon the face of Jesus while communing with Him, and enjoying loving the triune God more fully than ever. You will be communing with the holy angels and redeemed saints made perfect (cf. Luke 18:7; Rev. 6:9–11). Delightful, victorious, holy, happy, eternal day when we shall ever be with the Lord—sin-free in Immanuel’s land, ever growing in our capacity and fullness of knowing and relishing Him!
Examples of Victorious Death
God gives dying grace to His people for death’s hour. Some of His people die with little fanfare. They depart this life quietly, serenely, with barely a sigh. For others, the king of terrors is more violent, but Jesus brings them through in the end and gives them the victory. Still others receive special measures of dying grace, so that their deathbeds become their best pulpits. Such was the case with the well-known Scottish theologian, Thomas Halyburton (1674–1712), who died at the age of thirty-seven. To read in his Memoirs the nearly seventy pages of his last sayings, which were recorded by those around his deathbed, is to dwell in the vestibule of heaven. Here is only one example: “Come, sweet Lord Jesus, receive this spirit, fluttering within my breast like a bird to be out of a snare. I wait for thy salvation as the watchman watcheth for the morning. I am weary with delays. I faint for thy salvation. Why are His chariot wheels so long a coming?”1
History is full of tens of thousands of saints who have died victoriously in Jesus with great joy, despite the affliction death brought. Biblical examples, such as those of Paul (2 Tim. 4:6–8) and Stephen (Acts 7:54–60), are well known. So are the cases of many martyrs, such as John Huss (1369–1415), Hugh Latimer (c. 1486–1555) and Nicholas Ridley (c. 1500–1555), and repentant Thomas Cranmer (1489–1556). Cranmer recanted under pressure from Roman Catholic Queen Mary (1516–1558), but he recanted his recantation, went to the stake, and as the flames crept up his body, he stretched his right hand into the midst of the flames, and cried out: “This hand hath offended”—and died horrifically but victoriously!
One of my (Joel Beeke) favorite simple accounts of a victorious death is that of a Scotsman, David Dickson (c. 1583–1662), well-known for writing the first commentary on the Westminster Confession of Faith and for his commentaries on the Psalms, Matthew, and Hebrews. When his friends were gathered around his deathbed, one of them asked him when in the throes of a painful death what he was thinking. Dickson replied, “I have taken all my bad deeds and put them on a heap, and I have taken my good deeds as well, and I have put them on the same heap. And I have run away from that heap into the arms of Jesus. I die in peace.”2
Still others have written helpfully about dying and death. Affliction was a life-long companion to Puritan pastor, Richard Baxter (1615–1691). He wrote a 700-page classic, The Saints’ Everlasting Rest, while suffering from tuberculosis (a severe respiratory disease with long-term debilitating effects), chronic pain, and the frequent prospect of dying. In this condition, Baxter looked death in the face and experienced the sufficient grace of God to sustain him until he fell asleep in Jesus in 1691.
Baxter impresses upon his readers that suffering, sickness, and death are to be expected in this life; they are the norm at present. According to Baxter, these miseries remind Christians they are not to seek physical comfort, rest, and healing here and now so much as we are to seek to know Christ better. He says that when we are “fastened to [our] beds with pining sickness, the world is nothing, and heaven is something.” Further, he writes:
O healthful sickness! O comfortable sorrows! O gainful losses! O enriching poverty! O blessed day that ever I was afflicted! Not only the green pastures and still waters, but the rod and staff, they comfort us. Though the word and Spirit do the main work, yet suffering so unbolts the door of the heart, that his word has an easier entrance.
Baxter describes disease, dying, and facing death as providential means God uses to permit “easier entrance” of the Spirit-blessed Word into the human heart, so that it may transform us and enable us to rejoice in the midst of sorrow.
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Is the Concept of a “Self-Authenticating” Bible a Modern Invention?
Written by Michael J. Kruger |
Wednesday, May 4, 2022
The NT canon we possess today is not due to the machinations of later church leaders, or to the political influence of Constantine, but due to the fact that these books imposed themselves on the church through their internal qualities.How do we know which books are from God, and which are not? Certainly the apostolic origins of a book can help identify it as being from God (see post here). And, the church’s overall consensus on a book can be part of how we identify it as being from God (see post here).
But, Christian theologians—especially in the Reformed world—have long argued that there is a more foundational way we can know books are from God: the internal qualities of the books themselves.
In other words, they have argued that these books bear certain attributes (Latin indicia) that distinguished them as being from God. They argued that believers hear the voice of their Lord in these particular books. In modern theological language, they believed that canonical books are self-authenticating. As Jesus said in John 10:27: “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me.”
Anyone familiar with Reformation-era authors will know this was the core argument in some of the key discussions on Scripture by the likes of John Calvin, William Whitaker, John Owen, and others. Moreover, the idea of self-authentication is embodied in the Westminster Confession of Faith which holds that the Bible does “evidence itself” to be from God by its own internal qualities (1.5). Beyond this, the concept of a self-authenticating Bible played a central role in later Reformed thinkers, particularly Herman Bavinck, as they sought to explain how we know books are from God.
But, some will wonder, is this whole idea of a “self-authenticating” Bible just a novel invention of the Reformers? Did they invent the idea just as a tool in their fight against Rome?
No at all. When we look back even in the patristic period, we see that this concept was there from the beginning. Here are a few examples.
Origen is quite clear that the divine qualities of books play a role in their authentication: “If anyone ponders over the prophetic sayings…it is certain that in the very act of reading and diligently studying them his mind and feelings will be touched by a divine breath and he will recognize the words he is reading are not utterances of man but the language of God” (Princ. 4.1.6. ). And elsewhere, Origen insists that OT prophets “are sufficient to produce faith in any one who reads them” and thereby the Gospel offers “a demonstration of its own” (Cels. 2.1.).
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Prophets and Angels
That day had come and Peter was witness to it. He saw the suffering of Christ and the glory of His resurrection. He encountered the risen Christ and proclaimed the good news of the gospel in the power of the Holy Spirit poured out at Pentecost. Peter interpreted the events in light of the prophetic word of the Old Testament. We live in the fullness of time, the last days in which God has spoken and acted in His Son.
We live in the fullness of time.“things which angels desire to look into” (1 Peter 1:12, NKJV)
When we come upon a crowd gathered, curiosity compels us to find a vantage point for us to see what is going on. How much more so is that case with the most significant event in human history?
At the fall of mankind through the sin of Adam in Genesis 3, God uttered a completely uncalled for promise. He spoke of the Seed of a woman who would do battle and gain victory over the ruler of this present age. God could have brought the curtain down on human history, but in keeping with His purpose in redemption, God allowed history to continue that would be the womb for the promise of a Deliverer.
Through the years, God would give more and more detail about this Savior. -
The Bible Is Reliable
One of the most basic truths controlling Christian apologetics is this: argument alone cannot produce belief. None of the “many solid arguments for the authority of Scripture … are of much use if someone doesn’t want to be convinced.”[19]Those convinced against their will are of the same opinion still. So the Bible is not a book to be judged, but the gift of divine truth to be gladly received. We learn from its teaching, agree with its reproofs, obey its correction, and submit to its training. Being supernatural we expect it to make us “complete, equipped for every good work” (2 Tim. 3:16–17) in Christ. And we should introduce it to others in that same way.
One of Billy Graham’s early crises of faith was over whether he could totally trust the Bible. After much struggle he prayed to God, “I’m going to allow faith to go beyond my intellectual questions and doubts, and I will believe this to be Your inspired Word.”[1] Graham’s conclusion sets a good example for us.
While the Bible is fully defensible, like God himself it need not answer all our questions and doubts. And we have no right to judge Scripture. “In controversies of religion or matters of faith, we can not admit any other judge than God Himself, pronouncing by the Holy Scriptures what is true, what is false, what is to be followed, or what is to be avoided.”[2] Like the aural words of the prophets the Bible is simply and truly the Gods word written.[3] The prophets didn’t invite hearers to deliberate over whether their words were true. They were proclaimers, declarers of what God had spoken to them. This is how we should receive every Word of God.
Why does this matter? Too often in apologetics Scripture is set aside until it is proven to be reliable. But the reliability of Scripture is not the goal of our argument; it is the foundation. Christian apologetics “is to be more than a meaningless discussion about the that of God’s existence and is to consider what kind of God exists”— and to do that, we need to listen to the Bible.[4] Even the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus must be interpreted by Scripture “before they can avail as redemptive facts to us.”[5] Scripture “stands before us as that light in terms of which all the facts of the created universe must be interpreted.”[6]
Still, “The Bible is both the foundation upon which our defense must be built and one of our beliefs which must be defended.”[7] Let’s think about how this is so.
How Can We Trust the Bible?
There are at least four categories of evidence by which Scripture reveals itself to be God’s word.
First, consider the internal evidence. The Bible reads like no other book. “The Scriptures manifest themselves to be the Word of God, by their majesty and purity, by the consent of all the parts, and the scope of the whole, which is to give all glory to God.”[8] It shouldn’t surprise us that the Bible’s longest chapter by far is a poem praising God’s word, as the delight of all who know it (Ps. 119:24).
Second, consider the historical evidence. True prophets were known by their words coming true (Deut. 18:21–22). When John the Baptist asked if Jesus was “the one” he responded by describing how in him the works promised by God were being done.[9] The Bible is filled with amazingly specific prophecies that have come true. As promised, Cyrus sent God’s people back to Jerusalem to build the temple (Is. 44:28; 45:1), Jesus was born in Bethlehem (Micah 5:2), and those who executed Messiah cast lots for his clothes (Ps. 22:18). “Even the blind themselves are able to see that the things predicted in [the Scriptures] do happen.”[10]
Third, consider the experiential evidence. “The Scriptures manifest themselves to be the Word of God … by their light and power to convince and convert sinners” and “to comfort and build up believers unto salvation.”[11]
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