Free Book Give Away!

Calling all readers, I love reading good books, and I want you to read good books as well.  Therefore I am having my first free book give away here at Pleasing Pain!  To kick things off in a very robust and reformed manner I’ll be giving away a free copy of On Christian Doctrine by St. Augustine.  Augustine is one of the most quoted authors in history, and rightly so, his stuff is great.  You’ll enjoy this read if you’ve never read it before.

Here are the rules:

You may enter the draw once.  Simply send an email to me (adamwpowers@gmail.com) with your name and email address, with “Free Book Give Away” in the subject line.  As soon as the winner has been chosen, I will immediately and permanently erase all names and email addresses.  The winner will be notified by email.  You have until Wednesday (10/21) at noon to enter.  There are no catches involved at all, free means free.  You enter and I pay to ship the book to you; that is, if you win.

Did Jesus Descend Into Hell?

The Apostles Creed was one of the first creeds of the early Church; it is still confessed by millions of churches around the world today.  This is what the creed says:

I believe in God, the Father Almighty,
the Maker of heaven and earth,
and in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord:
Who was conceived by the Holy Ghost,
born of the virgin Mary,
suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified, dead, and buried;
He descended into hell.
The third day He arose again from the dead;
He ascended into heaven,
and sitteth on the right hand of God the Father Almighty;
from thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead.
I believe in the Holy Ghost;
the holy catholic church;
the communion of saints;
the forgiveness of sins;
the resurrection of the body;
and the life everlasting.
Amen.

This creed is great because it is full of universal truths of the Christian faith that all Christians have agreed on down through the ages.  I should say it is full of these universal truths that all agree upon, except one, “He descended into hell.” Most Christians confessing this creed stop at this part and think, “What does that even mean?”  So, we have a question on our hands don’t we?  Did Jesus descend into hell after the crucifixion?  If so, where does the Bible say that?  If not, where does the Bible say that, and where did Jesus go after He died?  Good questions!

Does the Bible say Jesus descended into hell after dying on the cross?  Some people have used 1 Peter 3:18-20 to say yes.  Peter says, “For Christ also died for sins once for all, the just for the unjust, so that He might bring us to God, having been put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit; in which also He went and made proclamation to the spirits now in prison, who once were disobedient, when the patience of God kept waiting in the days of Noah, during the construction of the ark, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through the water.” Those who use this claim that this verse clearly teaches  a descent into hell to preach to the spirits in prison (hell).  Is this a good reading?  No.  The REST of the verse says that the context of Jesus’ preaching to these spirits was in the days of Noah.  So how did Jesus descend into hell after the cross, in the days of Noah?  It doesn’t make sense.  The most satisfactory explanation of 1 Peter 3:19-20 was put forth by Augustine.  He said that the “passage refers not to something Christ did between His death and resurrection, but to what He did in the spiritual realm of existence, through the Spirit, at the time of Noah.  ‘Christ preached to the spirits in prison’ means Christ preached to people who are now spirits in prison when they were still persons on earth.” (Grudem’s Systematic Theology, 591) So can we use this verse to claim Jesus descended into hell?  No, we cannot.  Does the Bible allude to or say anywhere else that Jesus went into hell?  No, it does not.  So did Jesus descend into hell?  I think not.

1 Peter is clear, but does the Bible say Jesus did not descend into hell?  I think it does.  Wayne Grudem offers the following evidence to say so.  First, Jesus told the thief on the cross, “Today you will be with Me in paradise.” (Luke 23:43) This implies that Jesus’ spirit went immediately to paradise, or heaven, upon death.  If He went to hell, He could not have said this to the thief.  Second, Jesus said, “It is finished!” (John 19:30) on the cross.  This implies that Jesus’s suffering was over and the payment for sin was complete and done for all time, past, present, and future.  Therefore if the suffering is over and finished, there is no need to go to hell for further punishment.  Again, I think this shows that Jesus went straight to the Father’s side upon death.  Third, Jesus said, “Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit.” (Luke 23:46) This implies that Jesus’ spirit was in the hands of the Father directly after death; not in hell.  Just as Jesus’ body remained on earth while His spirit went straight to the Father upon His death, so too will our bodies remain here on earth while our spirits go straight to the Father upon our deaths.  I agree with Wayne Grudem when he says, “This is much greater comfort regarding death than could ever be given by any view of a descent into hell.” (page 594)

Alright, it’s clear that Jesus did not descend into hell for the above reasons; so were left with the question, why is this phrase kept in the Apostles Creed?  Well, some people say that it should stay in because it has simply been in the creed for hundreds of years and therefore we should not take it out.  But is it not true that an error is still an error no matter how old it is?  There is no Bible evidence that this phrase is true, it is not a universally agreed upon Christian truth, as all the other statements in the creed are, and it only causes confusion over its meaning.  I think it should be omitted from the creed for two reasons.  We should only confess what is true and Biblical, and we should only confess clear doctrine.

I realize that I am disagreeing with John Calvin, if you would like to read his take on this, go here.

Can You be Out of God’s Will?

I often hear people tell me, “You have to try to get into the center of God’s will” and then comment about someone who is not saying, “Their not in God’s will.”  I think a lot when people say these things to me, for one reason.  If God is absolutely sovereign (which He is!), it is possible to be out of His will?  Doesn’t Eph 1:11b say God “works all things after the counsel of His own will“?  So again I ask, if God “works all things after the counsel of His own will” than nothing works after the counsel of mine. right?  Yes.  Okay, than if nothing works after the counsel of my will, and all things work after the counsel of God’s will, can I ever be out of God’s will?  You see the issues going through my mind now don’t you.

This is a serious question, because if all things work according to God’s will, than what does that mean for sin?  Does God, in His sovereignty, allow me to sin?  Does God, in His sovereignty, allow others to sin?  In orthodox Christian theology, we have always recognized that the will of God is the ultimate cause of all things.  In this discussion there has also been a helpful distinction within the will of God, His decretive will, and His preceptive will.

The decretive will, or the will of decree, is the will in which God purposes or decrees whatever comes to pass.  No matter what language you use for it (causes, permits, allows, or ordains) it all means that God actively decrees all events, big or small, everywhere.  Some have called this the ’secret’ will of God, using verses like Deut. 29:29 to do so.  The preceptive will, or the will of precepts (commands), is the will in which God lays down the rule of life for His creatures, indicating the duties He has commaded them to do.  This rule is found in the Bible.

Back to our question: Can I be out of God’s will?  No, speaking in terms of His decretive will I am always going to be in the place God’s wants me to be, doing whatever it is that I am doing, good or bad.  Speaking in terms of His preceptive will, Yes I can be out of God’s will by my disobedience to God’s Word.  Now to the real question: if all things work according to God’s will, than what does that mean for sin?  Does God, in His sovereignty, allow me to sin?  Does God, in His sovereignty, allow others to sin?  The answer must be YES, God does allow me and others to sin (in His decretive will).  When God does this, we must take care to say that God does not tempt me to sin nor is God at fault for my sin (James 1:13-15).

Is this hard to swallow?  Yes for many reasons, one of which is that this shows that free-will is not an option for Bible believeing Christians (WHAT?!  Go here).  Listen to Augustine, he will calm your mind: “Evil men do many things contrary to God’s revealed (preceptive) will; but so great is His wisdom, and so inviolable His truth, that He directs all things into these channels which He foreknew (in His decretive will).”

Quotes like this have made verses like Matthew 10:29-31 very sweet to me.  It is here that I feast upon my sovereign God, who works all things out in the best possible way for my best possible good (Romans 8:28), and for His maximum glory!

He is No Longer Restless

Sorry I have not written lately, I have been back from our cruise for a couple of days and I am feeling a tad bit under the weather.

Anywho, on this day (August 28) in 430 AD, St. Augustine of Hippo died at 76.  He was the great early Latin Church Father and one of the most outstanding theological figures of the ages.  He is now living in what he looked forward to:

Thou hast made us for thyself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless till they find their rest in thee.

Before You Preach, Pray

Listen to Augustine’s words to preachers:  they are well put and should be well heard.

And so our Christian orator, while he says what is just, and holy, and good (and he ought never to say anything else), does all he can to be heard with intelligence, with pleasure, and with obedience; and he need not doubt that if he succeed in this object, and so far as he succeeds, he will succeed more by piety in prayer than by gifts of oratory; and so he ought to pray for himself, and for those he is about to address, before he attempts to speak. And when the hour is come that he must speak, he ought, before he opens his mouth, to lift up his thirsty soul to God, to drink in what he is about to pour forth, and to be himself filled with what he is about to distribute.