All Articles For Huizinga, Brian

Repentance and remission: The issue Having thoroughly explained repentance and God’s sovereign grace in bringing us to repentance, we come to the heart of the issue in the disputed matter that came to the PRC synods. Is there a God-worked activity of the believer that precedes a certain, specific manifestation of God’s mercy? In this case, the God-worked activity of the believer is repentance. The certain, specific manifestation of God’s mercy is remission. Is it permissible to teach that repentance precedes remission? Or, would that necessarily be false doctrine, some kind of conditional theology? The issue is order, mere order....

Let’s go up to 35,000 feet to see the lay of the land. There are really two issues in the dispute over repentance. One: what is repentance? Two: how does it relate to remission? Is it permissible to teach that repentance precedes remission or does that put man before God, so that the pardoning God must wait upon the penitent sinner? The second issue is the main issue of dispute. Protests to synod said: repentance cannot be prior to remission, because repentance is a good work and good works always come after blessings of salvation. Synod rejected the protests because...

Last time, (Dec. 15), I defined repentance as the believer’s sorrowful turn from sin unto God in the seeking of remission. Now I want to go to the Scriptures to elaborate. A right understanding First of all, genuine repentance begins in the renewed mind as the seat of true spiritual knowledge and understanding. This is evident from one of the key biblical words for repentance (metanoia) which, as you might recall, means, “change of mind.” The turning of repentance commences when the spiritually enlightened mind apprehends both the awful reality of sin and the wonder of God’s mercy in Christ....

A definition I am not aware of any carefully and comprehensively constructed exposition of the biblical concept of repentance produced in the history of the PRC. From one point of view, the absence of such a work is not entirely surprising because repentance is one of the elementary principles of the doctrine of Christ, the renewed instruction in which the writer to the Hebrews deems unnecessary (Heb. 6:1). Yet sometimes we must revisit and sharpen, and perhaps even correct, our understanding of the elementary principles. Surely one of the good and praiseworthy purposes of our faithful God in laying His...

Distinguishing repentance and good works Before I explain the concept of repentance, I want to demonstrate that repentance and good works of obedience should be distinguished as stated in one part of the decision of Synod 2021. I also want to show that this distinction is important in light of the connection that Scripture makes between repentance and remission. In treating a protest against the decisions of Synod 2020, Synod 2021 demonstrated that the protest contained doctrinal misunderstandings, one of which was: 2) __________ fails to distinguish repentance and good works of obedience. a) The Bible distinguishes between repentance and...

Previous article in this series: July, 2021, p. 424. Most recently in this series I have expounded the biblical concept of the righteousness of Christ which is imputed to us in justification. As our representative head, Jesus came under the law, was rendered guilty in our place, and suffered all the punishment that the law threatens for our transgressions. He suffered all the punishment we deserve for our sins. On our behalf He also rendered in full all the obedience that the law demands for the satisfaction of God’s justice. He provided all the obedience necessary for us to be...

Previous article in this series: April 15, 2021, p. 327. The testimony of the gospels The obedience of Christ comprehends the totality of the Father’s will as it was perfectly performed by Christ, the Servant of Jehovah, during His vicarious life on earth. Last time we demonstrated that the Scriptures and Reformed confessions teach that Christ’s perfect, lifelong obedience is imputed to our account in justification as our righteousness before God. Romans 5:19 teaches, “For as by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous.” Even as many are reckoned...

What justification is When God justifies the guilty, elect sinner by imputing to him the righteousness of Christ, He not only subtracts something from the sinner’s account but He also adds to it. The Reformed faith teaches that in the act of justification God executes a kind of legal subtraction in clearing the sinner’s account of all his guilt. God pardons the sinner by canceling all his debts and declaring, “I forgive you. It is as if you never had had nor committed any sin” (cf. Heidelberg Catechism, LD 23). In the one act of justification, God also executes a...

Previous article in this series: December 1, 2020, p. 106. Our last two articles served as an interlude of sorts in which we demonstrated that the doctrine of justification by faith alone does not minimize the importance of a holy life of good works. About this holy life we will have much more to say when in due time we take up a consideration of the relation between good works and sanctification. We concluded last time by affirming the teaching of the Heidelberg Catechism that the believer’s good works serve as confirming evidence to him that his faith is genuine...

We have been observing the publican of Jesus’ parable in Luke 18:14 who went down to his house justified. This man represents every justified believer. The justified believer walks home in the way of or on the path of obedience, and on this path of obedience he enjoys walking in communion with God his Friend. We now turn our focus to another closely related element of the justified believer’s walk: his assurance of salvation. Assurance of salvation Assurance is the believer’s conscious certainty of heart that Jehovah God, who loves and saves sinners, loves and saves him. Assurance is always...