The
Word of God encourages us to look beyond the here and now. It gives us a
glimpse of "the last days" (Isaiah 2:2). God knows the end as well as
the beginning - and He show it to us (Isaiah 2:2). We say, "Come, let us
go up to the mountain of the Lord ... He will teach us about His ways
so that we may walk in His paths ... Come and let us walk in the Lord's
light" (Isaiah 2:3,5). Our world would be a very different world if more
people were looking to the Lord and learning from Him, turning to the
Lord and travelling with Him. What about you? Are you looking to the
Lord? Are you learning from Him? Are you turning to the Lord? Are you
travelling with Him? These are the questions that the Word of God puts
to every one of us. Will we give the answer of faith and obedience? I
cannot answer this question for you. You cannot answer it for me. Each
one of us must answer for ourselves. What will your answer be?
A response to a comment by G. R. Osborne on Berkouwer’s understanding of the doctrine of final perseverance
In his contribution to Clark Pinnock (editor), Grace Unlimited (1975), G. R. Osborne states that Berkouwer, in Faith and Perseverance, pp. 9-10, “speaks of the time less ness of the doctrine of final perseverance, founded on ‘the richness and abidingness of salvation” (p. 188, emphasis mine). This single-sentence comment on Berkouwer’s view hardly gives a fair indication of the type of thinking found in Chapter 1 of Berkouwer’s Faith and Perseverance - “Time li ness and Relevance” (pp. 9-14, emphasis mine). Berkouwer insists that “the living preaching of the Scriptures, which offer no metaphysical and theoretical views about … ‘permanency’ as an independent theme in itself, does nothing to encourage ‘a continuity which is … opposed in any way to the living nature of faith” (p. 13). Berkouwer stresses that “The perseverance of the saints is not primarily a theoretical problem but a confession of faith” (p. 14) and that “The perseverance of the saints is unbreakably connected wi...
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