Foundations of Social Order

Forgiveness of Sins

Professor: Dr. R.J. Rushdoony

Subject: Sociology

Lesson: Forgiveness of Sins

Genre: Speech

Track: 137`

Dictation Name: RR126J18

Location/Venue:

Year: 1960’s-1970’s

The forgiveness of sins is a basic doctrine of the Christian faith, one of the Articles of Faith cited by the Apostles Creed. The Nicene Creed declares that knowledge won by {?} for the remission of sins. From beginning to end, this is proclaimed as the heart of the Gospel. It is the Good News, because in Jesus Christ through his atoning work, man finds forgiveness of sins.

In the world of humanism, the word “forgiveness” refers to an emotional and a personal act. It depends on how we feel about someone, whether we forgive him or not. This concept has nothing to do with the biblical doctrine of forgiveness. The biblical doctrine of forgiveness, in fact, the Greek word which is translated as forgiveness in the New Testament is entirely a judicial, or legal, term. It has reference to a court of law, and it only and always means something with reference to the proceedings to a court of law. It has two basic meanings.

First, charges dropped because satisfaction has been rendered. Now this makes it clear that forgiveness has reference to a guilty person. The person on trial is clearly and unquestionably guilty. The charges are dropped only because satisfaction has been rendered, the death penalty has been executed, or restitution has been made.

The second meaning, a subordinate one, charges deferred for the time being. The person is guilty, but the hearing is deferred fore a time, or rather, the passing of the sentence. There is one instance only, in the New Testament, of the usage in the second sense. When our Lord, on the cross, said, “Father, (speaking of the Roman soldiers) forgive them (defer the charges for the time being) for they know not what they do.” Forgiveness therefore, has reference to a court of law and in the physical sense entirely, to God’s court of law, to God’s judgment seat, and to what is done to guilty men who find their peace with God through Jesus Christ.

Forgiveness, therefore, in the biblical sense, is entirely about grace through Jesus Christ. The person of the believer is accepted as righteous not because of what he has done, but because of what Christ has done, not because the believer himself is able to make restitution. He is under sentence of death, but because Christ has paid the penalty.

The implications of this doctrine were very beautifully put into poetry some few years back by a Canadian poet. The title of her poem was My Advocate.

“I sinned. And straightway, post-haste, Satan flew

Before the presence of the most high God,

And made a railing accusation there.

He said, ‘This soul, this thing of clay and sod,

Has sinned. 'Tis true that he has named Thy name,

But I demand his death, for Thou hast said,

'The soul that sinneth, it shall die.'

Shall not Thy sentence be fulfilled?

Is justice dead?

Send now this wretched sinner to his doom.

What other thing can righteous ruler do?

"And thus he did accuse me day and night,

And every word he spoke, O God, was true!

Then quickly One rose up from God's right hand,

Before Whose glory angels veiled their eyes. He spoke,

‘Each jot and tittle of the law

Must be fulfilled; the guilty sinner dies!

But wait -- suppose his guilt were all transferred

To Me, and that I paid his penalty!

Behold My hands, My side, My feet! One day

I was made sin for him, and died that he

Might be presented, faultless, at Thy throne!’

And Satan flew away. Full well he knew

That he could not prevail against such love,

For every word my dear Lord spoke was true!”

Forgiveness is the act of God to Jesus Christ. Forgiveness means that the sentence of death against man has been dropped, because satisfaction has been rendered.

Now, the unregenerate sinner is concerned with forgiveness, but not of sin but rather of the consequence, of the penalty of sin. He wants the charges to be dropped without satisfaction, freedom granted to him to sin {?}, and so he wants something that will tell him that sin is not {?} that it does not destroy and that a man can be forgiven without grace, without repentance, and without regeneration, and forgiveness in this sense has played an important part in history, and many political figures have offered it.

A classic example, of course, is Julius Caesar, who gained power in the course of Rome’s civil wars precisely because he offered Pementhia{?}, because the offer to forgive and forget all sins and restore people to their previous estate without any penalty for their sin. Indeed, Caesar was able to overlook the sin of men but he could not change their hearts, and the very men whom he forgave and restored to their high places were the men who assassinated him. All he had done was to give them a subsidy in their sin, and today, in effect, this is our program today. We, too, are offering forgiveness of sins to criminals, to hoodlums, to all on every side, telling them that sin is of no consequence. Go and sin some more, and prepare the way for our national execution.

Every political attempt to forgive sins without grace, without salvation, has only increased lawlessness and chaos and become a subsidy to sin, and a means to the triumph of sin. We should not be surprised that sin is subsidized in political circles, because political saviors have a vested interest in sin. Sin is always a major instrument of political power. To examine how this is true and why this is true, first of all, blackmail is a major instrument of power. We know from long years of experience, how the communist countries have made a practice of compromising diplomats and military men in various acts of immorality and perversion in order that they might blackmail them. We know also that this sort of thing has been done extensively in this country as a means to political power. So that men in high places, the very top in Washington, in Congress, in the Cabinet, in the Pentagon, in state and local levels are regularly compromised and then blackmailed as a means of controlling them, and various unsavory characters have made this their chief and central instrument of political power.

Secondly, political saviors have a vested interest in sin, and therefore, subsidize religion because religion is necessary for political power. For men to be blackmailed, sin must be reprehensible to the public. So that the sinners act can, if they are exposed, destroy or endanger his career. After all, how can you blackmail and person, how can you exercise power and control over him if everyone accept fornication and adultery, and perversion as though there were nothing wrong with it. So, you must have sufficient religion but not sound religion to make people feel that sin is sinful.

Hence, religion must preach moralism, not salvation. It must make sin socially reprehensible without liberating men from it, without declaring that when the sinner comes to Jesus Christ, his sins are all forgiven, for as St. Paul declared, “There is therefore now no condemnation for them that are in Christ Jesus.”

But, the kind of religion the state favors is that where the churches, the evangelists, the chaplains, will make sinners feel guilty, but do not deliver men into God’s liberty and grace, will not proclaim the forgiveness of sins through the atoning blood of Jesus Christ, and so the state has a vested interest in apostate religion, to make sin terrible but release from sin impossible.

Third, the state has a vested interest in sin, because sinners are slaves, because a guilty conscience makes men more readily controlled. A man with a guilty conscience is not a free man. He is in bondage, and his life reveals his inner flavor. Through the years as a pastor, I have seen some fearful episodes where wives have worked night and day to try to push their husband into sin, into adultery, for one reason. Knowing that a guilty conscience would make them more amenable to control, and figuring this would be the way they could control their husbands, and cases where husbands have done the same, tried to push their wives into adultery so that thereby, with their guilty conscience, they will exercise less control over their husband’s conduct. Sin enslaves men. It binds their hands so that they are nor morally free to condemn that which is evil, and to stand up boldly for that which is righteous. As Shakespeare said, “Conscience does make cowards of us all.”

The apostate therefore, works to promote immorality as a necessity and declares that human liberty involves the freedom to sin, and so we have the doctrine promulgated today, increasingly, by the courts and by the pulpit, that the freedom to commit various acts of perversion, the freedom to be adulteress{?}, the freedom to fornicate, the freedom to have pornography are all enlargements of man’s liberty, knowing full well that these are the acts that enslave men. So, the courts tell us on the one hand how much they are enlarging our liberty, whereas, on the other hand, they are steadily destroying them, by working to destroy Christianity and increase statism.

Every time in history that a power state has moved toward totalitarian controls, it has dangled this pseudo-liberty of sexual license before the people, persuading them that this represents an enlargement of liberty, even as it, through growing totalitarianism, enslaves them.

We see today the courts, the schools, the pulpit, interpreting liberty as license, and liberty from Christianity as true liberty. The new freedom of today simply produces the old slave {?}. Where there is no forgiveness of sins, there is the condoning of sin, and when men are sinners, they hate judgment. They want sin to escape judgment, and so they turn on the law and they seek to destroy it. They seek to take away the penalty of death, and you have a campaign in every such period of history against capital punishment, against laws concerning abortion, against severity of punishment, so-called, and a coddling of criminals is advocated.

Today, in our criminal courts, the criminal has more rights than the person who is the victim of the crime. In our civil courts, the situation is not too different. About twenty years ago, a survey in New York County revealed that in the civil courts, where defrauded persons had secured a judgment, only 7% were able to collect on that judgment and the situation is far worse today. In other words, even when a person wins in a civil court, the court gives him no help toward collecting his judgment. This is not surprising. Where there is no forgiveness of sins, where men have not found forgiveness in and through Jesus Christ, there is the condoning of sins because men want to break the backbone of the law since they themselves are guilty sinners.

Moreover, where there is no forgiveness of sins, there is bondage to sin. {?} to rebel against evil, against injustice, and they simply complain. They are impotent. They are surrounded by evil, but they are slaves within to sin, and they can only groan and complain unto it. They can do nothing about it.

St. Paul declared the Hebrew in Hebrews 10:15-25 that the remission gave to the believer boldness in relationship to God, because the believer, being now a member of Jesus Christ, came to God not in himself, but in the perfect righteousness of Jesus Christ, so that when we are members of Christ, God sees not us in all our sins and shortcomings, but the perfect righteousness of Jesus Christ, so that we can come to God in all boldness in Jesus name, having, as St. Paul declared, “full assurance of faith,” knowing that he hears us and that we are wholly acceptable in him who is our Lord.

This is the glorious fact of the forgiveness of sins. It gives us boldness in relationship to God, and if it gives us boldness in relationship to God, how much more so boldness in relationship to men? It frees men from the penalty of sin and death, and from the fear of men. The sinner lives in fear of God and man. Adam and Eve hid themselves from God and came from God and man, and sinners through the centuries have, by their guilt, sought a hiding place from God, and also from man. The modern hiding place of the sinner is in the apostate churches. They clothe themselves in the modern fig leaf, the modern apostate church, or else they hide in unbelief. They assume that if they say “there is no God,” somehow God will go away and their guilty conscience also, but the forgiveness of sins restores, as Paul told the Hebrews, man into communion with God, and to his rightful place as lord of the earth under God. It is man’s liberation from God’s judgment and from the sentence of death which is written even in his own heart. It is man’s restoration into his calling as man, and his restoration also into clear thinking. The forgiveness of sins is the act primarily of the triune God. As the scribe said rightfully in Mark 2:6-12, “Who can forgive sins but God only?” and Jesus accepted the challenge and demonstrated by his miracle, as well as by his proclamation of the forgiveness of sins that, indeed, he was very God of very God, and so he alone had the power to forgive sins.

There can be no human forgiveness on humanistic grounds, such as love or emotionalism, or sentimentalism, or {?} for peace. Forgiveness can only be on God’s grounds, and therefore, our Lord said repeatedly that the church must bind whosoever sins cannot be forgiven, according to the word of God, and they are then bound in heaven, and it must release and can release whosoever sins. The word of God permits us to release, they are then released, or loosed, in heaven. Forgiveness can only be on God’s terms, never on man’s.

But universalism wants total forgiveness, total love, which means the denial of the fact of sin and the necessity for judgment. It means a total subsidy for sin and moral anarchism. It means therefore, perpetual bondage to sin, and a world in bondage to sin and death, but the forgiveness of sin is the ground of our liberty, of a glorious liberty of the sons of God, and it gives us boldness of access to the throne of grace, and boldness and power before him. Let us pray.

Almighty God, our heavenly Father, we give thanks unto thee that in Jesus Christ, our sins are forgiven, and we can come to thee with boldness and commit unto thee our every hope, our every need, ourselves, in the confidence, our Father, that we are wholly acceptable in the Beloved, even in Jesus Christ our Lord. Therefore, our Father, fill our hearts with thanksgiving and boldness that we may come unto thee to find rest and refreshing unto our souls, and might go forth to be more than conquerors through him that loved us, even Jesus Christ our Lord. In his name we pray. Amen.

Are there any questions now? Yes?

[Audience] {?}

[Rushdoony] We do not have a definite one. We are going to meet at Annette Maxwell’s until we can find something since we just learned of this, in fact, only yesterday. Plus, any help we can get will be appreciated.

[Audience] {?}

[Rushdoony] Are there any questions? Yes?

[Audience] {?} I’m not sure where it is, but the one where {?} he was the one sent, so {?} I’m not quite sure.

[Rushdoony] That’s right. That passage is in the Gospel According to St. John 8:1-11, and it’s a very significant episode. “They brought this woman, taken in adultery, and they said, Master, this woman was taken in adultery, in the very act. Now Moses in the law commanded us, that such should be stoned: but what sayest thou? This they said, tempting him, that they might have to accuse him.” Now, they report this was not justice in the situation. It was simply to put Jesus in a difficult spot. The Old Testament penalty for adultery was death, and the New Testament this was changed to making it a ground for divorce. Now, the Pharisees knew that, at that time, the whole matter was taken rather lively in Israel, that for him to have said the death penalty was required would have been to make himself immensely unpopular with the people, but if he refused to say so, they could say “He pretends to be for the law, but actually he has no respect for the law,” so they figured, either way, they were going to nail him on this situation, and Jesus said, “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her.” Now, this had reference to the law of witnesses. In the Mosaic law, a witness who perjured himself or was an accessory to the fact, or was involved in a similar crime, or didn’t come into the situation with clean hands, was liable to the same penalty as the person who he was testifying again. So, if you testified against a person whose sentence was going to be death, and you were found to be a perjured witness, you had the death sentence. If it were a case in which the restitution were say, $10,000, you paid $10,000. Now, to back up your testimony if you were a faithful and honest witness, you had to then assist in the execution. So, our Lord said to them, “Those of you who are not perjured or dishonest witnesses, who are without guilt, who have not committed adultery themselves, pick up and cast the first stone against her. Otherwise, I do not recognize you as a witness.”

In other words, what he did was to put the thing around them. “You’re accusing this woman of adultery, but you yourselves are adulterers, all of you. Therefore, every one of you are equally exposed to the death penalty,” and he didn’t deny the death penalty, so he said, “Cast the first stone, but be sure you’re innocent,” and so they left. “And they which heard it, being convicted by their own conscience, went out one by one.” For all they knew, he might have some evidence on them, you see. He was reading their hearts, but whatever it was, they didn’t want to stay around to be exposed. “And Jesus was left alone, and the woman standing in the midst. When Jesus had lifted up himself, and saw none but the woman, he said unto her, Woman, where are those thine accusers? hath no man condemned thee? She said, No man, Lord.” Now, she didn’t call him master or rabbi as they had done, {?} Lord, which means, God. In other words, she came there and recognized him for what he was, and believed on him, “And Jesus said unto her, Neither do I condemn thee.” Now that you believe on me, your sins are forgiven. Therefore, “Go, and sin no more.” So, our Lord said the death penalty stands, but let there be valid accusers, valid witnesses, and every one of you are guilty. You are not qualified, therefore, as witnesses, and when she turned to him, by faith, the equivocally. Yes?

[Audience] Not too long ago, I heard a {?} concerning sermons preached {?} in a Methodist church. {?} the advantages of adultery, {?} the sermon that was preached, and he used this text, and he said that there is {?} he said {?} verse, usually the {?} said that he wouldn’t condemn adultery, because it’s {?} really a terrible sin, and I’ve heard since, that the congregation did {?} the congregation {?}

[Rushdoony] Well, you see, simply by failing to interpret it in the obvious sense, and in terms of the biblical law, they pervert it. The sad fact is that this has had a very bad history, this passage, because in the early church, St. Augustine tells us, a lot of husbands didn’t want their wives to read this for fear they might feel that it would give them some excuse, so they would cut this part out of the Bible, and so St. Augustine said there is a great deal of Phariseeism on the part of husbands, and he spoke out against this. Well, you find that in the modern version, this is very often left out. In the Revised Standard Version, I believe, it is put into a footnote, but in many of your modern versions this is omitted. So it’s strange they both use it to deny the Gospel and then they use it to, well, they drop it entirely, because they know basically that it’s meaning is against them.

[Audience] There is another passage that is used by these apostate Christians, and many of the new modern thinkers, but in John 17:21, there Jesus was praying to God, and he said, “Neither pray I for these alone,” in verse 20, “Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word; that they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.” And this was interpreted last week to me, as being the verse that they use to prove that man has become God.

[Rushdoony] Well, what is very obviously said in the 20th verse makes clear: “Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word.” In other words, I’m praying for my disciples, but I’m also praying for those who, through their preaching, are going to believe on me. The believers to the end of time who, through the word of God, who now, having seen me, will still believe, “that they all may be one,” as thou, Father, are to me and I in thee, that they also may be one in us, that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.”

Now, there first, there is a condition of faith. Second, there is the union with God by faith. It is not a union of substance, but a community of life. Thus, when we speak of marriage, we say the twain shall be made one flesh, one life, but this does not mean that the man becomes a woman or the woman becomes a man. It refers to a community of life, and St. Paul, in Ephesians 5, which is essentially an interpretation of this same point, says that marriage is a type of relationship of Christ, and the church. Christ as the husband, the church as the bride, and it means a community of life. It does not mean that the church becomes Christ, but that they share a perfect community of life, so that here, what he is referring to is not the oneness of substance with the Father, but as their perfect communion between the Father and the Son. So, in the perfection of our faith, there will be perfect communion between us and Christ, and through Christ with God.

[Audience] I left one part of the explanation out. This person said that inasmuch as {?} through faith, he becomes a new man, a new person. Therefore, he is one with God, and therefore God {?}

[Rushdoony] Yes. Well, that of course, is nothing but heresy and blasphemy, because the essence of Christ’s work is to regenerate us, to remake us. We are reborn as men into the new humanity of Jesus Christ, and he is spoken of as the Second or Last Adam by Paul in 1 Corinthians 15, all those who are born of the first Adam are born unto sin and death, but of the Second Adam, Jesus Christ, when we are reborn again in him and his perfect humanity, we then are born again into life and righteousness. We do not become partakers of God’s substance, but of his grace. We have a community of life with him, not of substance, and of course, they know this. It’s a deliberate perversion of scripture. Yes?

[Audience] You spoke of {?} I don’t recall {?}

[Rushdoony] Yes. That’s in the Apocrypha, and it’s Susanna and the Elderly. Yes, and this was during the period of the captivity, and they perjured themselves, accusing Susanna of adultery, when they themselves had adulterous intensions with respect to her, and were aggravated because of her chastity, and so they themselves incurred the death penalty because of their perjured testimony. That’s a classic example, I’m glad you brought that up, because that’s from the Apocrypha. It deals very clearly how the penalty for perjury was death.

[Audience] Well, {?} I don’t think too many of the {?} the government, and I’m reminded {?} I have faith {?} and, so I find {?} that people who have {?} of faith {?}

[Rushdoony] Right, and these people who are perverters, their intent is only to destroy men’s souls. So, we simply have to stay away from such men as soon as we identify them, because there is no good thing in them, and we have to come to Christ with child-like faith. As Tertullian said, “I believe in order that I may understand.” That has been perverted, by the way. You find it commonly said that Tertullian declared, “I believe because it is {?}.” He never made any such statement. Never, but in almost any history book you will find that statement ascribed to Tertullian. He said, “I believe in order that I may understand,” which is a Christian attitude. Yes?

[Audience] {?} some people live their whole lives {?} what {?}

[Rushdoony] Yes, but I would put it this way: some people live their whole lives through and do not want to know what it is all about.

[Audience] {?}

[Rushdoony] Exactly.

[Audience] So, {?} epistemologically self-conscience {?}

[Rushdoony] It is deliberate. They know where the answer is.

[Audience] {?}

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Audience] {?} right?

[Rushdoony] Deliberately.

[Audience] {?} Epistemologically self-conscience.

[Rushdoony] Well, it is a form of epistemological self-consciousness. They know if they go in either direction they will be face-to-face with the implications of what they are. So they feel that if they blot out everything, they will never have to come to grips with the issue. For example, one prominent author of the twenties, in his latter years was living in his apartment in New York with his walls lined with books, which include the Bible, and people who knew him said that he was aware of the fact that he was facing death, that the answers to the questions were in the Bible, but he avoided deliberately ever coming to grips with the issue. Any reference to the fact of death, any reference to the fact of God, any discussion pro or con the issue, because he did not want to face it. He was running away from the certainty of the knowledge that he was going to face judgment, but he did not want to believe, but he didn’t want to acknowledge that he didn’t believe

And just this week, I was reading of a very prominent artist. There was a page of color illustrations of his paintings in Time Magazine, who, after he passed youth and began to approach middle age, began to be terrified by the fact that time was passing and he was ultimately going to die. Now, he didn’t want any answers concerning what was to face him, and he couldn’t even bear to be alone, so his mistress had to hold his hand if he went across the street, because he couldn’t bear to be alone to save the implications of his death{?} and he finally committed suicide because he was so afraid, not only of death, but ultimately of life.

[Audience] {?} human nature is such that there is a point in one’s life where he, really knowing {?} past that point as far as far as, sometimes you’ll see people that you know are in the prime{?} of their life. They know it, but they don’t care. Their hearts seem to be {?}. It’s not bothering them at all. {?} they might be {?} but {?} and {?} and they seem to be {?}

[Rushdoony] Yes, on the surface they seem to be, but they die hard. I’ve been at several hundred death beds. They die hard. They’re fighting all the way because they are afraid, and go into any rest home today, and Dorothy works in one. They won’t even mention the word “death.” When they die, they simply say, “Mrs. So-and-So has gone to the hospital,” and the insanity of their total flight from reality, from self-knowledge, is staggering. So they may {?} rather bravely while they’re still able, but there’s no braveness as they come close to it, because they do have a bad conscience, and their hearts are {?}

[Audience] {?} elderly people {?} talk less about that and {?} talks about it {?}. Now this is {?} a Christian {?} care less about {?} these people who are {?}

[Rushdoony] Only to this degree. Young people, as they are coming to grips, as they approach maturity, the issues of life, are very anxious often to settle the question for themselves. For some older people, it’s settled they believe, and that’s it. So they take what comes from God’s hands. I think one of the, as I mentioned earlier, the death bed is a very revealing place, and I have been by death beds that are so moving, they’re a thing of beauty, and found that he can only remember with joy, he can’t go out of them with grief, and this is the way many, many Christians die, especially those who from very early years have had a strong faith, and I think they very often surprise themselves with a serenity and power, and really a majesty {?}. Some of them are breathtaking, but you don’t see that in sinners. Some of them try to be flip, but of course, it doesn’t work. Yes?

[Audience] There’s {?} that I think very much of, and I {?} and the {?} a full scale {?} and {?} but I know this girl. I know she’s {?}

[Rushdoony] Well, whatever it is, she needs to have an expert that, someone who will in the name of the Holy Trinity, rid the place of any such disturbances, and that has been done many times.

[Audience] {?}

[Rushdoony] Sometimes it is and sometimes it isn’t.

[Audience] But some of these places like in Europe, and in Great Britain {?} castles are in the heart of it.

[Rushdoony] Well, you’ve read the book by {?}, Between God and Satan, he’s done a great deal of exorcism. Dr. {?} is one of the most prominent {?}

[Audience] {?}

[Audience] {?} I remember reading a book on {?} always the one who {?} I’m trying to think of what his name was.

[Rushdoony] Well, most prayer books and missals used to have a service of exorcism in them, but they’ve all been dropped, but it is interesting that as you get a return of apostasy, you have a return of such phenomena. So before too long we may see services of exorcism being resurrected. Very few priests or pastors have seen one {?}, for a few generations, and they may be digging them out.

[Audience] {?}

[Rushdoony] Well, hard to say. Such things vary, but there are such phenomenon. Yes?

[Audience] When we went north, we drove through the Haight Asbury area, and it’s a very bad experience, because it’s {?} those souls are lost. Now, are these people, are they ?}?

[Rushdoony] No, they are perverse to the “nth” degree, deliberately perverse.

[Audience] So young.

[Rushdoony] Yes, but we are sinners from birth, and with them it is a highly developed to a highly refined, a sophisticated a perversity, as thorough-going a denial of God and of law, and of moral order as possible, and that’s why they burn themselves out. They live a lifetime in a very short time, as even a very {?} director of our state mental institution has said, many of these people at 18 have a mental age of forty and fifty. They are burning themselves out so rapidly. I was interested, this last week, to learn that one of the top psychiatrists in the country has said, in psychiatry, of the Journal of Psychiatry, that the new morality is producing a tremendous amount of mental breakdowns, especially among girls. This is not surprising.

Well, our time is up and we stand dismissed.

End of tape