Salvation and Godly Rule

Salvation By Slavery

Professor: Dr. R.J. Rushdoony

Subject: Salvation By Slavery

Lesson: Change

Genre: Speech

Track: 20

Dictation Name: RR136K20

Location/Venue:

Year: 1960’s-1970’s

Let’s worship God. Lord, I have loved the habitation of thy house and the place where thine honour dwelleth. I was glad when they said to me Let us go into the house of the Lord. Praise ye the Lord. Sing unto the Lord a new song and his praise in the congregation of saints, for the Lord taketh pleasure in his people. He will beautiful the meek with salvation. Let us pray.

Our Lord and our God, who of thy grace and mercy hast made all things and hast made us for thyself, we thank thee that thou hast surrounded us with thy mercies and blessings. We thank thee that thou hast so often been good to us who often cannot be good to ourselves, and so our God, we praise thee. We give thee thanks for all the blessings which are ours, for this country, and for its heritage. We pray, our Father, that thou wouldst strengthen us by thy word and by thy Spirit, that we may use these thy gifts for thy praise and glory, and go forth as conquerors in thy name. Bless us in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Our scripture lesson is from Galatians 2:3-5, and our subject: Salvation By Slavery. Our concern is just with these three verses, which are set in the midst of a long passage which is a good deal of the book of Galatians, in which St. Paul defends himself against those who claim that he is a perverter of the faith, that instead of being an apostle, he is a fraud, a false apostle, a perverter of the faith. This was the charge against St. Paul, and Galatians is his defense. Unfortunately, not the only time St. Paul had to so defend himself. Galatians 2:3-5. “But neither Titus, who was with me, being a Greek, was compelled to be circumcised: and that because of false brethren unawares brought in, who came in privily to spy out our liberty which we have in Christ Jesus, that they might bring us into bondage: to whom we gave place by subjection, no, not for an hour; that the truth of the gospel might continue with you.”

It’s something of a start to see Paul presented as he tells us he was, as a perverter of the faith, as supposedly under condemnation by all good Christians elsewhere, but this is precisely what the Galatians were told, and we know on other occasions that other churches, other Christians were told the same thing, and St. Paul was put in the unhappy position of having to defend his integrity.

St. Paul answers this charge very plainly. The verses I have just read I am going to reread in Lenski’s translation, which is not a particularly good one just for the purposes of commentary, but it is, while offered, still very literal. Lenski renders the verses thus: “But not even Titus, the one with me, although he was a Greek, was compelled to be circumcised even on account of the pseudo-brethren sneakingly brought in, such as sneakingly came in to spy out our liberty which we have in Christ Jesus in order that they might completely enslave us, to whom we yielded no not for an hour by way of the submission they demanded, in order that the truth of the gospel might continue on for you.”

Now, St. Paul here contrasts two conditions: Christian liberty, freedom in Christ versus slavery. The purpose of his enemies he says is complete enslavement. This is why Lenski’s translation at this point is very good. In order that they might completely enslave you. There are no shadows in St. Paul’s picture. On the one hand, there is freedom in Christ. On the other hand, complete slavery, in terms of these false of pseudo brethren.

Now, is St. Paul overstating the enemy’s position? Is he so carried away in the heat of the controversy that like most of us so often do when we get angry, we tend to become a little louder and more positive, and this is an angry letter. St. Paul is angry, with good reason. Who would, having been so faithful to Christ, and having suffered for Christ’s sake repeatedly, take kindly to the suggestion that he was a perverter of the faith? Was St. Paul overstating it? Well, our first answer must be this is the inspired word of God. It is more than St. Paul who is here speaking. We must therefore, say that St. Paul was not overstating the case.

Then we can ask, why should anyone believe in slavery as a way of salvation? St. Paul says they do. Do people so believe? Again, scripture says that people do. They don’t call it slavery, but they do believe in slavery as salvation. I think some of our politicians have found out lately how true that is. Even the democrats, including some of the most liberal newspaper men felt that McGovern was making a fool of himself early in the campaign with the extravagant promises he made, promises which called for fantastic tax bills and the virtual enslavement of the people, but to their horror, the people went for it. So, people obviously do like slavery when it is given another label, when they aren’t brought face to face with what it means, and even then, they will insist on calling black, white.

Let’s examine this matter theologically, so that we can see what St. Paul has in mind when he says this is the choice. St. Paul speaks again of men having been delivered from the Spirit of bondage in Romans 8:15, or the Spirit of slavery, and again and again in various passages, St. Paul says, “This is the contrast.” Slavery as a plan of salvation as against Jesus Christ. Now, to understand this, let’s turn away from this question to another question that people so often raise. There’s no denying that there are fearful evils in the world. There is no denying some of the things that go on are staggering to the imagination in their monstrosity. Just in the past few days, I read the account of some of the unrepeatable tortures to which people are subjected in communist prisons. Certainly Wurmbrand has reported some that parallel them. The reaction of many people is Why does God allow so much evil, or any evil, to prevail? Why does He not make it impossible? Now, of course, we can say this would immediately eliminate freedom, the freedom of man which is a secondary freedom, a creation in which it is not possible for man to sin, or to reap the whirlwind for his sins is a creation in which man cannot exist. Man is created in the image of God. That is, he is created with the possibility of presuming on that image, of assuming that the image is the reality of the godhead rather than simply the communicable attributes of the godhead.

Thus, when God created man in His image, He did not give to man the incommunicable attributes of His deity. That is, His eternity, His deity, His omniscience, His omnipotence, and so on, but He did give the communicable attributes; knowledge, righteousness, holiness, dominion, and man can presume on that image to claim that which cannot be his, but some will object, Why did not God predestine man to be man without evil, suffering, and death? Then he would not have created man in His image.

Moreover, God predestined man in terms of His sovereign counsel and foreknowledge. He saw the possibilities. “Whom He did foreknow He also did predestinate.” Romans 8:28 tells us. What this means is that there are no possibilities outside of God. God’s foreknowledge therefore, contrary to those who try to deny predestination and insist on only foreknowledge has no reference to any possibilities within man which God supposedly foresaw and recognized. All the possibilities in the universe. All the possibilities in man are the work of God or else God is not God. The only possibilities in the universe and in man are God-given possibilities.

Now some have tried to deal with passages like Romans 8:29 without reference to this fact. Thus, Sanday{?} writing a generation or so ago, said in part concerning the word “predestinate” in Romans 8:29, “This is the term which seems most to interfere with human free will. Foreknowledge does not interfere with free will because the foreknowledge, though prior in point of time, is posterior in the order of causation to the act of choice. A man does not choose a certain action because it is foreknown, but it is foreknown because he will choose it. Predestination appears to involve a more rigorous necessity. All we can say is that it must not be interpreted in any sense that excludes free will.” In other words, for him, as he goes on to say, free will is the starting point. The free will of man, not God and the free will of God. So, Sanday ends up with man, ultimately, and progressively as the years went on, he became more and more humanist, and less and less even a seeming Christian. For Sanday{?}, the possibilities are in man. For the Bible, all possibilities are only in God, and the world of possibilities rests on God’s good pleasure, ultimately, but those who resent God’s sovereignty and find His world of possibilities not to their taste, want to be their own god and remake the world to exclude sin, suffering, and death. The only possibilities in the world they want must be good ones. It’s a terrible thing in their eyes that man should have possibilities which lead to consequences that are bad as well as good, but man does not become God by playing at it. He is always a creature, and his attempt to play God is sin, and sin is slavery.

As a result, because men outside of Christ are sinners, their idea of salvation looks very much like slavery because it is slavery. But very few are honest enough to say so. Once in awhile, one of them are.

I quoted, a few weeks ago Leopold Fermand{?}, the communist who has come to this country, and here Fermand{?} cites, in one of his writings, a socialist from a communist country whom he visited with in Paris, and when they got to a discussion of the basic issues, he found that this communist very candid finally.

“I do not want freedom,” a visitor from Eastern Europe told me in Paris. “I’m afraid of it. I feel old and tired. Freedom means choice, the possibility of estimating and the necessity to select. It also means constant effort in judging and evaluating life’s ways, attitudes, and stands. It opens the perennial question Who am I and where go I? which can be answered in so many ways that it gives me a headache. In communist Eastern Europe, I’m perfectly aware of who I am and what I can or cannot do, which is the perimeter of my functions and desires. My telephone is bugged, but I know it. It’s a blessed certitude, and I’m not exposed to improper temptations of intimacy. Freedom here [in Paris] is a nauseous multitude of shampoos among which I have to choose. I don’t want so many. I want one under government control, very difficult to find and obtain. My needs and wishes then make sense. This we call peace of mind.”

Now, this is an honest statement which many share but very few voice. For most people, salvation is slavery. In some form or another, to a state, to a controlling spouse; husband or wife, to a group, to an overlord of some form. Paul was thus right. Whoever his enemies, in this case, Judeizers{?}. In other cases, other men. Whatever they used was an instrument. The Judaizers{?} misused the law. They said the law was the way of salvation when Paul held it to be under God the way of sanctification. Others were Gnostics, and made knowledge the way of salvation. There were a multiplicity of people, all of them seeking to enslave man. What they offered under the facade, under the instrument, was a plan of salvation which was, and St. Paul was right, complete enslavement, complete enslavement. Their gospel is the overthrow, St. Paul said, of “our liberty which we have in Christ Jesus, in order that they might completely enslave us.”

In Jesus Christ, man is restored to dominion. Man is restored to a world in which he must exercise responsibility, in which he must grow, in which he must have a calling under God and discharge his responsibilities in every area of life faithfully in terms of God’s law. This is liberty, liberty in Christ, liberty again to fulfill the requirements of the image of God, and Paul was right. The opponents of the gospel seek to enslave man, and their program is one of slavery, and of course, we are surrounded today with all kinds of gospels, in the pulpit and out of the pulpit, in the schools, and in the political arena, which offers us salvation by slavery, and there will be no change in that program as long as man is a sinner. He will give it a variety of labels but he will still be looking for salvation by slavery. He will not break the bondage of that doctrine of slavery until he is a free man in Christ, and this is why, of necessity, and in every area of life there must be a Christian emphasis or there will be enslavement, and today we are seeing enslavement, very rapid enslavement, and men cheering because it is their gospel. It is their plan of salvation.

But we who are the Lord’s have been called to the glorious liberty of the Sons of God. St. Paul said that when he was confronted with these apostles of slavery, he did not give them place by subjection, no, not for an hour, that the truth of the Gospel might continue with you. It is out calling today, not to give place to the apostles of slavery. Not for an hour, not for a minute, and to know that we have been called by our Lord to victory, not to slavery, and if “God be for us, who can be against us?” Let us pray.

Almighty God, our heavenly Father, We give thanks unto thee that, generations ago, our forefathers in this country, in thy name and to thy glory, established first of all their freedom in Christ, and their freedom then in church, state, home, school, and every area of life. Thou Lord, God of Hosts, our generation has gone awhoring{?} after other gods, and it has sought salvation in slavery and not in thee. O Lord, our God, have mercy upon us, and cause the light of our salvation to shine abroad in our midst and make us strong in the defense of thy word, and the propagation of thy truth and thy saving power in every area of life, that we may again be a people dedicated to thy word, rejoicing in salvation through the atoning blood of Christ, and making manifest His dominion in church, state, home, school, work, in all things. Bless us to this purpose in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Are there any questions now, first of all, with respect to our lesson? Yes?

[Audience] {?} discussion, {?} consideration of {?} and of {?} is this {?}

[Rushdoony] Well, not quite. The point is this: God’s sovereignty is absolute. Man’s is relative. God’s freedom is absolute, and primary, and man’s is relative and secondary. Thus, man has freedom, but it’s the freedom of a creature, not the freedom of God. Ultimately, every aspect of our life is totally the work of God, but our freedom is a secondary freedom because man is not a first cause, not God, but a second cause. Now, in a sense, time does come into the picture and God is from all eternity and has ordained all things and man is a creature of God and a creature of that area of God’s creation, which is time. Any other questions?

[Audience] {?} we are enslaved to God, in a sense{?} no matter what way we go {?} salvation.

[Rushdoony] Yes, and that’s why you have the ancient response, “In thy service is perfect freedom,” you see. Because God has made us for Himself, and we are most free when we most serve Him. Just as I’ve used this, it’s a very clumsy illustration, a Ford carburetor will not work in a Cadillac. It isn’t made for it. A Ford carburetor is most itself when it is in a Ford, and so we are truly ourselves, truly free, when we are most in the service of God. This is what the ancient church fathers very clearly recognized, and in many of the great statements of their faith, they emphasized that in God’s service is perfect freedom. Our hearts are restless until they rest in thee, St. Augustine said, out of his own experience.

[Audience] We are also subject to a number of experiences in our life, we don’t’ know which way to go unless God {?}

[Rushdoony] Of course, we’re not perfectly sanctified in this life, and our choices are often, in the short term, wrong, but in the long term we have this assurance, that God makes all things work together for good to them that love him, to “them that are the called according to his purpose.” Romans 8:29. So, in the blessed providence of God, everything, our errors as well as our sins, he makes work together for good, and that’s a remarkable and a glorious fact. Any other questions? Yes?

[Audience] {?} How do you answer the fact that the Christian word for “God” is not available, nor recognized by people {?} 1500 years?

[Rushdoony] Yes. Well, first of all, we must not underestimate the extent to which the word “God” was available. It’s been overstated very definitely when people say it was not available. Second, as St. Paul makes clear in Romans 1, in verse 18-20, “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold [or hold down, very literally, the Greek, who suppress] the truth in unrighteousness; because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them. For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse.” So, St. Paul says, not only is the Bible the revelation of God, but you and I are, and the world around us is all a revelation, and everything that God declares in this word concerning himself, and salvation, is manifest in us. It’s emphasized. “That which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them,” but, as he says in the previous verse, they “hold [or hold down] the truth in unrighteousness.” So, St. Paul’s emphatically saying that when God created man in the beginning, he gave to man the entire knowledge concerning himself and the way of salvation as a part of his being, so that as long as man is alive, he knows God, he knows what God requires of him, that God requires that he be saved, and that he serve God, but man holds it down, he suppresses it, in unrighteousness, so that the sinner knows these things but refuses to admit them.

So, God subsequently began to give a written word. Now, the written word, of course, comes to us without our sin holding it down, so it hits us, very clearly, so we have a witness within us, the witness around us, and then the witness of the word directly and infallibly confronting us. So, St. Paul says all men are without excuse. There is not a single man anywhere who has not had this witness emblazed upon the tables of his heart.

[Audience] {?}

[Rushdoony] Yes. Now, St. Paul also says men try to burn their conscience with their sins as with a hot iron. Their skin is scarred to make it less sensitive, but it’s always there. Are there any other questions in our lesson? Well, we have one announcement. It’s the second of July so it isn’t too long before our Christian school seminar, on the 17th and 18th, Monday and Tuesday and on the evening of the 18th, Tuesday evening at 7:00 p.m., Knott’s Berry Farm, the chicken dinner restaurant. The Reverend Robert L. Foburn{?} will speak on “Crisis in Education.” I think this is an especially important dinner meeting because, as I have said so many times, the Christian school movement is the most important single area of American life today. The area in which we are winning. It is all the more important that we understand the issues in this area so that we are prepared to do something about them. I think it is significant that the enemy is trying to strike at this area, and that it is becoming a public issue. Some of you may have noticed that this Friday, the first editorial in the Herald Examiner attacked the move in the legislature to introduce any kind of control of Christian and private schools, and it was a very forthright and powerful statement, for which we have cause to be grateful, but it is indicative of the growing strength of the movement and the defenders it is beginning to gain. I feel therefore, that it is especially important for us to know more about these crises and be better equipped, as Christians and as citizens, to understand and to make a stand in terms of this movement. Those of you who have not made your registrations, the blanks are in the back on the lectern, and you can either mail them to Mrs. Thurston or hand them today to Mrs. Bizzard. Yes?

[Audience] Would you give that {?}

[Rushdoony] Yes, the original mailing was incorrect. It was 6:00 and it will be 7:00. Let’s bow our heads now for the benediction.

And now go in peace. God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost bless you and keep you, guide and protect you this day and always. Amen.

End of tape