Easy Believism Versus Lordship Salvation

Easy Believism Versus Lordship Salvation

El Kittim

Essentially, the teaching of “easy-believism” (which proponents prefer to call “free grace,” or some similar term), asserts that the faith which saves is mere intellectual assent to the truths of the gospel, accompanied by an appeal to Christ for salvation. According to proponents of the “free grace” movement (i.e. “easy-believism”), it is not required of the one appealing for salvation that he be willing to submit to the Lordship of Christ or to stop sinning.

This shallow understanding of salvation and the gospel, known as "easy-believism," stands in stark contrast to what the Bible teaches. To put it simply, the gospel call to faith presupposes that sinners must repent of their sin and yield to Christ's authority. This, in a nutshell, is what is commonly referred to as lordship salvation.

Question:

Can a person receive Jesus as his/her Savior without receiving Him as his/her Lord?

Easy believism says, yes.

Lordship salvation says, no.

What do you say?

Christ Says, “I Am Coming like a Thief”: In Other Words, like a Criminal

By Author Eli Kittim

The first point I’d like to make is that “there is no one who understands” Scripture (Rom. 3:11). Deuteronomy 21 declares that “someone guilty of a capital offense is put to death and their body is exposed on a pole” (v. 22), and further states that “anyone who is hung on a pole is under God’s curse” (v. 23). And yet, Galatians 3:13 maintains that “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: ‘Cursed is everyone who is hung on a pole.’” Moreover, Christ explicitly identifies himself with the snake mentioned in the Book of Numbers when he says, “Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up” (Jn. 3:14). Remember that the snake gave life, but only to those who beheld it: “So Moses made a bronze snake and put it up on a pole. Then when anyone was bitten by a snake and looked at the bronze snake, they lived” (Num. 21:9). In other words, Christ is portrayed as a criminal (i.e., a snake, which represents a sinner) who is under God’s curse.

In his commentary on the Letter to the Galatians, Martin Luther wrote:

“All the prophets of old said that Christ should be the greatest transgressor, murderer, adulterer, thief, blasphemer that ever was or ever could be on earth. When he took the sins of the whole world upon himself, Christ was no longer an innocent person. . . . In short, Christ was charged with the sins of all men, that he should pay for them with his own blood. The curse struck him. The Law found him among sinners. He was not only in the company of sinners. He had gone so far as to invest himself with the flesh and blood of sinners. So the Law judged and hanged him for a sinner.”

This means that all the sins that have ever been committed throughout human history are put on the back of Jesus. Pastor Matt Richard writes,

“And then to top it off God judged Jesus to be GUILTY for the whole package. . . . The weight of that, the horror, the dread and the enormity of it all is incomprehensible. It caused Jesus to cry out to his Father, ‘My God.... Why have you forsaken me?’ . . . . As repulsive as it may sound to us, only in this truth—that Jesus became SIN—is our hope and our salvation found.”

Second Corinthians 5:21 provides the basis for this interpretation. It reads, “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us.” However, when we look at the Greek text (Nestle-Aland, Novum Testamentum Graece, 28th ed.), it reads: τὸν μὴ γνόντα ἁμαρτίαν ὑπὲρ ἡμῶν ἁμαρτίαν ἐποίησεν (2 Cor. 5:21). The word ἐποίησεν is based on the verb ποιέω (poieó), which means to “make,” to “produce” (G. W. H. Lampe, A Patristic Greek Lexicon, p. 1107) or to “do.” It does not mean “to be,” as in the alternative translation: “God made him . . . to be sin for us” (cf. Jn 4:46 where ἐποίησεν means “made” water into wine). Thus, the correct reading of 2 Cor. 5:21 is as follows: “in our behalf He did make sin” (Young's Literal Translation). The Good News Translation—which reads, “God made him share our sin”—is far closer to the YLT and the original Greek text than the NIV, NASB or the KJV. Nevertheless, even the mainstream rendering of ἐποίησεν (i.e., “to be sin”) implies that Christ became “sin,” so to speak, by taking upon him our fallen, sinful nature: “He became like a human being and appeared in human likeness” (Phil. 2:7). How else could he be “fully human in every way” (Heb. 2:17), share our humanity (Heb. 2:14) and be tempted if he doesn’t have a sin nature? (cf. the Infancy Gospel of Thomas). You cannot tempt someone who, by definition, is incapable of being tempted: “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are” (Heb. 4:15). In this regard, 2 Peter 3:15—16 poignantly notes that “Paul also wrote you with the wisdom that God gave him. He writes the same way in all his letters, speaking in them of these matters. His letters contain some things that are hard to understand, which ignorant and unstable people distort, as they do the other Scriptures.”

Sin is evil. If Christ became sin, or made sin, then Christ became evil in some sense via the incarnation because he took on our nature and became a sinner. Kenneth Copeland rightly asks: “Why did Moses raise a serpent instead of a lamb?” John Chrysostom, an important Early Church Father, writes: “God allowed His Son to suffer as if a condemned sinner . . .” (Homily on 1 Cor. 11:5). That is why Christ is punished; because “the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all” (Isa. 53:6). And, according to the gospel narratives, Jesus is arrested, tried, condemned to death, and later executed as a criminal (i.e. an enemy of the state)!

But the real question is, did this happen in Antiquity or is God “declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done”? (Isa. 46:10). Revelation 12:5 suggests that Christ’s incarnation is a future event that takes place in the end-times. First Peter 1:20 similarly says, “God chose him as your ransom long before the world began, but he has now revealed him to you in these last days” (cf. Heb. 1:1—2). What’s more, Hebrews 9:26 explicitly states: “Once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.” The NIV says that his death takes place “at the culmination of the ages,” while the NASB puts it, “at the consummation of the ages.” The NRSV associates Christ’s sacrifice with the end-times by rendering it “at the end of the age.” The Greek text is as follows: ἅπαξ ἐπὶ συντελείᾳ τῶν αἰώνων εἰς ἀθέτησιν [τῆς] ἁμαρτίας διὰ τῆς θυσίας αὐτοῦ πεφανέρωται. Lampe defines the word συντελείᾳ as ‘consummation’ (i.e. the ultimate end), particularly in reference to Heb. 9:26 συντελείᾳ τῶν αἰώνων and Mt.13:39 συντελείᾳ τοῦ αἰῶνος. Appropriately, the NJB equates Christ’s initial appearance on earth with the last days. It reads: “He was marked out before the world was made, and was revealed at the final point of time” (1 Pet. 1:20).

Let us now try to understand the meaning of the phrase, “I am coming like a thief!” (Rev. 16:15). In Matthew 24:43, a thief is depicted as one who breaks into a house to steal another person's property. He is commonly known as a burglar and is considered to be a criminal. Here is “Martin Luther’s Commentary on Galatians 3:13: Christ, The Greatest Of Sinners?”

(Galatians 3:13. Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law, having become a curse for us—for it is written: Cursed be everyone who hangs on a tree)

“It was appropriate for Him to become a thief and, as Isaiah says (53:12), to be 'numbered among the thieves.'" Similarly, C. H. Spurgeon’s sermon, “Christ Made Sin”—which was on 2 Corinthians 5:21: “For He has made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us”—echoes the words of Martin Luther. He exclaims:

“He bound His only begotten Son to the pillar and scourged and bruised Him! Sooner than sin should go unpunished, He put that sin upon Christ and punished Him—oh, how tremendously and with what terrific strokes! . . . And upon His Son He laid a tremendous, incomprehensible weight, till the griefs of the dying Redeemer utterly surpassed all our imagination or comprehension!”

In summary, Christ is “numbered among the thieves” (Isa. 53.12) and has “become a curse for us—for it is written: Cursed be everyone who hangs on a tree” (Gal. 3:13). He becomes the snake of Num. 21:9 (cf. Jn. 3:14), signifying a criminal (i.e., a sinner) who is under God’s curse. And according to the gospel narratives, he is in fact convicted of a crime: he’s arrested, tried, and condemned to death. If this story is played out in the end-times (cf. Heb. 9:26; 1 Pet. 1:20; Rev. 12:5), and if the word ἐποίησεν (2 Cor. 5:21) means that Christ "did make sin" rather than "be sin," then the exegesis of Rev. 16:15—“I come like a thief”—suggests a literal interpretation, namely, that we should expect Christ to come like a criminal; that is to say, like a thief!

Based on Translation and Exegesis of the Greek New Testament, the Woman of Revelation 12.4-5 Can Only be Placed in Eschatological Categories

By Author Eli Kittim

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ΑΠΟΚΑΛΥΨΙΣ ΙΩΑΝΝΟΥ 12.4--5

καὶ ἡ οὐρὰ αὐτοῦ σύρει τὸ τρίτον τῶν ἀστέρων τοῦ οὐρανοῦ καὶ ἔβαλεν αὐτοὺς εἰς τὴν γῆν. Καὶ ὁ δράκων ἕστηκεν ἐνώπιον τῆς γυναικὸς τῆς μελλούσης τεκεῖν, ἵνα ὅταν τέκῃ τὸ τέκνον αὐτῆς καταφάγῃ. καὶ ἔτεκεν υἱὸν ἄρσεν, ὃς μέλλει ποιμαίνειν πάντα τὰ ἔθνη ἐν ῥάβδῳ σιδηρᾷ. καὶ ἡρπάσθη τὸ τέκνον αὐτῆς πρὸς τὸν θεὸν καὶ πρὸς τὸν θρόνον αὐτοῦ.

---- Novum Testamentum Graece NA28

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Translation:

REVELATION 12.4--5

His tail swept down a third of the stars of heaven and threw them to the earth. Then the dragon stood before the woman who was about to bear a child, so that he might devour her child as soon as it was born. And she gave birth to a son, a male child, who is to rule all the nations with a rod of iron. But her child was snatched away and taken to God and to his throne.

---- New Revised Standard Version 1989

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The key words used in the original Greek text are as follows:

τῆς γυναικὸς τῆς μελλούσης τεκεῖν

which are traditionally interpreted as "the woman who was about to bear a child."

However, there seems to be a mistranslation of the original word μελλούσης, which essentially misleads the reader with regard to the proper chronological context of the passage in question! And we're not even covering the eschatological context of the seven-headed dragon with ten horns that "stood before the woman" (12.4), which is later depicted in Rev. 17 as a final empire on earth. So let's take a closer look.

The Greek term μελλούσης that is mentioned in Rev. 12.4 is derived from the root word μέλλω, which means "about to happen" and refers to "coming" or "future" events. An inflection of the word μελλούσης is the term μέλλουσα, a derivative of the root μέλλων, which means “future” (i.e. μέλλουσες γενεές ― future generations).

We must always bear in mind the future context of the Book of Revelation, which is firmly embedded in the very first verse concerning "what must soon take place" (cf. 22.6), and which then undergirds "the words of the prophecy" (v. 3), an expression that is later reiterated several times beginning in chapter 22 verse 7 with regard to "the words of the prophecy of this book." Thus, the eschatological nature of the Book of Revelation is clearly emphasized. This would imply that any interpretations which look to the past are, by definition, anachronistic!

Here are several New Testament quotations for the word μελλούσης and its inflections:

1) μέλλοντα (i.e. things to come), Rom. 8.38, cf. 1 Cor. 3.22;

2) εἰς τό μέλλον (i.e. in the future), Luke 13.9, cf. 1 Tim. 6.19;

3) σκιὰ τῶν μελλόντων (i.e. a shadow of what is to come [things future]), Col. 2.17;

4) ζωῆς τῆς νῦν καί τῆς μελλούσης (i.e. the present life and the life to come), 1 Tim. 4.8;

5) τήν οἰκουμένην τήν μέλλουσαν (i.e. the world to come), Heb. 2.5;

6) τό κρίμα τό μέλλον (i.e. the coming judgment), Acts 24.25;

7) τὴν μέλλουσαν πόλιν (i.e. the city that is to come), Heb. 13.14.

As you can see, each time the Greek term μελλούσης or one of its inflections is used (i.e. μέλλοντα, μέλλον, μελλόντων, μέλλουσαν), it is always in reference to a future event. Nowhere does it refer to a past event. For example, just as Matt. 3.7 refers to a future wrath----ἀπὸ τῆς μελλούσης ὀργῆς (i.e. from the wrath to come?)----so Matt. 12.32 refers to a future age: ἐν τῷ μέλλοντι [αἰών] (i.e. in the age to come).

Conclusion

It cannot be gainsaid that the Greek term μελλούσης in Rev. 12.4 is referring to an eschatological figure. However, according to the standard interpretation of the New Testament, there is often a proleptic interpretation that accompanies this verse, which begs the question: how could a future woman possibly give birth in Antiquity? Such an interpretation seems anachronistic and contradicts not only the content but also the context of Rev. 12.4--5.

THE NAME AND PREEXISTENCE OF JESUS WAS KNOWN AND ATTESTED BY PRE-CHRISTIAN SOURCES

If the New Testament (NT) was written in advance,  as I have suggested, then one could reasonably argue that the NT writers knew of Jesus before he became man by way of revelations, including Paul as well as Philo who preceded him.

Case in point. Philo of Alexandria is a Jewish mystic philosopher and theologian who is writing between 20 - 40 CE, thus predating the New Testament writings.

In his "Confusion of Tongues" pp. 62-63 and pp. 146-47 as well as in his work entitled "On Dreams" 1.215, he attests that there existed within the Jewish Angelology of that period a belief in a celestial being - who in Zechariah 6 LXX is named Jesus - and that it is precisely this archangel who is considered to be the firstborn son of God (cf. Rom. 8.29), the celestial image of God (cf. 2 Cor. 4.4), God's agent of creation (cf. 1 Cor. 8.6), and God's celestial high priest (cf. Heb. 2.17, 4.14).

Source credit: Richard Carrier

In fact, Philo often refers to him as the Logos (cf. John 1.1) or the highest emanation of God. Similarly, many Christian scholars consider Jesus to be the preincarnated so-called "Angel of the Lord" in the Old Testament!

Thus, despite vast doctrinal and philosophical differences, there is considerable evidence to suggest that the name and preexistence of Jesus was known and attested by multiple independent sources!

Mark Lehman Strauss, an American biblical scholar and professor of the New Testament