Four Kinds of People

No two humans are exactly alike. Everyone’s a unique creation. However, when it comes to their relationship with God, they fit into, generally speaking, one of four categories at any given moment. Calvin explained:

“Either (1) they’re destitute of the knowledge of God, and immerged in idolatry; or, (2) having been initiated by the sacraments, they lead impure lives, denying God in their actions while they confess Him with their lips, belonging to Christ only in name; or (3) they’re hypocrites, concealing the iniquity of their hearts with vain disguises; or (4) being regenerated by the Holy Spirit, they devote themselves to true holiness.”

We’re all born “destitute of the knowledge of God.” Sadly, many stay that way. There are billions of folks who remain in the reprobate condition described in the Bible: “The human mind is more deceitful than anything else. It’s incurably bad. Who can understand it?“ (Jeremiah 17:9). “Peoples’ thoughts are morally bankrupt“ (Psalm 94:11). “Everyone rejects God… None of them does what’s right, not even one!“ (Psalm 14:3).

The Scriptures aren’t implying they’re all murderers, thieves, adulterers, etc. Most of these individuals are law-abiding citizens who want to live comfortably. R.C. Sproul wrote, “Sinners in their fallen condition are still capable of performing works of ‘civil virtue.’ They can refrain from stealing and perform acts of charity, yet deeds that outwardly conform to God’s law but proceed from a heart alienated from God isn’t deemed by God as a ‘good deed.'”

Reformed theologians call God’s merciful oversight “common grace.” John Murray wrote, “Every favor of whatever kind or degree, falling short of salvation, which this undeserving and sin-cursed world enjoys comes from the hand of God. Common grace involves God’s restraint of sin, divine wrath and evil.” In other words, God is gracious enough to prevent rebellious mankind from causing its own extinction.

Truthfully, for most of my life I belonged in the second category. I’d readily claim to be a Christian, but I behaved and thought like I’d never heard of Jesus. I did as I pleased. Calvin wrote of people like me, “They know their heart is full of impurity, yet if they perform any specious actions, they consider them too good to be despised by God. …While they acknowledge themselves to be unrighteous, because it can’t be denied, they still arrogate to themselves some degree of righteousness.”

Having been raised in church by wonderful parents, I was keenly aware that a high percentage of what I regularly indulged in was sinful, but I wasn’t about to let my bothersome conscience stop me from doing whatever I wanted. I had no excuse because I’d certainly “heard the message” but chose to ignore it. I was the kind of guy James warned:

“Put away all filth and evil excess and humbly welcome the message implanted within you, which is able to save your soul. Be sure to live out the message and don’t merely listen to it and so deceive yourself. For if someone merely listens to the message and doesn’t live it out, he’s like someone who gazes at his own face in a mirror and then goes out and immediately forgets what sort of person he was“ (James 1:21-24). What I didn’t do was call myself a faithful, devoted follower of Jesus Christ. I wasn’t fooling anybody because I at least knew better than to pretend I was “religious.”

The third category is where the “holier than thou” type sit. They’re spiritual phonies, of whom Jesus said, “Woe to you, experts in the law and you Pharisees, hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and the dish, but inside you’re full of greed and self-indulgence. Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup, so that the outside may become clean, too!“ (Matthew 23:25-26).

It’s a tragedy that so many preachers have fallen into Satan’s trap of believing they’re no longer capable of sinning. They boldly stand before their congregation and use their God-given charisma to mislead those who look up to them as a role model, blatantly spouting false doctrines that increase their popularity and their bank account. Yet behind the scenes they commit some of the worst moral sins imaginable, convinced they’re immune from God’s wrath. They act like they’ve never been born again. Perhaps they haven’t.

Next is the fourth category – the elect. “God chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world that we may be holy and unblemished in His sight in love. He did this by predestining us to adoption as His sons through Jesus Christ, according to the pleasure of His will – to the praise of the glory of His grace that He’s freely bestowed upon us in His dearly loved Son“ (Ephesians 1:4-6).

Many people, even some Bible-thumping Christians, don’t accept the doctrine of election because they want to feel like they have a say in where they’ll spend eternity. Now, are God’s chosen already “holy and unblemished?” Hardly. Sproul wrote, “Even the regenerated person with a liberated will is still vulnerable to sin and temptation, and the residual power of sin is so strong that without the aid of grace the believer would, in all probability, fall away. But God’s decree is immutable. His sovereign purpose to save His elect from the foundation of the world isn’t frustrated by our weakness.”

I can’t tell who is or isn’t the elect. What I do know is we can’t save ourselves. God alone turns stony hearts into flesh. Those in the first 3 categories may yet be redeemed. That’s why the gospel is “Good News.”

Those blessed to be in category #4 know full well that “nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature“ (Romans 7:18). Thus, we still sin. Calvin wrote, “We’ve now ascertained that there’s not a single action performed by the saints, which, if judged according to its intrinsic merit, does not justly deserve to be rewarded with shame.”

Bottom line: We all need Jesus’ precious blood to cover our sins.

The Perseverance of the Saints

It’s an enormous stretch for to me to think I’m a “saint.” Yet the Bible says I am. For example, Paul wrote, “To all those loved by God in Rome, called to be saints; Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ!“ (Romans 1:7) and “To those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus, and called to be saints, with all those in every place who call on the name of our Lord…” (1 Corinthians 1:2).

As if that humbling designation isn’t enough, Peter spoke of our glorious, eternal home with our Lord that’s “reserved in heaven for you, who by God’s power are protected through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time“ (1 Peter 1:4-5).

Irrevocable salvation is truly an unmerited blessing. R.C. Sproul wrote, “More accurate than perseverance is preservation. We persevere because we’re preserved by God. If left to our own strength, none of us would persevere. Only because we’re preserved by grace are we able to persevere at all.”

It’s an assurance confirmed by our good shepherd, Jesus. “My sheep listen to my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish; no one will snatch them from my hand. My Father, who’s given them to me, is greater than all, and no one can snatch them from my Father’s hand. The Father and I are one“ (John 10:27-30).

In other words, if you belong to Christ you’ll belong to Him forever. “You are not your own; you were bought at a price“ (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). Never forget that your soul’s redemption was expensive. A steeper price has never been paid. Therefore, the saying “Once saved, always saved” is true. John MacArthur commented, “We did nothing to earn our adoption into God’s family, and we can do nothing to lose it either.”

However, some insist Hebrews 6:4-6 proves a Christian can forfeit their salvation. “For it’s impossible in the case of those who’ve once been enlightened, tasted the heavenly gift, become partakers of the Holy Spirit, tasted the good word of God and the miracles of the coming age, if they fall away, to renew them again to repentance, since they’re crucifying the Son of God for themselves all over again and holding Him up to contempt.” The word “if” is the qualifier.

Understand, there’s a difference between falling away and falling. That verse doesn’t say if a believer stumbles and commits a sin they can’t repent, be forgiven and welcomed back into the fold. “Although a righteous person may fall seven times, he gets up again“ (Proverbs 24:16). The Bible is full of saints who failed to remain sinless. Abraham, Noah, and David (just to name a few) all fell short. But to fall isn’t to fall away. If a single sin could negate a believer’s redemption, we’d all be doomed.

Spurgeon preached, “What is falling away? Well, there never has been a case of it yet, and therefore I can’t describe it from observation. I’ll tell you what I suppose it is. To fall away would be for the Holy Spirit entirely to go out of a man and for his grace entirely to cease. That is, to fall away wouldn’t mean to lie dormant, but to cease to be, so that God who’d begun a good work would leave off doing it entirely, take His hand completely away, and say, ‘There! I’ve half saved you; now I’ll damn you.’ That’s what falling away is.”

He continued, “It’s not to sin temporarily. A child may sin against his father and still be alive. Falling away is like cutting the child’s head off clean… Falling away would involve God’s grace changing its living nature, God’s immutability becoming variable, God’s faithfulness becoming changeable, and God Himself being undeified. Falling away would necessitate all these things.”

Only pretend Christians – those lacking the indwelling Holy Spirit – can fall away. For they were never part of Jesus’ herd in the first place. John referred to them when he wrote, “They went out from us, but they didn’t really belong to us, because if they’d belonged to us, they would’ve remained with us. But they went out from us to demonstrate that all of them do not belong to us“ (1 John 2:19).

The elect can’t fall from grace. Thank the Lord.

John Murray said of perseverance, “Have we not in this truth new reason to marvel at the grace of God and the immutability of His love? It’s the indissolubility of the bond of the covenant of God’s grace that undergirds this precious article of faith.”

God vowed to His adopted children: “‘Even if the mountains are removed and the hills displaced, my devotion will not be removed from you, nor will my covenant of friendship be displaced,’ says the LORD, the one who has compassion on you“ (Isaiah 54:10).

Thomas Watson wrote, “Though a Christian has but little grace to trade with, yet he need not fear breaking, because God not only gives him a stock of grace, but will keep his stock for him. Fear not falling away. If anything should hinder the saints’ perseverance, it must be either sin or temptation: but neither of these can.” Augustine opined, “Grace may be shaken with fears and doubts, but it can’t be plucked up by the roots.”

So, the critical question every believer should ask is, “God’s Word says I’m a saint. Do I act like one?” Jesus warned, “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven – only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven“ (Matthew 7:21).

In the Celebrate Recovery ministry we have a saying – “The only thing worse than suffering a relapse is letting it stop you from getting back up and continuing onward.” I fall. A lot. But my Savior reaches down and pulls me to my feet. Every time. Why? Because I belong to Him.

Quiet Joy

Blessed assurance isn’t physically tangible. It’s a feeling. So is inner peace. As is spiritual joy. All three are gifts from God. Yet joy, in my case, seems to be in another category altogether. It’s somewhat foreign to my introverted personality. Probably because my concept of what I think it should be isn’t what it really is.

Webster’s defines joy as “(a) the emotion evoked by well-being, success, good fortune or the prospect of possessing what one desires; (b) the expression or exhibition of such emotion.” Bible dictionaries don’t disagree per se. The Scriptures simply state that joy is a “fruit of the Spirit…” (Galatians 5:22).

Still, I can’t help but equate human joy with loud, uninhibited exuberance, the kind I see in the behavior of sports fans when their team wins a championship. As for me, that manner of response arises from my soul only upon witnessing something overwhelmingly wondrous. For example, the births of my two beautiful children. In other words, it’s rare.

As always, when I encounter a mystery in God’s Word, I turn to my favorite theologians for help. Thomas Watson called joy, “A delightful passion contrary to sorrow, which is a perturbation of mind, whereby the heart is perplexed and cast down. Joy is a sweet and pleasant affection which eases the mind, exhilarates and comforts the spirits.”

Therefore, it appears that worldly rejoicing and spiritual rejoicing aren’t the same. The former’s usually external while the latter’s mostly internal. Jesus told His crestfallen followers, “So you have sorrow now, but I’ll see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy away from you“ (John 16:22). Thus, I assume joy is principally a “heart thing.”

Watson wrote, “Joy is hidden manna, hid from the eye of the world; we still have music which others hear not; the marrow lies within, the best joy is within the heart.” That helps me better understand the verse that reads, “My brothers and sisters, consider it nothing but joy when you fall into all sorts of trials, because you know the testing of your faith produces endurance“ (James 1:2-3).

Both God and the devil send temptations/trials our way. Calvin wrote, “But the temptations of God and Satan are very different: Satan tempts that he may destroy, condemn, confound, throw headlong; God, that by proving His people He may make trial of their sincerity, and by exercising their strength confirm it; may mortify, tame and cauterize their flesh, which, if not curbed in this manner, would wanton and exult above measure.”

Now, nobody I know has ever “jumped for joy” when grieving the loss of a loved one or upon being diagnosed with terminal cancer. I doubt the Holy Spirit expects us to. The only joy a person can have in those dire circumstances is knowing that God is good, that He loves His adopted children and that He’s in complete control of everything. As with all things, our joy must be centered on our gracious Savior.

In His prayer for his disciples Jesus said to His Father, “Now I am coming to you, and I’m saying these things in the world, so they may experience my joy completed in themselves“ (John 17:13). John Murray wrote, “Apart from union with Christ we can’t view past, present, or future with anything but dismay and Christless dread. By union with Christ the whole complexion of time and eternity is changed, and the people of God may rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory.”

There’s also joy in knowing justice will be served. “Will not the judge of the whole earth do what is right?“ (Genesis 18:25). The much mistreated and beleaguered Martin Luther summed up that type of joy thusly: “There’s a life after this life in which will be punished and repaid everything that’s not punished and repaid here, for this life is nothing more than an entrance on, and a beginning of, the life which is to come!”

The honesty contained in the book of Job inspires me. If anyone had reason not to be joyful it’d be Job. Yet in the midst of his misery he proclaims, “I know that my Redeemer lives, and that in the end He’ll stand upon the earth. And after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God; I myself will see Him with my own eyes – I, and not another. How my heart yearns within me!“ (Job 19:25-27). His was a forward-looking joy.

Philip Yancey commented, “For people who are trapped in pain, or in a broken home, or in economic misery, or in fear – for all those people, for all of us, heaven promises a time, far longer and more substantial than the time we spent on earth, of health and wholeness and pleasure and peace. If we don’t believe that then, as Paul plainly stated, there’s little reason to believe at all. Without that hope, there is no hope.”

For Christians knowing and loving Jesus is our joy.

Those who’ve kept up know I often let Spurgeon have the last word. After quoting Jeremiah 31:3, “The LORD has appeared of old to me, saying: ‘Yes, I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore, with lovingkindness I’ve drawn you,” he preached:

“My poor weeping brothers and sisters, inasmuch as you’re now coming to Christ, God has drawn you. It’s proof that He’s loved you from before the foundation of the world. Let your heart leap within you. You’re one of His! Your name was written on the Savior’s hands when they were nailed to the accursed tree…

Rejoice in the Lord and shout for joy all who’ve been drawn of the Father. For this is your proof, your solemn testimony, that you from among men have been chosen in eternal election and that you’ll be kept by the power of God, through faith, to the salvation that’s ready to be revealed.”

My sins are forgiven, and I’m being sanctified. That’s a “quiet joy.”