C. Matthew McMahon
Christian Preacher
[video=vimeo;94263700]https://vimeo.com/94263700[/video]
Justification Explained Briefly
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Ask Mr. Religion
Flatly Unflappable
Nicely done! I have shared the vimeo version at some of my other internet forums.
C. Matthew McMahon
Christian Preacher
John Owen against the exclusion of experience in justifying faith (emphasis added):
"It answers not the experience of them that truly believe. This all our inquiries and arguments in this matter must have respect unto. For the sum of what we aim at is, only to discover what they do who really believe unto the justification of life. It is not what notions men may have hereof, nor how they express their conceptions, how defensible they are against objections by accuracy of expressions and subtile distinctions; but only what we ourselves do, if we truly believe, that we inquire after. And although our differences about it do argue the great imperfection of that state wherein we are, so as that those who truly believe cannot agree what they do in their so doing,—which should give us a mutual tenderness and forbearance towards each other;—yet if men would attend unto their own experience in the application of their souls unto God for the pardon of sin and righteousness to life, more than unto the notions which, on various occasions, their minds are influenced by, or prepossessed withal, many differences and unnecessary disputations about the nature of justifying faith would be prevented or prescinded. I deny, therefore, that this general assent unto the truth, how firm soever it be, or what effects in the way of duty or obedience soever it may produce, doth answer the experience of any one true believer, as containing the entire actings of his soul towards God for pardon of sin and justification."
The Latin phrase is usually "simul justus et peccator."
"It answers not the experience of them that truly believe. This all our inquiries and arguments in this matter must have respect unto. For the sum of what we aim at is, only to discover what they do who really believe unto the justification of life. It is not what notions men may have hereof, nor how they express their conceptions, how defensible they are against objections by accuracy of expressions and subtile distinctions; but only what we ourselves do, if we truly believe, that we inquire after. And although our differences about it do argue the great imperfection of that state wherein we are, so as that those who truly believe cannot agree what they do in their so doing,—which should give us a mutual tenderness and forbearance towards each other;—yet if men would attend unto their own experience in the application of their souls unto God for the pardon of sin and righteousness to life, more than unto the notions which, on various occasions, their minds are influenced by, or prepossessed withal, many differences and unnecessary disputations about the nature of justifying faith would be prevented or prescinded. I deny, therefore, that this general assent unto the truth, how firm soever it be, or what effects in the way of duty or obedience soever it may produce, doth answer the experience of any one true believer, as containing the entire actings of his soul towards God for pardon of sin and justification."
The Latin phrase is usually "simul justus et peccator."
C. Matthew McMahon
Christian Preacher
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