Is the Reformation Over? A Review by Iain Murray - Introduction

Interesting statement you quoted, Valiant. As someone who has some Roman Catholics in my family, it does hit home for me. But I'm inclined to disagree with it on many levels. Claiming evangelism is just preaching 'come to Jesus' is a gross oversimplification. Even as a former Christian, I understand that.

What's difficult here is that evangelical and protestant Christianity are not as uniform as the Catholic church. Many different sects call themselves protestant, but don't associate with one another. Catholicism strives to maintain a single, unified sect and as history has shown that does not always lead to a flourishing faith. Protestantism arose out of the Catholic church's centralized inefficiency and since it has no central authority, it has fragmented a lot more over the centuries. Catholicism may still be big, but Protestantism has shown many times to be very robust. It allows people to find a version of faith that better suits them and unless people are more inclined to believe the current structure of the Catholic church, they would probably find a faith more appealing to them in Protestantism.

You miss the point of his statement…modern evangelicalism is void of doctrinal content and they have given off membership accountability. The Jesus of the Bible has content both in OT theology and in the NT revelation of His person and work. Jesus cannot be divorced from His revelation.

This is the Great Commission that Christ gives to His Church; that is, His people of every generation: “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” [Matthew 28]

Disciples are known through their identification with the church in baptism and are characterized as those concerned with and learning all things that Christ commanded the apostles, which they have given to the churches in the NT.

This is where the problem lies; the modernists are ashamed of the gospel. They will not teach the whole counsel of God as given to us in the apostolic, eye witness testimony. Nor are they concerned with keeping a church membership that maintains a credible profession of faith.

They have invented a Jesus in their own image who is weak and dependent on the will of men. Their religion has no power over the hearts of men nor does it influence their thinking.

apprehension. First, my best friend is Roman Catholic and she is my best friend because she show Christian traits to a higher degree than anyone I know in my OP church--and we have good people there.

Second, I use to work with a roman catholic who grew up in 10th Pres in Philly. BTW, 10th Pres in Philly is a very strongly reformed Church and needs to apologize to nobody regarding doctrine and evangelism.

Third, I think RCs, at least the ones I know can teach us flaming fundamentalists a thing or two about what it means to have social conscience.

I think Lloyd-Jones's comments are a bit of an oversimplification and seems to be made out of a spirit of competition and strife. Don't get me wrong, Reformed Theology is far superior to Roman Catholic Theology. But the people from both groups are equal in strengths and weaknesses.

Social consciousness is important, but it is not the first thing of importance; that would be the matter of a man’s salvation. In First Corinthians 14:3 Paul wrote,

“if I give all my possessions to feed the poor, and if I surrender my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing.”

In other words, evidences of “social consciousness” are not the issue at all. Love is the issue.

And what is the origin of love? “We love, because He first loved us” [1 John 4:19].

Anyone who rejects the initiative of God in salvation has reason to question whether he indeed has love. Jesus did not come in order to make us more civil and generous; He came to save us.

To differ from Lloyd-Jones is like differing with Calvin or Edwards; we had better be wondering whether we understand the issues or not. How many revivals have we been a part of or witnessed first hand?

I look at the social ethics and what a social conscience brings to mind as providing a list of sins to repent of just like the individual sins we commit should be repented of

One of these days I'm going to have to ask Aurora to set up a log-on just for me, but for now ...

I grew up RCC, becoming a Christian when I was 21, so I am acutely aware of the differences between RCC dogma and Biblical Christianity. Although I have met a few RCC in recent years who I consider born-again Christians, no RCC church I have ever attended taught the Biblical gospel. It was all about following RCC dogma and practices as the means to "salvation" (what I came to realize was "acceptability" by the Church hierarchy). That's another post and I think I've done that.

Not all, but many "evangelical" (seeker-sensitive) churches have abdicated the gospel to chase after membership. You no longer have to actually believe in Christ in order to be a Christian, according to them. Just walk an aisle and say some "magic words" and it's good enough. Sometimes you don't even have to walk the aisle. I think our President is a prime example of such an "evangelical Christian." It's talking-points Christianity and it's only skin deep. It is also very similar to the Catholicism I grew up with, which was all about saying the "magic words" and performing the right rituals. Man, what a shock when I read the Bible and discovered God wanted real commitment and repentence and not just Saturday confession and Sunday communion! Man, what a shock when "evangelicals" read the Bible and learn it's not about social conscience.

If you really thought the RCC teaches "magic words", "Saturday confession", "Sunday Communion" then you really never were a catholic, were you!

You say the RCC in not biblical. Wow! Every Protestant that I have ever spoken to, who for whatever reason found themself at a catholic Mass, was shocked (pleasantly shocked) at the amount of Scripture read during that Mass.

Do you know why the Mass was opposed by the Reformers? Do you know that this doctrine was used to accuse the English Reformers as heretics and condemn them to the flames?

Protestants have forgotten why they were willing to die for their faith rather than recant on their understanding of this doctrine.

I don't know, for sure, the answer to your question. But based on what many Protestants have said to me about the Mass, I have a pretty good idea.