The Offer of Grace: Biblical Grounds

We believe with all orthodox theologians that in the preaching of the Gospel there is a general, sincere, unconditional offer of grace.

We must address the question: How can God sincerely offer grace to those whom He has not elected? What are the grounds for the preaching of a general, sincere and unconditional offer of grace?

The first ground is: Cods command! God has commanded us to preach the Gospel. This command we must obey, even though we cannot make it agree with the doctrine that all nations are not elect. We must only obey God.

This causes Dr. John Owen to say: The preachers of the Gospel in their own churches, totally ignorant of the purpose and the secret decrees of God, and also being forbidden to delve into these things, according to Deut. 29:29, may justly admonish every man to believe and assure them of salvation, if they do so, leaving it up to the decrees of God to whom He shall grant faith, and for whom Christ died. (Death of Christ, page 298)

The second ground for a true offer of grace to the greatest of sinners is the all-sufficiency of the sacrifice of Christ We saw that it is Gods charge to preach the Gospel to all hearers. But can this be done sincerely? Has Christ not died only for His elect? This can be done because preaching does not proceed from Gods secret decree, but from His revealed will, and from the all-sufficiency of the sacrifice of Christ.

God does not deceive men when He kindly invites and beseeches the sinner, and promises him that whosoever believeth in Christ should not perish but have everlasting life.

The sacrifice of Christ is abundantly sufficient to atone for the sins of the whole world. If God had so willed, there would have been sufficient power in the sacrifice of Christ for the whole world.

Election is a secret that only God knows and fathoms. The all-sufficiency and power of the sacrifice of Christ is a matter that is abundantly revealed in Scripture. In Christ there is sufficient for the greatest of sinners.

With an eye upon that, Dr. Owen says: This is a sufficient basis and ground for all those general instructions to preach the Gospel to all people, namely, the all-sufficiency of Christ, that we have described. (Death of Christ, p. 297)

The Reformers did not need to teach a doctrine of general atonement in order to preach a sincere offer of grace. They based this preaching on the all-sufficiency there is in Christ for the greatest of sinners.

We believe with all orthodox theologians that in the preaching of the Gospel there is a general, sincere, unconditional offer of grace. This is not based on Gods hidden decree, nor upon mans ability or repentance. This offer is general, that means it is directed to every hearer. That is why we read so often whosoever. Calvin notes: He uses a general expression, whosoever both to invite all sinners without exception to partake of this life, and to take away every excuse from the unbelievers. (Commentary on John 3:16)

The offer is sincere. Think of the oath of God in Ezekiel 33:11: As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his way and live.

The offer is unconditional. It speaks of without money and without price. It calls, Come as you are. Many want to teach a conditional offer of grace. Man must first fulfil the conditions, before they are considered ripe for the offer of the grace of God.

Such speaking caused Ralph Erskine to say, Better to have no Gospel, than a conditional Gospel. Since man has fallen the doorstep of conditions is too high for the sinner. We must not (intentionally) confuse this with the Biblical truth that only the brokenhearted desire grace. We heartily confess that no one seeks Christ except he who by the Spirt of God has learned to feel the burden of his sin and lost condition. Repentance and faith are the means by which we obtain the promise of the Gospel, but they are not the basis upon which God offers His grace. To offer is not the same as to give in possession.

We want no offer on conditions! Then man is urged to seek a basis in himself for being accepted by God.

Boston says that this doctrine causes the hypocrites to grow in audacity, and it discourages the upright. A hypocrite soon assumes that his repentance is true, and thereupon with great audacity he will appropriate Christ and His grace. The upright, however, suspects His repentance and seeks for more sincere and deeper sorrow for sin, and becomes discouraged and desperate under a preaching that offers grace upon conditions.

The Necessity of the Work of the Holy Spirit

How necessary it is that the offer of Gods grace is preached to sinners! We do not preach the Gospel when we merely tell the way of salvation, and close with the pious wish that God may one day apply it to the heart. Paul did not preach in that way, nor the Reformers or the Puritans. They sought to move them, to admonish them, to beseech them and to allure them. They told their hearers to leave the paths of sin, and to flee to Christ for salvation.

They said, Knowing therefore the terror of the Lord, we persuade men to believe. But they did not persuade men to accept Christ with an imagined faith. For the most stubborn sinner they had an offer of Gods grace, but the sinner may not imagine that he already is a partaker of that which God promised in the Gospel. The sinner could only become a partaker by repenting and believing. If they did not believe and remained unconverted, they would be condemned.

Men did not talk them into an imaginary faith. I am now thinking of an evil that is spreading all around us, and the best name I can give it is superficial faith. The call to believe the Gospel is then presented without the command to repent and believe. The necessity of the work of the Holy Spirit, if not denied, is certainly not mentioned.

Such say, Away with those old-fashioned distinctions of external and internal call, of common and special grace. All we need is simply to believe and accept the Gospel. They have not the least trouble or struggle with faith any more.

I heartily believe in the free offer of grace of God, but also in the total depravity of man, so that he is unable and unwilling to come to Christ and to believe in Him.

The inability of man to accept the offer must also be preached, and that in such a way that his inability and his unwillingness to obey the Gospel is his sin!

Our congregations, our young people, must be convinced of the truth that they must repent and must believe, and at the same time that they cannot. I cannot, and still I must repent and believe. That must become the state of distress into which we must seek to bring the sinner.

By these truths the conviction is established that the Holy Spirit is necessary to work in us both to will and to do of His good pleasure. Thus the work of God attains the place of honor. Only the experience of the distress and the guilt of our impotence and unwillingness teaches us to cry aloud to God. Then the cry is heard: Turn Thou us unto Thee, O Lord, and we shall be turned.

Everything calls to us, Salvation is not of me. There is no hope in the law of works, nor is there anything good in our mind, for all things condemn us. But still the way of the free, unmerited and gracious Gospel is open. That Gospel tells you and me, O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself, but in Me is thy help.

Repentance and faith are the means by which we obtain the promise of the Gospel, but they are not the basis upon which God offers His grace. To offer is not the same as to give in possession.

This represents the concluding part of an article on the offer of grace by Rev. C. Harinck, pastor of the Gereformeerde Gemeente (Netherlands Reformed Congregation) at Oostkapelle, the Netherlands. The first part was entitled: The Offer of Grace: The Historical Issue.

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