Dr Paul Allen

What do the sovereignty of God, salvation by grace, justification by faith, and new life in union with Christ mean for the living of the Christian life? For Luther, they carry four implications: The first implication is the knowledge that the Christian believer is simul iustus et peccator,1 at one and the same time justified and yet a sinner.   This principle, to which Luther may have been stimulated by John Tauler’s Theologia Germanica, was a hugely stabilizing principle: in and of myself, all I see is a sinner; but when I see myself in Christ, I see a man counted righteous with His perfect righteousness. Such a man is, therefore, able to stand before God as righteous as Jesus Christ—because he is righteous only in the righteousness that is Christ’s. Here we stand secure. The second implication is the discovery that God has become our Father in Christ.   We are accepted. One of the most beautiful accounts found in Luther’s Table Talk was, perhaps significantly, recorded by th...

The sovereignty of God is not a secondary doctrine that is relegated to an obscure corner in the Bible . Rather, this truth is the very bedrock doctrine of all Scripture. This is the Mount Everest of biblical teaching, the towering truth that transcends all theology.  From its opening verse, the Bible asserts in no uncertain terms that God is and that God reigns. In other words, He is God—not merely in name, but in full reality. God does as He pleases, when He pleases, where He pleases, how He pleases, and with whom He pleases in saving undeserving sinners. All other doctrines of the Christian faith must be brought into alignment with this keystone truth. The sovereignty of God is the free exercise of His supreme authority in executing and administrating His eternal purposes . God must be sovereign if He is to be truly God. A god who is not sovereign is not God at all. Such is an imposter, an idol, a mere caricature formed in man’s fallen imagination. A god who is less than f...

“And this we will do if God permits” (Heb. 6:3). The author of Hebrews previously encourages his audience to press on to maturity in the faith. This maturity is something that the original audience should have possessed, and it is a maturity that many of us should also possess. If we have been Christians for some time, we should not have to lay again the foundation of our faith, that is, the basic and elementary doctrines that all of our beliefs are built upon (6:1). The author now proceeds to list these elementary doctrines of the faith. Though we will be studying verses 2–3 today, the first of these doctrines is found in 6:1: “repentance from dead works and faith toward God.”  This refers to our resolve to leave the works of the flesh and place our faith in Christ alone for salvation. This resolve is present for the first time at our conversion and continues daily throughout the rest of our lives. Note that faith and repentance belong together. You cannot truly have o...

In Romans 9, Paul discusses God’s absolute freedom in His saving purposes. He uses the illustration of the twins, Jacob and Esau, stating that God’s choice of Jacob over Esau had nothing to do with either of them. Rather, God chose “so that [His] purpose according to His choice would stand.” This choice was “not because of works but because of Him who calls” (Rom 9:11). He goes on to say that salvation “does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy” (Rom 9:16), and then supports that claim by referring to God’s hardening of Pharaoh’s heart for the expressed purpose of demonstrating His power and proclaiming His name through the events that followed (Rom 9:17; cf. Exod 9:16). Paul then summarizes his point by declaring: “So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires” (Rom 9:18). Then, Paul anticipates an objection: “You will say to me, then, ‘Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?’” First, let us under...