Joseph Prince’s heresies called by Derek Prince & Martyn Lloyd-Jones as a Satanic deception & of the devil – By Rev George Ong (Dated 16 May 2023)
Joseph Prince’s heresies on God’s love & judgement is debunked by Derek Prince & Martyn Lloyd-Jones – By Rev George Ong (Dated 16 May 2023)
Don’t miss the Appendix:
Joseph Prince’s dispensational doctrine
is decisively refuted
by the many insightful views of Martyn Lloyd-Jones.
Please note that there are
1 video and 1 audio on Derek Prince,
2 videos on Joseph Prince and
many insightful resources from Martyn Lloyd-Jones.
Summary of the Crucial Points of this Article:
First, Derek Prince said;
“We are warned again and again
against false Christs, false prophets and deceiving spirits.
Now, the wolf comes from without, very deceptive.
They use honey language.
They talk ever so sweetly about love,
till it drips like syrup from their lips,
and they’re wolves.”
What Derek Prince has masterfully described
is exactly what Joseph Prince has always been preaching.
Joseph Prince’s easy and feel-good Christianity;
about the God who always loves you,
but He will never judge and punish you,
and He will also never be displeased or get angry with you
even though you sin against Him,
are pertinent examples of what Derek Prince said
about the honey language and the sweet talk about love,
that come from the wolves.
So, according to Derek Prince,
Joseph Prince is indeed a wolf in sheepskin.
If you aren’t aware, the focus of my website
is in proving that Joseph Prince is a wolf
that the Church must be warned against.
Second, Derek Prince said;
“The people that preach about it (love) and nothing else,
are dangerous.
God is a God of love,
but He’s a God of judgement too,
and any kind of love
that obliterates the truth of God’s judgement,
is a Satanic deception.”
Derek Prince categorically said
that those who preach God’s love
that obliterates His judgement
is Satanic deception.
In other words, it is not just a deception that originates from man,
but it is a deception that comes from Satan.
This simply means that Joseph Prince
who preaches about God’s love
and obliterates God’s judgement,
is clearly under the influence and empowerment of Satan himself.
Martyn Lloyd-Jones said;
“God acts always in the light of all His attributes and they are all in operation at exactly the same time.
All the attributes of God are always displayed together
– ‘the goodness “and” the severity’ of God.
And we must never isolate any one of the attributes of God
– that is the modern heresy
– the love of God has been isolated from all the others.
And it is a form of idolatry…”
According to Martyn Lloyd-Jones,
Joseph Prince who preaches on the goodness of God
and not His severity,
and the love of God
at the exclusion of His wrath, judgement and punishment,
is preaching heresy and involved in idolatry.
Martyn Lloyd-Jones also said;
“… any teaching concerning salvation
which does not express itself in terms of the demands of the law of God
is a false teaching.”
“Many people teach salvation solely in terms of the love of God.
They talk about nothing but God’s love…”
“So, any teaching, or any thinking, about salvation
which does not put it in terms of satisfying the law of God
is completely false
and is to be rejected as being of the devil himself.”
Going by what Martyn Lloyd-Jones said,
Joseph Prince, who teaches the gospel of God’s love,
and totally rejects using the law for gospel-preaching,
is not only a false teacher,
but he is also representing the devil himself.
If such is the damaging and conclusive verdict
that both Derek Prince and Martyn Lloyd-Jones,
who are giants in Bible exposition,
have come to regarding Joseph Prince’s grace teachings,
Why did a Singapore Methodist Bishop
and a Singapore Presbyterian Pastor
say that Joseph Prince isn’t a heretic?
(This article was also sent to Rev Dr Ngoei Foong Nghian, General Secretary, National Council of Churches of Singapore (NCCS) office, and for the attention of the Executive Committee Members.)
In two separate sermons, Joseph Prince said;
Please click here to view the 1-minute video:
“So, when you look at it, be aware of God’s love.
When you study the Old Testament, especially, Amen.
New Testament, is quite obvious like I said.
So, I’m focussing a bit more on the Old Testament because I want you to study the Bible.”
“So, when you look at the Old Testament,
be conscious of the love of God in the verses.”
“So, when you look at the Old Testament,
what do you do, people?
See the love of God.
See the love of God.”
“When you read Old Testament,
bring grace out of it like Paul did.
See the love of God.”
“God loves you more than you know.”
“God loves you.
In all those moments, God loves you.”
“God loves you.”
“God loves you. God loves you.”
“God loves you.”
In his sermons, Joseph Prince has always focused on the love of God,
but what is deplorable is that
he has also eradicated the teaching of God’s judgement from his sermons.
Joseph Prince teaches that there is no place for God’s judgement in the New Covenant
both for believers and unbelievers.
In the sermon, Joseph Prince said;
Please click here to view the 25-second video:
“We know what our mentality become judgement mentality.
We looked at the world, and we started thinking,
‘Well, it started already.
God is judging the world.’
God is judging the world.
Is that true, my friend?”
“We cannot say God is judging America.
God is judging Singapore.
God is judging the Philippines.
God is judging;
we cannot say God is judging all this.
Because we are not in the day of vengeance of our God.
Friend, we are still under the dispensation of grace.”
What I have shown you in the 2 videos of Joseph Prince
is only a sample of his teachings that prove the point
that Joseph Prince is not only constantly focusing on God’s love,
but he also eradicates God’s judgement in the New Covenant.
Joseph Prince has always taught the false doctrine
that under the New Covenant,
God is a God of love, but He is not a God who judges.
However, both Derek Prince and Martyn Lloyd-Jones,
who are giants of the Christian Faith,
especially in the area of Bible exposition,
have not only exposed
but also demolished Joseph Prince’s heretical doctrine
of a God who loves but doesn’t judge.
In the sermon, Derek Prince said;
Please click here to listen to the 50-second audio:
“We are warned again and again
against false Christs, false prophets and deceiving spirits.
Now, the wolf comes from without, very deceptive.
They use honey language.
They talk ever so sweetly about love,
till it drips like syrup from their lips,
and they’re wolves.
When a person can talk about nothing but love,
I’ve come to that place in my experience
where I say,
‘What’s wrong with their doctrine
or what’s wrong with their life?’
There must be something wrong.
You say,
‘What’s wrong with love?’
Love is wonderful, but friends,
it’s much better to act than preach about it.
The people that preach about it (love) and nothing else,
are dangerous.
God is a God of love,
but He’s a God of judgement too,
and any kind of love
that obliterates the truth of God’s judgement,
is a Satanic deception.
What Derek Prince said is utterly serious.
First, Derek Prince said;
“We are warned again and again
against false Christs, false prophets and deceiving spirits.
Now, the wolf comes from without, very deceptive.
They use honey language.
They talk ever so sweetly about love,
till it drips like syrup from their lips,
and they’re wolves.”
What Derek Prince has masterfully described
is exactly what Joseph Prince has always been preaching.
Joseph Prince’s easy and feel-good Christianity;
about the God who always loves you,
but He will never judge and punish you,
and He will also never be displeased or get angry with you
even though you sin against Him,
are pertinent examples of what Derek Prince said
about the honey language and the sweet talk about love,
that come from the wolves.
So, according to Derek Prince,
Joseph Prince is indeed a wolf in sheepskin.
If you aren’t aware, the focus of my website
is in proving that Joseph Prince is a wolf
that the Church must be warned against.
Second, Derek Prince said;
“The people that preach about it (love) and nothing else,
are dangerous.
God is a God of love,
but He’s a God of judgement too,
and any kind of love
that obliterates the truth of God’s judgement,
is a Satanic deception.”
Derek Prince categorically said that those who preach God’s love
that obliterates His judgement
is Satanic deception.
In other words, it is not just a deception that originates from man,
but it is a deception that comes from Satan.
This simply means that Joseph Prince
who preaches God’s love
and obliterates God’s judgement,
is clearly under the influence and empowerment of Satan himself.
May I refer you to what I featured in my last article,
Kristen Jane Lin’s Testimony about her 6-Year Journey (2016-2022) with New Creation Church and under Joseph Prince’s teachings,
Please click on the link below to read,
In the above article,
I have written that Joseph Prince is empowered by the devil,
and that’s why he is able to enchant and deceive millions around the world.
Joseph Prince not only teaches
there is no place for the judgement of God in the New Covenant,
but he also categorically stated
that there is no place for the preaching of God’s judgement
in the New Covenant gospel of grace.
In ‘Destined To Reign,’ Joseph Prince wrote,
“Is God Judging America?
Soon after the tragedy of September 11 had taken place,
some believers publicly declared that
God was judging America because of its sins.
When I heard that,
I could just imagine Osama bin Laden in a cave somewhere in Afghanistan
agreeing with them and thinking
that “god” was indeed using him to judge America.”
“I have also heard some believers pronouncing,
“If God does not judge America for all its sins,
God has to apologize to Sodom and Gomorrah.”
Well, let me say this with honor and respect:
If God judges America today,
He has to apologize to Jesus
for what He has accomplished on the cross!
My friend,
God is not judging America (or any country in the world today).
America and its sins have already been judged!
Where?
At the cross of Jesus!
Sin has been judged at the cross!”
But Derek Prince (in the video below)
categorically upheld the presence and need of the judgement of God,
not just in the New Covenant per se,
but more importantly, in the preaching of the New Covenant gospel.
In the sermon, Derek Prince said;
Please click here to view the 3-minute video:
“Now judgement,
God’s judgement, is a main theme of the gospel.
You cannot really understand the gospel
until you have an understanding of God’s judgement.
I want to point out to you that the apostles,
when they came with the gospel
especially to unreached people,
the first thing they spoke about was judgement,
not forgiveness.
I’ll give you two or three examples.
In Acts chapter 10, we have the message of Peter
to the household of Cornelius.
But this is what he (Peter) said about Jesus in Acts 10:42:
“And He commanded us to preach to the people, and to testify that it is He who was ordained by God
to be Judge of the living and the dead.”
What’s the first thing he emphasized?
The judgement of God.
Then he went on to say (Acts 10:43):
“To Him all the prophets give witness that, through His name, whoever believes in Him
will receive remission [or forgiveness] of sins.”
If there’s no judgement,
actually, there’s no need for forgiveness.
If we leave out judgement,
we don’t have an issue of forgiveness.”
Let’s look at Paul in Athens. Acts 17:30-31.
And now he’s speaking to completely unchurched, unreached people, very intellectual and sophisticated, and he says:
“Truly, these times of ignorance God overlooked, but now commands all men everywhere to repent, [No one is left out, neither you nor I. All men everywhere are commanded, not recommended, but commanded to repent.
Why?]
because He has appointed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness…”
Why do we need to repent?
Because we’re going to face the judgement of God.
All of us, without exception.
There’s a certain amount of presentation of the gospel that points out it’s beneficial to become a Christian.
God will solve your problems, your marriage will work better, your business will succeed, etc. etc.
But that’s not the main or primary reason.
The primary reason is
we are going to stand before the judgement of God.
All of us, without exception.
And if we don’t respond to the gospel,
it will be a very sad day for us.”
“I find that there is an order in the presentation.
Judgement, repentance, forgiveness, and then faith.”
What is patently obvious is that
Derek Prince’s position on the judgement of God
that is sorely needed for the preaching of the gospel,
is diametrically opposed to that of Joseph Prince,
who is against God’s judgement for gospel-preaching.
Let me give another proof
that Joseph Prince is against God’s judgement,
not only for unbelievers but also for believers.
In ‘Destined To Reign,’ Joseph Prince wrote;
“God’s righteous anger against sin has been satisfied and today,
we can expect only love from Him, not judgment.
We can expect grace, not punishment.”
“What does this mean, my friend?
This means that there is no more judgment for you
when God looks at you.”
“I have shown you that under the dispensation of grace,
God is not judging you…”
But Martyn Lloyd-Jones demolished the false idea
that Christians cannot be judged.
In ‘Exposition of Chapters 2:1-3:20, The Righteous Judgment of God, Romans,’ Martyn Lloyd-Jones said;
“Another reason why it is important is that
if we do not realize that the judgment of God is always according to truth,
we shall, for certain,
fall into the terrible sin of antinomianism,
which says that because we are God’s people, it does not matter what we do.
‘Of course,’ such people say, ‘if we were not God’s people, these things would be tremendously important.
But after all I am a child of God
and therefore, I am right with God,
my salvation is assured; it does not matter what I do’.
But this is putting the grace and the love of God
over against the law, the justice and the righteousness of God.
Antinomianism!
It is a belief which is denounced in the New Testament,
and which has often wrought havoc in the history of the church.
And people fall into that terrible pitfall
because they do not realize that the judgment of God
is always according to truth,
that it does not matter to God whether you are His child or not,
if you sin against Him, it is sin, and He will punish you.
What a terrible thing it is not to realize this!”
“It is no use saying, ‘Because I am saved, it does not matter what I do’.
God’s judgment is always according to truth,
whether you are a believer or an unbeliever.
Sin is sin.
Do you not think, in the light of all this,
that perhaps one of the main explanations of the lifeless state of the Christian church today
is just this unconscious antinomianism?
We have become guilty of this
because we are for ever talking about ‘taking it by faith’,
and saying we must never examine ourselves and never look into ourselves.
We are saved and we are all right,
and thus, we become slack and loose in practice and in conduct,
forgetting that God’s judgment is always according to truth.”
Joseph Prince’s teaching that God will never judge New Covenant believers,
even though they sin against Him
is categorically refuted by Martyn Lloyd-Jones when he said;
“it does not matter to God whether you are His child or not,
if you sin against Him, it is sin, and He will punish you.
What a terrible thing it is not to realize this!”
“It is no use saying, ‘Because I am saved, it does not matter what I do’.
God’s judgment is always according to truth,
whether you are a believer or an unbeliever.
Sin is sin.”
Furthermore, what Martyn Lloyd-Jones has described about how an Antinomian behaves,
has proven my assertion, which I have been making all along
– that Joseph Prince is an Antinomian.
Antinomianism, like legalism, which is the opposite of Antinomianism,
is clearly a heresy.
And anyone, such as Joseph Prince, who preaches Antinomianism,
must, of logical necessity, be a heretic.
Let me now focus on
Joseph Prince’s constant and false emphasis on God’s love
at the expense of His other attributes.
In ‘Exposition of Chapter 11, To God’s Glory, Romans,’ Martyn Lloyd-Jones said;
“Indeed, it seems to me this is creeping even into Evangelicalism.
Only one side is represented
– the goodness, the love of God, the mercy, the kindness and the compassion,
and we are hearing less and less and less
about the severity, the justice, the righteousness, the wrath of God upon sin.
That is where all our troubles come from.
That is why the church is as she is.
Now I would put this point in this way, that we have got to realize, says the Apostle here,
that when God acts, the whole of God acts.
God does not act in parts.
God acts always in the light of all His attributes and they are all in operation at exactly the same time.
All the attributes of God are always displayed together
– ‘the goodness “and” the severity’ of God.
And we must never isolate any one of the attributes of God
– that is the modern heresy
– the love of God has been isolated from all the others.
And it is a form of idolatry,
it is a form of unbelief; it is a form of philosophy and speculation.
We must not only not isolate any one of the attributes of God,
still less must we ever ‘play’ one of the attributes against the others.
That is equally bad.
Often men have done that
– they have set the righteousness of God against the mercy of God, and the mercy of God against the righteousness of God.
In this same way, goodness has been opposed to severity and vice versa.
You must not set them against one another.
Not only do not isolate them, do not play them against one another.
God is everything that He is, always.
He is goodness, severity, love, holiness and light.
All these things are always true of God, and they are always true at the same time.
Goodness and severity; justice and mercy; righteousness and peace; holiness and love – and so on.
And this is, of course, the very special point that the Apostle is making here and is emphasising.
He says,
‘You know if you begin to extract certain things, as it were, out of the character of God, you will soon be in trouble,
you will soon go astray’…”
Martyn Lloyd-Jones said;
“God acts always in the light of all His attributes, and they are all in operation at exactly the same time.
All the attributes of God are always displayed together
– ‘the goodness “and” the severity’ of God.
And we must never isolate any one of the attributes of God
– that is the modern heresy
– the love of God has been isolated from all the others.
And it is a form of idolatry…”
According to Martyn Lloyd-Jones,
Joseph Prince, who preaches on the goodness of God
and not His severity,
and the love of God
at the exclusion of His wrath, judgement and punishment
is preaching heresy and involved in idolatry.
In ‘Studies in the Sermon on the Mount,’ Martyn Lloyd-Jones said;
“The false prophet
is a man who comes to us, and who, at first, has the appearance of being everything that could be desired.
He is nice, and pleasing and pleasant;
he appears to be thoroughly Christian, and seems to say the right things.
His teaching in general is quite all right
and he uses many terms that should be used and employed by a true Christian teacher.
He talks about God, he talks about Jesus Christ, he talks about the cross,
he emphasizes the love of God,
he seems to be saying everything that a Christian should say.
He is obviously in sheep’s clothing,
and his way of living seems to correspond.
So you do not suspect that there is anything wrong at all;
there is nothing that at once attracts your attention
or arouses your suspicion, nothing glaringly wrong.”
Martyn Lloyd-Jones
has aptly described how a false prophet and a wolf in sheepskin,
goes about deceiving people,
and that is exactly how Joseph Prince operates.
In ‘Exposition of Chapter 10, Saving Faith, Romans,’ Martyn Lloyd-Jones said;
“A second general point is that any teaching concerning salvation
which does not express itself in terms of the demands of the law of God
is a false teaching.
This, again, is a most important point.
There are many such false teachings with which you are familiar.
Many people teach salvation solely in terms of the love of God.
They talk about nothing but God’s love,
and their message is that however much you may have sinned, it does not matter,
because God loves you, and it is this love which gives you your salvation.
Or they put it in terms of the love of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
They teach that He came into the world to tell men and women about the love of God
and the trouble with people is that they do not know how much God loves them.
The problem, they say, is entirely on our side.
Here is God loving everybody, ready to forgive everybody, but people are unhappy because they do not realise it.
So, the preaching of salvation, according to them,
is just the making known of that fact, and we only need to come to a realisation of it.
Now this verse is sufficient in and of itself to show that
such teaching is not only wrong, but it is dangerous and tragically so.
There is no more misleading teaching than that.
Any teaching concerning salvation
must be put in terms of the demands of the law.
‘Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believeth.’
So, if our notion of salvation is not in terms of the satisfaction of the law of God, it is wrong.
Those who know the Epistle to the Romans should be in no trouble about this.
The Apostle has already told us this very clearly in chapter 3:24-26,
where he describes the way in which God saves sinners through the Lord Jesus Christ
as being in keeping with the righteous demands of His law.
He then asks, in verse 31,
‘Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law.’
So, any teaching or any thinking about salvation
which does not put it in terms of satisfying the law of God
is completely false
and is to be rejected as being of the devil himself.
All this comes out, in a general manner, in this fourth verse of the tenth chapter (Romans).”
Martyn Lloyd-Jones said;
“… any teaching concerning salvation
which does not express itself in terms of the demands of the law of God
is a false teaching.”
“Many people teach salvation solely in terms of the love of God.
They talk about nothing but God’s love…”
“So, any teaching, or any thinking, about salvation which does not put it in terms of satisfying the law of God
is completely false
and is to be rejected as being of the devil himself.”
Going by what Martyn Lloyd-Jones said,
Joseph Prince, who preaches the gospel of God’s love,
and totally rejects using the law
(especially, when he rejects using God’s wrath, judgement and punishment in preaching the gospel)
for gospel-preaching,
is not only a false teacher,
but he is also representing the devil himself.
If Joseph Prince is representing the devil,
how can he be a true prophet of God?
In conclusion,
by preaching a God of love and not a God of judgement,
Joseph Prince is using the half-truth deception
to distort the true portrayal of God in the scriptures.
“Posturing a half-truth as whole truth is the most deceptive way of concealing a lie.” (George Ong)
“False teachers are too clever at alerting you with full-lies, but they are most deadly at alluring you with half-truths.” (George Ong)
“If half the face of a man is constantly blown up, while the other half is repeatedly squashed, a completely different face will emerge – it is the same with Joseph Prince’s Pseudo-grace ‘half-truth teaching’ which is nowhere near the true-grace doctrine.” (George Ong)
“Removing half the face of a man is not only giving a false picture of the real but a horrifying depiction of the original – that’s what the half-truth theology of Joseph Prince abhorrently does to the God of the Bible.” (George Ong)
Hence, by preaching the half-truth
of a God of love and not a God of judgement,
Joseph Prince is preaching a different God of the Bible.
A true prophet of God will never do that.
Only a wolf in sheepskin in Joseph Prince
will have the unholy guts to do so.
Rev George Ong
Appendix
Joseph Prince’s dispensational doctrine
is decisively refuted by Martyn Lloyd-Jones
Joseph Prince said;
“We cannot say God is judging America.
God is judging Singapore.
God is judging the Philippines.
God is judging;
we cannot say God is judging all this.
Because we are not in the day of vengeance of our God.
Friend, we are still under the dispensation of grace.”
In ‘Destined To Reign,’ Joseph Prince wrote;
Throughout this book, I have endeavored to show you
the gospel of Jesus Christ through the Scriptures
as well as through my own struggles
with the erroneous teachings that I had received
as I was growing in the Lord.
I have shown you that under the dispensation of grace,
God is not judging you…”
Joseph Prince’s dispensational doctrine
about the strict separation
between law in the Old Covenant and grace in the New,
and his many other doctrines
that are associated with dispensationalism,
is conclusively rebutted by Martyn Lloyd-Jones.
In ‘Exposition of Chapters 3:30-4:25, Atonement and Justification, Romans,’ Martyn Lloyd-Jones said;
“Another fallacy, and a popular one in evangelical circles, is that God, first of all, in this matter of salvation,
tried the Law, and finding that the Law did not work,
He then had an afterthought and introduced the whole notion of the Cross.
The Cross as an afterthought!
What an unbiblical conception!
It is characteristic of the type of teaching
that divides up the Bible into numerous sections or dispensations
and fails to see the essential unity of all its parts.”
“Thirdly, I want to emphasize one other thing which we should bear in mind.”
“It is what may be described as the dispensational error.
I mean the teaching that emphasizes that there is still a real distinction and difference between the Jews and the Gentiles.
It is a teaching which says, that though, in a sense, now in the time of the Gospel, they are both one,
Nevertheless, the old fundamental distinction is still there; and it will come back again, for it is still a real one.
Indeed, some go so far as to say that it will persist throughout eternity,
that the Church will be in Heaven
and the Jews, the nation, will be on earth
– this distinction between Jew and Gentile
will be perpetuated to all eternity.
But not only that;
it teaches that there are several Gospels,
that there is a ‘Gospel of the Kingdom’
which is not the same as the ‘Gospel of the grace of God’.
This teaching has achieved great popularity.
It maintains that, when our Lord first came, He, like John the Baptist, preached the Gospel of the Kingdom.
But that when the Jews rejected that,
then God brought in the Gospel of the grace of God,
the present Gospel which we preach,
which says that both Jew and Gentile can be saved by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
That is the Gospel of the grace of God,
which is not the same thing as the Gospel of the Kingdom;
and this Gospel of grace, they say, will go on being preached until the end of the great tribulation,
then it comes to an end.
There is disagreement as to details; some say it will end earlier, and that then the Gospel of the Kingdom will come back again,
and that there will be people who will be saved through believing the Gospel of the Kingdom, which the Jews rejected of old.
You see the implication of all that.
It means that there will be some people saved in eternity, not through believing the Gospel of the grace of God
but through the Gospel of the Kingdom.
In other words, it is possible for people to be saved
apart from the grace of God in and through our Lord Jesus Christ and Him crucified.
You cannot reconcile that with this clear and plain teaching.
There is only one Gospel,
it is the Gospel of the grace of God.
That is the only Gospel that admits anyone into the Kingdom;
it is the only way into the Kingdom of God.
There is only one way to be reconciled to God,
and it is through this ‘propitiation’ which He hath set forth in the blood of Christ.
There is no other,
there never has been another,
there never will be another.
It is the only way.
So, to insist upon this perpetuation of the difference between Jew and Gentile,
and to talk of different types of Gospel,
is to deny the very teaching that the Apostle has gone out of his way to stress and to emphasize.”
“There is only one Gospel for Jews and for Gentiles alike.”
Romans 4:1-3
“Abraham Justified by Faith What shall we say then that Abraham our father, as pertaining to the flesh, hath found? For if Abraham were justified by works, he hath whereof to glory; but not before God. For what saith the scripture? Abraham believed God and it was counted unto him for righteousness.
And we made the point that God, because of that,
has only one way of salvation for everybody.
But here the Apostle adds another thing
– not only one way of salvation for everybody,
but one way of salvation at all times also.
This is, obviously, a most important and material point.
The theme of this chapter (Rom 4),
to put it in a more doctrinal manner,
is that there is only one covenant of grace,
and that men in all dispensations
are saved in exactly the same way.
It is the same covenant of grace under the Old Testament
as it is under the New.
There is a difference in administration,
but it is the same covenant of grace.
There is only one way of salvation always,
whether in the past, present, or future.
People often get confused about this.”
“There is only one great covenant of grace.
The Old Testament saints were saved
in exactly the same way as we are.”
“That is the theme he begins to deal with in this fourth chapter (Romans)
– that because God is one
there is only one way of salvation,
whether under the Old Testament or the New.
And, more, there never will be another.
There is only one Gospel.
There is only one way of salvation.
There is only one way of being reconciled to God.
It is the same covenant of grace then, now, and in the future.
There will never be a time when man can enter the Kingdom of God
by any way or by any means save this one and only way.”
“Then from verse 9 to verse 12 (Romans 4),
he points out that all this had happened to Abraham
before he was circumcised;
so circumcision cannot be the vital thing.
Then in verses 13 to 17 (Romans 4),
he proves that this also was before the Law had been given.
Indeed, God had ordered things in this way
in order that He might show once and for ever
that salvation is by grace, through faith,
not by circumcision or by the Law,
because grace is the only way whereby it can be made certain and sure.”
“The vital point so far is that we should have understood and grasped that
when we are told that ‘Abraham believed God’
it means that Abraham was given to understand that God’s way of justification
is not by works, not by law, not by circumcision,
not by any of these things;
but that it is God imputing the righteousness of His Son to us, and enabling us to see that by faith.
It comes to us by the instrument of faith, but the righteousness is that of Jesus Christ.
What an amazing doctrine, and how wonderful that Abraham saw it, saw the day of Christ, believed it, rejoiced in it!
So did David, and so did others under the Law!
Here they were under the Old Dispensation looking forward – to what?
To the day when all this would really be enacted and done.
They saw it clearly enough to be saved by it.
It is that that saved them,
because it is God’s plan from all eternity,
and nothing can upset it.”
In ‘Exposition of Chapter 5, Assurance, Romans,’ Martyn Lloyd-Jones said;
“The Apostle often gives expression to this idea.
He says exactly the same thing in the fourth chapter of the Epistle to the Galatians, verse 4:
‘When the fullness of the time was come’ – ‘in due time’ – ‘God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law.’
It is very important that we should understand this.
Salvation is not an afterthought.
Nothing is an afterthought where God is concerned.
God sees the end from the beginning.
He knows everything.
The importance of all this from the standpoint of our salvation needs no demonstration.
This is not something haphazard.
God had planned it all before the foundation of the world.
There is a sense in which our Lord can be referred to as
‘the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world’.
All that is brought before us in this expression
‘in due time’.”
“And salvation was planned in eternity.
It is not accidental, or contingent, or haphazard.
God has seen the whole from beginning to end.
There is a plan of salvation, there is a scheme of salvation,
and it was purposed before time.”
In ‘Exposition of Chapter 8:17-39, The Final Perseverance of the Saints, Romans,’ Martyn Lloyd-Jones said;
“Then there is that well-known statement in the Book of Revelation about our ‘names written in the book of life
of the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world’.”
“It is important that we emphasize that the plan of salvation did not come into the mind of God after the fall of man.
It was in His mind even before the creation of the world.
The plan of salvation was not conceived after the Fall.
There have been no re-adjustments in God’s plan.
Some have taught and still teach a notion of a series of re-adjustments in God’s plan.
They teach that God dealt with the children of Israel in an experimental or empirical manner,
trying this and that, and when He found that one plan did not work, He tried another.
For instance, they say that God gave the Law to the children of Israel as a possible way of salvation;
then, when it did not work, He began to give promises through the prophets that He would send a Deliverer.
In this way, they deny Scripture’s emphatic teaching concerning the purpose of God,
and give an utter denial to those passages
which teach plainly that all was planned
‘before the foundation of the world’.
This erroneous teaching is carried even further in the notes of a certain well-known edition of the Bible,
which do not hesitate to say that even when eventually God sent His Son into the world, the plan had to be changed.
They assert that the Son came and preached the Kingdom of God,
and offered an entry into the Kingdom of God to the Jews
simply on the terms that they should believe on Him and His teaching.
Had they done so, the Kingdom of God would have been established there and then.
But unfortunately, the Jews rejected the offer, and on that account,
God had to introduce another way through the death of His Son.
And so, the Church came into being.
The Church had never been thought of before;
it came in as an afterthought, as a temporary expedient,
because the Jews had rejected the teaching of the Kingdom and the offer of entry into the Kingdom.
The Church and salvation through the death of Christ are a kind of improvisation.
The death of Christ need not have taken place
if the Jews had believed the message of the Kingdom.
God’s plan had to be interrupted.
The ‘prophetic clock’ was stopped for the time being,
and after this ‘church age’, which is a digression,
God’s plan and purpose will be continued again.
Such notions are a complete denial
of the biblical teaching concerning the ‘purpose of God’
conceived in eternity
before the foundation of the world
and the creation of man.
They represent the teaching
which is known as ‘dispensationalism’.
We must be clear about these things.
God’s purpose came into being before the foundation of the world.
There is nothing contingent, nothing temporary or expedient about it.
It does not come into being because of something unforeseen.”
In ‘Exposition of Romans Chapter 9, God’s Sovereign Purpose, Romans,’ Martyn Lloyd-Jones said;
“But also, it seems to me to be a final refutation of a very popular dispensational teaching
which tells us that our Lord came into the world primarily to offer the kingdom to the Jews,
and that it was only after the Jews had refused to believe and to receive the teaching about the kingdom,
and as the result of that,
that the gospel of grace by the death of Christ had to be introduced and brought in.
It was, they maintain, an afterthought.
If only the Jews had accepted the teaching about the kingdom this would never have happened;
there would never have been any need for the doctrine of the grace of God.
And then they go on to say that this doctrine of the gospel of the grace of God is only a temporary one,
and that a day will yet come when the gospel of the kingdom will once more be preached,
and people will either be saved by believing or lost by rejecting that offer of the kingdom.
But now it seems to me that this one statement alone is enough to refute that teaching.
The cross was something that had been planned before the foundation of the world.
There was no change in God’s programme as the result of what happened to our Lord when He was here in the days of His flesh.
This notion that the ‘prophetic clock’ was stopped then,
and that the whole plan had to be rearranged because of the rejection of the Jews,
seems to me to be a sheer denial of what we read here and in so many other places
– how the cross is prophesied and predicted right the way through the Old Testament.
All the types and shadows, the paschal lamb, the burnt offering, the sacrifices,
all of them are proclaiming the absolute necessity of the Son of God’s incarnation and sacrifice.
And here we are reminded that the treatment which was meted out to Him by the Jews
was something that had long ago been prophesied by the prophet Isaiah.
So, this is an extraordinary refutation of any such teaching which suggests
– the suggestion itself is monstrous!
– that God’s eternal plan had to be modified
because the Jews rejected the gospel of the kingdom.
No!
As the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews tells us,
He ‘was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death’ [Hebrews 2:9].
All this happened to Him that He might ‘taste death for every man’.
He came into the world primarily to die,
and that is why this had been prophesied and predicted so long before,
in the writings of the various prophets,
and in the whole of the Levitical ceremonial and ritual.”
In ‘Exposition of Chapter 10, Saving Faith, Romans,’ Martyn Lloyd-Jones said;
“No one has ever been saved, no one has ever been reconciled to God, no one has ever become a child of God,
except in and through Jesus Christ and Him crucified.
We must all be clear about that.
Nobody was saved under the old dispensation except in and through Him.”
“This matter is quite crucial because of the artificial distinction that is drawn
by what is known as Dispensationalism,
which is a denial of,
and does violence to the Scriptures.”
“(Dispensationalists argued:) Of course, Paul was an apostle after the death of Christ,
and of course, he preached nothing but the gospel of the grace of God.
The Jews had now already rejected the gospel of the kingdom – it is now the gospel of the grace of God
– but the gospel of the kingdom will come back again.’”
“(Martyn Lloyd-Jones argued:) You see, preaching the gospel of the grace of God and preaching the kingdom of God are exactly the same thing,
because it is the grace of God alone that admits anybody into the kingdom.
Nobody has ever entered the kingdom, or will ever do so, except by the grace of God.
There is only one gospel, it is the gospel of the grace of God
which tells us the one and only way by which anyone at any time has ever been able to enter the kingdom of God.”