John Bevere: Driven
by Eternity, Faith Words, 2006. 283 pages.
Introduction
John
Bevere’s Driven by Eternity is reminiscent of what is arguably one of
the most famous sermons ever preached: Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God
by Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758).
When Jonathan
Edwards first preached his now famous sermon on July 8, 1741, the response was
amazing. The congregation in Enfield, Connecticut, where Edwards was a guest
preacher, was filled with cries, shrieks, and moaning as people called out,
asking how they could be saved. Edwards’s passionate warning had convinced them
that they were desperately close to being thrown into the endless torment of
hell.1
To
be sure, hearing a sermon preached and reading a book are two different things.
However they are not disconnected. For, infallible Scripture says, “For since,
in the wisdom of God, the world through wisdom did not know God, it pleased God
through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe.” 1
Corinthians 1:21. Thus human wisdom believes that a) the act of preaching the
Gospel is foolishness. And b) the Gospel message is foolishness. Therefore to
the unconverted the publishing of Driven by Eternity is a foolish
exercise – a complete waste of a tree!
The
aforementioned ‘foolishness’ being understood, John Bevere shows his readers
Heaven while showing them Hell. It’s as if he is saying to the reader, ‘Look,
here’s Heaven and there’s Hell,’ as he dangles them over the edge of the
fire-filled pit – perhaps like a turkey roasting on a rotisserie spit. Jonathan
Edwards did likewise to a group of church attendees many years before. Said
Edwards to them:
Your own
wickedness weighs you down like lead and is dragging you down toward hell with
great weight and force. Again, if God would let you go, you would immediately
sink, quickly descending and plunging into the bottomless gulf. All of your
health and personal care, all of your best schemes, and all of your own
righteousness would no better support you and keep you out of hell than a
spider’s web would stop a falling rock.[2]
No,
we’re not reviewing Jonathan Edward’s sermon, but perhaps in a future edition
of Driven by Eternity John Bevere might consider including the Calvinist
Jonathan Edward’s Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God as Appendix C
of his book. It would be so appropriate, and the response might also be
‘amazing.’ But three cheers to Bevere for shocking Christians into taking stock
of their lives in relation to eternity.
Premise & Content
Driven
by Eternity has an Introduction, thirteen chapters and two Appendices.
Bevere uses a lengthy but interesting allegory to assist the reader in
understanding eternity and the reader’s place in it. In order to have the
reader from the very outset ponder eternity, Bevere, in his Introduction, draws
the reader’s attention to Sydney’s the late Arthur Stace.
Stace, post conversion from
a life ‘filled with petty crime and alcoholism,’ did something strange but
remarkable. ‘Arthur would rise early each morning, pray for an hour, and leave
his home between 5:00 and 5:30 A.M., to go wherever he felt God led him. For
hours he would write one word, eternity, approximately every hundred
feet on the sidewalks of Sydney.’
Thus, by arguing that Stace
was a man ‘driven by eternity,’ Bevere immediately gets the reader to
contemplate the deeper meaning of eternity. Then, for the purpose of
illustrating the reader’s relation to eternity, Bevere begins his allegory. The
allegory reflects Jesus, God the Father, Satan, the human being’s life on this
earth, the heavenly city of God, and the dreaded lake of fire. It is a story
well told. And, because of some of its characters therein, it can’t help but
remind the reader of that great allegory The Pilgrim’s Progress, by John
Bunyan (1628-1688).
Like Bunyan’s The
Pilgrim’s Progress, Bevere in Driven by Eternity seeks to show the
reader the many pitfalls encountered along the way by the Christian on his
journey to the ‘Celestial City,’ or in Bevere’s case, Affabel, (i.e., the
New Jerusalem). To a certain extent Bevere succeeds in his endeavour. He
represents some of the various personalities commonly found in the worship
community of God (i.e., church attendees), by use of descriptive names such as Independent,
Deceived, Faint Heart, Selfish, Charity, and
others.
The
sub-title of Driven by Eternity is Making Your Life Count Today and
Forever. In Bevere’s own words:
This is the
focus of this book: Making your life count not only today, but throughout
eternity. The Bible is clear about how to do this. If we are to be motivated by
the eternal, let’s start off by getting an understanding of it.[3]
Then follows a couple of
quotes from the Bible regarding eternity. Then he quotes a couple of
contradictory dictionary definitions of eternity to illustrate that the
understanding of many regarding this subject has become vague.
Bevere
holds to the premise that ‘We are saved by His grace.’[4]
However, like the contradictory dictionary definitions regarding the meaning of
eternity, Bevere holds a contradictory view to the already mentioned
Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758), and John Bunyan (1628-1688), regarding the
meaning of being ‘saved by His grace.’
Likewise, Bevere also would
be offside with John Newton (1725-1807) – the slave-trader who God saved by His
grace. Thus, were Bevere to be consistent with his Driven by Eternity,
he could not sing with conviction the well-known words of the hymn Newton penned
post-conversion: ‘Amazing grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch
like me, I once was lost but now am found, was blind but now I see.’ For,
according to Bevere’s take on salvation
(as he espouses in Driven by
Eternity) these words at
best can only be understood as tentative.
The
Lord knows that we have no wish to denigrate the man John Bevere, but the
reader needs to be alerted to Bevere’s faulty theological understanding as
expressed in Driven by Eternity. In clear but blunt terms, Bevere has
immersed himself in the peatbog of Pentecostal theology.[5]
His Driven by Eternity is a by-product of the labyrinth of the
contradictory extremities of contemporary Pentecostalism. Bevere claims to hear
and see ‘voices and visions’ – which he, without objective proof, alleges is
God communicating with him one on one. He also gives unqualified but
wholehearted endorsement of the ‘voices and visions’ experienced by others, for
example, Kenneth Hagin.[6]
As one would expect from
anyone trapped in the dark and dank dungeon of aberrant theology, the eerie
sound of chain-rattling and chain-dragging contradictions to the clear ring and
teaching of Scripture are heard too often in Driven by Eternity. Indeed,
Bevere puts the whole Bible through the mincer of Dispensationalism. Alan
Cairns warns us of one of the main pitfalls of Dispensationalism regarding the
Gospel. Says Cairns,
The most
dangerous element in the dispensational scheme is that it affects the very
basis of the gospel of salvation by grace alone, through faith in Christ. It
posits the idea that man has been on probation all along and that God’s mercy
is displayed in giving him a new trial after every failure, thus holding out
the possibility of salvation by works of obedience…
Thankfully,
there is evidence that many dispensationalists are awakening to the failures of
the system. Even in moving away quite radically from its fundamental tenets,
they hold on to the name. But that name is too fraught with theological error.
As Reginald Kimbo argues, dispensationalists must recognize the error, admit
that it continues in the system, be clear on the soteriological effects of it,
and entirely repudiate it.[7]
In the following we wish in
particular to take issue with what is perhaps Bevere’s chief aberration: that
those whom God has truly saved by His grace have the power to ‘walk away.’ Thus
in Driven by Eternity Bevere builds his house upon the sinking sand of
faulty premise. For example, in reference to John 10:28-29 Bevere has ‘Jaylin’
(who represents the Lord in his allegory) state the following:
No one can
pluck you out of my hand, but I never said you couldn’t walk away. You alone
hold that power.[8]
Thus
the premise and content of the book is a lengthy apology or defence for the
false and demoralising doctrine that someone who is truly saved by the grace of
God is not truly saved at all!
Faulty Conclusions Drawn from Faulty Theology
The upside of Driven by
Eternity is that Bevere occasionally pops his head out of the murky
swamp-water of faulty theology to breathe fresh air. His book seems to be a
genuine attempt to deal with the ‘Decisionistic Easy Believism’ of
Pentecostalism – a culture which has been steeped since its inception[9]
in a theology attended by ‘Altar Calls’ and a ‘Sinner’s Prayer’ – whereby
people, because they have repeated the ‘Sinner’s Prayer,’ are told that they
have now become Christian converts. Says Bevere:
Not only are
those who’ve never heard, or refuse to believe the Gospel in bondage, but many
typical ‘converts’ of this generation are in bondage as well. We’ve created
this dilemma by neglecting to proclaim the cost of following Jesus. Many assume
they are free but in reality aren’t and the evidence is in their lifestyles.[10]
We wholeheartedly agree with Bevere’s statement just quoted, for Scripture speaks of ‘bad trees’ producing ‘bad fruit’ or ‘evidence’ of non-conversion. Whereas ‘good trees’ producing ‘good fruit’ is ‘evidence’ that the Holy Spirit has regenerated that particular individual. ‘Good fruit’ is the result of the Spirit working in the Christian’s heart. Take as an example of this the following verse of Scripture, ‘But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.’ Galatians 5:22-23a. Therefore, the true Christian ought to be confident in the promise of God that ‘He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ.’ Philippians 1:6.
The fruit in the Christian’s
life is not only the ‘evidence’ of the Christian’s regeneration, but, more
importantly, it indicates that God is true to His Word and that it is God who
has all the power of salvation and not the Christian. For, it is God who begins
the ‘good’ work. The Christian is powerless – being beforehand in bondage to
sin, self, and Satan. If indeed God has begun a good work in someone’s heart,
it is not the Christian who will complete it, but Almighty God. Therefore the
Christian does not have the power to ‘walk away,’ i.e., pluck himself out of
the Lord’s hand as Bevere alleges.
To teach a loss of salvation
is nonsense because God does not convert ‘bad trees’ into ‘bad trees.’ Rather
He only ever converts or changes ‘bad trees’ into ‘good trees.’ And since ‘good
trees’ (i.e., true converts) produce ‘good fruit’ (by the power of the Holy
Spirit working in and through them) these ‘good trees’ don’t produce ‘bad
fruit.’ Therefore, a ‘good tree’ cannot reject God because rejecting God would
be extremely ‘bad fruit.’ Thus rejection of God is clear evidence of being
unconverted regardless of any prior seeming conversion.
In the Parable of the Sower
Jesus illustrates what Bevere is mistakenly portraying as a loss of salvation.
‘A sower went
to sow his seed. And as he sowed, some fell by the wayside; and it was trampled
down, and the birds of the air devoured it. Some fell on rock; and as soon as
it sprang up, it withered away because it lacked moisture. And some fell among
thorns, and the thorns sprang up with it and choked it. But others fell on good
ground, sprang up, and yielded a crop a hundredfold.’ When He had said these
things He cried, ‘He who has ears to hear, let him hear!’
Then His
disciples asked Him, saying, ‘What does this parable mean?’ And He said, ‘To
you it has been given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God, but to the
rest it is given in parables, that Seeing they may not see, and hearing they
may not understand.
‘Now the
parable is this: The seed is the word of God. Those by the wayside are the ones
who hear; then the devil comes and takes away the word out of their hearts,
lest they should believe and be saved. But the ones on the rock are those who,
when they hear, receive the word with joy, and these have no root, who believe
for a while and in time of temptation fall away. Now the ones that fell among the
thorns are those who, when they heard, go out and are choked with cares,
riches, and pleasures of life, and bring no fruit to maturity. But the ones
that fell on the good ground are those who, having heard the word with a noble
and good heart, keep it and bear fruit with patience.’ Luke 8:4-15.
Notice
that the parable does not speak of anyone losing salvation. Rather, the parable
indicates, that there are those who, though they seem to be numbered among the
saved, prove to be otherwise. No doubt this is why Scripture says, ‘Do not lay
hands on anyone hastily…’ 1 Timothy 5:22a. It comes as a shock and is
bewildering for a Christian to see another who was so ‘full on’ for Christ
‘walk away’ from Him. But, in light of the Parable of the Sower we ought to expect
to see this from time to time.
Bevere
invokes Hebrews 6:4-6 to prove his allegation that true Christians can lose
their salvation. But we interpret Scripture by Scripture. Therefore keep in
mind the Parable of the Sower as you read what the writer to the Hebrews says:
For it is
impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted the heavenly
gift, and have become partakers of the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the good
word of God and the powers of the age to come, if they fall away, to renew them
again to repentance, since they crucify again for themselves the Son of God,
and put Him to an open shame.’ Hebrew 6:4-6.
Hear
again what Jesus said regarding some of those who have ‘tasted the good word of
God’ but have fallen away: ‘The seed is the word of God… The ones on the rock
are those who, when they hear, receive the word with joy, and these have no
root, who believe for a while and in time of temptation fall away. Now the ones
that fell among the thorns are those who, when they heard, go out and are
choked with cares, riches, and pleasures of life, and bring no fruit to
maturity…’ Thus some ‘fall away.’
The
Apostle John speaks of those who ‘… went out from us, but they were not of us;
for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us; but they went
out that they might be manifest, that none of them were of us.’ 1 John
2:19. Then later in 1 John 5 he says,
‘There is a sin leading to death. I do not say that he [i.e., Christians]
should pray about that.’ 1 John 5:16b.
In the following, Martin
Duffield refers to those who have tasted ‘ the good word of God’ but have
rejected it, i.e., those who have ‘walked away’ from Christ, as the ‘terminally
sinful’:
The terminally sinful, for who Scripture
says we should no longer pray are men and women who have known the truth but
have now turned from it, they have known the law of God and will not now submit
to it and who have heard the call to love one another as Jesus loved us but now
refuse. In these things it would appear that they have crossed the line and
belong to that dreadful category captured in the words of Hebrews six, ‘it
is impossible to renew them.’[11]
Kept by Grace
In
Driven by Eternity Bevere demonstrates to the reader that he (i.e.,
Bevere) has not understood what it means to be ‘saved’ and to be ‘kept’ as such
by God’s grace. Bevere’s is teaching that it is we who ‘keep’ ourselves saved
and not God who keeps us. We give the following as a clear example of this
serious misunderstanding of God’s salvation. Writes Bevere:
To those who
keep themselves in love with God by looking for the revealing of Jesus, He
says:
Now to Him who is able to
keep you from stumbling, And to present you faultless before the presence of
His glory with exceeding joy, to God our Saviour, Who alone is wise, be glory
and majesty, dominion and power, both now and forever. Amen. Jude 24-25.[12]
Bevere
alleges that God Almighty does not have the dominion and power to keep a true
believer from ‘walking away’ from God for eternity. Notice that he is saying
that it is Christians who ‘keep themselves in the love of God,’ i.e.,
saved. Which is it? Are true Christians
kept by God or kept by themselves? To put it another way, is ‘God our Saviour’
or are we our own saviour? Shouldn’t we just believe what the Jude verses
plainly say? It is God who has dominion and power – not the Christian. It is
God (not the Christian) who keeps the true Christian from stumbling, i.e., from
falling away. It is God who presents the true Christian as faultless (not the
Christian).
Bevere
believes that the person who is, as the Bible states, ‘dead in trespasses and
sins’ (Ephesians 2:1), is not so dead as to be unable to make a ‘decision’ for
Christ. According to Bevere, to decide for Christ is to get one’s name written
in the Lamb’s Book of Life, i.e., to get saved. It is because of his
‘Decisionistic’ theology that Bevere thinks that if a person is able to
‘decide’ for Jesus, then, conversely, that same person is able to decide to
give up following Jesus. But notice what the Lord says through His prophet
Jonah, ‘Salvation is of the LORD.’ Jonah 2:9b. Wait! Read it again. ‘Salvation
is of the LORD.’ Salvation is not part by God and part by the person dead in
trespasses and sins. No! Salvation is of the LORD!
If
it is God who saves you then you are saved indeed! If we have any part in our
salvation then we are all doomed! God doesn’t do His part towards our
salvation, then we are to do the rest. No! Christ is our Saviour! We don’t save
ourselves by making a decision. Therefore we are not saved BECAUSE we believe.
Our belief is not the CAUSE of our salvation. God is the CAUSE of our
salvation, not our ‘decision.’ Belief or faith is the instrument THROUGH which
the Father communicates the salvation purchased by Jesus Christ to the individual
by the Holy Spirit working with the Word.
‘For
God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever
believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.’ John 3:16. Sure,
believers may backslide at times. One only has to look to king David with his
adultery with Bathsheba and the murder of her husband for an example of a
believer backsliding. But true believers do not perish and they have
everlasting life because God by His grace alone grants it to them in Jesus Christ.
Thus God will preserve those for whom His Son died.
If
we are able to snatch ourselves out of Jesus’ and the Father’s hand then Jesus
has lost us and our salvation does not belong to the LORD. But Jesus says, ‘All
that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will by
no means cast out.’ John 6:31. Those chosen by the Father are those that the
Son will not cast out. These are true believers being spoken of here.
Again,
Jesus says, ‘This is the will of the Father who sent Me, that of all He has
given Me I should lose nothing, but raise it up at the last day.’ John 6:39.
And notice who these true believers are, ‘No one comes to Me unless the Father
who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day.’ John 6:44. And
one more, ‘I pray for them. I do not pray for the world, but for those You have
given Me, for they are Yours. And all Mine are Yours, and Yours are Mine, and I
am glorified in them.’ John 17:9-10.
It
is the Father who draws those He has chosen or elected and gives them to His
Son. Jesus died for those who were chosen by the Father. They are drawn to the
Son because they have been elected by the Father in eternity past and saved by
the Son some two-thousand years ago. ‘Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord
Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with ever spiritual blessing in the heavenly
places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the
world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love, having
predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to
the good pleasure of His will.’ Ephesians 1:3-5.
Notice
who chooses whom: God chooses or elects us. And notice that God has chosen us
in eternity past, i.e., before the foundation of the world. And notice that we
are chosen according to the good pleasure of His will. ‘But as many as
received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who
believe in His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the
flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.’ John 1:12-13.
We would all do well to read
Martin Luther’s The Bondage of the Will. Our will is in bondage until
God by His Spirit sets us free by regenerating and converting us. Indeed the
Gospel is about God reconciling Himself to us and us to Him because all mankind
in its fallen state is at war with God!
Being at war with God means
that we will not chose Christ: ‘We will not have this man reign over us.’ Luke
19:14b. Fallen man does not choose God in Jesus Christ. As Jesus says
elsewhere, ‘You did not choose Me, but I chose You and appointed you that you
should go and bear fruit…’ John 15:16a. Therefore it is not we who decide for
Christ. It is God who chooses us. Thanks be to God that ‘The Son of Man came to
seek and to save that which was lost.’ Luke 19:10. Otherwise we would remain
dead in our trespasses and sins and end up in torments in Hell forever. It is
to demonstrate his gratitude to God for saving him that the saved person
strives to keep God commandments.
But
we must keep in mind that God does not choose us because of any good thing in
us, or because He foresaw that, given half a chance, we would ‘decide’ for
Jesus. No! For, ‘There is none righteous, no, not one; there is none who
understands; there is none who seeks after God. They have all turned
aside; they have together become unprofitable: there is none who does good, no,
not one.’ Romans 3:10-12.
Teaching Also the Hard Bits
It
is good that Bevere says that ‘We are to proclaim the whole counsel of God.’[13]
But it is bad that he means by this that we are to teach that true born again
believers can make themselves unborn again!
Yes,
the real downside to Driven by Eternity is that Bevere gets himself lost
in the leech-filled swamp of real saved-by-grace believers losing their
salvation. Rather than suck life out of true believers Bevere ought to have
left it where Scripture leaves it. For it is written: ‘For they are not all
Israel who are of Israel.’ Romans 9:9b. And, ‘They went out from us, but they
were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us;
but they went out that they might be manifest, that none of them were of us.’ 1
John 2:19.
To
be sure, there are people attending churches who are deluded in thinking they
are true believers, and no doubt there are those who go to the grave under that
delusion, but that is why Christians are told: ‘Therefore, brethren, be even
more diligent to make your call and election sure, for if you do these things
you will never stumble; for so an entrance will be supplied to you abundantly
into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.’ 1 Peter
1:10-11. You are to ‘work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for
it is God who works in you both to will and to do His good pleasure.’ Philippians
2:12-13.
Christians
are to make their ‘call and election’ sure. They are called by God and they are
elected by God. Therefore true Christians are the ‘called’ and the ‘elect’ of
God. ‘Therefore do not be ashamed of the testimony of the Lord, nor of me His
prisoner, but share with me in the sufferings for the gospel according to the
power of God, who has saved us and called us with a holy calling, not
according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was
given to us in Christ Jesus before the world began…’ 2 Timothy 1:8-9.
‘And we know that all things
work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called
according to His purpose. For whom He foreknew, He also predestined, to be
conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many
brethren. Moreover whom He predestined, these He also called, whom He called,
these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified.’
Romans 8:28-30 (KJV & NKJV).
It is God then who calls and
elects by His grace alone. And those He calls and elects Jesus will in no wise
cast out. Therefore would He ever let that which belongs to Him ‘walk away’
from Him? Jesus says to the Father, ‘Those whom You gave Me I have kept; and
none of them is lost except the son of perdition, that the Scripture might be
fulfilled.’ John 17:12b. Judas Iscariot did not belong to Jesus. He belonged to
the Devil. (See what Jesus says about Judas e.g., in John 6:70).
True Faith Versus False Faith
Bevere
takes the Biblical exhortations for Christians to persevere in the faith to
mean that the true Christian can somehow lose his or her salvation by walking
away from Christ forever. Don’t miss the subtleness here! The Bible encourages
Christians to run the race so that they will ‘make their calling and election
sure.’ But they are not making their calling and election sure to God, for God
already knows He has called and elected them. Rather, they are making their
calling and election sure to themselves. In other words the Christian is make
sure that he or she has indeed been called and elected by God FOR PEACE OF MIND!
Perhaps the most unfortunate
thing about the Arminian theology to which Bevere so tenaciously adheres is
that the Christian is left with no real assurance that God has saved him. For Driven
by Eternity is promoting the idea that no one can really know if they have
been saved or not.
Bevere therefore reads the
Scriptures through clouded glasses, for he believes that true Christians can
lose their blood-bought salvation. Indeed, Bevere is sure that each of the
following early Church Fathers quoted below held that same view. But before you
read the following Bevere quote keep in mind that God tests the genuineness of
faith of those who claim to be Christians. For example, ‘In this you greatly
rejoice, though now for a little while, if need be, you have been grieved by
various trials, that the genuineness of your faith, being much more
precious than gold which perishes, though it is tested by fire, may be found
to praise, honour, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ, whom having
not seen you love.’ 1 Peter 1:6-8a.
It benefits the Christian
therefore to know that his faith is of the genuine sort and not the ‘power of
positive thinking’ type of faith that so often tries to pass itself off as true
God-given faith – especially in the Arminian churches. God at times weeds out
the phonies through testing.
True Christians practice
true righteousness which is the fruit of their Christ-purchased salvation.
Those without the gift of true faith are found wanting. But the exhortation is
for all to produce ‘good fruit.’ It is those who do not have true saving faith
that fall away and are disinherited. With this in mind listen to what Bevere
says:
I’ve shared
the truths of almost every writer in the New Testament concerning believers
walking away from their salvation. Let me now share some of the writings of the
noted early church fathers, some of whom were companions of the apostles who
wrote the New Testament. I find their writings to directly correlate with the
words we’ve seen in Scripture.
Let us then practice
righteousness so that we may be saved unto the end. CLEMENT OF ROME
Even in the case of one who
has done the greatest good deeds in his life, but at the end has run headlong
into wickedness, all his former pains are profitless to him. For at the climax
of the drama, he has given up his part. CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA
Some think that God is under
a necessity of bestowing even on the unworthy what He has promised [to give].
So they turn His liberality into His slavery. . . For do not many afterwards
fall out of [grace]? Is not this gift taken away from many? TERTULLIAN
A man may possess an
acquired righteousness, from which it is possible for him to fall away. ORIGEN
Those who do not obey Him,
being disinherited by Him, have ceased to be His sons. IRENAEUS[14]
None
of the early church fathers quoted here necessarily give any evidence of the
false doctrine Bevere is promoting. For none of them says anything about a truly
converted Christian losing the salvation God has given them by His grace alone.
Again, the words of the Apostle John equally apply even here, ‘They went out
from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have
continued with us; but they went out that they might be manifest, that none of
them were of us.’ 1 John 2:19.
Rejection of the grace
offered in the Gospel is evidence of reprobation. Holding fast to the end is
evidence of regeneration. Man cannot regenerate himself. Nor does he cooperate
in his regeneration. It is God alone who brings men – who are dead in
trespasses and sins – back to life. None of us chose when to be born the first
time. Neither do we choose to be born again. Both are subject to God’s
sovereign control. The Christian community, like the world in which it exists,
consists of sheep and goats, wheat and tares. These, of course, will be
separated on the last day.
However, as Christians may
be distinguished from non-Christians in the world (such as from Muslims, Jews,
Atheists etc.), so at times it is possible to distinguish true Christians from
false Christians in the Church. For example, the Apostle Peter also speaks of
those who give evidence of their reprobation (i.e., unconversion) where he
calls those who ‘walk away’ ‘slaves of corruption’ – hardly a term used of true
Christians!
While they
promise them liberty, they themselves are slaves of corruption, for by whom a
person is overcome, by him also he is brought into bondage. For if, after they
have escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and
Saviour Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overcome, the latter
end is worse for them than the beginning. For it would have been better for
them not to have known the way of righteousness, than having known it, to turn
from the holy commandment delivered to them. But it has happened to them
according to the true proverb: ‘A dog returns to his own vomit,’ and, ‘a
sow, having been washed, to her wallowing in the mire.’ 2 Peter 2:19-22.
‘Slaves of corruption’ returning to their master the devil has absolutely nothing to do with Christians losing their salvation! What it does is spur the Christian on to ‘make his call and election sure.’ In other words, it goads the Christian into making sure that they really are a Christian and are not deluding themselves. As Scripture says, ‘Examine yourselves as to whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Do you not know yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?–unless indeed you are disqualified. But I trust that you will know that you are not disqualified.’ 2 Corinthians 13:5-6.
Jesus
said to a group of Jews who did not believe in Him, ‘But you do not believe
because you are not of My sheep, as I said to you. My sheep hear My voice, and
I know them, and they follow Me.’ John 10:26-27. Those who do not follow Jesus,
along with those who give up following Jesus, are not His sheep. ‘In this the
children of the devil are manifest: Whoever does not practice righteousness is
not of God, nor does he love his brother. For this is the message that you
heard from the beginning, that we should love one another, not as Cain who was
of the wicked one and murdered his brother.’ 1 John 3:10-12a.
Who would deny that Judas
Iscariot belonged to the same group as Cain? Judas and Cain were not Jesus’
sheep. All who reject Him are not His sheep. His sheep hear His voice, are
known by Him, and follow Him to the very end. This is what salvation is!
Salvation includes the gift of perseverance because it is God who preserves us.
Hidden Theological Bias
Bevere
refuses to nail his theological colours to the mast for all to see. Instead he
leaves it for reviewers of his book to alert the undiscerning reader to his
theological leanings which in turn greatly affect his interpretation of
Scripture. Says Bevere,
Upon hearing
my stance on these truths from Scripture, some have incorrectly said to me,
‘John, you are an Arminian.’ This is a term that the dictionary describes as
follows: ‘Of or relating to the theology of Jacobus Arminius and his followers,
who rejected the Calvinist doctrines of predestination and election and who
believed that human free will is compatible with God’s sovereignty.’
To these
people I simply say, ‘No, I’m neither a Calvinist nor an Arminian, but a
Christian who believes in the Bible being the infallible Word of God.’ Jacobus
Arminius lived long after the writers of the Scripture and even the early
leaders quoted above.
So could you
call these writers Arminian? Obviously not, as they lived and wrote before
Arminius was born.[15]
Here
we agree with John Bevere. He is not a Calvinist, and the writers of Scripture
were not Arminian! But John Bevere Driven by Eternity espouses Arminian
theology cover to cover! Driven by Eternity is purely and simply the
product of an Arminian theology.
It
is because Bevere holds to the view that human beings have the power on their
own to ‘decide’ to follow Jesus that he believes that they have the same power
to decide to ‘walk away’ from Jesus. This is pure Arminianism! We commend
Bevere’s stand against Antinomianism by his call to Christians to live holy
lives, but we condemn his allegation that believers truly converted by grace
alone can ever be lost and perish.
In
the Arminian scheme of things the tendency is for the believer to look back to
his or her ‘conversion date’ as evidence that they are truly in the faith.
Therefore the problem with ‘Decisionistic Easy Believism’ is that the believer
constantly looks at his or her own previous profession of faith, i.e., to
whenever it was that they went forward at the ‘altar call,’ or whenever it was
that they followed the instructions and repeated the ‘sinner’s prayer’ and
signed the dotted line at the back of the New Testament someone had given them.
But Scripture says instead that we are to be ‘looking unto Jesus the author and
finisher of our faith.’ Hebrews 12:2a.
Conclusion
There
are many gold nuggets in Driven by Eternity, but it is such a pity that
the reader has to crawl around in the decayed and dangerous mineshafts of
Dispensationalism and Arminianism to find them! Bevere’s challenge for
Christians to live godly lives by keeping God’s Commandments is heartening. His
exhortation to do so in order to secure a good seat in eternity is not –
although we thank him for the timely reminder that as Christians we ought to be
thinking in terms of eternity. However, as Christians we ought to serve the
Lord out of love and gratitude for the salvation He has purchased for us on
Calvary’s cross. We ought never to presume upon His grace as we strive to love
Him with all our heart, all our soul, all our strength, and all our mind, and
love our neighbour as ourself.
It
was a delight to read in Driven by Eternity of a Heaven that is a real
and solid place for real and solid (saved) human beings. And it was good to
read about the real and solid New Earth to which the real and solid New
Jerusalem descends. Yes, there are some aspects even of these things where we’d
beg to differ with Bevere on the basis of Scripture. For example, Bevere speaks
of a resurrected Christ who walks through solid walls. However, this is nowhere
taught in Scripture. Indeed great care needs to be taken here not to confuse
the two natures of Christ and have the divine nature absorb the human nature of
Christ even for a moment.
Bevere then ascribes the
same divine attributes to resurrected Christians in order for them to do
likewise regarding solid objects and also to traverse vast distances at the
speed of light by their own power. This is to distort the true nature of man
even in his glorified state. To be sure, the resurrected saint will have
immortal and incorruptible qualities, but as God always remains God so man will
always remain man.
Chapters
17 and 18 of the Westminster Confession of Faith (1647), to which the
aforementioned Jonathan Edwards, John Bunyan, and John Newton were able to
subscribe, distils what the Scriptures have to say about the perseverance of
the saints and their assurance of grace and salvation. It would be a fitting
conclusion to this book review, and is worthwhile reading in order to reassure
and strengthen the true Christian:
Chapter XVII: Of the
Perseverance of the Saints
I. They, whom God has
accepted in His Beloved, effectually called, and sanctified by His Spirit, can
neither totally nor finally fall away from the state of grace, but shall
certainly persevere therein to the end, and be eternally saved.
II. This perseverance of the
saints depends not upon their own free will, but upon the immutability of the
decree of election, flowing from the free and unchangeable love of God the
Father; upon the efficacy of the merit and intercession of Jesus Christ, the
abiding of the Spirit, and of the seed of God within them, and the nature of
the covenant of grace: from all which arises also the certainty and
infallibility thereof.
III. Nevertheless, they may,
through the temptations of Satan and of the world, the prevalency of corruption
remaining in them, and the neglect of the means of their preservation, fall
into grievous sins; and, for a time, continue therein: whereby they incur God’s
displeasure, and grieve His Holy Spirit, come to be deprived of some measure of
their graces and comforts, have their hearts hardened, and their consciences
wounded; hurt and scandalize others, and bring temporal judgments upon
themselves.
Chapter XVIII: Of
Assurance of Grace and Salvation
I. Although hypocrites and other unregenerate men may vainly deceive themselves with false hopes and carnal presumptions of being in the favour of God, and estate of salvation; which hope of theirs shall perish; yet such as truly believe in the Lord Jesus, and love Him in sincerity, endeavouring to walk in all good conscience before Him, may, in this life, be certainly assured that they are in the state of grace, and may rejoice in the hope of the glory of God; which hope shall never make them ashamed.
II. This certainty is not a
bare conjectural and probable persuasion grounded upon a fallible hope; but an
infallible assurance of faith founded upon the divine truth of the promises of
salvation, the inward evidence of those graces unto which these promises are
made, the testimony of the Spirit of adoption witnessing with our spirits that
we are the children of God: which Spirit is the earnest of our inheritance,
whereby we are sealed to the day of redemption.
III. This infallible
assurance does not so belong to the essence of faith, but that a true believer
may wait long, and conflict with many difficulties, before he be partaker of
it: yet, being enabled by the Spirit to know the things which are freely given
him of God, he may, without extraordinary revelation in the right use of
ordinary means, attain thereunto. And therefore it is the duty of every one to
give all diligence to make his calling and election sure; that thereby his
heart may be enlarged in peace and joy in the Holy Ghost, in love and
thankfulness to God, and in strength and cheerfulness in the duties of obedience,
the proper fruits of this assurance: so far is it from inclining men to
looseness.
IV. True believers may have
the assurance of their salvation divers ways shaken, diminished, and
intermitted; as, by negligence in preserving of it, by falling into some
special sin which wounds the conscience and grieves the Spirit; by some sudden
or vehement temptation, by God's withdrawing the light of His countenance, and
suffering even such as fear Him to walk in darkness and to have no light: yet
are they never utterly destitute of that seed of God, and life of faith, that
love of Christ and the brethren, that sincerity of heart, and conscience of
duty, out of which, by the operation of the Spirit, this assurance may, in due
time, be revived; and by the which, in the mean time, they are supported from
utter despair.
1 John Jeffrey
Fanella, Jonathan Edwards Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, P&R
1996, p. 29.
[2]
Jonathan Edwards, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.
[3]
John Bevere, Driven by Eternity: Making Your Life Count Today & Forever,
Faith Words, 2006, p. 3.
[4]
Ibid. p. 276.
[5]
‘Historically, Pentecostalism was mainly a holiness movement that accepted the
fundamental truths of the Protestant faith, though it was mostly Arminian in
its soteriology [i.e., in its teaching on salvation].’ Dictionary of
Theological Terms by Alan Cairns, Ambassador Emerald International, 2002.
[6]
John Bevere, Driven by Eternity: Making Your Life Count Today & Forever,
Faith Words, 2006, p.111.
[7]
Dictionary of Theological Terms by Alan Cairns, Ambassador Emerald
International, 2002.
[8]
John Bevere, Driven by Eternity: Making Your Life Count Today & Forever,
Faith Words, 2006 pp. 48-49.
[9]
‘The origins of Pentecostalism may be dated to 1 January 1901, when Miss Agnes
Ozman, a student at Bethel Bible College, Topeka, Kansas, spoke in tongues
after the principal, Charles Fox Parham (1873-1929), laid hands on her and
prayed for her to receive the power of the Spirit. Henceforth, for
Pentecostals, the supreme sign of being baptized in the Sprit would be speaking
in tongues. This is considered to be the gateway to vivid experience of God, lively
worship, the gifts of the Spirit, especially divine healing, and power for
Christian witness and service.’ New Dictionary of Theology.
[10]
John Bevere, Driven by Eternity: Making Your Life Count Today & Forever,
Faith Words, 2006, p. 84.
[11] Martin Duffield, in a sermon preached at
Wavell Heights Presbyterian Church, Queensland, Australia, February 2008.
[12]
John Bevere, Driven by Eternity: Making Your Life Count Today & Forever,
Faith Words, 2006, p. 126.
[13]
Ibid. p. 98.
[14]
Ibid. pp. 123-124.
[15]
Ibid. p. 124.
